STi New Features, Phones

After a nearly 16-minute call with a STi rep (my phone timer said 15:58 or 15:59, don't remember quite how long but it was just a tad under it), I found out several things...

1. They are rolling out text messaging as a test in certain markets. Right now it is free. The call before this a rep had actually turned on SMS for my account so...whopeeee! :) My AIM screen name, which I have now linked to my phone pretty much is...never mind...I don't like spim (spam IMs) ;)

2.Text messaging, along with web, call waiting and 3-way calling, should be out in 30, or at most 45 days. For the first, that means everybody will start having to pay for it :( but the guy said the rates should be the best in the industry, and with what I've seen so far from STi I'm inclined to believe him.

Web will I'm guessing cost something too, but I don't know how they'll charge (by minute, by kilobyte or by time period, as in day or month, or a VirginMobile-like hybrid of the latter). Call waiting and 3-way calling are probably going to cost just the same as everybody else's (airtime for both calls and suchlike) so no biggie there. Now, if they'll only get call forwarding... ;)

3. New phones will be coming out about the time the LG (PM) 225 cameraphone will ship (the 21st he said). I'm thinking this last comment is why I\anyone hasn't seen the 225 on CheapPhoneCards, or anywhere except for on CheapPhoneCards, yet. Probably when the 225 gets shipped, at the very lest these other two phones will come online with CheapPhoneCards, with the good possibiloty that the cameraphone will too.

One is the Samsung SPH-N400, a unique flip-up (not quite flip, not quite bar either) phone. The phone has OK reviews and seems to have a pretty good feature set, but the phone's software looks a little on the shaky side. But for an interesting way to get a "flip" phone with a color "external" display this phone is just plain perfect. I expect to see it like the A460 is now, a rebadged, refurbed, second-tier phone available for a relatively low price ($50 maybe) with the purchase of a $25 card and with no rebate.

Samsung N200 (as STi calls it) on PhoneScoop

The other phone that they're going to introduce is the Sanyo SCP-200, aka Sanyo 200 on STi's website when they pit it on there or Sanyo Voice Phone 200 on Sprint's site. It looks like the type of phone to eventually replace the LG 5225 as the carrier's Free-After-Rebate phone. The big thing about this phone is that it's a Voice Phone, as in it can't access the internet through PCS Vision at all. But it can still do text messaging and works terriffically as a phone or so the PhoneScoop reviews seem to say. Of course Sanyos are the phone of choice for Sprint PCS because they are the carrier's reception kings as far as phones go. The Sanyo also has a nice big speakerphone grill on the outside of the flip (no display though :( ) which means that yes, you get a first-rate handsfree phone in the package. I still don't like the absence of an outer display, the fact that the inside display isn't the huge screen that the Sanyos in my opinion are famous for (it looks to be the size of my 3560's) and that it doesn't have web. But for those who need a phone, this is it :).

Sanyo 200 on PhoneScoop

Oh, one more thing. Sprint has lowred the LG PM-225's price to $40 after specials. STi lost one bragging right but is still pretty darn cheap with their phones.