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Over the past few months I’ve gone through several phones and several different carriers.
It started back a May when I killed my iPhone 3G and ended December with an iPhone 3GS on T-Mobile.. I’ll make another post with more details on that.

Part of my quest inclueded looking at Android phones, other than the Hero, since I had the Hero for a few weeks and had issues.
Verizon is too expensive, plus I don’t like the Droid, so that left me at T-Mobile.

I found out about the plans at T-Mobile that you can bring your own phone and pay a cheaper month to month plan, sweet!
On AT&T I had 450 minutes, 1500 Text and unlimited web and AFTER a corporate discount, it was costing me $80 a month.
Over at T-Mobile, my plan is 500 minutes, unlimited text and unlimited web for $60 a month and NO CONTRACT.

I started doing some research and thought I’d give it a try using my 3Gs on T-Mobile. I’m happy to say that at this point the only thing I don’t have, that I had on AT&T is 3G since the 3G on AT&T and T-Mobile are not compatible.

I really don’t care about 3G – Youtube works fine over T-Mobile Edge, Slacker Radio works fine, basically I haven’t run any apps that didn’t work fine over the Edge network.

Oh, I even have a solution for Visual Voicemail.
Youmail is a free service that you redirect your voicemail to and you can do it from any phone, they also have an iPhone app with push notification and when you go in the app it’s very similar to the native visual voicemail.. so that problem was solved.

I’m VERY happy with this setup and, if requested, I’d be happy to post a tutorial on how I did it.. although there are a TON of them out there.

If anyone is thinking of trying this combination – DO IT and save yourself some $$.

I got the Hero on launch day and am trying it out for 30 days. I’m trying to decide if I am going to go back to the Pre or keep the Hero… at this point it’s looking good for the Hero.

One thing I’m not crazy about on the Hero is the battery life, it’s about the same as the Pre, but I was hoping for better.
I started to do some research and have done two things that have DRAMATICALLY improved my battery life:

1. Apparently there is an issue with the HTC SMS/MMS client. It does some “hokey” stuff behind the scenes and, long story short, keeps your phone from properly going to sleep.
   • I fixed this by installing ‘Handcent SMS’ – It does all the same stuff as the built in client, but no issues with the sleep.
   • I then went in and turned off the notifications for the built in SMS
2. Go to Menu –> Settings –> Wireless Controls –> Mobile Network Sharing –> Enable always-on Mobile Network and disable it.
   • So far the only negative I’ve noticed on this is that I have to manually refresh Facebook.. email, SMS, MMS, etc… all still notify on new messages.

Over the next few days I’ll try and collect some concrete numbers, but I can tell you after making these changes I still have significant battery life at the end of the day.

HTH

I’ve been using the Palm Pre since two days after release and REALLY like it. A while ago I broke my iPhone and since my AT&T contract was almost up, I borrowed my friend’s old Treo until the Pre and iPhone 3GS came out and then decided on the Pre.
I have no regrets about that decision.

I’ve always liked the idea of Android but, in my opinion, the G1 just wasn’t ready for prime time.

Then a couple of months ago I stared following the European release of the HTC Hero and fell in love (or at least lust) with the phone. Once I found out it was going to be released on Sprint I knew I’d have to try it.

So here I am finding myself with another line to try out the Sprint HTC Hero on.

I’ve only had it one day, so I’m not ready to give it any kind of review yet, but there are some things that I’m missing from the Pre already, but by the same token there are some things that I like a lot better on the Hero.

Things I miss from the Pre:

• Gestures – It’s amazing how used to these you get
• Hardware keyboard – the software keyboard on the Hero is actually very good, at least as good as the iPhone, but doesn’t match a hardware keyboard
• Camera – The camera on the Hero may be higher megapixel, but it’s MUCH slower and no flash

Things I like better on the Hero:

• The GPS seems MUCH more accurate, Sprint Navigation seems to be much smoother as well
• The compass mode in Google Maps – This is just plain cool.
• The amount of apps available in the Android Market.
• A true Facebook app and widget
• Micro SD / SDHC support – Can increase storage up to 32 Gigs

Again, I’ve only had the Hero one day so I’ll post a proper review after I have it for a while, but this is my findings after a day with the device.

Don’t get me wrong, so far I REALLY like it, but we’ll see if it’s a match for my beloved Pre.

If you’d like to see any tutorials on how to set things up on the phone, or would like me to make specific videos or reviews please feel free to let me know.