I'm looking at $55/mo to have an iPhone vs. my current $35/mo for my Windows Phone, a HTC Touch Pro2. Apples for apples on unlimited data, text, picture mail, 500 anytime (never spent it all), n&w Starting @ 7, caller id and all that other jazz. Data use will be no problem with the iPhone. Current phone is ill. I hate it's touch screen, no flash, and laggyness; two of which are negated when it comes to the iPhone. I'm not a fan in the lacking keyboard or missing flash on the iPhone, but dig the HD camera. I think I can break even on the cost of the phone when working with Sprint (haven't used their upgrade rebate since '09) and selling my iPod Touch and other phone.

If I can get the iPod on the $55 plan and also keep my $35 plan and old phone, I'll do that for certain.

 

I have no issue with the 4s. On it right now and it works well for me.

 

I should add, I'm on Sprint SERO. I am jumping to the Mac side, so this would be a nice time to learn the peripheries.

 

Don't waist any money on anything not lte capable.

 

Established Sprint 3.5G installations use WiMax and they just recently announced plans to switch 4 major markets to LTE at some point to begin the conversion...however, none of these, new or old, according to Sprint's handy coverage map are within probably 75 miles of where he lives and likely won't be for some time, so that point is largely.......pointless?
Hell, even many Verizon LTE markets are still running at a lower speed than their 3G because the buildout is still in it's infancy. FFS, it's 2012 and you can barely find 3G outside major markets.

 

As for the actual topic, I'm not due for a subsidy till at least fall, but my wife recently upgraded to a 4S and it's pretty goddam fantastic, even compared to my 4. The camera is retarded and is as good as a compact PnS in good light. Siri is fucking awesome and I'm very jealous that I don't have a personal slave to order around. I got my Dad one for xmas and he shares the same enthusiasm. There's lots of cool integration with other products too. I use the free iCloud backup service to sync and all my devices update to each other and my mac as soon as they connect to any wifi. With photo stream, I take pics with my phone and they automatically appear on my iPad and mac. I upload pics to iPhoto with my regular cameras and they automatically transfer to the mobiles. The phone works as an expanded remote to control my apple TVs, iTunes, etc, etc.

Another nice benefit of getting into iP ownership is that you'll probably only pay a full price subsidy once because the resale value is historically so good. Ex: A few days after getting the 4S (32g for $299), my wife put her 2.5 year old 32g 3GS (which was also $299) on CL and it sold IN ONE HOUR to the first caller for $200. Why?, when that same phone is now free with a contract and a 4 is $99? Who the fuck knows, but that's what people are willing to pay. My 4 will be on CL the day I'm eligible to upgrade....possibly sooner if they'll still do a $100 early upgrade penalty instead of paying full price.

 

I am downloading songs right now on my phone at 12mb/sec. Fuck sprint and wherever you live.

 

You are quite possibly the missing link .....

 

And you still can't help but to look at yourself in the mirror disappointed with your self that you are not more like me.

 

I'm happy with my 3g data speeds. Sprint is the carrier to have in this area for some reason, and I've been happy with their service. 9/10 my phone will still work when other carriers have dropped signal completely. A few times a month I'll head an hour or so south. Cell service gets very sketchy. My phone is the only one that works in every room of my girlfriends house it's that bad. AT&T comes in second place around here. Verizon... well, in an corporate office of 3,500+ that is exclusively contracted through Verizon for all of it's corporate and field needs, not one Verizon phone works within the corporate building. Verizon is a very distant third. While AT&T and Verizon may have faster data coverage, it doesn't mean dimp if you can't access it.


The camera and Siri are the biggest benefits over the regular iPhone 4. I use my phone like a PnS all the time since I don't own one. Siri will learn not to back talk me. Looks like I need to call spint and start to figure out what deals they can break me on the new phone.

 

Are you jailbroken? My friend and I have siri working on his iphone 4. It took some time but can be done.

 

I know you asked specifically about the 4S but I thought I would just throw in that I have the iphone 4 and couldnt be happier. my last phone wasn't even as good as what you have now, although it was still a "touch screen" and apparently it could also be used as an mp3 player- it sucked balls. The camera on the iphone is great, videos record pretty good for being a camera and the screen is so damn clear. I give it a 2 thumbs up. You'll enjoy it.

 

Not currently. My phones usually are, but since ios5 I honestly haven't found a great benefit to it except the loss of my beloved 5 icon dock, lol. I did hear there was a JB/Siri workaround in the early stages of functioning awhile back, but didn't know it had been released to the public. I'll definitely need to investigate further now.......

It would probably be really helpful to me considering the retarded amount of time I spend in congested, 14 lane freeway traffic at 75mph with a phone (or two) in my hand(s).

 

Define jailbroke, a guy that works for me has a friend that jailbreaks iPhones for people and tried to get me to have mine done. So what does it do , what the reason behind it, ?

 

Jailbreaking is just the process of unlocking the iPhone's firmware allowing you to load utilities or apps that don't come from the official iTunes app store. Back in 07-09 ish the phones capabilities were pretty restricted in order to get the best performance from the processors and batteries that were available at the time, and jailbreaking ebabled users to do things like make appearance changes, use free data-based texting, multitasking, etc, as well as provide a gateway to a carrier unlock to allow an AT&T phone to be used with tmobile.

In the end, a lot of people realized that apple really did know best because a lot of the 'hacks' JBing enabled lagged processors and drained batteries. By 2010 and ios4 there was honestly little reason to do it because it's hard to think of something the phone doesn't already do.....well. But some people just like to eff with shit and tweak appearance themes or whatever, so it still lives on. There are also ways, via JBing, to bypass iTunes charges and download legit aps for free, but considering that I've been stealing music and video media for 14 years now, I don't jew out on 99 cent apps, especially since half of it goes directly to the developers.