While working with Verizon's support people to get a new phone, I asked them about activating the 7135. I told them that I'd heard that they wouldn't activate that model, but I had also heard that Verizon was opening up their network, blah, blah, blah.

The nice woman I was working with said that as long as the 911 GPS stuff was supported, it wouldn't be a problem. And she then looked it up in their database and confirmed that if I had a 7135, they'd activate it.

I like my new phone well enough now that I probably won't do it, but I know there have been several people here who have experienced issues around this. So FWIW, if you get a Verizon 7135 off eBay or something, you should be able to activate it. Check first, of course.