Google Debuts New Fi Wireless Service

Photo Credit: Kachwanya

Google finally announced their wireless phone service called Fi. The service will cost $20 per month for unlimited talk and texting plus $10 per gigabyte of data used. It's a little bit cheaper than your standard phone service plan.

The downside is that if you use 7GB or more regularly, then a normal phone plan with T-Mobile or Sprint would be cheaper than Fi. The upside is that Google will only charge you for the data you use each month, no matter which plan you end up going with. For example, if you were to pay $30 for 3GB and only use 1.4 GB, then at the end of the month you'd receive a refund for $16. No U.S. carriers offer these rebates, the closest you can get is going with rollover minutes with your standard phone carriers. Google is just trying to have a service that makes it easier on us to surf the web at a cheap price. Fi also works over Wi-Fi networks if there's no cellular coverage available.

Something I don't like about Fi is that you can't use your normal smartphones, like Apple or Samsung. These phones won't be compatible with Fi at first. The only phone you can get is a Google Nexus 6 phone that starts at about $649 or $27 a month for 24 months. Motorola did come out with a Nexus 6, with a 6-inch screen, which is bigger than your typical smartphone, but not as good of a phone as an iPhone or Galaxy S6. Still, Google's plans are cheaper than your standard services provided by AT&T and Verizon, two of the largest, broader network coverage carriers in the country.

The Fi service is also providing inexpensive international features, like unlimited international texting. Just like the U.S., data will cost $10 per GB in 120 major countries like Japan, Germany, and India. Also a plus side if you or anyone you know either travels a lot or is in the marines and also across seas.

Google is buying their wireless service from T-Mobile and Sprint, which isn't appealing to me at all. In my opinion, Sprint and T-Mobile are two of the worst phone carriers available. But I can see why they are doing it this way. It saves Google from having to buy an airwave license and start a national network from nothing. And for T-Mobile or Sprint, it gives them more traffic on their networks without having to worrying about any risks. T-Mobile shares were up 2.1% and Sprint 1.7% with Google shares up 1.3% after they announced the new Fi service.

The prices may not be as low as anticipated, but it still is a good plan to consider. Especially if you already have services with T-Mobile or Sprint and are willing to buy from the limited phones you have to choose from. For now, I'm going to stick with my AT&T service and basic smartphone. I'm sure this isn't the last we will hear of this. Next time around, they'll have more options, phones, and services to pick from.

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iPhone 4S Sales Are Going Well

On Friday, October 14 Sprint and AT&T were both able to boast about their sales and activation numbers for the iPhone 4S. The numbers prove that consumers are extremely excited about the latest version of Apple’s iPhone.

The weekend before the iPhone 4S’s release the preorders for the device sold out on Apple’s online store, and on Friday sales continued to boom.

"Sprint today reported its best ever day of sales in retail, web and telesales for a device family in Sprint history with the launch of iPhone 4S and iPhone 4," said Fared Adib, Sprint's product chief, in a statement. "We reached this milestone at approximately noon CT/1pm ET. The response to this device by current and new customers has surpassed our expectations and validates our customers' desire for a truly unlimited data pricing plan."

Three of the four major U.S. mobile carriers began selling the iPhone 4S on Friday: AT&T, Sprint and Verizon. Although the lines outside the stores were smaller than the lines for the launch of the iPad 2, there were still plenty of consumers that were hyped about the latest version of the iPhone. Sprint announced earlier in the week that they had already sold out of its cheapest version of the iPhone 4S, while Apple said that they had sold 1 million devices via preorders. Obviously, these devices are selling well.

AT&T reported that it had "record activations," although they did not attach a number to that statement. "As of 4:30 pm ET today, AT&T had already activated a record number of iPhones on our network – and is on-track to double our previous record for activations on a single day,” was all that the carrier said.

However, all of these record sales numbers do not mean that the activation process was a breeze.

All of the devices required a two-year contract with either AT&T, Verizon Wireless or Sprint, unless the customer wanted to pay almost an extra $500 for an unlocked iPhone 4S. Once buyers, especially AT&T’s customers, attempted to power up and activate their new phones, there were some reports of the activation process being slow.

"Seven iPhone 4s activation attempts in a row... #ATTFail," tweeted one buyer.
There have been different delays and glitches with the whole process, but hopefully the issues will die down in the next few days so that customers can enjoy their latest version of the iPhone.

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Droid Bionic Now Available

With absolutely no lack of enthusiasm, Verizon Wireless has officially announced the release of the much anticipated Droid Bionic by Motorola. This much talked about device was first announced and unveiled all the way back in January during CES and eager Verizon customers have been waiting ever so patiently to get their hands on it.

The device, which looks stunning in my opinion, is physically available today at any Verizon retailer or online store for $299.99 with a new two-year agreement as is customary with Verizon.

The Droid Bionic is a 4G LTE device that runs the latest Android 2.3.4 Gingerbread OS. It is powered by a dual-core 1GHz processor and comes with a beautiful 4.3-inch qHD display. What's more, this beautiful screen is scratch resistant thanks to Corning Gorilla Glass. The screen also has a dual-layer anti-reflective coating to make it all the more special.

Full specifications of the Droid Bionic include:

• 1GB of RAM


• 32GB of memory with 16GB on board and 16GB on a pre-installed microSD


• Front-facing camera that allows for video chatting via 4G LTE, 3G or WiFi


• 8 megapixel auto-focus rear camera with flash and full 1080p HD video capture


• Mirror Mode with HDMI out that supports full 1080p HD video playback


• MOTOPRINT application allowing you to print through a WiFi-enabled printer


• Multi-window options for easy multitasking


• Adobe Flash Player pre-installed


• HTML 5 capabilities


• Wireless charger support


• Business ready with advanced security features

In addition to the Droid Bionic, Verizon is also offering all the bells and whistles that one might want or need when using this device. Verizon is also offering the Lapdock for $299.97, the HD Station for $99.99, the Webtop Application Adapter for $29.99, the Car Navigation Dock for $39.99 and the Battery Dock for $49.99.

Needless to say, this definitely looks like the device everybody has been waiting for. I'm just mad that I don't have an available upgrade on my Verizon account for another 9 months. But by then, something bigger and better than this will probably have already come out.

Source: TFTS - Verizon Wireless Makes It Official: Motorola Droid Bionic Coming September 8th

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Verizon Lands Super Fast 4G Galaxy Tab 10.1

You have probably heard just about everything there is to hear about the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 by now. It seems that every time you turn around there is something new going on with it and today is no different. A new version of the tablet has just arrived, this time packing an LTE radio tuned to the 4G waves of Verizon.

