$100 Budget, help me pick a phone

[Mellow]

I'm an AT&T/Cingular user and my current phone just bit the dust. I'm ineligible to upgrade via AT&T, so I'm taking the eBay route. I have a $100 budget, and would like the following features:

USB/Bluetooth compatibility with my computer (running XP)
an intuitive/decent sized keyboard (I'll be doing a lot of texting/emailing)
Decent battery charge-time.

I've been looking at the Cingular 8525, Palm Treo 750, and the Blackberry 8700. Anybody have any better ideas/input? Thanks a lot,

-Mat

 

[gorcorps]

Wow... those phones are all awful. How far away is your upgrade time? The blackberry 8700 is a pretty poor blackberry IMO, and the Cingular 8525 is a monster of a phone. Very uncomfortable to use and pretty sluggish with the windows mobile software.

 

[Mellow]

Upgrade time is over a year from now. Any suggested alternatives to the phones listed above?

 

[gorcorps]

Any other blackberry

 

[Mellow]

Originally posted by: gorcorps
Any other blackberry

You, sir, are incredibly helpful. Thank you.

 

[HopJokey]

How much is a Blackberry Curve 8310? It should be around your budget price.

 

[Mellow]

Originally posted by: HopJokey
How much is a Blackberry Curve 8310? It should be around your budget price.

Looks like they're going for $160+ on ebay, with an average closer to $200. A ways out of my $100 budget.

 

[HopJokey]

Originally posted by: Mellow

Originally posted by: HopJokey
How much is a Blackberry Curve 8310? It should be around your budget price.

Looks like they're going for $160+ on ebay, with an average closer to $200. A ways out of my $100 budget.

Try the Curve 8300, those will probably be in your range. The keyboard is excellent for email/text and it is a portable phone. Load OS 4.5 and you'll be good to go.

 

[davidjaii]

i would suggest either the bb curve or pearl. try craigslist

 

[Keitero]

The 8525 wasn't too bad though it is a bit long in the tooth. I used one for a 1.5 years without any issues till I got a Tilt. That worked fine as well till I got my iPhone.

 

[Ausm]

I wouldn't buy a phone off Ebay been screwed to many times doing that.

 

[uli2000]

Take a look over in the fs/ft forum. Just found this for $100

http://forums.anandtech.com/me...=2194663&enterthread=y

A little bigger than the curve, but its the version w/ wifi.