Canadian Carrier Telus Offering the Audiovox 6600

[Jason Dunn]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://www.telusmobility.com/ab/pcs/handset_audiovox_ppc6600.shtml' target='_blank'>http://www.telusmobility.com/ab/pcs...x_ppc6600.shtml</a><br /><br /></div><i>"The Audiovox 6600 is a Windows-based handheld that offers always on e-mail plus much more. Clients will have access to familiar applications like Pocket Outlook for e-mail and calendar, plus Word and Excel. The Audiovox 6600 also has a QWERTY sliding keyboard and a stylus for easy touch screen access. The fast processor, large and expandable memory, ability to e-mail photos and videos, built-in speaker phone and key Bluetooth capabilities makes this device ideal for the mobile professional who needs access to more than just e-mail The Audiovox is even easier to install both for a large client with Exchange 2003 or small businesses with POP3/IMAP4 based e-mail solutions."</i><br /><br />Telus is now offering the CDMA/1xRTT version of the PDA2K, which is stunning because it's actually a modern device! Telus is the biggest carrier in my area, and they're well known for carrying obsolete Pocket PC Phone Edition devices. The price isn't too painful in comparison to the equivalent iMate device: $749 CAN with no contract, $449 on a one year contract, $399 on a two year contract, and $349 on a three year contract.<br /><br />The painful part is the 1xRTT data plan: $90 CAN for an "unlimited plan" which also includes 350 minutes of daytime calling and free evenings and weekends...plus a $60 activation fee, $6.95 a month for a "system access fee", $60/year for a "data network charge"...and you still have to pay 15 cents per SMS message. :roll: Oh, and the unlimited bandwidth? They reserve the right to cut you off after 50 MB and charge you $10 per MB over 50 MB. 8O And the carriers wonder why more people aren't buying data plans...<br /><br />How do the data plans where you live compare to this?

[Darius Wey]

How do the data plans where you live compare to this?

i-mate PDA2K 1xEV-DO (http://www.telstra.com.au/smallbusiness/mobile/phones/i-mate.htm) through one of our national operators, Telstra: A$0 upfront, on a A$100/month plan for 24 months, which gives A$90 monthly voice calls + SMS (at a call rate of 20c per thirty seconds and a call connection fee of 18c) and A$10 monthly data/MMS/GPRS/1x. All this plus a bonus option of half price mobile to mobile calls, half price mobile to landline calls, 25% off mobile to mobile + fixed lines, or a per second saver benefit. There are other group saver bonuses as well.

If you jack up the price you pay per month, you get more included credits plus lower call rates. Whatever the price we pay, I'm pretty sure it still sucks compared to what some of the operators in the US and Europe are offering. Anyway, I know I'm beating a dead horse here seeing as though Telstra is one of the more expensive operators (despite being the biggest). So I assume we pay more for their wider coverage, but the question here is whether it's really worth it? We'd save a lot more through other national operators, and they'd be the better option if bush-bashing isn't a daily thing.

[cubed]

PLEASE REMOVE THIS POST!!!! - If Sprint PCS here in the States hears of all these additional fees, I'm sure they will start implementing them as well! Our company will take another hit from higher telecom costs.

I wouldn't be surprised if they implemented a "Network Connection Instantiation Fee" for each time you turn the phone on.

I guess that's why I'm still using T-Mobile for my cellular data coverage. Hasn't changed for years...$20 a month for TRUE unlimited data. Sure, it's a little slower than the other networks, but if I really need speed, I'm looking for wifi anyway.

[Darius Wey]

We'd save a lot more through other national operators, and they'd be the better option if bush-bashing isn't a daily thing.

Now as I was saying earlier, operators like 3 (Three) (http://business.three.com.au/index.cfm?pid=2312&amp;pageid=2433) aren't ripping our wallets open as much as others. An A$99 monthly cap gives you A$500/month worth of data usage (at 0.1c/KB or 0.4c/KB for roaming). Vodafone (http://www.vodafone.com.au/business/bussol/databundle/databundle.jsp?gs=business&amp;hd=bussol&amp;ss=databundle) has a good thing going too. A$49.95/month for unlimited use (following a fair use policy of 500MB or less in two-way traffic per month).

