 Review by SSidlov 
UPDATED: 1.6 years ago
member for 8.4 years, 1284 visits, last login: 1 days ago
 Pompton Lakes,Passaic,NJ
 $95 per month (24 month contract)
 about 21 days
 "GSM means you don't need to buy phone from Cingular"
 "GSM makes your other electronic devices have odd sounds"
 "generally good coverage, reasonable internet service"
| Pre Sales Information:
Install process:
Connection reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
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The Best Thing about GSM service is that you are not required to purchase your phone from Cingular. GSM is worldwide, and you can buy any damned phone that you please from any seller around the world. There are tons of sellers for new Razor phones with sync software, a case/holder and cables included. Even the issue of locked or unlocked phones is not a problem, as I talked to one CSR at Cingular who said that they had all the codes on file to unlock any phone that a customer purchased, and would do so for any customer who purchased a phone and wanted Cingular service. This makes it possible to purchase a phone that has functions that you are in need of rather than just what the carrier wants you to have. Cingular is on some sort of kick that only PDA type phones can have address storage for contacts, and calendar functions that go beyond the very simple. If you need a device that can sub as a PDA without needing Word, it may pay to look carefully at the manuals of alternate GSM phones not offered by Cingular.
I started a decade ago with ATT Wireless and though the buyout became a Cingular customer. Recently, my wife and I both had different plans with ATT. We decided that we wanted to take advantage of the supposed $9.95/mo additional line so that we could give a cell phone to our 15 yr old. To get the third phone, my wife and I were forced to 'update' our service from rather low monthly plans that were grandfathered to 'modern' Cingular accounts. We chose the '500 minutes family plan with rollover.' We had to wait a week to order the third phone since the CSRs were not capable with their computer systems in adding a third phone to the plan at the same time. This caused some additional charges, as when we 'upgraded' our own phones, they waived the activation fees ($18 each phone). I had to wait until the bill came to get them to remove the activation fee from the third phone. Like many people we chose to get the ‘featured’ phones. Two Samsung D357’s with Bluetooth and high speed EDGE for the price of one and a $50 rebate. This did not work out as the D357 is a crummy phone for more than just phone calls. See my review at CNET Samsung_SGH_D357 »reviews.cnet.com/Samsung_SGH_D35···ag=uolst I ended up exchanging my phone after three weeks with a bit of hassle on the part of the Cingular people. They wanted me to send them the phone first and then they would send me the new Siemens’ S66 which had the functions that I wanted, I demurred and told them to send me the phone first, and then I would send the Samsung back. Giving them a CC to charge for the S66 (which was free on the web page) if I didn’t return to the D357 made that work. In the end they credited me the full price of the two SGH D357s. So I ended up with one for free.
Additionally, Cingular in January, when we changed plans was offering free internet access for a month. I downloaded all of Siemens’ phone games, themes, ringtones, and firmware updates. So, we all played with our phones and our next bill had $40 in extra billing charges. My highschooler's friends did not understand that the phone did not come with a messaging plan -- we had additional costs for that too, but have added a messaging plan to that phone. If I need to message it, I use a computer and Cingular's web site to send it. The internet fees were also removed from the bill by a call to the CSR. There was no problem with removing the $70 or so additional charges on the first month’s billing; the CSR was professional and non-argumentative about the additional fees. I suspect it’s common.
Rebates: The Sony and the Samsung came with rebates in the form of VISA Rewards cards. We got the cards after two months. $100 and $50 rebates.
[Now, as an aside, in NJ, it is illegal for children to bring electronic communication devices such as cell phone and pagers to school K-12. N.J. STAT. ANN. 2C:33-19 This is some sort of preventive tactic for preventing drug deals. Since school shootings, et al, this is largely ignored especially in suburban communities, but the schools in my town have a no tolerance policy on phone calls, etc and will confiscate the phones if used during school. No camera phones are allowed on away trips, either.]