Nothing has really changed with the Verizon version of the Galaxy Tab 10.1 aside from a new brushed, gray plastic back and a rumored Micro SIM slot on the top. This latest version officially went on sale yesterday, so many people are wondering how the 4G LTE capabilities stack up.

While it has been noted that Verizon's LTE network is fast, things seem a little different with the Galaxy Tab 10.1. Not only does this device run the table on most cable modems, it is also competitive with a FiOS connection. The Galaxy Tab 10.1 averages 28.25Mbps down and 7.93Mbps up on speed tests, which is definitively better than the Thunderbolt's 21.77Mbps. Some speed tests have even seen the Galaxy Tab 10.1 get as high as 44.44Mbps down and 9.39Mbps up. Ping times are also very low, averaging just shy of 67ms.

Reports are also coming in that the connection feels just as fast as the speeds suggest. The Galaxy Tab 10.1 is capable of loading full desktop websites, even ones bogged down with Flash, in no time at all and movies from the Android market start playing almost instantly.

While all this is highly impressive, it is raising a few questions. Mainly, why is the Verizon Galaxy Tab 10.1 posting such dramatically faster speeds? It is a possibility that there is some beefed up hardware in the Galaxy Tab that isn't in the LTE smartphones currently available, I mean it is a bigger package. Whatever the reason, the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 from Verizon is definitely an impressive piece of equipment.

Source: Engadget - Galaxy Tab 10.1 for Verizon, hands-on with the new 4G speed king

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AT&T Has More iPhone Activations Than Verizon

Last week, AT&T and Verizon both posted their quarterly results as well as the number of iPhones that they have activated on each of their networks. Surprisingly, the mobile phone carrier with the most iPhone activations is AT&T.

AT&T reported that it has activated 3.6 million iPhones on its network this quarter, while Verizon has only activated 2.3 million. All in all, that adds up to 5.9 million new iPhones, which constitutes about 30 percent of the 20.3 million iPhones that Apple reported that it has sold during this past quarter.

So, are you surprised that AT&T has activated more iPhones than Verizon? I definitely was! So, how have they done it? Well, the advantage that AT&T has over Verizon is that it offers its customers both the iPhone 3GS and the iPhone 4. Verizon is only offering its customers the iPhone 4. AT&T is also offering the iPhone 3GS at a discounted price. Customers can get a new iPhone 3GS for $49.99 or pick up a refurbished device for $9 with a two year contract. That is one heck of a deal! Unfortunately, AT&T did not break down its quarterly numbers to show how many of each version has been activated. They just lumped the numbers all together.

Although Verizon does not have the most iPhone activations, the company did add more subscribers than its rival, AT&T. According to the company, they added more than 2.2 million people to their carrier, clearly beating AT&T who only added 1.1 million new users. Verizon now can boast 106.3 million subscribers, while AT&T sits behind them with 98.6 million users.

Breaking down the numbers even further, only 36 percent of Verizon’s subscriber base is made up of smartphone users. Although this is up from 32 percent last quarter, AT&T is way ahead. Almost 50 percent of the AT&T client base is made up of smartphone subscribers. So why does all of this matter? Well, smartphone subscribers tend to lead to more revenue for the company, due to data plans that users must take out when they choose a smartphone. So, although Verizon had more customers than AT&T, AT&T made $31.5 billion in total revenues, while Verizon came in at $27.5 billion.

Reports have said that when the next generation iPhone is made available, it will be offered by both mobile carriers. They have also reported that it will be a world phone, complete with the capability to run on GSM or CDMA networks. So, once the “iPhone 5” is released, the iPhone 4 will most likely be offered by both carriers at a discounted price. This could help to even the activation numbers, but who knows? Apple could decide to switch things up and offer the newest version of the iPhone through another phone carrier such as Sprint. That could really skew the numbers for both AT&T and Verizon. For now, we will just have to sit back and wait for Apple to release the new and improved iPhone. Hopefully, the wait will not be much longer.

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Droid 3 Now Available

Droid users, rejoice! The Motorola Droid 3 is now officially up for sale and available for an in-store pickup. Lots of people have been waiting for the powerful dual-core smartphone for a while now and the sleek keyboard is perfect for people who prefer a more physical text solution.

The Droid 3 features the new OMAP 4 dual-core chip as opposed to the popular Qualcomm found in devices like the myTouch 4G slide. In addition to that, the Droid 3 is not a Tegra 2 device so it will be exciting to use the complete and full power this phone has to offer.

The Droid 3 comes with a 1GHz OMAP 4 4430 processor, which some people are saying is a bit of an upgrade over the suspected NVIDIA Tegra 2 processor that was rumored to be included here. The user interface is also different. Motoblur is no longer your UI; instead you get a cross-breed that brings in new icons, new animations between Windows and Gingerbread.

The app screen gives you three full pages of 20 apps each, which includes your regular array of Google apps with some other interesting oddities. An app version of GoToMeeting, which allows you to chat in multiple different ways, is also included as well as MOTOPRINT, NOVA, Social Location, Skype and all the V-Cast apps you expect on a Verizon device.

Physically the device is heavier than most smartphones and comes with a seemingly hardcore chassis and a solid sliding keyboard. By the looks of it, this is one phone you will be wanting to take care of. The internal speakers are loud and the chassis seems to be tightly fitted together making the Droid 3 everything a Droid lover could ask for.

If you are a devout Droid fan or somebody who is looking for a solid smartphone on a solid network, then Motorola's Droid 3 from Verizon is exactly what you are looking for. You can buy the Droid 3 now anywhere phones are sold.

Source: Android Community - Motorola Droid 3 in Verizon Stores Today

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Verizon's HTC Trophy Windows 7 Phone Available May 26

Hey, everybody! Check out the HTC Trophy, Verizon's first Windows Phone set to be available starting May 26th online! However, if buying things online isn't your thing, you can always wait until June 2nd when Verizon ships the HTC Trophy to actual stores so you can buy one in person. In addition to the early online date, Microsoft is also offering a freebie to Verizon customers. Anybody who purchases a Windows Phone from Verizon before July 15th will be eligible to receive a free Xbox 360 game. Customers will be able to choose from one of three titles: Lode Runner, Kinect Sports or Halo Reach.

