If Sprint EOLs 6700, how long 'till Lockline runs out?
With Sprint, it never seems to fail. No sooner do you find a Sprint phone you like, the bastards EOL it, and Lockline starts replacing broken/stolen ones with a different phone that's a major step down in some way Sprint/Lockline just can't grasp (can we say, "i500 vs Treo, all over again?").
As luck would have it, I've finally more or less decided to get a 6700, only to discover that Sprint's apparently planning to replace it with the Samsung i830 next month... stupid thumb-board, dysfunctional joystick, and all. So... if Sprint does that, does anybody care to speculate the odds of Lockline having enough 6700s to make it through a 2-year contract without having to endure my final few months with a Treo-like abomination from hell?
OK, maybe that's a tiny bit harsh... at least the i830 has a 320x240 screen & can do Graf^h^h^h^h Block Input, so it's not quite as bad as the Treo. But having seen hardware from HTC and Samsung, I've come to respect HTC way more than Samsung, if only because HTC has the decency to make the whole device re-flashable instead of rolling the dice on having to send ten million phones to a landfill somewhere thanks to fatally-flawed firmware (a-la i330)...
Last edited by miamicanes : 08-24-2006 at 10:39 PM.
the i830 is not replacing the 6700. the i830 is a "world phone" with no wifi and no camera.
It is replacing the 6601 since it is a PDA device with no camera which is what some companies require of their workers.
EOL is also an estimate. It doesn't mean a straight cutoff and I have not heard solid info stating the 6700 is ready for EOL anytime soon. I personally think it'll go till Spring 2007 when a RevA device with Crossbow comes out.
Where did you read that the i830 will replace the 6700? I highly doubt that will happen as the i830 platform (which is based on the i730) is older than the 6700. The i830 is meant to fill two niches for Sprint:
1. Users who travel abroad and need/want to use their Sprint phone number
2. Users who cannot or do not want an integrated camera
Sprint finally discontinued the PPC6601 a couple of weeks ago--the i830 is the replacement for that device, not the PPC6700.
I saw it over at sprintusers.com. The allegations seemed somewhat plausible given the apparent ease with which people are now able to get 6700s for $179-199 via retention.
I got an letter in the mail from Sprint, they offered me $50 for my 6700! HA! I buy it for $450 in November, and less than a year later they offer me $50 for it!
Sure hope Sprint's not kicking the 6700 to the curb already. Nonetheless, I would not put it past them... As HTC does produce some poor quality products, IMHO. Further, I'd bet Sprint's eating too much of the high replacement rates for the Apache. In turn, Sprint's probably looking at the Apache as a hardware loss leader, and trying to find a suitable replacement.
Sure hope Sprint's not kicking the 6700 to the curb already. Nonetheless, I would not put it past them... As HTC does produce some poor quality products, IMHO. Further, I'd bet Sprint's eating too much of the high replacement rates for the Apache. In turn, Sprint's probably looking at the Apache as a hardware loss leader, and trying to find a suitable replacement.
Best to all,
R
No offense but there is no evidence to suggest any of that is accurate.
I mean were you around for when the Treo 650 hit the market? Talk about returns galaore, yet there they are with the 700p and the 700wx.
I'm still reading posts of people on their 4th or 5th 700p and rarely see that for the 6700.
No offense but there is no evidence to suggest any of that is accurate.
I mean were you around for when the Treo 650 hit the market? Talk about returns galaore, yet there they are with the 700p and the 700wx.
I'm still reading posts of people on their 4th or 5th 700p and rarely see that for the 6700.
Hummm... malatesta, so you think the 6700's not being replaced at high rates like the treo? Really? Wow, myself as well as every one of my friends and employees have had our 6700s replaced atleast one to five times in the last nine months. Doh! Off the top of my head, the main issues have been failed touchscreens (will not stay aligned and has dead touch points in the center of the screen), failed 2.5mm audio jacks, failed volume sliders, failed speakers, failed mini B ports, bad bluetooth radios, and failed hard buttons, as well as the pathetic stylus silo catch. Granted some issues could be caused by the users to some degree. Anyway, from my discussions with my local Sprint rep, these PPC's do have a high failure rate. The sad part is that the rep has tried to get me to switch to the treos again. Still, like the treos, which I would not owe again if you or anyone paid me, lol, the 6700 is far from a quality product. That said, it does have almost everything I would like in PPC phone except a good build quality. Anyway, I sure hope Sprint/HTC/Lockline keeps replacing them, and Sprint continue to sell them until a better Rev A or WiMax PPC phone becomes available.
