If you are thinking about getting one of those new digital phones, take a good look at AT&T Wireless. With superb coverage, incredibly good pricing, and advanced phones, AT&T's offering makes it one of the best deals available in Greater Boston.
Wireless phones are addictive: The more you use them, the more you want to use them. With old-style cellular phones this usually spelled trouble, in the form of cellular bills for $200 a month or even more.
AT&T's Digital One Rate takes the bite out of owning a cellular phone. The company has three different one-rate plans: 600 minutes a month for $89.99, 1,000 minutes for $119.99, and 1,400 minutes for $149.99.
But unlike other cellular providers, both old-style analog and the new digital, there are no hidden costs. With Digital One Rate, there are no long-distance fees and no roaming fees for the vast majority of the United States. (AT&T also offers cheaper monthly plans, but the free minutes are much fewer and long-distance charges apply).
To use One Rate, you'll need one of AT&T's special digital phones.
For the past month I've been using a Nokia 6160. This phone weighs six ounces, fits comfortably in my pocket, and gives me between five and seven days of typical use on a single charge with the standard battery. (Nokia claims the standard battery delivers three hours, 15 minutes of talk time with eight days of standby, while the ultra-extended battery can deliver five hours talktime with 13 days of standby.)
The phone has standard features like a telephone book, but it's also got advanced features like a calendar, a built-in pager, and even a few video games.
Over the past year I've tried wireless phones from Sprint, Omnipoint, and Nextel, in addition to AT&T. In my experience, AT&T has the best wireless coverage of these providers. The reason is that that the Nokia phone is really a triple-mode device: It can run using the digital TDMA technology at either 800 Mhz or at 1900 Mhz, or it can run as a conventional cellular phone at 800 Mhz as well. This means that if you stray outside of AT&T's service area, the call will be placed over another digital service with which AT&T has contracted or over a conventional cell network. (However, certain digital services, such as voice mail or call forwarding, cannot be used when outside AT&T's network).
While Sprint also sells a dual-mode phone, Sprint charges between 65 cents and 99 cents for every minute that the phone is in analog roam mode. Unfortunately, in Cambridge this happens a lot due to holes in Sprint's network. AT&T, on the other hand, charges the same flat rate no matter how your phone is making the connection.
Over the past few months many readers have sent me e-mail saying that Qualcomm's CDMA technology (used by both Sprint and Bell Atlantic Mobile) should have superior voice quality because it transmits the most data through the air. Perhaps so, but in my testing the voice quality with the Nokia 6160 is superior to every phone that Sprint is selling for use with its system. So much for theory.
My only complaint about the Nokia phone is its little talk button. With traditional cellular phone, you have to hold down the send or talk button for a good half second in order to initiate a call. But with the Nokia 6160 (and with every other digital telephone I've tried out), all you need to do is tap the talk button. That's poor design. I've frequently had the Nokia 6160 turn on in my pocket by accident and dial the last number that I've called. Although it's possible to lock the keypad, in practice it's easy to forget.
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