Buying a Smartphone as a Gift?

[Jerry Raia]

I am curious. Are any of you thinking of buying anyone (or have you already bought) a Smartphone for a Christmas present? As you know it is not as simple as buying say, an iPod or a Camera. There is that activation aspect to the whole thing and what if the phone you want to get them is CDMA and they are GSM already? How would you handle the process of moving them and the phone number? Obviously the easiest scenario is if you are buying them a Cingular phone and the recipient already has Cingular, for example. Then there is the issue of plans. Would you buy them a gift that they would need to pay more per month to get full use out of? If you are kicking back today because you are all done shopping then ponder these issues with me and leave your thoughts here. If you aren't done shopping yet, get moving! :lol:

[Kris Kumar]

Accessories are easy. That's what I bought.

[sosha]

It isn't a smartphone, but I got the Cingular Samsung A707 for my husband. He wanted a straight forward phone with BIG buttons and a readable screen. At this point, I did not activate the data portion (eventho it's 3G). I'll give him the option to activate it if he wants it. Cingular's pretty good about that; they'll turn a data ($20) on, and, if he tells me it's not worth it, they'll deactivate it.

He's never used internet or email on a cell phone. But, this phone can do a lot of slick things. If it had WM5 on it, I'd be on it like white on rice.

Oh yea...does buying myself a Blackjack for Xmas count? :D I think I'll need a new SIM card for the 3G, right?

P

[Jerry Raia]

Oh yea...does buying myself a Blackjack for Xmas count? :D I think I'll need a new SIM card for the 3G, right?

Yes it counts! I don't believe you need a new SIM card. Maybe someone here can confirm that.

[xyphos]

I bought my mom a blackjack :D . I even opened it and took the liberty of putting a picture of her puppy as the homescreen background, added a ringtone of one of her other sons playing guitar, and in the calendar/tasks application I wrote notes to her saying things like "i love you" and "merry Christmas"

[Jerry Raia]

That's a great idea, to personalize it before you give it. :D

[OSUKid7]

No new Smartphone this year, but hopefully by next winter there'll be a slew of new WM6 devices out, and I can trade up and renew my Cingular contract. The big question for me in the next year is should I switch to a PPCPE :grinning devil:, or go with another Smartphone. I love the small form-factor of Smartphones, but the features of the PPC OS are (imo) superior to the Smartphone OS. If they ever make a clamshell PPCPE, that's what I'll be getting. :werenotworthy:

[Rocco Augusto]

Oh yea...does buying myself a Blackjack for Xmas count? :D I think I'll need a new SIM card for the 3G, right?

it depends, if you got your last phone after november 2005, chances are you might have a 3G SIM chip already. To check, look on the back of your SIM chip, somewhere on there it should say 3G.

if you are doing an upgrade and you need a need SIM chip, they should provide you with one for free. :)

[Jerry Raia]

So you DO need a different SIM for 3G?

[Tim Williamson]

I bought my mom a blackjack :D . I even opened it and took the liberty of putting a picture of her puppy as the homescreen background, added a ringtone of one of her other sons playing guitar, and in the calendar/tasks application I wrote notes to her saying things like "i love you" and "merry Christmas"

That's a great idea, I'll have to remember that for future reference! :)

[Kris Kumar]

I will also have to steal it. :-)

But I think I am too lazy to execute it all the way thru. :-(

[sosha]

I popped the old SIM chip in the Blackjack and it popped up 3G. It's not a 3G SIM card.

I'll have to find some software to check the download speeds I'm getting. I did find an option to change it to 256 kbps. But, that still doesn't seem right.

Personalizing is a great idea. I did that with hubby's new phone too.

[Stinger]

So you DO need a different SIM for 3G?

It's down to the individual carrier. In Europe, generally you do need a new SIM (called a U-SIM) to access 3G services from your device. However, even without one, most phones will detect the 3G signal and display a 3G symbol.

I don't know if it's still true, but originally you didn't need to use a U-SIM in order to get 3G data speeds with Vodafone. It all depends on how the network is set up.

Luckily it's all backwardly compatible, so if you swap back to a 2G device you can still use your new 3G U-SIM.

[mbranscum]

So you DO need a different SIM for 3G?

The one that will not work is white and says 32K on it.

[Jerry Raia]

OK I think I have finally got this figured out. Regardless of what is on the front of the SIM card, on the back (the contact side) it will have a little "3G" there. Those are the ones that work I'm told. :)

[Mike Temporale]

Well, I got myself the BlackJack - and that was pretty recent, so I would consider it a xmas gift. But now it looks like I need to add a Excalibur to the line up too. So that will be my New Years present. :mrgreen:

[Jerry Raia]

So that will be my New Years present. :mrgreen:

I like that concept! :lol: