I apologize for the entirely amateur nature of these questions. I've held off buying a PDAPhone for quite some time now for a number of reasons. Ultimately, five criteria had to be met in order for me to make a purchase:

1. It must replace my Palm for calendaring/scheduling, notes, etc.,
2. It must replace my pocket digital camera for the less important point-and-shoot photos,
3. It must replace my mobile phone, and
4. It must replace my MP3 player, with the added criteria that
4a) It must be able to play my spoken-word podcasts at increased tempo, which my Creative MP3 player does beautifully and allows me to get through hours of content more quickly.


It's worth noting that nowhere on this list is the ability to surf the Web on the device, which is really the basis for my questions below.

Anyway, with the advent of the Droid – or some other yet-to-come Android 2.0 phone – I'm thinking all of these may be met.

So here are my questions:

I'm a Verizon customer and I don't see any reason to flee from them. I've read some chatter about “required” data plans. Is this really the case? Couldn't I just buy the phone elsewhere and call in the new ESN and use it as a normal phone on my current plan? I could still use the Web functions via Wi-Fi , right? I understand that this wouldn't always be available, but again, this isn't an objective of mine; certainly not an objective that merits $30/month for the way I'd use it. I'm assuming that these phones can authenticate against WPA/WPA2(?)

If this is possible and I can use the PDAPhone without a data plan... what about software updates, applications, etc.? Would I be able to download apps when connected to a wireless network, or are these typically only available over Verizon's 3G network? Do these phones generally come with software suites to interface with the phone, and is it possible to load new applications that way, eg., with a USB connection to a computer?

And last, is there any kind of central repository where I can take a look at the apps available for a particular phone/operating system? Looking for apps for my old Palm Tungsten PDA was a nightmare because there was no central authority for managing them.

Sorry to be so long-winded. I hope someone can clear some of these things up for me.

Many, many thanks in advance for any feedback.

hello and welcome.

if you want to stick with Big Red, then you have a few options, however let me as YOU sir a couple questions..

do you need/desire/must have a physical keyboard?

is native Microsoft exchange important to you?

that will filter out one or two devices off the bat.

you do not need a data plan to use apps. if you have access to a wifi access point then you can download and surf the net that way.

there are mp3 players out there that will do what you need from podcasts

there are several software sites out depending on which platform you choose (android, palm, ppc)

software updates can be sent via email. you can also go into a verizon store and they will do the updates for you for free.

Android, palm, ppc.. those platforms can do all of what you want. you just need to decide on:

how much you want to spend
do you need a physical keyboard
what platform you want to use

Thanks for your reply! This is great information.

First, a couple of things that are at best tangential to the questions you asked. I am very smitten with what I've heard of the Moto Droid and Android 2.0 in general. I am primarily a Linux user and do some coding aside from my day job, and the idea of open-source environments is very appealing to me. I'd be inclined to purchase a phone that most closely adheres to the FOSS philosophies.

As for a physical keyboard, it's not an absolute necessity, but using my brother's iPhone was enough to convince me that it would be strongly preferable to have one.

Native Exchange is not all that important. I'm assuming there are plenty of POP3-compliant apps out there, and I'm also assuming that my gmail account will be seamlessly integrated with Android or whatever other modern platform I might choose. I don't know if my company has made provisions to enable us to get to its Exchange servers from the outside, but I do know that the servers are heavily firewalled without using the VPN. Either way, I would have access via the Web using the Outlook Web Access client, although I'm sure that's not a pleasant experience on a hand-held screen.

Let me be sure I understand one thing from your post... I can buy, for example, a Droid (whether thru VZ or elsewhere) and enable it on my current voice plan just as I would any other phone, and they can't "require" me to purchase a data plan(?)

Again, sincere thanks for your help!

i am a sprint customer so i dont know big red all the well..

there is no technical reason you cant buy a CDMA phone and activate it on verizon, but im not sure of their policy..

the droid is a decent android phone but verizon has limited models. i read they plan to release more phones in the near future...

if you were not tied to verizon, and sprint had good coverage in your area, i would have you take a look at sprint and what they have to offer. they have just released the htc hero (which i have) and the samsung moment. the hero has sense UI which is pretty great, and the moment does not have sense UI but has a physical keyboard and 800 mhz processor. i agree with you the android OS will be second in line in a few years.. its come a long way in the last year and is not slowing down. HTC have released a lot of android phones...

anyway im digressing... im not sure on verizons policies.. you may have to have a minimum type of data plan to put the droid on.. id call or head into a store first. you could possibly purchase the phone with no plan (at full price) and activate it of course...