Just ordered my first smartphone! Some questions

[Eckyx]

Just picked up a 2nd-hand Droid off ebay, I'm really excited, never had a smartphone before. I have a friend who has been filling me in on details, but there are a few questions he can't answer.


The main one: I am on a family plan w/o data, there is no chance of me getting data, and I'd rather not have another bill (poor college student), I bought the phone mainly as a toy, for the camera / audio / video / gps / apps / wifi web browsing.

My old phone is a Rumor 2 (sprint), and from what I've read, the Droid is hardware compatible with Sprint's network, but it's required that you have a dataplan to connect a smartphone to it. Is there any way for me to just replace my old phone entirely, and connect my Droid to the sprint network, without a dataplan?

If not, does the cellphone antenna turn itself off (save battery) by itself, or do I have to do this manually?


I've also read a bit about undervolting the processor, to increase battery life, do you think it's worthwhile to try? I'm not going to be playing many (any?) games, so if I can downclock the gpu maybe, that would be good too.

He gave me a list of basic apps as well, but I'm happy to take suggestions. Is the stock media player good for mp3s, or does anyone have a 3rd-party preference? What's a good weather app that does not run in the background? Etc.

Thanks!

 

[Genetic_Bloom]

It technically can work on Sprint but you're going to have a real hard time getting them to activate it for you. You have to mess around and discover some settings in the phone and then go to a Sprint store where I don't think they'll be too happy to put a Verizon phone on their account. It's not even guaranteed to work well, or even at all. You can turn the antenna off by going into airplane mode but it doesn't do it automatically. You can have it in airplane mode and still use wifi if you want to do that.

 

[Eckyx]

Perfect.

About how much does that increase battery life?

 

[Genetic_Bloom]

A huge amount. If it's only using wifi then the battery will last a couple days most likely with regular, but not constant use.

 

[Eckyx]

You can definitely still use Wifi in airplane mode?

EDIT - friend comfirmed.