anyone go back to a dumbphone from a smartphone?

[Bateluer]

Went smartphone in 2009 with the OG Droid. It would be easier to cut a hand off than go dumb phone.

Cheap these days too, Moto G/Lumia 521 are 100 off contract and TMOs plans are very cheao.

 

[KeithTalent]

I've actually been without my phone for about six days now and it's driving me a bit crazy. 😵

KT

 

[nageov3t]

I'm pretty sure you can go without just about anything but shelter/food/water.

😛:biggrin:

but at what cost? 😱

it sounds ridiculous to say, but GPS literally changed my life. anxiety issues + bad sense of direction = I just wouldn't go some places pre-GPS unless I could either bum a ride or get one of my friends to drive with me and read the directions (or, if I really, really had to, I'd suck it up and do it but drive shittily trying to read while driving... or at night, have to stop and pull-over multiple times to double check directions)

 

[Ichinisan]

My work provides me with an iphone but if I were to ever leave and no longer get a work phone, I would not be getting a 'smart' phone on my own. Well, not an expensive one anyhow. I would probably get a cheap semi-smart phone from virgin mobile or something..

Maybe you can clarify the feature set that defines a "semi-smart" phone. You just mean a low-performance smartphone, right?

 

[Sonikku]

I traded down to a tracfone. I like how it's a flip top that doesn't have any bare screen to scratch or crack. I like how I can answer a call just by flipping the top out when it's ringing, as opposed to having to take a good long look at a smart phone and hold down the touch screen button at just the right angle to get it to work. I don't need text messaging and I don't have the down time to be all "Dude where u at" all day, so for my uses it works.

 

[Ichinisan]

I believe this is incorrect...at least in the United States and most of the world. Excluding China, Japan (and maybe Canada based on what you've said).

AT&T reaches FAR more people than Verizon or Sprint. That said, the areas that AT&T covers aren't covered as reliably as Verizon (in my experience). T-Mobile coverage in the US sucks compared to AT&T, but that's another GSM provider stateside and they are a major player in Europe.

GSM is generally accepted as the international standard. CDMA providers outside of the US and canada are rare and only seem to exist in places like Japan (NTT DoCoMo) and China.

Anyway, CDMA "3G" speeds are complete shit and you can't do a phone call and use data at the same time.

What? Verizon's coverage is better than AT&T.

I believe this is a common misconception based on these things:
1. In my personal experience, Verizon's covered areas have more-reliable coverage than AT&T.
2. AT&T simply covers more areas; but eliminating dead spots is more difficult or lower-priority.
3. Throughout the 3G era, Verizon's deceptive advertisements compared AT&T's 3G coverage map with Verizon's ENTIRE coverage map (ignoring AT&T's edge coverage)...because CDMA calls their show-shit "3G" even though it doesn't come close to the speed of GSM 3G. The commercial shows people frustrated by their phones and implying that there was no service at all before showing the map comparison. At the time, half of my town only had Edge coverage from AT&T. Less than a year after 3G coverage was expanded, we had 4G LTE. All the places I know of that had Edge AT&T coverage a couple years ago are at least 3.5G HSPA+ ("4G" 14.x mbps) now and many are LTE.

I could be wrong, but I've assumed it is still so since the days of this:
http://www.att.com/Common/merger/files/pdf/iphone_att_network_fs.pdf
"AT&T reaches over 270 million Americans -- 50 million more than any other wireless network"

In my experience, I've been to many large areas where AT&T has service and Verizon does not; even just a week ago. Any place I've encountered where Verizon is available and AT&T is not, it's just a tiny dead zone for AT&T (not a large, unserviced area). I used to carry an AT&T phone, Verizon phone, and Southern Link (Nextel) phone -- all at the same time (ugh).

Into Europe, GSM (based) is far more common (not even sure if anyone runs CDMA in Europe).

Yeah. I also said this.

3G speeds are 2/.5, not great but plenty for browsing the web. You can, in fact, do voice/data simultaneously over CDMA with SVDO.

Have any CDMA providers in the US deployed that tech? Which CDMA phones support it?

In practice, I never saw 3G CDMA measure over 1mbps with Sprint or Verizon.

 

[Oyeve]

I went back to my iphone 5 for a week when my Note 3 was getting fixed, does that count?

 

[Fritzo]

I believe this is a common misconception based on these things:
1. In my personal experience, Verizon's covered areas have more-reliable coverage than AT&T.
2. AT&T simply covers more areas; but eliminating dead spots is more difficult or lower-priority.
3. Throughout the 3G era, Verizon's deceptive advertisements compared AT&T's 3G coverage map with Verizon's ENTIRE coverage map...because CDMA calls their show-shit "3G" even though it doesn't come close to the speed of GSM 3G.

I could be wrong, but I've assumed this was so since the days of this:
http://www.att.com/Common/merger/files/pdf/iphone_att_network_fs.pdf
"AT&T reaches over 270 million Americans -- 50 million more than any other wireless network"

In my experience, I've been to many large areas where AT&T has service and Verizon does not; even just a week ago. Any place I've encountered where Verizon is available and AT&T is not, it's just a tiny dead zone for AT&T. I used to carry an AT&T phone, Verizon phone, and Southern Link (Nextel) phone -- all at the same time (ugh).


Yeah. I also said this.


Have any CDMA providers in the US deployed that tech? Which CDMA phones support it?