You can pick up the HTC Trophy online on May 26th or in stores on June 2nd, like I said above, for $149.99 after a $50 mail-in rebate. This is all, of course, if you commit to a new 2-year contract with Verizon. Since this is a smartphone, customers will, in addition to picking their talk and text plan, have to sign up for an unlimited data plan for an additional $30 a month. However, Verizon has just confirmed that they plan on eliminating unlimited data plans in lieu of tiered data plans. When this will officially go into action is still unclear though Verizon has stated that it will begin this summer.

This first Windows Phone from Verizon has experienced a tough start in the market. The HTC Trophy was originally expected to launch in March. However, the device was delayed several times for various reasons. Verizon's leaked spring outlook also originally revealed an April 15th release date. However, we saw that date come and go and saw no HTC Trophy. Many Verizon customers have been frustrated by these delays,, customers who are very interested in buying a Windows 7 device.

One good thing is that this Windows Phone will ship with Microsoft's "NoDo" copy and paste update. "NoDo" is Microsoft's first platform update and also includes improved application start-up and resume times. Verizon recently posted support articles that referenced Microsoft's own fixes for issues known to Windows 7 Phones. The HTC Trophy Windows 7 Phone from Verizon was seen out and about back in February with more photos leaking in March following confirmation that the device included all of Verizon's branding.

Full specs of the HTC Trophy include:

• 1 GHz Snapdragon processor


• WVGA 3.8-inch touchscreen


• Surround sound through SRS WOW HD


• 5-megapixel camera with autofocus and LED flash


• 720p HD video capture


• 16GB on-board storage


• Wi-Fi connectivity: 802.11 b/g/n


• Global ready


• HTC-hub customization via downloadable applications


• View and Edit Microsoft Office documents

Source: WinRumors - Verizon Windows Phone 7 HTC Trophy officially available May 26

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Free Phone Friday...And Saturday at Best Buy

Best Buy is offering three mobile phones for free Friday and Saturday as well as stocking the new white iPhones. The free phones that they are offering are the Samsung Fascinate (Verizon Wireless), the Samsung Captivate (AT&T) and the Blackberry Curve (Sprint).

Now this offer will only be good on Friday, April 29 and Saturday, April 30. Best Buy went ahead and extended the “free phone Friday” period this year to Saturday, which will give more customers the opportunity to take advantage of this awesome deal.

Last year, Best Buy offered the iPhone for free during free phone Friday. This year customers will not be so lucky, but if you are looking for the white iPhone, Best Buy says that they will have it stocked in stores as well as available online. However, they have not said how many will be stocked in stores, so if you want one, you should get there soon.

Scott Moore, vice president of Marketing for Best Buy Mobile, released a statement saying, "We've had tremendous success with the 'Free Phone Friday' campaigns we ran last October and December, and we've been waiting for the opportunity to do it again with a great lineup of in-demand phones. We've worked hard to make it as easy as possible for people to find the smart phone that's right for them with the most smart phones under one roof, exclusives and expert advice, and this is just one more reason to visit Best Buy Mobile."

Best Buy did make sure to mention that the free phone requires a two-year contract or activation, and the deal will not be available with any other offer.

Of course, Best Buy is not the only place that offers free phones. There are plenty of websites where a free phone can be purchased. These sites include Amazon Wireless and Dell, among others.

Best Buy also said that they would be the only mobile retailer that will stock the Nexus S 4G, which is the latest smartphone from Google. A spokeswoman for Best Buy also claimed that they will be the only retail store that will allow customers to try out the phone in person before purchasing it in the store or online.

Other Best Buy news includes the announcement that the company is now taking preorders for the HTC Flyer tablet. The 7-inch mobile device will only be available through Best Buy and will be sold for $499. It will feature a customized version of Android Gingerbread (with a Honeycomb upgrade that will be made available at a later date), 1.5-GHz single-core Qualcomm processor, 1,024 x 600 multi-touch display, optional digital pen, 5 megapixel rear-facing camera, 1.3 megapixel front-facing camera, 16GB of memory, a microSD card slot and support for Adobe Flash 10.1.

If you’re looking for good deals on the latest technology, Best Buy is the place to be. Just remember that some of these deals are only available for a limited time. If it’s time for you to renew your phone contract, you should definitely look into the free phone Friday deals that Best Buy is offering.

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Samsung's 4G LTE Droid Charge Hitting Verizon on April 28th

A new device has just been announced by Verizon Wireless and Samsung. The newly announced Droid Charge by Samsung will become available on April 28th in your local Verizon store or on Verizon's website.

The Droid Charge is yet another installment in the Droid family, this time coming with a 4.3-inch Super AMOLED Plus display. According to Samsung, this display should set a new standard for brightness, clarity and outdoor visibility, but don't they all say that? The Droid Charge also comes with a rear facing, 8-megapixel camera with LED flash as well as a 1.3-megapixel front facing camera. The Droid Charge also has a 1 GHz application processor and HTML 5 Web browser which maximizes high-speed 4G LTE connectivity.

Some additional features of the Droid Charge include 4G LTE, Android 2.2, which also supports Google Mobile Services like Gmail, YouTube, Google Talk, Google Search and Google Maps, Adobe Flash Player, Mobile Hotspot capability, Samsung Media Hub, virtual QWERTY keyboard with Swype and tons more.

As I mentioned earlier, the Droid Charge will be available on April 28th with a $299.99 price tag, as long as you sign a new two year agreement. You can also get unlimited 4G LTE data plans from Verizon for $29.99 a month and for a limited time you can get Mobile Hotspot for no additional charge.

If you don't want to buy one, you can always take part in this new program from Samsung. Starting today, April 21st, anyone over the age of 18 is able to participate in an exclusive Droid Charge Scavenger Hunt. All you have to do is follow the online clues to find hidden locations in 16 different cities in order to win a free Droid Charge from Samsung. Head on over to http://twitter.com/droidlanding to get all the details.