[Gerard]

By coincidence I happened to be browsing the TelusMobility site last night - still on the cellphone fence, haven't got one yet and waiting for the 'right' deal. I halfway considered going Phone Edition when seeing this Audiovox... then read those prices. Is Telus completely insane!?

Compare Fido (recently acquired by Rogers) - Canadian dollars gets these rates, access fee included, taxes extra:

$45 = 750 min. anytime + unlimited eves./weekends

$65 = 1500 min. anytime + unlimited eves./weekends

$50 = GPRS unlimited - two operaters 6 months apart told me they'd give me a polite warning around 1GB


How is it that ANYONE even subscribes to Telus? It's like they're stuck in the 1990's or something.

[szamot]

actually I just picked up one of these babies yesterday, and I must say that for all the huff and puff the service is good and I can't believe I will say this quite reasonable. Yeah there is a $60/year data network access fee but your get free voice mail, Rogers does not charge you that fee but they charge you $5/month for voice mail. Even if you compare these plans to a CrackBerry rates these are still quite decent, as far as Canada goes. Still for a one year contract at $449 CDN a PDA with a keyboard and a lame camera, is not a bad replacemtnt for my aging HP5450.

Hopefully in 3-6 months we will have a full number portability at which time I can get any Unlocked PDA and hook it up with whomever I want and keep the number, which to me is the most important thing.

[mv]

$10 per MB over 50 MB.


In the world I live that will be called stealing :)

[Rob Borek]

Data in Canada is still incredibly expensive. Excluding Fido, you're only likely to get 10MB for $50 (I'm paying $40 for 7MB with Rogers right now), and 100MB costs you $100.

Hopefully, with number portability around the corner, there might actually be some competition, thereby lowering data rates.

[JD Silver]

I have the Telus Audiovox PPC6600, and really enjoy it. I am staying with Telus, despite the prices, due to the network coverage in Edmonton, Alberta. I found (non-edge) data throughput on Rogers to be reaaalllly sllloooowwww, and could not get reliable coverage where I needed it. After several years of experimenting, I've grudgingly found that I need to select the carrier over the device. A reliable network is the higher priority, since my 6600 is my home phone.

Sigh...I would actually prefer a reliable and fast GSM network with good coverage, so that I could have an iJam in my pocket. On the other hand...the 128Mb of RAM with the 6600 is really sweet! All that being said, Telus has EVDO around the corner. Perhaps I'll have a Samsung i730 next year?!

[Paragon]

I'm with Fido, and pay 50 bucks for unlimited data, and now with the Rogers takeover of Fido I now use the big wide Rogers network where Rogers customers pay 100 bucks for data. My existing contract runs out in August, so I won't be laughing much longer. I do know of longtime Rogers customers negotiating unlimited data for $70.00, and have heard that they will be actually be dropping their data rate to that $70 for everyone fairly soon.

Canadian carriers, Bell Mobility in particular talk the big talk when it comes to wireless data, and how important it is, yet they price it at a level that turns many people away. They must all be doing something very aggressive with their pricing at the corporate level......

Telus and Bell Mobility have had this phone for awhile now through their business chanells, otherwise they have been doing a pretty good job of keeping it secret.

Bell is doing EV-DO testing around Toronto. You need a separate login to access it. Apparently this not going to change once it is launched. That makes me wonder if they are going to have an even high price for EV-DO? :devilboy:

Dave

[Don't Panic!]

How can they call it unlimited if they can cut you off at 50MB? Is the Canadian definition of Unlimited different from the American one? :confused totally:

Isn't that fraudulent advertising?

[Paragon]

How can they call it unlimited if they can cut you off at 50MB? Is the Canadian definition of Unlimited different from the American one? :confused totally:

Isn't that fraudulent advertising?