Cingular has been treating the former ATT customers as second rate customers since the merger. They never integrated the web pages and services. Internet services have lagged and became increasingly unusable as Cingular changed the underlying web sites from plain WAP sites to those with newer and prettier faces. The older phones' browsers were increasingly outdated. Full support for the minority brands of phones was (is) reduced. Phones that are perfectly capable of the 'latest and greatest' services are refused access to them. My S66 is fully JAVA capable, but I am denied access to Cingular's additional for pay; JAVA based services, such as MapQuest and My-Cast Weather. My phone plays the same mpg movies that the Samsung takes, but it’s not allowed video services. My-Cast has a perfectly good WAP version of its service (along with a JAVA application,) I am denied access to that. Only TWC is allowed and its radar service is not as localized as the My-Cast service is. If this is by design or negligence is not known, I understand from CSR people that Cingular's web services are under 'reconstruction' and will be updated in the next few months -- I suppose when they change the name back to ATT Wireless.
Since I first wrote this 9 mos ago, Cingular has not updated the support for my phone the S66, but instead, I've added a MYCAST weather subscription service to the phone myself, along with installing "Google Local" and Opera Mini browser (v3) to my phone as applications. I love Google Local, and while the business information (e.g. pizza inmyzipcode) may not list all 25 pizza parlors within 5 miles, it lists most of them. Goggle on the non-EDGE S66 takes 3-5 seconds to refresh. Opera works much better than the included MediaNet browser..... MyCast is a great weather service which shows weather alerts and radar that actually has meaning to you as an indivdual. TWC's radar shows regional radar, MyCast shows very local radar and allows zoom functions and if much more 'real time' (5 minutes) than TWC IMHE. I don't know if the animated color java $9/mo subscription is for you, but the $1.99/mo color static maps work fine. You can setup a list of cities you are interested in, and get a 'weather alert' when there is 'sever weather' aka, thunderstorms, flood alerts, tornado, etc. for those cities.
Web services from ATT had always been by the kilobyte charge of a penny. 5mb and 10mb plans have always been available and an all-you-can-eat data plan in the $60-80 range*. I have had four internet capable phones, a Mitsubishi, 2 Siemens (S46, S66) and a Samsung (D357), a Sony-Ericson W600i was purchased for my highschooler. Except for the Samsung, all these phones have been 'modem' ready, meaning that you could use them as a modem connected to your laptop and use the TDMA/GSM portion of the network to act as a connection to an ISP. The two Siemens, have also had the capability of passing you directly to the data portion of the ATT/Cingular service and using the GPRS portion. The difference? as a modem, you are clocked against your minutes, as GPRS or EDGE service it's kilobytes. On the older S46 it was a 28.8 modem, and on the S66 it’s a v56, I believe. Once I had to download a PDF file that I needed to review for the next day. I couldn't connect to my 'national ISP' via the phone and used the GPRS connection. I was billed $45 extra for my 5mb download. Cingular’s preference is to have the phones configured to GPRS or EDGE since they require additional charges.
**Since this time, there are now media bundles which claim to offer unlimited MediaNet access for as low as $19/mo including 200 SMS/MMS messages.
The Siemens S66 was introduced in late 2004, and the Samsung 4Q2005 and are fairly new phones. The S66 is much more flexible and allows a owner to have complete access to the storage. Like the S46, Siemens provides software to sync it to Outlook or Lotus Notes and they have a full calendar appointment function. The SE W600i also comes with the software to sync it up with Office and has the full 'PDA' type functions, including address information. (As one of the “walkman” phones’ its 256mb storage can be allocated to playing MP3 files.) Additionally, the Sony came with a full set of cables including USB, and has IR and Bluetooth which works very well. The S66 also has IR and Bluetooth which works well. Both display full Bluetooth functions including SYNC. The Samsung comes with no cables or software to sync. Bluetooth functions are limited to object push/echange, voice/headset.
Siemens and Sony's phone support sites both allow you to select or configure the type of email carrier that you have, such as Optonline (was preconfigured by Siemens) or Yahoo and many others on their web sites and they will send a MMS message to the phone with the configuration parameters so that you can receive email. Cingular's MediaNet Messaging will allow you to access preconfigured MSN, AOL, Yahoo mail. You may also have pre-configured ALLTEL, NetZero, Mindspring, BellSouth, among others on the 'add additional' or 'add other email' function. Cingular service also includes the ability to have a Cingular "MediaNet” email account that is accessible on your phone. ATT had its old attmobile.com email addresses. Email is counted against your data (GPRS/EDGE) service contract.