Source: Engadget - Samsung's LTE-enabled Droid Charge coming to Verizon on April 28th for $300 on contract

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One-Year Contract Option Dropped By Verizon

According to a report released Friday, April 8, Verizon Wireless has made the decision to end its one-year contract option which customers previously had been able to sign up for in place of their more popular two-year agreements. The report, which was released by PhoneScoop, stated that the one year-contract option will be terminated on April 17. The site went on to quote a Verizon Wireless executive saying, “Keep in mind, a majority of our customers select a two-year contract when buying our devices, so we are responding to what our customers want. They still have options available, such as two-year contracts, month-to-month and prepaid plans.” So far, Verizon representatives have not responded to any requests for comment on the claims that PhoneScoop is making. This may not be a big deal to many people, because if you were like me, I didn’t even know that Verizon offered anything like a one-year or month-to-month plan. On their Web site there is not mention of any plan besides the usual two-year agreement. In comparison to other major U.S. mobile carriers, Sprint does not have a one-year plan available on its Web site, but if customers go into a Sprint store, they will have the option of selecting a one-year plan. It’s interesting that Verizon reps claim that they are “responding to what our customers want,” because how can customers know whether or not they might want a one-year plan if they don’t even know that such an option exists? I think that Verizon has been a little shady about it, but honestly, it doesn’t even matter anymore since in a week the option will be completely obsolete. For those of you looking for a one-year contract, I guess you’ll have to start looking somewhere other than Verizon now.

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Is Verizon Really Stealing THAT Many of AT&T’s Customers?

When Verizon Wireless announced that it would be adding the Apple iPhone to its smartphone lineup, analysts predicted that the amount of AT&T iPhone customer base that switched over to Verizon could add up to as many as 50 percent. So has this really happened?

As of now, the figures concerning the iPhone user switch rate from AT&T to Verizon have not yet been released; however, early speculations seem to be saying that about 14 percent of Verizon iPhone preorders were AT&T iPhone owners who were switching over.

Although that sounds like a pretty hefty amount of customers for mere preorders, it really doesn’t seem to be bothering AT&T Mobility and Consumer Markets President and CEO Ralph de la Vega. Earlier this month de la Vega said that AT&T’s mobile customer losses were within the company’s expectations.

According to reports from Mobclix, two out of every three AT&T iPhone customers who switched to Verizon’s iPhone paid the termination fee that is required by AT&T. These fees include: $325 for AT&T’s smartphone, minus $10 for every month that a user has been on the company’s two-year contract. This can be quite a chunk of change, and in addition to that users still have to go and buy a new iPhone from Verizon.

Mobclix is also saying that 14 percent of iPhone 4 users are now calling Verizon Wireless their home. Out of all the iPhone users in the world, Verizon’s customer base makes up about 4 percent. All of this information from Mobclix is being pulled from the company’s Mobclix Exchange, which is Mobclix huge advertising marketplace that goes ahead and matches different developers with any interested advertisers in a bidding atmosphere. Mobclix did some research to see why AT&T iPhone customers were switching over to Verizon.

What they found just confirms everything that every other survey about AT&T iPhones vs. Verizon iPhones has discovered. The top reason for the switch was reception quality. In the survey of 600 different Verizon iPhone users, Mobclix found that the second and third most popular reason that customers were deserting AT&T was because of “personal hot spots” and “reputation.” The personal hot spot that AT&T users were missing is a feature that allows the iPhone to serve as an Internet host for up to five devices connected via Wi-Fi, or one single device connected via Bluetooth or USB.

Although this was an initial concern, just recently AT&T released its iOS 4.3 update for iPhones that allows AT&T iPhone users to have the same personal hot spot abilities. Mobclix also went on to research where there were the highest areas of Verizon iPhone usage. They found that Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York City, Boston, Chicago and Seattle where the cities with the most usage…big surprise.

I guess we’ll just have to see if Mobclix is accurate when the final official numbers come in. No matter, Verizon really seems to have made a dent in iPhone users that I assume will only increase from here on out.

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Pre 2 Shipping February 17th

A lot of people predicted it and a lot of people were correct, the Verizon Pre 2 will be shipping out to customers willing to lay down $99 and sign a 2-year contract on February 17th. If you want the phone but don't feel like throwing your name down on a contract, you can expect to fork over $439.99. If you want to, you can reserve one now at HP's web store and only there due to the fact that Verizon's online store doesn't have a pre-order.

The Pre 2 may get passed over by a lot of people due to two main things: the fact that Verizon just launched their iPhone and the fact that the Pre 3 was just announced as well, which will have a larger screen, better keyboard, dual cameras, video calling and a lot more. Now the Pre 3 isn't set to release until the summer and the only other information is that it will be EVDO Rev A. It is still unclear whether or not Verizon will pick it up.

Questions have emerged as to whether or not HP and Verizon should release the Pre 2 with all the newer devices coming out soon. When HP was approached with that very same question, they responded, "some people want a slightly smaller phone with a slightly smaller screen."

That seems like a pretty weak explanation to me. I mean, since when does anybody prefer things to be smaller? Nevertheless, reports are coming in from different places from companies that have already gotten a chance to use the Pre 2 and test it out. There have been the occasional bugs with webOS 2.0.1 but the general consensus is that the Pre 2 is a big step forward from the Pre Plus. One plus is that HP's Mobile Hotspot application, which allows you to tether as many as five devices via WiFi, isn't going to cost you a dime over your standard data plan.

What about you? Are you excited for the Pre 2 or are you going to wait for the iPhone 4 or Pre 3? Let us know in the comment section below.

Source: Pre Central - HP puts Verizon Pre 2 on pre-order - $99 on contract, ships Feb 17th

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Lawsuit Filed Against AT&T Over Inflated Data Charges

A man from California is filing a suit against AT&T saying that their data charges for Apple’s iPhone and iPad are inflated.

Patrick Hendricks, the frustrated AT&T customer that filed the suit, claims that the billing system that AT&T has adopted for their data plans is like a “rigged gas pump.” Hendricks is an AT&T iPhone user with a $15 per month data plan that allows him 200MB of data transactions. He said that late last year AT&T charged him for 259 individual data transactions that totaled 223MB; however, according to court documents, Hendricks claims that “many of these charges were phantom data transactions” that never really occurred.

A two-month review of Hendricks’s claim and other aspects surrounding the claim was conducted by an independent consulting firm that was hired by Hendricks’ lawyers. According to the lawsuit that was filed on Thursday, January 30, 2011 in the California district court, the consulting firm found that AT&T consistently overcharges their customers for their data plans by 7 to 14 percent.

The suit said that this proves that “AT&T's bills systematically overstate the amount of data used on each data transaction involving an iPhone or iPad account.”

After the filing of the suit, AT&T did not immediately respond to a request for a comment.

Hendricks not only accuses AT&T of billing him for phantom data usage, but also for consistently overbilling him for legitimate data usage. The consulting firm that was investigating for Hendricks went to an AT&T store and purchased a iPhone. They then proceeded to turn off push notifications, location services, closed all apps, and did not enable e-mail on the phone. After a ten day trail period, AT&T still charged the phone for 35 data transactions that totaled 2,292KB of usage.

