"best" smartphone at Verizon

[master7045]

My wife is due for an upgrade at the end of the month (8/30), she has been rocking a BB 330 for the past 2 years and hates the damn thing. As an early bday gift, I want to get her a new phone. My work pays for my ATT iPhone, so I am totally out of the loop when it comes to this stuff as I don't have a personal interest anymore.

She has the unlimited data plan, so I think we'll be grandfathered into it, which is nice. She uses it for typical girl things, facebook, gobs of text messages, and random internet searches.

She has been such a trooper w/ the BB, that I want to get her one of the top of the line phones, but have no idea which is better than the other.

From the Verizon site, it looks like the Samsung Charge, LG Revolution, or HTC Thunderbolt are my top 3. There is always the iPhone 4, which would be the "cool" phone to get. Any thoughts?

 

[sciwizam]

Since you are waiting till the end of August any way, look for the Samsung Galaxy S2 or the new iPhone. I'm not sure if the Galaxy S2 will have 4G LTE, definitely not the iPhone. If you want 4G LTE & dual-core goodness wait for Droid Bionic.

 

[dguy6789]

The Droid 3 is probably gonna be the best phone with a physical keyboard on Verizon for the rest of the year. If she needs a physical keyboard then I'd definitely get that. If she doesn't need one, then things can get a little tricky. The Droid Bionic is probably going to be the best phone on Verizon until the winter devices launch. Some will disagree but the iPhone 5 and Galaxy S2 are extremely unlikely to have LTE support and Verizon LTE support is easily the biggest game changing smartphone feature on the market today in terms of how much it actually changes the user experience for the better.

 

[Oyeve]

The new BB (9930?) coming for VZW looks sick. piqued my interest.

 

[master7045]

I think I'd like to go w/ the LTE as when we travel, it would be nice to have that for when we are looking things up on the web. Physical keyboard is not a requirement nor is having a small/light phone. Like all girls, she carries a purse everywhere so it's just going to get tossed in there.

 

[Oyeve]

I think I'd like to go w/ the LTE as when we travel, it would be nice to have that for when we are looking things up on the web. Physical keyboard is not a requirement nor is having a small/light phone. Like all girls, she carries a purse everywhere so it's just going to get tossed in there.

Then make sure, no matter what phone she gets, to get a decent protective cover. My GF tosses her phone in her bag like its her keys.

 

[vshah]

if she is a heavy user, make sure to check out battery life. the thunderbolt for example has pretty terrible battery life so it wouldn't be ideal for her

 

[boomhower]

Sounds like the Galaxy S 2 or the Bionic is what you need. They are very similar phones with very similar specs with a big difference being the screen tech's used.

 

[OBLAMA2009]

motorola has better build quality and fewer bugs but samsung will have much better hardware so thats the way i would go.

 

[Geekbabe]

I'm with Verizon and just got a Thunderbolt, sweet phone,love the screen size

 

[master7045]

I'm with Verizon and just got a Thunderbolt, sweet phone,love the screen size

How's the battery life been on that? Seems it is the biggest complaint with that phone.

 

[Pliablemoose]

Give her a really nice card and an IOU for an iP5 when it comes out, she'll love t.

 

[Jodiuh]

Had a Thunderbolt since release. Love it. In fact its the only Android device I've ever been satisfied with.

 

[BTRY B 529th FA BN]

Ask her what she wants in her next phone... but beat around the bush like

my next phone will have dual core and be 4G

 

[Pliablemoose]

Ask her what she wants in her next phone... but beat around the bush like

my next phone will have dual core and be 4G

4G is nice & all, but with the data caps, it's just a faster way for the carriers to hit you with overage charges.

My last 2 phones have been Sprint WiMax and Verizon's ThunderBolt, and I have to say, give me a good 3G signal indoors and I'm a happy camper.

 

[BTRY B 529th FA BN]

4G is nice & all, but with the data caps, it's just a faster way for the carriers to hit you with overage charges.

My last 2 phones have been Sprint WiMax and Verizon's ThunderBolt, and I have to say, give me a good 3G signal indoors and I'm a happy camper.

So when you have a slower connection you will say the hell with doing more on your phone like watching a netflix movie..??

 

[Anubis]

So when you have a slower connection you will say the hell with doing more on your phone like watching a netflix movie..??

id never watch a movie on my phone anyway
i honestly could not care less about 4g

 

[BTRY B 529th FA BN]

3 g sucks. feels like dialup

 

[runawayprisoner]

I'd echo the sentiment that 4G or LTE is unnecessary right now.

If not for the terrible coverage compared to 3G, then it's the terrible battery life. It's good to have maybe for tethering multiple devices, but not for much else. 3G is still plenty fast on a phone.

Remember that it is still a phone first at the end of the day and not a multi-use tank for you to hack into CIA network.

Not to mention it's possible that Verizon may crack down on grandfathered unlimited data plans at some point and force them into tiers just like AT&T, so that wouldn't help at all.

 

[BTRY B 529th FA BN]

Reading the front page article about the Droid 3, the writer mentions the next gen of 4G and says, in a nut shell, it wont be a big improvement on battery-life/power consumption. He used the word "small" improvement. IIRC

 

[Pliablemoose]

So when you have a slower connection you will say the hell with doing more on your phone like watching a netflix movie..??

I fail to see the value in streaming NetFlix to a 4" screen after having done it. What's the point if there are bandwith caps anyway?

 

[s44]

No, he just said the SOC as a whole would be slightly smaller and less power hungry. That doesn't tell you how much less the LTE is going to kill you.

LTE is a big step just for the improved latency (which sucks for Verizon 3G).

 

[BTRY B 529th FA BN]

I fail to see the value in streaming NetFlix to a 4" screen after having done it. What's the point if there are bandwith caps anyway?

You mentioned 4g giving the provider a "faster" reason to hit the client with data charges.

The first thing i was wondering with your statement was what you were doing that would cause you to say this.. Then I couldn't figure out what the difference was if you were using 4g or 3g given you didn't change your personal habits with your smart phone.

You just made a loose statement and I was trying to figure out what you were getting at rather than with 4g the user will get hit with data charges faster cause if you were doing the same thing with your phone as on 3g it wouldn't make a difference.

 

[Jodiuh]

For me, its not a phone first. Its a mini tablet browsing, RSS, music streaming, podcasting, gaming, irc/im, foruming funpad.

Yes, 4G kills the battery. But have you ever had to download windows updates? Its not a whole lotta fun at half a megabit a second.

There's a ridiculous amount of usage patterns for 10+ Mbit speeds...especially if you're on Verizon's unlimited plan.