Cingular has been dictating how the phones should be setup. It appears from discussion with Samsung techs as to why a 1,000 phone number phone wouldn’t have address storage was that Cingular wanted it that way. This may explain why the Moto Razor v3 from Cingular, doesn’t appear to have that either. Cingular does offer via its internet connection the ability to store contact information, but then you have to pay (or have a more expensive plan) to access that information.
With all three brands of phone (Siemens, Samsung, Sony) pressing down on the rocker switch will turn on the Browser function. Right press will access the IM function, move UP and you get Text Message. Cingular’s MediaNet Mall is another internet site that is accessible from the rocker switch. This is inconvenient IMHO as it allows for accidental access when you don't want it. SMS/MMS messages are more controllable as you don't get charged until you actually send something. Not configuring the IM may be the only way to not access that service and the data charges the go with it, accidentally.
IM users may be the only ones who might benefit from the PTT functions that Cingular is now pushing. The Samsung we have does have PTT but the $19/mo per PHONE charge is excessive and you can't access anyone without the same PTT function. When calls between Cingular customer phones are free, and most phones have conference call capability to talk to two or more people at a time why would you spend as an example in my case, $60/mo extra for this service? I don't even understand texting between family members on the same system, except when you need to leave a short clear message that doesn't need a reply. I was recently with friends waiting for our kids in the parking lot, and their kid was texting them about where he was in relation to the car......
Followup comments:  
DD43206
@wideopenwest.com
| I agree in some aspects... I do agree that the D357 needs some work, but maybe that's why it's now the D407? With almost every other wireless company integrating PTT service, Cingular/ATT was the country's largest provider, but they could not deliver. Cingular/ATT worked for years on developing the most advanced/full featured PTT Radio network. Their PTT service by-far out-performs Nextel/Sprint, Verizon and all others. The audio quality is tremendous, the features, such as Group Calls - Convert to cellular - PTT/Call Notification and Request - Iconicized Availability Notification (that's a great one) - No Special PTT Number (just your cell number) - and many more! The one downfall is the time it takes to connect on the PTT Server, but who cares about an extra 5 seconds when you get the most up to date and best performing PTT service available? Anyways, back to where I was going in the first place, the D357... With all that said about the PTT service, they needed phones capable of working with their new PTT service. Their system was so advanced, I think Samsung and LG both fealt pressured, and maybe a little intimidated; they wanted the phone's PTT service to work without flaw, so they concentrated their designs around that and maybe slacked off (well did slack off) on a few other features. Hey people, it's a new thing, and we all know that everything NEW has flaws; it's a given with modern technology! It's not all Cingular's fault, they didn't make the phone, Samsung did. I love how everyone is so anxious to blame the service provider and not the manufacturer! It happens every day, with almost every product; especially technical or mechanical products. Well, that's my two cents worth on that subject -- feel free to agree or to disagree.
BTW, everyone that says, "There is no way to SYNC data from the D357 with Outlook," think again... I purchased a $20 IOGear USB to Bluetooth adapter at Wal-Mart and downloaded a copy of Samsung's PC Studio 3; it works like a charm! All my contacts are synchronized between my phone (D357) and Outlook, it even knows that the phone can't hold addresses, and skips that automatically! It also includes an MP3/Ringtone editor, a picture editor and a Phone Browser so you can transfer sounds and pictures and other files back and forth between the phone and your computer! Just because the phone didn't come with this software, doesn't mean it's not out there! Please people, I can remember the days when phones never came with software, and the software/cable (Data) packages cost an additional $50-$100! We didn't gripe then, why gripe now, not everything is always going to be handed to us on silver platters. | |
|  | | njvictor
join:2007-08-13
Brick, NJ
 ·Cablevision
 ·Cingular Wireless
|  AT&T THE MOST DROPPED CALLS in NJ
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