Hendricks said that although the overbilling really just has a “modest effect” on customers, for AT&T there is a “huge effect.” He claims that AT&T is receiving a “significant portion” of their data revenues from these inflated data transactions.

What Hendricks is really actually suing for is a breach of contract, unjust enrichment, and a few other things. Hendricks says that he wants damages as well as costs.

AT&T announced in June 2010 that it was revamping its system for the data plan lineups. The company decided to adopt a metered usage model in place of their old methods. They offered their customers 200MB of data for $15 per month, 2GB of data for $25 per month, and a tethering plan for $20 per month. They did allow for their existing customers to keep their unlimited data plans. There have also been recent reports that said that AT&T also allowed any of their customers who had downgraded their data plan within the last year to return to their unlimited status.

In late October the FCC said that to settle the compliant issues about the incorrect data charges Verizon Wireless would be forced to pay $25 million. This came just a few weeks after Verizon had said that they would issue refunds to over 15 million different customers who had found mistakes with their phone bills.

"Verizon Wireless works very hard to simplify the wireless experience for customers and to ensure that customer bills are accurate," Verizon said in a statement. "Nonetheless, internal billing processes can be complex and, in this case, we made inadvertent billing mistakes. We accept responsibility for those errors and apologize to our customers who received accidental data charges on their bills."

"We are notifying eligible current and former customers that we are applying credits to their accounts or sending refunds in October and November," the company said. "Current customers will be notified in upcoming bills; former customers will receive a letter and refund check in the mail. In most cases these credits and refunds are in the $2 to $6 range; some will receive larger amounts."

The settlement "sends a clear message to American consumers: The FCC has got your back," FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski said in a statement. "People shouldn't find mystery fees when they open their phone bills – and they certainly shouldn't have to pay for services they didn't want and didn't use. In these rough economic times, every $1.99 counts."

"Today's settlement also includes strong FCC oversight and accountability to ensure that Verizon Wireless fully repays what they owe to their customers and puts new measures in place to improve customer service," he said.

More recently than all of this stuff with Verizon, Microsoft has said that there have been inefficiencies between the synchronization of e-mail between the Windows Phone Mail client and Yahoo Mail, and this resulted in a much larger than expected data usage for certain users.

It looks as though AT&T will definitely be shelling out some big bucks when all of this is settled. It may just take a while to make it through the legal system.

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Does 4G Really Mean Much of Anything Anymore?

4G is something that we hear wireless carriers talking about all the time these days. Everyone seems to be fighting to provide the best 4G coverage, and while they try to convince the public that their particular company is the best, they don’t seem to mind taking a few jabs at their competition.

The problem is that 4G honestly seems to have turned into a meaningless term. All four of the major U.S. wireless carriers claim that their faster wireless networks are “4G” networks, but really none of the networks actually meet the International Telecommunication Union’s standards for 4G.

Speed is the most important requirement for a network to be labeled as 4G. The ITU says that 4G is technology that downloads at a speed of 100Mbps on mobile devices or 1Gbps on fixed wireless connections. The technology that all four of the U.S. carriers utilizes just isn’t that fast.

Back when the industry moved from 2G to 3G there weren’t any issues. The criteria was clearly defined, so there was no mislabeling going on, and wireless service providers and device makers followed the criteria when labeling their devices.

When 4G started to come about, the ITU defined new requirements. The problem was that wireless operators have decided to ignore the specifications set down by the ITU and have attempted to push their own definition of 4G.

The fact that carriers are doing this and the ITU really hasn’t done anything to clear up the matter is really getting to some people. It’s honestly making everything very confusing for customers.

Dan Warren, the senior director of technology for the GSM Association, an industry group that represents the interests of mobile operators in more than 200 different countries, said, “The term 4G is basically meaningless. It's not a term that anyone could use with a straight face to refer to anything technical. It's a marketing term that means different things to different people."

Some people are arguing that a label is merely a label and nothing else, but Warren says that the standards that are set by the ITU are important for setting customers’ expectations.

"The people who suffer from this are the consumers, who are confused," he said. "The operators use this term interchangeably to refer to different technologies that are incompatible. Customers are confused because they think they can compare the networks like for like. But they can't."

So how close is the “4G” service that U.S. carriers are providing to the real 4G service that is defined by the ITU? Well, keep in mind that the ITU says that the download requirement for 4G is 100Mbps. Verizon claims that its LTE service offers an average download speed somewhere between 6Mbsp and 12Mbsp, and Sprint says that its network download speed comes in somewhere between 3Mbsp and 6Mbsp.

T-Mobile didn’t want to be left out of the 4G game. They were a little a late with their 3G coverage compared to their competitors, but they almost immediately began updating with advanced 3G technology called HSPA+. The upgrades made their service almost as fast as LTE and WiMax in terms of speed. Therefore, last summer T-Mobile began marketing their service as having “4G-like speeds.” By the fall the company dropped the “like” aspect and began referring to their network as a 4G network.

Now instead of stepping in and clarifying, the ITU sent out a press release in early December that simply said that it was okay for the U.S. carriers to call their networks 4G.

"It is recognized that [4G], while undefined, may also be applied to the forerunners of these technologies, LTE and WiMax, and to other evolved 3G technologies providing a substantial level of improvement in performance and capabilities with respect to the initial third-generation systems now deployed," the ITU said in the statement.

This just made everything even more confusing and complicated.

T-Mobile’s CTO Neville Ray justifies calling the company’s HSPA+ network “4G” because he says that it performs just as well or better than the networks that T-Mobile’s competitors are calling 4G.

"Sprint chose to call WiMax 4G first," he said. "And then they chose to charge their customers $10 more for the service, even if some customers aren't in an area where they can get WiMax coverage. So who is misleading customers?"

"Our service performs better than what they are offering," he went on to say. "And HSPA+ and the path this technology is on has the same ability to reach the definitions of 4G as much as LTE and WiMax do."

Warren continues to say that the misuse of the term 4G has just gone too far.
"T-Mobile wasn't the first to cross the line in how they used 4G," he said. "But let's just say it went the furthest. Verizon and Sprint each bent the definition, but T-Mobile stretched the most."

Verizon and Sprint are obviously just as guilty as T-Mobile, but standards experts are saying that those companies’ claims are a little more justifiable, since their technology is at least moving towards the direction of true ITU approved 4G standards.

