Iphone 4 on ATT -> Android!! Which phone / service??

[ballgum]

OK, so although I'm new to android phones, I'm not new to technology. I'm already familiar with linux/unix and use my smart phones quite a bit. So, for an upgrade I'm looking for a couple things:

1. speed increase (from iphone 4... i know this won't be hard to accomplish lol)
2. I do enjoy cutting edge OS / apps, at the same time I like reliability. Which phones and service have best reliability / least dropped calls?
3. I'm with ATT, but am debating the idea of just paying the stupid ETF and going with a different carrier. Which carriers are supporting the latest smartphones and which are the cheapest (sprint? verizon? etc)?

My ATT contract is up in june of 2012, but I won't let that stop me!! I will either pay full price for the phone to use with ATT, OR switch to a cheaper service and pay the ETF from ATT (ATT kind of irritates me).

Is now a good time to buy / upgrade a new smart phone or are there any upcoming phones that will be better and better in what ways?

I use my phones hard for everything from music listening to gps to games to heavy multitasking.

Bottom line the iphone just doesnt cut it and it's been awhile since I wanted to switch. I was somewhat waiting for android to mature a bit...

What are the suggestions on phones people prefer? Galaxy S2? Atrix 2? HTC?

I WILL use the cpu/memory/hd to capacity. So these things along with a decent - nice display and hardware specs (camera IQ/lighting, etc..) are more important to me than how it looks. 4G is nice also, although some friends have problems with their 4g service in my area...

thanks!!

 

[schwenger]

Get the samsung galaxy s II status on at&T (not the skyrocket unless you want a little bit bigger screen, worse battery life and a not as good cpu).

Best android phone ever made. I switched off verizon to at&t for this phone and haven't looked back once.

 

[Crashdamage]

T-Mobile is easily the cheapest of the Big 4 carriers. Check out their Value Plans. For phones T-Mo has several good choices including the Galaxy SII, as good or better than anything anywhere. If you long for a Nexus and have the cash, a GSM international version will work on T-Mo.

 

[ballgum]

Once ice cream is released for the gs2, how will it compare to the galaxy nexus? I think I've narrowed it down to these 2 phones....

Also, you mention tmobile being the cheapest, but when I look at their plans on the website for 10mb data (i use this much or more and have unlimited with att), it comes out to the same price as ATT? Which plan were you referring to?

Thanks for the info guys!!

 

[ballgum]

And what about the NOTE?? THIS seems like an excellent device!!

 

[chanchan05]

Once ice cream is released for the gs2, how will it compare to the galaxy nexus? I think I've narrowed it down to these 2 phones....

Also, you mention tmobile being the cheapest, but when I look at their plans on the website for 10mb data (i use this much or more and have unlimited with att), it comes out to the same price as ATT? Which plan were you referring to?

Thanks for the info guys!!

Considering that the only thing the Nexus has over SGS2 is ICS (SGS2 has better hardware), then once SGS2 has ICS it will undoubtedly be the better phone, plus the fact I like TouchWiz skinned over pure Android.

 

[ballgum]

I've kinda narrowed it down with Note and sg2... If there aren't issues with it working with ATT, I want to get the Note

 

[hull22]

the poor resolution of the SGSII doesn't bother anyone? I tried out the Tmobile one yesterday, felt like I was some old person with everything zoomed in.

 

[dan330]

if you are going to use the phone to the max.. then you will want unlimited data... or be prepared to pay for the 10GB (i dont think you meant 10mb) of data.

If sprint has good data connections in your area..then they have the unlimited data at good price. and their version of GS2 is the Samsung Epic Touch with a bigger screen.

since you are technically inclined... then you might be interested in the Development community and rooting your device. in this regard, i think the htc EVO 3D has more to offer.

 

[chanchan05]

the poor resolution of the SGSII doesn't bother anyone? I tried out the Tmobile one yesterday, felt like I was some old person with everything zoomed in.

Its not exactly, poor. AFAIK there's only less than 5 (2 I think) phone models with a better resolution than the SGS2. The problem is that the T-MO version I think has a larger screen than the other SGS2 (including international), so its kinda stretched thinner on that. Granted nothing beats iPhone resolution.