Going off topic a little more, lol... But I been abusing a Sony Ericsson T610 to the max for around five years now, and it just failed due to an unexpected dive in salt water. lol... Even then, I recovered it, dried it out, and it turned on! Further, I have a nine plus year old Nokia that's still on the original battery and it just keeps on going... What I'm getting at is there's something to say about build quality or the lack there of... And the 6700 falls into the lack there of catagory from all the practical evidence I've witnessed over the last nine months.
I'm just saying unless I see some actual numbers of purchases, returns, exchanges and repairs (and lets be honest, we're never going to get those numbers) I find it dubious at best to say "device A has a high failure rate".
We just have no way of knowing and everything is just guesswork, rumor or "my friend who's a sprint rep said..." stories.
I don't doubt you and your friends have had problems with QC with the 6700 for a second but I'm sure we can get just as many people on this board to say their 6700 has been working flawlessly (myself included, using a Sept '05 device).
Understand, I'm a science guy so I just don't believe in making statements that can't be validated with numbers.
While I think the i830 and the 6700 have different pros and cons, I doubt they will drop the 6700. The phone is far from perfect but it isn't much different from just about any other pda phone. All have random issues and faults. There was a firmware update for the i730 so they do have rom updates for the samsung pda phones.
If they were to EOL the 6700 before the new WM6 phone becomes available, I'd love to see them consider SLIMMER phones like this one - http://www.engadget.com/2006/08/23/t...-ubiquio-brand - I'm not familiar with the company but I wasn't familiar with UTStarr/HTC when I got my 6600. Besides being much much slimmer I would guess it has a better BT unit/stack only because I don't think I've ever tried a phone with a worse BT stack than the 6700. Edit - OK - I'll admit my 6600 from the same company was probably worse. Thank goodness somebody from XDA developer released a patch (not available on Sprint or HTC/UTSTAR/AUDIOVOX's website) that made it at lease useable.
No offense taken, malatesta. I'm guessing you're very careful with your 6700, and I'm glad to hear you have not run into any issues. I'm also guessing that you do not have much face to face contact with many heavy 6700 users on a daily basis other than in the forums, and you do not use the phone all day long for work? Correct or not? Anyway, my findings are mainly based on what has held up and not held up under the working conditions here. For example, our small company has 23 employees using 6700 every work day, and every phone have failed in one way or another over the last nine months. Also, four of my friends have the phone, (due to my recommendation, doh) and again all have had issues that required atleast one replacement each already... albeit for some minor issues in a couple cases. The bottomline is that the phone just does not stand up to the useage of our employees, my friends, or me for that matter. Heck, I'm on my third new 6700, and highly doubt it will stand the test of time, lol, or even another three months... just based on past experience. That said, I will agree to disagree with you in regard to the HTC Apache build quality as well as the high number of replacements needed. The sad part is that I actually like the phone, and just wish it was not so "wimpy" for lack of a better word, lol...
Boe, thanks for the link and info... I'd like to find a "slimmer" PPC phone too. Darn 6700's a brick with or without the extended battery. Unfortunately, so far, I have not been thrilled with any of the forthcoming square screen models.
And... yes, I completely agree with you in regard to the poorly implemented 6700 BT stack. Doh! It's just another one of those "what were you thinking" MS blunders. Anyway, with the ongoing 6700 problems here, the 830i is next on my list to try out with Sprint. Looking forward to testing the faster processor... and really hope Samsung has done a better job with their hardware than "wimpy" HTC Apache, lol...
Back to the original question, Lockline replaced my 6600 with a refurb 6600 less than a month ago. This is fairly close to a year after the 6700 was released. This does not absolutely mean that this will be the case for 6700s, but I am confident that Lockline will have replacements for quite a while after the 6700 is phased out.
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But having seen hardware from HTC and Samsung, I've come to respect HTC way more than Samsung, if only because HTC has the decency to make the whole device re-flashable instead of rolling the dice on having to send ten million phones to a landfill somewhere thanks to fatally-flawed firmware (a-la i330)...
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