They don't really cut you off Bobby. They are using wording that protects them from someone with an aircard plugged into their laptop and doing some major file sharing, or something like that which can chew through large amounts of data in a hurry. I'm willing to bet that if you look at any of the US carriers you might find similar wording buried somewhere in your contract. :)

Dave

Dave

[Don't Panic!]

I haven't hit the Hi-Speed road yet. t-mobile doesn't seem to care how much bandwidth I use. I stream radio quite a bit. But yeah I heard Verizon has a clause something like that and they don't allow streaming. :cry:

[ctmagnus]

How is it that ANYONE even subscribes to Telus? It's like they're stuck in the 1990's or something.

Coverage. And advertising.

[adamz]

I'm on a grandfathered T-Mobile plan. 300 Nationwide Talk &amp; Text plus the Smartphone internet add-on. Since T-Mobile stopped keeping track of data usage, that turned from 1Mb/month into unlimited internet. So I've got 300 anytime minutes, unlimited weekends, 800 SMS messages (500 + 300 with the Smartphone add-on), 30 MMS messages, unlimited GPRS, and push email for about $42/mo including huge NY taxes.

To top that off, when I visit Canada I don't get charged for roaming data usage. So far, high speed internet isn't worth the switch or the cost.

[that_kid]

I'm on sprint and I have 2 audiovox 6600's on an unlimted data plan with 2500 buket of minutes, unlimited nights and weekends that start at 7pm, unlimited text msgs and mobile to mobile for $105/mo before taxes. I sure hope I can keep this plan with EvDO rolls around, then again I had the sprint cf2031data/voice card on my plan for a few years and no one ever said anything about it and I was really heavy on the data usage.

[Mick]

I use a PPC-6601 and grandfathered Sprint PCS unlimited Vision for $10/month--I generally stream arount 50 to 90 MB/day listening to internet radio at work. I easily use well over a Gb/month.
I also used T-Mobile GPRS with an Audiovox data card to stream the same amount through an Ipaq 2215 for $30/month until I got the PPC-6601, at which point it made more sense to drop T-Mobile for the cheaper and faster Vision service.
Mick

[Darius Wey]

How can they call it unlimited if they can cut you off at 50MB? Is the Canadian definition of Unlimited different from the American one? :confused totally:

Isn't that fraudulent advertising?

Ugh, the same can be said for some of our unlimited broadband internet plans. It's seemingly unlimited, but you get shaped after a certain quota. :(

[szamot]

How can they call it unlimited if they can cut you off at 50MB? Is the Canadian definition of Unlimited different from the American one? :confused totally:

Isn't that fraudulent advertising?

They don't really cut you off Bobby. They are using wording that protects them from someone with an aircard plugged into their laptop and doing some major file sharing, or something like that which can chew through large amounts of data in a hurry. I'm willing to bet that if you look at any of the US carriers you might find similar wording buried somewhere in your contract. :)

Dave


Indeed the unlimited, 50MB/month plan put a quick stop to my dreams of me hooking up to a shoutcast server for some variety and burning some MB listing to music. Now I might need to resort to 1gig SD card instead. DARN it all.

T

Dave

[karen]

The really terrible issue with ALL Canadian carriers is how data roaming is charged. I work in both the US and Canada and my phone needs to work that way as well.

But all carriers charge something like $6 a MB for roaming data access. Just a couple of e-mails and I'm paying something like $6 a second for data access. It means that a data plan for me is out of the question.

..unless I do what I think will work:

I have a Canadian GSM phone with a North American plan (about $80 a month). Then I activate a SIM card in the US with a data only plan....is that possible? When I am in the US and need data acces, I use the US SIM card. When I'm in Canada, I use the Canuck card. Seems like a stilly plan for me. Maybe I should just have two separate phones?

Funny, how two companies with the same name can screw each other's customers so well, eh?

Karen