Keeping Unlimited Data, Getting a New Phone

A few weeks ago, Verizon Wireless announced a radically different pricing plan which goes into effect June 28th, 2012. In this post, I'll profile our family situation, walk through the analysis of staying with our current plan, and discuss my new phone selection.

We have been on an older Family Share 700 plan which runs just under $120/month for my smartphone, two basic phones, and unlimited data on the smartphone. This includes a discount through my employer of about $12/month. Thus the full charge for the plan is about $130/month. We have typically added our daughters to our plan with a basic phone for $9.99 a month. My youngest daughter just got her license this week. No one else in the family wants a smartphone just now, but I could see us needing more minutes or shared data if the girls want a smart phone when they go to college. My oldest daughter will start college in fall of 2013.

The new plan essentially would change the following for us:

• Talk time and text is unlimited (vs limited now, but we go over our minutes maybe once a year)
• Data costs are tiered (vs unlimited now)
• Data is sharable (vs unshareable now)
• Devices such as laptops and tablets can be tethered to the phone (vs not available now)
• To keep unlimited data in the future, customer pays full list price for the phone.

The lowest cost a basic phone can be added to a new plan is $30/month, so my younger daughter keeps her TracFone and won't be joining us on Verizon.

As noted in previous posts, I have been holding out for the rumored Samsung Galaxy Journal which is the Verizon version of the Galaxy Note on AT&T. Two things I like about the Note are the S Pen (stylus) and the 5.3 inch 1280 x 800 resolution display. 

My current phone is an original Motorola Droid which has not been performing as well on newer apps with its slow (500 MHz) single core processor and limited (500 MB) of RAM. While it still gets through the day on a single charge, battery life will become an issue over the next year or so. It runs Android 2.3.

So against that backdrop, what if I just wait for the Galaxy Note which may or may not move from rumor to product?

If I pay full price list price for the phone and keep my unlimited data, I will pay about $500 more than the subsidized price and may need to change plans in a year anyways if a new collegiate opts for a smartphone. That $500 over 12 months is $41/month.

If I switch plans now with my 2 GB or less monthly data usage, our three phone plan costs us each month

$40 smartphone + (2 x $30 basic phone) + $60 data + $30? taxes & fees = $190/month.

So with the new pricing, our monthly bill would go up $30 to $60 per month. We don't need the unlimited talk minutes or text messages. The tethering would be nice, but isn't essential.

So what if a basic phone is upgraded to a smartphone? Under the current plan, the cost would go up by $30/month for the data and the minutes would still be shared. In the new plan, assuming an extra 2 GB were needed, the cost goes up $10/month for the smart phone and $10/month for the added 2 GB of data. Thus the more smart phones, tablets, and devices on the plan, the better the new plan looks.

Thus, sticking with my current plan is cheaper for our current use patterns and will be re-evaluated when someone wants a smartphone.

Given the age of my current phone, I wanted to upgrade while I could still retain unlimited data AND pay the subsidized price on the phone. I researched a number of phones including

• HTC Rezound
• Motorola Droid RAZR and Motorloa Droid RAZR MAXX
• Samsung Galaxy Nexus
• Samsung Galaxy S III

And the winner is....Samsung Galaxy S III 32 GB in Blue. Features that I liked included

• Quad core processor
• 2 GB of RAM
• 1280 x 720 4.8 inch Super AMOLED display
• 2100 mAhr battery (4G LTE takes more power than 3G. Earlier 4G phones have smaller batteries.)
• 8 MB camera
• Samsung
• Android 4.0
• C Pen which could give me much of what I'm looking for from the S Pen on the Note

I've started looking at accessories. The C pen I've mentioned. Cases are important. When I get this phone, the plan is to retire the failing Palm Tungsten E2 which is been in my front left pocket for many years and the Droid which has been on my right hip for over two years. The case(s) I select may depend on where I will carry my phone. I suspect that a larger phone on my hip may get bumped or caught on more things than my 3.5 inch phone, but it is a very clean and convenient place to carry a phone. The S III is about the size of my current Tungsten case. Right now I am leaning slightly towards a Commuter series case from OtterBox. 

While I'm not planning to buy one at this time, there is a class of phone and tablet back-up batteries which send power to the device via the USB port. Getting one of these general purpose devices makes a lot more sense than buying a second device-specific battery.

My new phone is scheduled to ship July 11th. I worked with Andrew at the 19th Avenue North Verizon store and found him good to work with.

Technology Reflections During the Transit of Venus

Am watching coverage of the transit, the last of my lifetime, as observed at the Mount Mauna Kea observatory in Hawaii and streamed to our iPad via nasa.gov.

At the last Venus transit in 2004, I had found a quote from William Harkness, the director of the US Naval Observatory in 1882:

‎"We are now on the eve of the second transit of a pair, after which there will be no other till the twenty-first century of our era has dawned upon the earth, and the June flowers are blooming in 2004. When the last transit season occurred the intellectual world was awakening from the slumber of ages, and that wondrous scientific activity which has led to our present advanced knowledge was just beginning. What will be the state of science when the next transit season arrives God only knows. Not even our children's children will live to take part in the astronomy of that day. As for ourselves, we have to do with the present ..." William Harkness, the Director of the U.S. Naval Observatory, 1882


Back in 2004, I had intentionally gone out to our garden and taken pictures of my daughters with the June blooms.

I had also reflected on the technology of the 1882. The telegraph was the main long distance communication means at the time. The telephone was 6 years old, Edison's light bulb less than 2 years. Motion picture cameras were just being developed. The electric car had been shown the year before but a car with a petroleum-powered engine was still 3 years off. Harkness would not live to see an airplane or listen to a voice on radio.

This evening I started watching the streaming coverage at work and then was going to watch it on my Android smartphone while walking home. 3G data speed wasn't good enough. When I got home, I grabbed the iPad and streamed the coverage to that device over our home wi-fi from the DSL broadband. One, two, three, four, five technology changes in our home technology since 2004.

What other technologies have changed? Analog broadcast TV went away. We've gotten some flat screen TVs as our old cathode ray tube units have failed. Star Trek is available 24/7 streaming from Netflix. Our computers have multi-core processors. Our cars have navigation systems built in or from our Garmin or from  my smartphone.

The girls in the photo have grown into young women and I'm seriously middle aged. I won't speak for my wife ;-)

The next transit of Venus is in 2117. Unless people start living well past 100, it will be my elderly grandchildren and their offspring that may witness the event. I wish them God's grace and blessing. I would also wish them fine June blooms except that it will be December.