In practice, I never saw 3G CDMA measure over 1mbps with Sprint or Verizon.

Not sure what the OP is talking about- Verizon's network is SOLID in the US. It's the gold standard by which other networks are compared.

 

[Ichinisan]

Not sure what the OP is talking about- Verizon's network is SOLID in the US. It's the gold standard by which other networks are compared.

Yes. The areas Verizon covers are very reliable. However, unless it changed in the last few years, AT&T covers more areas.

 

[Ichinisan]

Verizon lists something like 40+ countries where their roaming partners offer CDMA coverage, FWIW.

You sure it's CDMA? You probably need to have a "world phone" (with SIM and dual CDMA+GSM capability) to use your Verizon phone in those countries. Fortunately, a lot of phones now have both GSM and CDMA tech built-in.

 

[homebrew2ny]

Maybe you can clarify the feature set that defines a "semi-smart" phone. You just mean a low-performance smartphone, right?

I suppose so.

I mean something a bit more current than a flip phone circa 2001, but certainly not as feature rich or powerful ((smart) as a iphone or similar high end current smart phones. Something like a Kyocera Rise would suit me just fine. A phone that operates as a phone, but also is simple to text with and minimal web features. I call them semi-smart phones.

 

[AznAnarchy99]

I had free international calling when I was abroad. Definitely no.

 

[Bateluer]

Yes. The areas Verizon covers are very reliable. However, unless it changed in the last few years, AT&T covers more areas.

While Verizon's 3G CDMA is slow, its a few orders of magnitude faster than EDGE; which you're including when stating AT&T covers more area. EDGE is closer to slow dial up speeds and utterly useless for anything more than text email. At least with Verizon CDMA, you can actually browse the web, stream YouTube, or do other staple smartphone things.

How did a thread about downgrading to a dumb phone turn into a discussion about network coverage anyway?

 

[Ichinisan]

While Verizon's 3G CDMA is slow, its a few orders of magnitude faster than EDGE; which you're including when stating AT&T covers more area. EDGE is closer to slow dial up speeds and utterly useless for anything more than text email. At least with Verizon CDMA, you can actually browse the web, stream YouTube, or do other staple smartphone things.

How did a thread about downgrading to a dumb phone turn into a discussion about network coverage anyway?

Though Edge is slow, it's definitely not "dial-up slow." I used AT&T's 2G Edge GSM service on my iPhone 3G and iPhone 4 a *lot* until my area was finally upgraded to 3G in late 2011. I do a ton of serious web browsing and I tend to browse sites like this one that are not optimized for mobile.

I have found AT&T 2G Edge GSM to be more-comparable to Sprint/Verizon "3G" CDMA (versus comparing their "3G" CDMA services to AT&T 3G GSM). Yes "3G" CDMA is noticeably faster than 2G Edge GSM, but the speed disparity doesn't feel very different compared to the disparity between "3G" CDMA and 3G GSM.

You're probably getting tired of me putting "3G" in quotes when I refer to CDMA. It's the same reason I out "4G" I quotes when I'm talking about GSM HSPA+ tech penology.

Sometime in the past, CDMA providers successfully lobbied government regulators (the FCC, IIRC) to allow them to describe their networks as "3G" just because they had made speed improvements (without actually overhauling the technology).

 

[CZroe]

I went back to my iphone 5 for a week when my Note 3 was getting fixed, does that count?

What happened to your Note 3?!

 

[notposting]

Thunderbolt, Rezound, Galaxy S3 at least had SVDO on Verizon. The 40 countries was the CDMA coverage -- they called it something weird. They used to just have the few "global" devices that offered GSM as well, but for the most part all of their LTE devices are now fully global (and SIM unlocked, to boot).

Also, with my old OG Droid up north a few years back, was pissing off a friend stuck on AT&T with crap coverage and EDGE everywhere up there:

Check out where I ran this test

Test Date: Jul 7, 2011 2:42:45 pm
Connection Type: EvdoA
Server: Houghton, MI
Download: 1854 kbps
Upload: 517 kbps
Ping: 143 ms

External IP: 174.253.29.209
Internal IP: 10.244.183.148
Latitude: 47.41802
Longitude: -88.22629

A detailed image for this result can be found here:

http://www.speedtest.net/android/66017158.png

 

[IHateMyJob2004]

I have a cousin that did/ Not everyone can afford the extra money it costs.

Quite frankly, I am sick of being super connected all the time.

 

[K1052]

I'd never give mine up. I travel a lot and the damn thing is just about indispensable, particularly if things get fubared.

 

[BUTCH1]

I suppose so.

I mean something a bit more current than a flip phone circa 2001, but certainly not as feature rich or powerful ((smart) as a iphone or similar high end current smart phones. Something like a Kyocera Rise would suit me just fine. A phone that operates as a phone, but also is simple to text with and minimal web features. I call them semi-smart phones.

It's kind of a "grey" area, my $35 Samaung takes pictures but@640X480 it's next to useless, it also has a built-in web browser but with a "1.5 screen it also is next to useless. I think they just wanted to list those features on the list so people thought it might actually be able to do those things, it can, but so poorly it's not worth the bother to use them.

 

[Papagayo]

I went from Iphone 4 to Blackberry Z10.
I think it's a step back.. Hardly any good apps available..

 

[dingster1]

^^ Try side loading th e ones you want.