The Verizon iPhone

I recently posted about a Windows Phone 7 device that I have had the joy of carrying around. It's a demo unit, but it has been loads of fun. There was one major drawback, though, and that was lack of CDMA network support... which means "No Verizon". As I understand it, there are plans for that... however, my network is Verizon.

The Windows Phone 7 is on T-Mobile. I have been carrying around both phones. In my experience, Verizon has been far superior in getting the phone to work.

However, this was not meant to be a post about that. I want to just focus on my new Verizon phone... the iPhone 4.

In short, the phone is excellent. Having worked with previous iPhones, everything is as it should be... except, I can make calls on it consistently. When I carried around an AT&T iPhone as a demo, it was great and fun to play with, except that I couldn't count on it when I really needed to, to be a phone.

I also pay for the tethering package from Verizon. This allows me to use the phone as a 3G modem if I am in a hotel and they want me to pay $15 for internet access per day. Tethering is integrated nicely into the iPhone.

In short... the Verizon iPhone is an iPhone that also works as a phone consistently.

Windows Phone 7 ... worth a shot...

I recently was given the opportunity to spend serious time with a new Windows Phone 7. The specific model is an HTC HD7 running on T-Mobile. I m going to spend time talking about the phone and not T-Mobile.

My first impressions were very positive. The first thing I was looking for was how responsive the user interface was. I had previously has a Windows Mobile 6.5 phone (HTC Imagio ... don't buy one!). The user interface was very slow and the phone, at time, was unusable. The HD7 is quite the opposite. I have found it as responsive as the iPhone 4 (more on my new iPhone 4 in a later post).

The phone, in general, is very enjoyable to work with. It comes with excellent email integration. Integration to Exchange was flawless. It took only a few minutes to set up. Integration to Gmail was simple as well. Web browsing is excellent, as well. The built-in Internet Explorer performs admirably.

The 'killer app' part of the phone is the integrated contacts list. You can enter your various contact list logins, such as Facebook, Windows Live, Exchange, etc... When you pull up a contact, the phone has already combined the contact information into a single contact. Also, you can get the contact's picture and status updates. The clearly differentiates the device from the iPhone. It's an excellent experience. Your user profile is easy to update as well, and updates across your various services.

If you are about to get a new phone and one of these is available, you might want to give it a shot. The phone has great potential. The apps are not there, yet, but that is only a matter of time, especially given the Nokia announcement.