"Never anywhere on the planet have I ever heard of any version of HSPA being referred to as 4G," said Perry LaForge, the founder, executive director, and chairman of the CDMA Development Group (CDG), a trade association that promotes the use of CDMA cellular technology around the world. "In general, the industry looked at LTE and WiMax as the two 4G approaches. And the ITU was going through the process. Then this marketing stuff cropped up."

Honestly, it’s really just all a big mess. If only the ITU had stepped in when carriers started making 4G claims that weren’t meeting 4G standards, then we wouldn’t be in this situation and there would be a lot less customer confusion.

AT&T Losing iPhone Customers to Verizon

According to data that was released Thursday, January 13 by ChangeWave, approximately 26 percent of current Apple iPhone users that are on AT&T’s plan are planning to switch to Verizon’s iPhone when it is made available in February.

ChangeWave polled 4,050 people a few days before the big announcement that Verizon Wireless made on Tuesday, January 11. They asked those polled that if Verizon were to announce that an iPhone would be made available on their network, would they be switching providers in the next 90 days? Ten percent said that they were planning on switching within 90 days. About 16 percent said that they would be purchasing a Verizon iPhone but not necessarily right away. Among the AT&T users polled, 26 percent said that they would be ditching the AT&T version of the iPhone for the Verizon iPhone.

About 41 percent of those polled, who said that they would be switching from AT&T’s iPhone to Verizon’s, said that they would be making the switch sometime within the next three months. Another 31 percent said that they would be making the switch within the next year.

AT&T users aren’t the only customers that plan on switching service providers though. About 15 percent of T-Mobile users said that they will switch to Verizon for the iPhone, 10 percent of Sprint’s customers also plan on doing this as well, and 4 percent of the existing customers at Verizon said that they will be switching from their current device to the iPhone.

ChangeWave reported that this is the biggest churn rate that has ever been recorded for AT&T. The most prominent reason for AT&T’s customers leaving and choosing the Verizon iPhone is due to poor reception or coverage. A whole 42 percent claimed that this was their reasoning. Another 27 percent said it was because of dropped calls, while 17 percent said their decision was due to the cost.

ChangeWave did report though that AT&T has made improvements in its dropped call history.
"While AT&T continues to struggle in this very important area and trails Verizon by a wide margin, it has made significant advances since our previous survey –improving from its all-time worst 6.0 percent rating last September to 4.7 percent in the current survey," ChangeWave said. "The findings suggest AT&T is now taking concrete steps to try to improve long-standing service issues. But can it do so quickly enough to forestall large-scale defections to Verizon?"

Who knows if consumers are really going to dump AT&T and jump on the Verizon bandwagon, but as data that was released by comScore on Thursday, January 13 suggested, the Verizon iPhone is really a big turning point in the smartphone market.

"The iPhone Verizon deal will no doubt bring even greater competition to the smartphone arena throughout the coming year as Android, iPhone and RIM jockey for the leadership position," Sarah Radwanick, comScore's marketing communications manager, wrote in a blog post.

Radwanick also pointed out Verizon’s smartphone market share that grew from four percent in the last year to 27 percent. Obviously, that’s less than AT&T’s 38 percent market share, but AT&T did drop 7 percent last year due to the abundance of different smartphones that were made available in the last year. Verizon’s numbers really rose mostly because of the strong Android-based devices that the company added to their lineup of smartphones.

In just overall mobile device market share, Verizon has 31 percent, while AT&T has 27 percent.

ComScore also suggested that the iPhone customers that Verizon does end up nabbing will most likely be in customer segments that are attractive to mobile providers. This basically means younger users that come from higher income brackets. Also important to note, iPhone users seem to remain loyal to the iconic Apple smartphone. More than half have subscribed via AT&T for more than three years now, while another 28 percent have had subscriptions for one to three years.

"Although it's too early to tell exactly how consumers will react to the Verizon iPhone announcement, it is fair to say that this deal represents a potentially significant turning point in the ascendance of the smartphone market," Radwanick concluded. "Only time will tell which carriers and platforms will emerge as the market leaders, but it's clear that right now the consumers are winners as they gain yet another option when making their smartphone choice."

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Apple’s Co-Founder is Buying a Verizon iPhone

Lots of people are extremely excited about the announcement that Verizon Wireless made Tuesday, January 11 about featuring the iPhone at their stores and online. Everyone has been waiting for quite some time for Verizon to finally make this announcement. AT&T’s exclusive iPhone contract made things a little difficult, so there were a lot of things that had to be worked around. Fortunately, the wait is now almost over, and you’re not the only one who is excited about the iPhone from Verizon.

When Apple’s co-founder Steve Wozniak was questioned about whether he would be getting the Verizon iPhone at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View on Jan. 11 after the announcement was made by Verizon, he responded, “A VeriPhone? Of Course.”

"I'm definitely going to get one," Wozniak said. "I always have at least one Verizon phone on me at all times, just in case I'm in one of those bad areas. You can find those areas where Verizon doesn't work and AT&T does, but in truth, it's usually the opposite."

"And I also love the mobile hotspot," Wozniak added. "I hope it's the standard $30 a month. I wish it was free like the Palm Pre because that made the Pre a cheaper Mi-Fi. Anyway, so I'm expecting that it's no big new iPhone, not even a new color. It's just going to be on the Verizon network."

The Verizon iPhone has been rumored for years, and the rumors have escalated and really started flying around in the past few months. Well, Verizon has finally officially launched the Verizon iPhone. Verizon says that they will offer a CDMA EVDO version of the iPhone 4 as of February 10. Any exsisting Verizon customers will be able to pre-order the smartphone as early as February 3. The 16GB iPhone will cost customers $199 with a two-year contract, and the 32GB iPhone will cost $299 with a two-year contract.

Wozinak went on saying, “I'm actually playing games in my head about which phones I want to keep. I actually want to keep at least one Android phone."

All this talk about the multiple phones that Wozinak has had me wondering exactly how many phones the guy has.

"I came to the conclusion last night that I'll have three activated AT&T iPhones, so if the battery runs down I have a spare," Wozniak said. "And I'm in Europe a lot of times, so maybe one of them will be Verizon, one of them will be AT&T. So I'll have two AT&T, one AT&T with the international plan, and one Verizon if I need it. Although the tethering's only to a computer. Although maybe I can give one number up and give it to Verizon. And I'll keep the Droid X. And I'll probably give up the Palm Pre because I now have another Mi-Fi."

Wozinak also added, though, that data plans are always an issue.

