greyraven40

I've been a loyal sprint customer for 12 years. My wife and I have had the Epic 4G since it's realase. I was pleased with it for thr mostpart, especially after I rooted it.

I am wondering on input on what to do next. Both of are phones are having hardware issues and I'm not going to pay the $100 deductible to have them replaced with a refurb.

I've never understood the risks of buying your own online to avoid a contract. I don't see much reason to leave sprint but I will seek out incentives they have to keep me on board. I'm not interested in an Iphone.
My biggest problem is I feel like I have to have a physical keyboard and options seem limited. Any thoughts on this would be so greatly appreciated.
thanks,
grey

Crashdamage

T-Mobile has the Samsung Galaxy S Relay 4G, very nice phone with a physical keyboard and a long name.

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Registered Linux user #266531 Android since v1.0

Rush

Unfortunately, Sprint's top notch phones don't have a physical keyboard. It will be hard finding one of these awesome phones which has a physical keyboard.

I guess nowadays people love having the option of using different kinds of keyboards.

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SEMIJim

Gotcha beat by a year or two

Can't imagine why you'd do that, when, for little more than that you can have new devices.

Do you mean what the risks are or why people feel there are risks?

If you buy your own phone you can carry on w/o renewing your two-year lock-in, but, unless it's an unlocked world phone, you won't be able to take it with you anywhere, except maybe a Sprint MVNO, anyway, so I do not see the point.

Same with Verizon Wireless.

T-Mobile and "AT&T" (I believe), however, give you plan reductions for Bring(ing) Your Own Device (BYOD). And, with the right phone, you can even move back-and-forth between them. They're GSM, so they're world phones, by default, and T-Mobile, at least, has a relatively liberal unlocking policy.

If they're serving you well, then I would not see any reason, either.

Yeah, it seems Sprint's device selection is pretty limited, these days. I don't have an answer for you. They have the new Motorola Photon Q, but that hasn't actually been getting rave reviews. It's essentially the 8-month-old Photon with a sliding keyboard added, the GSM SIM slot removed and the battery made non-removable, near as I can tell.

Jim

Rxpert83

I think after a few days you'll get used to not having a physical keyboard.

None of the high end devices on sprint have one unfortunately

Timanator

The new iPhone 5 looks great, not sold on the Samsung G3 or the HTC Evo LTE from what I have seen.

Citizen Coyote

Let me ask what it is about the physical keyboard you love so much. Have you tried some of the keyboard replacements out there such as Swype and SwiftKey? The stock Android keyboard on Gingerbread is pretty bad, but alternatives do exist. Before sticking yourself with another keyboard phone, try out alternative on-screen keyboards. You may find you like one better, and thus your options will open up.

That said, the Photon Q would be an upgrade for you if you must have a slider and don't want to switch carriers. Don't buy it from Sprint, though... I'm sure you can find it cheaper online.

3vodroid

I was the same way. I always had physical keyboard phones for years. When it was time to get rid of the Samsung moment I chose to ditch the keyboard. But I didn't know how I would feel about it. I'm so happy I did. The touch screens nowadays are really impressive. Phones with physical keyboards are really limited as far as cases, And sometimes the overall build quality just isn't as good. They are thicker heavier etc. If you plan on sticking with sprint I would suggest the HTC evo 4g lte. If your not a big fan of HTC I would go with the galaxy s3. I'm not a big fan of Samsung phones and I've had the evo line for a while so I went with the evo lte. And I love it. Build quality,screen,speed,kickstand,nfc,camera,beats audio. It's a nice piece of hardware. But truth be told both phones are great choices. Sprints network seems to be getting better. I'm seeing more and more people with faster speeds. ( unfortunately they haven't gotten to my neck of the woods yet lol) But they are unlimited. Which is great.

3vodroid

If your interested in the i5 you might as well go with the i4/4s the iPhone 4 is now free and the 4s is 99.99 with IOS 6 its basically an iphone 5 that's not a bad deal at all if that's your thing.

SarcaGuy

Photon Q = Best QWERTY slider phone for now

As long as the phone's screen is bigger than four inches, you wouldn't have to worry about the physical keyboard too much.

mydian

My phone has a physical keyboard and when I got it I just had to have a phone with one (previous phone was a BlackBerry.) A couple weeks ago SwiftKey was on sale for $0.99 so I figured I would pick it up. I never use the physical keyboard now. I can type faster on my phone than on my PC lol. I'll never buy another phone with a clunky physical keyboard. Before you make a decision try some of them out in the PlayStore.

3vodroid

+1