T-Mobile

Treo 650 Is In

by

I got my Treo 650 today. Finally after months of waiting for it, I got it! First impressions of it are good. It seems like a solid phone. The screen is fantastic. Bluetooth works. I was able to get my Sony Ericsson headset to pair up in a few minutes. It was sending and recieving calls without a problem. More impressive was after about 30 minutes of tinkering I got my 3Com Bluetooth PCMCIA card to sync with my Treo. the problems I had were actually related to the 3Com software, and once I figured out the issue, I was able to sync with no problems. I just did it twice and it worked!

Next up is the big task. I need to get DUN (dial up networking) to work with the Treo. I have done it before with other Bluetooth phones so I am hopeful I can get it to work. I am off to play with that, but first a few pictures I took this afternoon.

2005-02-14_treo_650_07 2005-02-14_treo_650_06 2005-02-14_treo_650_05 2005-02-14_treo_650_04 2005-02-14_treo_650_03 2005-02-14_treo_650_02 2005-02-14_treo_650_01

, , , , ,

Treo 650 Rumors

by

The rumor mill is filled with buzz about the PalmOne Treo 650 GSM version coming out within a week or so. All I have to say is “took it long enough, but WoHoo!”. I will most likely pay for the full priced unlocked version. I am so far basically happy with T-Mobile. I also do not want to be forced into a 2 year deal with Cingular. They can kiss my ass over having to pay full price for any phone unless I sign a 2 year deal. So if I don’t get a subsidized phone, why do I have to sign a 1 year deal? Don’t start telling me that a 2 year deal is needed to make up the price of the phone subsidy. They do that after 1 year. Cingular is trying to lock people in since now people can move to a new carrier with their cell number by making a simple phone call. Let me give you a bit of advise Cingular. T-Mobile has kept me as a customer by NOT being pricks about their contracts. This is from a user who has had issues with them as recent as last week. I also am not happy with their data speeds of GPRS, but I don’t want to move to another carrier and get screwed with a long term contract or a company that blatantly doesn’t care about their customers choices.

To anyone that says the non-customized version of the Treo won’t work well with T-Mobile I have to say give it up. I had an unbranded Treo 270. It worked just fine on AT&T and T-Mobile. I don’t need to wait for T-Mobile to do some GPRS tweaks and stick their logo on the phone. Unbranded and unlocked versions should work fine.

Of course I bash Cingular, but I ever do want/need higher data speeds I will be using them since T-Mobile’s higher speed data network seems years away. Dam mobile providers. None of them has just what I need/want:(

T-Mobile Woes Continue

by

Called T-Mobile twice today about my phone(s) still not working. The first time I called the CSR put me in touch with the data group because to level 1 support people any problem with a phone like the Treo 600 means that the data group has to get involved. I tried to explain that I had 2 phones and the other one (non-data phone) was also not working right. the did something on the back-end to my account and had me restart the phone.

Then a few hours later I had to call back because the issue was still happening. This time I was told that there was in fact 3 cell sites in my area that were messed up. I asked what they said by my area and they said Manhattan. I was like dude Manhattan is kind of big and there are like millions of cell users on the dam island. Just because 3 sites are down on that island does not mean that I am affected. of course I truly believe that the problem I am having is related to their network, but this guys logic was retarded.

I don’t like talking to so called experts about technology that I am only have a passing (as a hobby) knowledge of, and yet I know more about it than the people I talk to. This genius first tried to tell me that if I didn’t turn my phone off every day that it could cause my problems. I was like that was nice info, but I had rebooted the dam phone like 4 times today and it still does not work right.

T-Mobile’s contract policies are great, but if this technical issues continue I will be looking elsewhere. This is not the first time they have had issues like this.

&*%^@# Cell Phones

by

I read something yesterday that said the majority of cell phone owners were unsatisfied with their service. That has been traditionally true for me. But I thought hey recently I have not had issues. I should not have spoken. Last night and today I have had huge issues making and receiving calls on my Treo. I think it is T-Mobile. I have had problems like this before, and it was not the phone. I am in an area with great signal and I still don’t get calls. voice mail goes off like an hour after the call was made. That is not good when people are trying to call you to tell you websites are f–ked up. Then I try to place calls and I hit send and the phone does nothing. I do that like 5-10 times before it works.

