Need some phone & carrier advice

[JACKHAMMER]

I always feel like I should start with "Long time lurker, First time poster, Love your show" but anyways...

Here is my relevant smart phone history:

Samsung Blackjack on ATT - Phone was fine, though the added functionality was not really worth the data plan. ATT service around here was atrocious (Chicago). My wife has had a iPhone 3 and now 4 on ATT, and barely gets service in the house.

then jumped to HTC Hero on Sprint - Phone was garbage compared to the wife's 3g iphone. Slow, buggy, and endlessly frustrating. I rooted and ROM'd it, was still garbage. Sprint service was so-so, a little better than ATT but not much. Went to upgrade device on Sprint, they wanted to hit me up with the extra $10 fee, even while keeping a 3g device. I paid the ETF and....

Landed on VM ($40/mo)with the Optimus. Phone is better than the Hero, and though while not fast it is functional. I initially had issues with the battery, and losing data, but the tweaks seem to have alleviated it. My issues are twofold : VM's coverage outside the city is terrible, and I would like to be able to surf the web and this thing is just not quick enough to get it done. Plus, the data speeds I get are 2g.

So I am currently looking at the BYOD, Monthly, and Simple Mobile options for T-Mobile. I like not being tied down with a contract, and would like to keep the monthly bill under $50. I am not a big data user, 500MB would be great but I can get by on 100 MB, as wifi is available most places around me. Is there another carrier option I should be looking at?

As far as phones, my real question is are they fast enough to be used as browsing devices? Is 4in big enough? I had a touchpad recently, and that is around an acceptable level to me. I am looking at (used):

HTC - Sensation - around $400 more $ than I am looking to spend, but its an option
LG G2x - Around $250-275. Dual core, but have heard of problems
Samsung Galaxy S 4g - Around $250. Single core, no official GB that I know of, but people seem to like them.

Anything else that I should be looking at? Any potential steals out there?

 

[ImDonly1]

I thought Chicago had decent coverage from every carrier?

Anyway for t-mobile you can do t-mobile prepaid for $63/mo for 5gb of data.
Simple mobile uses the t-mobile network. They have a $60/mo plan, but they are capped at 1gb. They won't tell you this though. They also just introduced an umlimited everything with 3g speeds only for $40/mo. It is rumored that this service, while it says 3g speeds is throttled to less than 500 kbps.

ATT
You can do the straight talk trick for $45/mo + $100 for the e71. Or h2o wireless $50/mo plan. H2O's data speeds might be throttled.

Verizon
Pageplus does a $30/mo talk, text, and 100 mb of data. You can bring almost any phone on it except the iphone and new android phones. Since you are looking at the older galaxy s phones you can bring that on there.



For phones, I would avoid the g2x. The galaxy s has gps problems, I am skeptical about it too.
Sensation is good.

 

[JACKHAMMER]

I thought Chicago had decent coverage from every carrier?



Verizon
Pageplus does a $30/mo talk, text, and 100 mb of data. You can bring almost any phone on it except the iphone and new android phones. Since you are looking at the older galaxy s phones you can bring that on there.

Is there a convenient list on what andriod phones I can port to page plus?

 

[ImDonly1]

Is there a convenient list on what andriod phones I can port to page plus?

Howardforums.com If you go to the forums and check the wiki page, but its a little outdated.

You can use almost any phone, except Verizon prepaid ones. Also the Droid Charge, Thunderbolt, iPhone, etc. They are too new to be used.

 

[cardiac]

Is there a convenient list on what andriod phones I can port to page plus?

No Verizon prepaid, no 4g, and no iPhone. Droid 2,x,Pro, Samsung Fascinate, etc...all work beautiful. I have 3 phones on Pageplus and love it.Wife uses an original Droid, I have a Droid X, and the son uses and older Windows based Motorola. I use http://www.kittywireless.com for my customer service and PIN purchases.