What is your opinion on cell/smart phones for travling?

[eZAK]

We are looking to purchase new cell phones to replace our Moto Razr's.
We currently have Verizon pre-paid. We are some what neutral about keeping Verizon. In general, we don't use our phones a whole heck of a lot. It takes me about 3 mos. to go through 1,000 mins. It takes my wife about 5 mos. to go through 1,000.
We talk and text (would be nice to have a keyboard or voice recognition)

Also, We are open to paying for data to access the net on occasions.

So what we are looking at is a reliable carrier across the USA and a easy to use reliable phone with a good battery life.

[tahiti16]

Me and most of my peers at work, have cell phone on either AT&T or Verizon and a MIFI/data service on the opposite one. The theory is it will be very rare that NEITHER has a signal and if they BOTH don't have a signal than most likely no one has a signal.

Since I work from the MH when we travel I added a Wilson external antennae, amp and internal antennae to up how many places I can get signal. That setup has warnings even before you buy it that you must have a signal in order for it to amplify it. If you have no signal at all in an area then the amp won't help.
:B

[Bob___Ann]

We still use the "Verizon dumb phone" but we also have Verizon MiFi which we use for our laptop. It acts as a wireless router for laptop, printer etc.We can be on the internet and still use the dumb phone for reservations etc. Works for us and has excellent coverage

[MickeyBrennan]

After your phone receives the route, cellular reception is not necessary. GPS does the rest.

[pawatt]

I find Verizon to be the best for us. There are some great apps for locating campgrounds, RVPARKY.com & Allstays camp & RV. I also access RV.NET and RVparkreviews.com by smartphone.

[bobsbbq]

This is a very interesting subject, and one I'm very experienced in. The cell phone business itself has been changing and evolving every year. For us cell phones are more than just internet or a phone it is the major reason we are able to full time in our RV. You see about 1 year and 4 mos ago I was tired of all the big 4 greedy carriers and I sought out to take control of my wireless. While searching I was trying T-Mobile Prepaid, Simple Mobile, Straight Talk etc. Then we found this new company which had a great offering and we switched. To our total surprise this turned out to be the best thing ever and we now have a 3,000/mo income and free cell service from this carrier. No other cell phone company ever paid me for telling other people about their service. So as life would have it I got disabled and lost my Engineering job. While this was hard and required a big adjustment it was this extra income which suddenly became our only income (at least for a while). Now that I have my disability income we have decided to full time at least for a while, health permitting. So as you can see phones and cell service can mean so much more to some of us than others. For us it is our life.

Now I will agree with others that Verizon has the best overall coverage, definitely better 4G, LTE in rural areas. AT&T is a close second. T-Mobile while great in Metro areas does lack in rural areas. This being said they are making huge improvements to their network. Sprint Don't even bother IMHO.

What we use: For internet Only we use a Verizon Hot Spot.
Our Cell Service: 3 Lines on Solavei @ 29.00 unlimited Talk and Text. Of course they are all Free now.

We personally don't like contracts and being locked in to one option. But this is just us. What ever you choose you might look in to a prepaid option for a month or two to see if it works for you.

[GrumpyGator]

I'm in TN and travel a lot in the East. I find that Verizon has the best coverage of the major carriers.

I have a 3 year old plan that gives me unlimited text, data, and phone. Included in the unlimited data is the use of my phone as a Hot Spot. I can stream unlimited movies, etc in 4G all day long. I pay right at $110 a month.

No matter what WiFi is available in any RV park I always have Internet available.

Couldn't be without my SmartPhone and Verizon.

[wbwood]

eZAK wrote:
So I'm looking into a Samsung Galaxy, unlocked, & comes with a T-mobile simm card on a GSM network. Alternatively I could get an unlocked, CDMA phone which will get me Verizon & Sprint.

Decisions decisions.........

Any Thoughts?

Sounds like a pain n the butt. Why not just go with the service provider you want and get the phone from them. Jail breaking and unlocking a phone voids the warranty of the phone and you can not rely on the service providers to help you with any problems.

[Altern]

eZAK wrote:

Altern wrote:

eZAK wrote:
Does anyone know about unlocked phones?

Not to hi-jack the thread but what did you want to know?
Feel free to PM me if necessary.

Any info you have.

Can one hijack their own thread??????

Any info? I wouldn't know where to begin. It might be more productive for you to just google the subject.

[eZAK]

Altern wrote:

eZAK wrote:
Does anyone know about unlocked phones?

Not to hi-jack the thread but what did you want to know?
Feel free to PM me if necessary.

Any info you have.

Can one hijack their own thread??????

[eZAK]

So I'm looking into a Samsung Galaxy, unlocked, & comes with a T-mobile simm card on a GSM network. Alternatively I could get an unlocked, CDMA phone which will get me Verizon & Sprint.

Decisions decisions.........

Any Thoughts?

[Itching2go]

Had an opportunity to do a direct comparison this past summer between AT&T and Verizon for wireless cellular data when taking a three-week sojourn out west from Indiana to the Tetons, then to Yellowstone, and finally the Black Hills on our way back home. We had two iPhones on a Verizon data plan, and an iPad on an AT&T data plan. While we did run into locations where we didn't have service from either provider, most notably in Yellowstone, there were many times we had to use the WIFI hotspot service on an iPhone to connect to our iPad as there was no AT&T data service. This was necessary for us as our iPad was hosting our travel applications, including Allstay, iExit, etc. Having said this, I expect that there would be fewer incidence of that happening out east where both carriers have better coverage, but if traveling to the thinner populated western states, I'll be sticking with Verizon. No experience, so no comments on TMobile or other companies.

As for phones, we've had both Droids and iPhones, and while the iPhones cost more up front, I wouldn't go back to any of the Droids due to ease of use and availability of applications.

And a final comment... I was one of those folks that swore I'd never get that much use out of a smart phone. Said the same thing at one time about GPS navigation systems. While I can't say that I actually NEED either, the value I get from both of these technologies is such that I really wouldn't travel without them. Hershey's list on the first page of this thread lays out a number of the potential benefits, but there are many more beyond those.

[Dutch_12078]

pnichols wrote:
You're right ... a DSL connection ... I didn't realize anyone had those anymore. 😉

By the way, there is also one more (very rare) Internet access method that is the type we have in our residence here in the mountains. It's kindof a wide area WiFi. It's a system with the main Internet trunk feed broadcasted wirelessly from a town miles away to repeaters throughout our mountains. The repeaters aim line of site (high frequency carrier) or through the trees (low frequency carrier) into the canyons and then to antennas on roofs that in turn carry the Internet data via hard wiring into wall sockets inside the residences.

The coffee shop COULD HAVE had that type of Internet access, but I doubt it.

A company that was offering wide area WiFi in that area went broke before they signed up very many customers about 5 years ago. A salvage company took down their towers. I know exactly what the coffee shop has now though, because I installed their WiFi hotspot setup. The DSL is only 6MB tops, but it's the only game in town other than satellite.

[sowego]

We've had Verizon for years. Whether at home or on the road we've had good service and used one of their air cards for a while too, which also worked well for our purposes. You can choose to have the data plan or go with a basic phone & not get it. We chose not to have the data plan because we have no one to text with and don't do web searches. However, while traveling having a data plan can be a great asset.

I'd do some shopping around, check out provider websites to see the coverage map,which may indeed help you decide if you know what areas you will be visiting.

[Jarlaxle]

I use Virgin Mobile...my phone is an LG Optimus, costs me $45/month for unlimited everything. (Talk, text, data.)