iPod touch Advice pls (phone + PIM + iPod touch)

[wongulous]

Hola. I'm so torn as to what I should do and there are obviously a lot of different ways to do it, and I know I can't be alone... so I thought maybe someone here would have an idea.

I need a wireless phone (preferably Sprint because I have been referred to SERO)... I like gadgety phones, yes, but more important than that is durability and aesthetics. I tried AT&T for two weeks and I was just consistently disappointed with their service in my city and surrounding area (Omaha, NE), and their minute plans would end up costing me more than twice what Sprint would with SERO over the course of the two-year contract.

I also need a PIM/PDA of some sort. This might be a part of the iPod touch, or might be a part of my phone, but I need it somewhere. I've used Palm OS for years and I like it except that it is SO old and ugly compared to even WinMo, let alone OS X on the iPhone/iPod touch. I like Treos fine but I just don't text message THAT much to justify a keyboard (though again with SERO I'll have unlim text so maybe I would in a year). I am hesitant to get anything Microsoft-based. I basically just need something with a calendar with an "events" view and a "day" view, possibly a "week" view, that I can add, edit, and delete events on. I don't need alarms, just something to refer to. I am seriously ADD with a terrible memory, plus I often overcommit myself to people, groups, school, work, etc. My two weeks with a Treo on AT&T in August proved to me that the Treo calendar was a GODSEND. So I really would like that.

I also really love the iPod touch and the non-AT&T parts of the iPhone. For many obvious reasons.

My issue is that I dumped AT&T because it was so bad, and I was hoping for the iPod touch.. then it comes out, and Apple has crippled it! Which means I either will have to carry 3 devices (separate phone, PIM/PDA, and iPod touch which is like half of a PDA), or 2 devices (but the PIM/PDA functions will have to be in the phone--which means I have to buy a Treo, Blackberry, Series60, or WinMo device for any decent calendar). There's no Series60 phones for Sprint, and as I said I'm hesitant about any Microsoft products. I also do not want to have to pay crazy Blackberry plans, and I don't really like their UI.

So that leaves me with buying another Treo, except on Sprint... but I don't want to spend $300 on a Treo and $400 on an iPod touch and have half of an iPod in the Treo and half of a PIM/PDA in the iPod, and have neither of them totally meet my needs!!!

WTF.

Thanks for reading my rantyness, btw.

 

[0007776]

If you don't mind hacking it you could get an iPhone and use the hacks out there to make it work except for the phone part without service. or wait a few weeks and someone will probably have moved the iPhone calendar to replace the one on the touch.

 

[ivan a rom]

Hey, I am in the EXACT same boat as you. I want a to carry a PDA/Phone/iPod on me at all times. I also need wifi included. I have Verizon though and really don't like the blackberry or treos available.

I am probably waiting for the htc 6800 which has wifi and WM6. Here's the thing, I could just keep my phone now, it has a 3.2mp camera and get a touch. But the planner functions on my phone are a little annoying since I don't have a qwerty keypad.

There are so many ways to go on this, and I hate thinking about the advantages and weaknesses of the different setups. If I were you I'd go either Treo/ Crackberry + Touch or you could go with the Mogul and a high capacity microSD card. This will give you PDA/wifi/phone and music all in one.

 

[wongulous]

If you don't mind hacking it you could get an iPhone and use the hacks out there to make it work except for the phone part without service. or wait a few weeks and someone will probably have moved the iPhone calendar to replace the one on the touch.

Well, I've thought unlocking an iPhone with no service, and there are several issues. For one, we don't know if or when iPhone unlocks will be broken. Two, parts of the iPhone will forever integrate into the phone software. Three, I'd be paying an 8GB premium (or rather losing 8GB) for the same dollar amount by getting an iPhone instead of an iPod touch--but I wouldn't be using the one thing that premium goes toward: the phone! Not to mention the extraneous buttons and extra size (not that either of those are such a big deal though). I don't think getting an iPhone makes much sense.

The "wait a few weeks and see" approach is also a huge variable, and every day without a phone and calendar grates on my sanity. Plus, even if this hack does happen to un-cripple the iPod touch calendar, wouldn't there again be the possibility of each and every iPod touch OS update breaking that hack? I don't care about voiding a warranty, I just don't want to suddenly one day after an update have no calendar-editing and have to wait 2 weeks for a solution and my life goes haywire in the meantime. But I may not have much other option than jumping and waiting, or just waiting altogether...

Hey, I am in the EXACT same boat as you. I want a to carry a PDA/Phone/iPod on me at all times. I also need wifi included. I have Verizon though and really don't like the blackberry or treos available.

I am probably waiting for the htc 6800 which has wifi and WM6. Here's the thing, I could just keep my phone now, it has a 3.2mp camera and get a touch. But the planner functions on my phone are a little annoying since I don't have a qwerty keypad.

There are so many ways to go on this, and I hate thinking about the advantages and weaknesses of the different setups. If I were you I'd go either Treo/ Crackberry + Touch or you could go with the Mogul and a high capacity microSD card. This will give you PDA/wifi/phone and music all in one.

I'm glad to hear I'm not alone. This whole thing boggles my mind, because obviously Apple must understand that AT&T won't work for everyone, and some people don't want their phones fully integrated... but I am almost 100% sure that no one complained that "I HATE EDITING CALENDARS ON MY iPHONE! SIMPLIFY IT!" to make them do this. So they're just artificially boosting the iPhone's status to push people to get it, with AT&T. And that just sucks.

I've thought about the Mogul, or HTC Touch (supposedly coming soon), as well as the Centro (supposedly coming soon), and I'm still thinking. It would be funny to have two touch-sensitive devices that are from companies with lawsuits against each other, but I would still feel like there would be a huge duplicity in my devices, and that I'll have paid a large sum for each and therefore a premium for those individual, duplicated features. Large sum is right: with $400 for the iPod touch and $300-500 for the other device, I'll have spent way more than I wanted. Plus as I said I'm apprehensive about WinMo, and what kind of Mac Geek wants to be seen toting around a WinMo phone? Honestly. Plus that Start menu is really annoying to me--but I'm sure I'd get used to it.

Now a Treo/Centro, I guess I could do, because their media software for photos, music, video, mail, and browsing all absolutely suck ass so I'd never use them anyway. I guess I'd have the keyboard for texting and calendar entry, emergency email, and I could load some games on it since there are none for the iPod touch. But still, even with the lesser iPod touch, $300+300 for the two devices is just a lot to spend. I don't get why Apple couldn't have put the calendar editing/adding feature into the iPod touch, or even for an additional fee!