"I have those grandfathered [data] plans," Wozniak added. "I love those grandfathered plans, but you have to watch them [carriers] like a hawk."

I’m so excited that Verizon has finally worked things out so that they can carry the Apple iPhone. We’ve all been waiting for a very long time, but now we finally have an end date to the wait. I think we can all definitely make it until February. Many people suspected that the “event” that Verizon was holding in New York on Januray 11 had to do with the announcement of a Verizon iPhone, and all of those people were correct. I’m glad the cat is finally out of the bag, and everyone can start making their plans concerning Verizon’s iPhone.

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Apple's iPhone is Still Going Strong

Apple’s iPhone is arguably one of the most successful companies of our time, and if you don’t agree with that statement, than you can’t argue with the fact that in the past few years the company has been incredibly successful. The iPhone is one of the factors that add a good bit to Apple’s success story. The iPhone revolutionized the smartphone industry and continues to do so. Many would say that it is the most popular and coveted phone right now. Well, according to DigiTimes, Apple must feel that their success will continue with the phone.

On Monday, December 27, the popular Taiwanese publication DigiTimes claimed that Taiwan-based suppliers could confirm that Apple was planning to increase its global shipment of iPhones for the first quarter of 2011. They seem to be planning on increasing the number of units from 19 million to 20 or 21 million.

It has been reported that Apple’s supplier Foxconn is shipping out between 14 and 15 million WDCMA iPhones, which is up from 13 million. It is also said that Foxconn and Pegatron are going to be shipping out 5 to 6 million CDMA iPhones. It is expected that these devices will be released in Asian Pacific and the United States (on Verizon’s network) in early 2011. A rumor is flying around that China and the U.S. will be the first countries to offer a CDMA compatible iPhone.

There have been rumors about Verizon carrying an iPhone for quite some time now, but the Wall Street Journal seemed to hint in October at the idea that Apple planned to introduce a Verizon version of the iPhone sometime in early 2011.

According to JP Morgan analyst Mark Moskowitz, if Verizon were to launch some type of version of the iPhone, there is a potential for Verizon’s stock to add at least $1.25 in incremental earnings per share annually.

For the fourth quarter, it is expected that global iPhone shipments are going to come in somewhere around 15.5 million. For the entire year, it is predicted that Apple’s total iPhone shipments are going to be close to 47 million.

Ticonderoga Securities analyst Brian White said that his firm was forecasting iPhone sales to reach 13.3 million in the first quarter of 2011, and those numbers do not include what sales would be if Verizon were to release a version of the iPhone.

White wrote that if the number of CDMA iPhones that Digitimes claims to be shipping are correct, "these are big numbers and directly point to the growing popularity of the iPhone around the world in our view and the potential for a healthy upside to our earnings estimates.”

White said that during a trip to China, he noticed that the demand for iPhones definitely seemed to exceed the supplies that the country was receiving, as the exclusive official carrier of the iPhone, China Unicom, still seems to struggle to meet the demand for the iPhone 4. "For example, we indicated that the iPhone 4 was sold out for two months at authorized Apple resellers, Apple stores and China Unicom," he said. "We also mentioned that China Unicom was unable to fulfill approximately one-third of the iPhone 4 orders due to shortages." He said that China is still “in the early stages of catching ‘Apple Fever.’”

Earlier this month, Shaw Wu, one of Kaufman Bros. analysts, predicted that Apple would sell more than 62 million iPhones in 2011. This prediction did include Verizon contributing 2 to 3 million units in the U.S. per quarter or 8 to 12 million annually. Another analyst, Gene Munster, from Piper Jaffray said that Apple could sell another 2.5 additional iPhones next year if they add Verizon Wireless as a service provider.

iPhone sales are doing incredibly well, and it looks as though the sales will only continue to do well. Analysts are predicting that the first quarter of 2011 should be extremely successful. If Verizon can secure a version of the iPhone, I think that sales numbers will skyrocket. I know so many different people who prefer the iPhone to the Droid, but since they like Verizon Wireless service much better than AT&T, they settle with the Droid or some other smartphone offered by Verizon. If Verizon offered the iPhone, Apple would be sure to increase their iPhone sales by a good amount. The Wall Street Journal seems to think that Verizon should have some version of the iPhone early in 2011. I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.

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New App Store for the Droid Incredible

On Thursday, November 4th, Verizon announced that their new Droid Incredible software update, which will be available within the next week, will add the V CAST App store to the phone. Basically, Droid Incredible users, who are currently utilizing Android Market for their apps, will have a second app store to browse.

Due to this new change, app developers will now have to decide whether they want to offer their apps with Android Market or the Verizon app store. The only real difference is the billing format. Unlike Google’s app store, which allows users to return their apps for a full refund up to 24 hours after the purchase, Verizon’s V CAST will only consider refunds on a case-by-case basis. One nice thing about the Verizon store though is that it will allow users to send the bill for the apps that they purchase to their existing wireless bill. With the Android Market, users are forced to utilize Google Checkout.

The update that Droid Incredible users will receive next week won’t just give them a new app store, but it will also update their Flash player, improve their visual voicemail application, enhance Yahoo IMAP email, update their Slacker application, give them the ability to attach files that are larger than 5 MB, update COX and Comcast POP3 mail, and a variety of other things.

The V CAST App store was originally launched by Verizon in July of 2009 for the RIM platform. A Verizon spokeswoman said that the company has always planned on expanding the V CAST App store to other platforms. “We think of it as sort of complementary to the other marketplace out there,” she said. "It gives consumers an opportunity for discovery and to choose.”

So far Google representatives have chosen not to respond to the question as to whether or not they view the Verizon app store as complimentary or competitive.

In contrast, Apple offers a single app store. Steve Jobs, chief executive at Apple, has said that Google’s OS itself is “very fragmented.” In an October conference call Jobs said, “Many Android OEMs, including the two largest, HTC and Motorola, install proprietary user interfaces to differentiate themselves from the commodity Android experience. The user's left to figure it all out. Compare this with iPhone, where every handset works the same."

Jobs added, “The multiple hardware/software iterations present developers with a daunting challenge. Many Android apps work only on selected Android handsets, running selected Android versions. And this is for handsets that have been shipped less than 12 months ago. Compare this with iPhone, where there are two versions of the software, the current and the most recent predecessor, to test against."