Thankfully I had the VOIP phone for outbound calls. Maybe I am thinking of switching to Cingular if they get the Treo 650 before T-Mobile. I just am not sure if their customer service is as good as T-Mobile. I like the fact that T-Mobile does not force me into a contract if I make changes to my account since I have been a customer for 3+ years now. Still debating…

Pocket PC Vs. Treo 650

by

Gus is trying to convince me that I should be looking at the new Pocket PC on sale from Cingular. It is branded the Siemens SX66, but it is basically the same PPC phone that HTC is making for several vendors. Gizmodo had a comparison of Audiovox’s variant of the phone for use on Sprint’s network. I am not impressed. The Treo 650 is smaller and from this review still better than the PPC. I am going to wait. Gus on the other hand may actually go buy that beast and use it. To me it looks too close in size to the HP Pocket PC that AJ got from T-Mobile a few months ago.

Patiently waiting for the Treo 650 for T-Mobile…

UPDATE: Gus got the SX66. He wants me to goto the Cingular store and check it out. I am going to go, but I think I will still wait for the 650.

Rumor New Treo’s Oct. 25

by

I have read on many tech sites that the new Treo will be out in late October. I am saving up to get it once it is out for T-Mobile. If the last Treo release is any indication of how long I will have to wait for T-Mobile to release the Treo, I have until March to wait for it. Lets hope PalmOne buying handspring has fixed the REALLY long wait times for the phone to be released.

Several people in my office have the Treo 600’s and a few of us already plan on upgrading when the new one comes out. Jayson on the other hand is hoping to pick one of our 600’s up on the cheap when we upgrade.

The Travel Blog

by

As I write this (no idea when it will be posted) I am around 35,000 feet. I am on the first leg of my Vegas vacation. It is short, but I hope to rest, and party a bit. So far no rest was possible. I sometimes forget why I stopped traveling for a living. Going away on a short vacation always reminds me. this trip is no different. Due to the hurricane my connections in Atlanta caused me huge delays. my flight left about 1:30 minutes late. I will miss my original connecting flight. Thankfully I got a page from Delta about the delay and called before I went to the airport. I was able to call and get confirmed on a later flight out of Atlanta to Vegas. problem 1 fixed. Problem 2 was that since I made a change on my plans I had to goto the ticket counter instead of the self service check in. it took allot longer but I was still early for my trip.

I had time to kill so I tried out the Delta Crown Room. In all my travels I never used airport clubs, and as I said I am well traveled. When I was at IBM my boss was going to take us to one on a few occasions, but we never ended up there. With my Amex card I get free admission to a few of the clubs, so today I decided to try it out. All I can say is, NICE. comfy chairs and a bar awaited me. T-Mobile hotspot access also was nice. I had to pay for that, but it was worth the $9.99 for the full day of usage. I only had time to download my mail before they called my flight, but I had stuff do to on the plane. I also plan on using the day pass in Atlanta during my layover.

Since I planned ahead I even got my aisle seats. The rescheduled flight is a good seat also. The customer service people were cool. After you have been flying allot you get to want things done in a specific way. I will freely admit I am a travel snob. I for example am grateful that the 2 dogs in little cages 2 rows in front of me are quiet now. they weren’t when I started this flight. Now I said planning ahead is good. Lets see if my plans hold water for the entire trip. They say best laid plans fall apart at step 1. Hopefully my next flight will not be delayed that much, and I can catch a decent dinner at the hotel tonight. My plans for a late afternoon swim or spa session is dead now that I wont be getting in until 8PM ish. I hope to do either or both of those things tomorrow while I wait for Sean to finish work.

Now that I have told you about my woes today, I can go backwards and tell you how this trip started. Before the flight I went to breakfast with my dad. He was still having issues eating after gum surgery, but we went to his usual breakfast place. My mom was busy doing something and passed on food.

I stayed over at my parents last night since the first night of the Jewish new year was at their house. Carrie, Mike, Morgan, Donny, Herb, Na, Loren, Andrew, Tina/barry and their kids Lindsey and Cory were over. It was crowded since my parents don’t have their new dining room set yet. Their old one is sitting comfortably in my apartment.