I think that having two app stores is great. A little competition has never hurt anybody. Verizon says that they are excited about the V CAST App store because it will allow them to have “the opportunity to do marketing and merchandising” for the developers. The Verizon spokeswoman did add that Verizon will offer the same 70/30 revenue split with V CAST that Google offers with Android Market. It will be interesting to see what V CAST has to offer in contrast to what is currently available with Android Market. I think that there are advantages and disadvantages with both of the app stores, so I guess it will simply come down to what apps you are looking for and which store is offering them.

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Top 10 Touch-Screen Phones

These days, everything is going in the touch-screen direction. High-quality touch screens can be found on PCs, tablets, phones, GPS systems, digital cameras, and a variety of other different devices. By now, touch-screen interface has almost become mainstream.

The original iPhone that was released in 2007 is the device that sparked the touch-screen revolution. Consumers were fascinated by the beautiful 3.5-inch Multi-Touch screen found on the iPhone. Since then, every major phone manufacturer has come up with their own touch-screen smartphone. Some of the companies have succeeded, but others have failed miserably.

Three years after the release of the first touch-screen smartphone, there are plenty of phones that could make the top ten touch-screen phones list. Every one of the major U.S. carriers have at least one very successful touch-screen smartphone. If you’re looking for an amazing smartphone, here is a list of the best of the best.

AT&T

iPhone 4
The iPhone 4 has the most gorgeous touch-screen of any smartphone in my opinion. It also features a fantastic camera and the fastest iPhone processor yet. Apple’s app store has the greatest variety of apps that offer you anything you could need in a phone. Unfortunately with the iPhone 4, Apple has still not made voice calling top priority, which can be frustrating.

iPhone 3GS
Yes, the iPhone 3GS is not as fast as the iPhone 4, but it is still a great phone. This affordable smartphone features access to the thousands of apps that are also available for the iPhone 4, but you can get them for half the price for your iPhone 3GS. The iPhone 3GS is still a very popular smartphone that has all of the features you look for in an iPhone.

Samsung Captivate
The Captivate is perfect for AT&T users who simply do not like the iPhone. It is a fantastic smartphone that features a very fast processor, bright screen, amazing social networking hooks, and the ability to sync your phone with PCs.

Verizon Wireless

Droid Incredible by HTC
This smartphone has a great screen and lots of power. Droid phones are the iPhone’s biggest competitor. The Incredible truly is incredible. It has beautiful interface additions and good strong call quality.

Samsung Fascinate
For Verizon customers that aren’t really interested in a Droid smartphone, the Fascinate could be just what you are looking for. It has a gorgeous screen and is very light and slim. The Fascinate also features a fast processor and a loud speakerphone. One of the biggest disappointments with this smartphone is that it has very inaccurate voice dialing.

Motorola Droid X
The Motorola Droid X is the most powerful Android smartphone to date. It features a large 4.3-inch, 854 x 480 resolution screen that gives you tons of room to maneuver your finger around the screen. The smartphone has excellent reception and fantastic noise cancellation. The only thing to criticize is the size. Some people simply think the screen is too large.

Sprint

HTC EVO 4G
If you’re looking for a smartphone that is dedicated to providing great online access, the EVO is perfect for you. It is the first WiMAX phone to be offered in the U.S. It is perfect for streaming media, Web browsing, and getting your laptop online with Sprint’s 4G network.

Samsung Instinct HD
The Instinct HD is the first phone in the U.S. to be a true high-def video phone. It can easily record and display sharp HD video and features lots of great media features. Some of the issues are that it's expensive, takes a long time to boot up, and has a very poor battery life.

T-Mobile

Samsung Vibrant
This is T-Mobile’s super smartphone. It has a very bright screen, PC syncing options, great camera, and a free full version of Sims 3. This phone offers a lot of power and a relatively inexpensive monthly plan. Unfortunately, the phone does not support Bluetooth voice dialing or tethering, but it is still an excellent smartphone.

Samsung Highlight SGH-t749
The Highlight SGH-t749 from Samsung features a very responsive touch-screen and TouchWiz UI that is extremely easy to use. It also features great battery life. If T-Mobile customers are looking for an touch-screen smartphone that is straightforward and simple to use, the Highlight is the phone for them.

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Apple’s iPad Available from Verizon?

Unfortunately, despite all the rumors, Verizon Wireless will not be carrying the iPhone anytime soon, but they will be offering something else from Apple. As of October 28, over 2,000 Verizon stores across the nation will be carrying Apple’s iPad.

Now this statement may cause you to question how this is possible. Doesn’t Apple have a completely exclusive contract with AT&T? Hasn’t Verizon been attempting to get an Apple product as part of their line for a while now and been totally unsuccessful? Well, with the iPad the company has been able to pull a few strings.

The trick is that Verizon will not be selling the iPad (Wi-Fi + 3G). This is the version of the device that runs on AT&T’s 3G network. They will instead be providing the Wi-Fi only iPad that will run on Verizon’s MiFi 2200 Intelligent Mobile Hotspot.

There will be three different bundles that Verizon will offer to customers: a 16GB iPad with MiFi for $629.99, a 32GB with MiFi for $729.99, and a 64GB iPad with MiFi for $829.99. Verizon will only offer one data plan for the iPad: up to 1GB of data for $20 per month.

It’s no surprise that AT&T announced recently that they will be selling Apple’s WiFi + 3G iPad in their retail stores as of October 28 as well.

The bundle prices that Verizon will offer will be about the same as AT&T’s 3G packages, but with AT&T there will be the option of two different data plans. You can either get up to 250MB of data per month for $14.95 or up to 2GB of data per month for $25.

So which carrier should you consider purchasing your iPad from? Well, the up side to getting your device from Verizon is the convenient versatility of their MiFi 2200 Intelligent Mobile Hotspot. Verizon’s MiFi provides Internet access for up to five different devices ranging from 30 to 40 feet away. Unfortunately with MiFi you have to carry it around with you. It is very small though, measuring about 3.5 x 2.3 x 0.4 inches.

Battery life is another thing that you must take into consideration. When you have other devices connected, the life can be drained very quickly. Some testing revealed that when four other Wi-Fi connections were made, the battery dropped to one single bar in about an hour or so. In about an hour and a half, the battery was almost completely drained. On the other hand, AT&T’s iPad with Wi-Fi + 3G was able to last about eight hours, while having the 3G modem running constantly.

Where you decide to buy your iPad is entirely up to you. There are advantages with both of the carriers. No matter what, I just think that it is great to see an Apple product made available from Verizon. It may still be awhile before we see the iPhone, but the fact that they are now providing the iPad is definitely a step in the right direction.

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