We got to play with Morgan, so the night was perfect. She even was giving out hugs and kisses without being asked. I love my niece. she is becoming talkative. it is very cute.

TRAVEL UPDATE: Sorry in this blog I jump around allot, but I am still stuck on the plane. We are over Georgia somewhere. We are in a holding pattern into Atlanta at this time. We have been circling for maybe 20 minutes or more and they say we will be doing it for another 30 before we can begin our final approach into Atlanta. This flight is way longer than normal since the flight crew also said before we started circling that we were moving slower than normal to avoid circling allot. Eventually I will get there.

Bluetooth Card And Other Travel Gear

by

I got a new Bluetooth PCMCIA card yesterday. I wanted to see how/if I can successfully use the bluetooth card with my Sony Ericsson T610 phone as a wireless modem. In tests yesterday things looked good. I have yet to need to test it on the road. Like I mentioned in my travel post, I had a T-Mobile hotspot in the airport in NYC.

I had a little issue getting the install shield to run on the CD of drivers that came with the card. I found the hidden exe that starts the actual install to run and got the drivers and software to install. I even paired the phone without major issue. I will put the card through its paces later this weekend.

What I didn’t like was whenever the card was inserted and I opened any network connection, the bluetooth card asked me if I wanted to use the phone to connect. annoying, but I will see if it happens again.

Besides the bluetooth card (from 3Com btw) I am also trying out the Thinkpad extended life battery. Gus and Dean have had them for months (in Gus’ case a year) but it is the first time I have used one. It is heavy compared to the old card. So far I have 80% battery life left. That is good since I have around that much % of my trip left:) I have my regular battery as a backup. Intel says you can go 8 hours with this battery. I may be pushing the spec’s on this trip.

What didn’t make the trip is my trusted (aka old) Sony cybershot camera. it is only 1.3 mega pixels but it works. Well it did up until last night. I was going to take some shots of Morgan but the camera wouldn’t turn on. that was weird since I had charged it up earlier in the week in planing for the trip. I left it with my parents to save weight. I will get it next week when I am back there, and try charging it. It may be dead, or the charge I gave it didn’t hold. not sure what yet. I need to look at that in more detail when I get back.

The new HP iPaq GSM Phone

by

I checked out the new HP iPaq h6315 GSM Pocket PC mobile phone on friday. I was walking by a T-Mobile store and decided to see if the had it. I was able to get a side by side feel from the new iPaq and my Palmone Treo 600. I didn’t get any pictures but my original assessment seems accurate. The iPaq is allot bigger. It is more the size of the old Treo 270, but a bit taller. It is just as wide. That was what made the 270 not comfortable to hold when talking. The screen was big and nice, but I have doubts about the removable keyboard. I will probably wait for the new Treo to come out. Whenever that may be. My luck it will be another 6 months before it is for T-Mobile. Of course since there is no official release date, it is anyone’s guess how long it will be before the new Treo’s hit the stores.

AJ will be getting the new HP iPaq phone this week, so I will check it out in detail later this week. Hopefully I will get a picture of it with my Treo. It will remind me why I won’t spend $600 (I already have T-Mobile service so it will be more than a new activation) on a larger pone.

More T-Mobile Stuff

by

It is ironic that I wrote good things about T-Mobile customer service the other day. Gizmodo wrote very negative things about the same group of T-Mobile Customer Service people. I read that site all the time, and I can totally see what he wrote about happening. I have had bad experiences with plenty of companies. It just goes to show you that two people can have totally different experiences with the same company. It is and will always be the people that make a company good or bad.

I for one had a billing problem for 3 months early this year. After several calls they finally fixed the issue. Twice T-Mobile said it was fixed, and then was not. To my credit I keep dates, customer service rep id #’s and one line summaries of what we discuss. I know it sounds like over kill, but at work I have had problems I was working through and if I didn’t have data like that I would have been screwed. I take that lesson learned and have applied it for personal use. it has worked for me. But even then it took months to fix the problem. The difference was the problem I had was in fact fixed, and during the period of time the billing issue went on, I got credits each month for the mistake.