Smartphone without Internet?

[EllieJ]

Hi--

I'm in a bit of a conundrum. My cell phone (which does nothing but make phone calls) is on its last legs, and I broke my Palm the other day. Soooo...I'm in the market for something that will combine the two and will not break my budget. But here's the thing--I don't need anything that will allow me to surf the web or send/receive emails. I'm so luddite that I don't even text people. I'd just like something that can make a phone call and have something similar to Palm's datebook and contacts features so that when I'm out on a client visit I have my calendar with me and can schedule the next meeting without having to get back to my office to check the calendar.

My husband and I have the cheapest plan possible on T-mobile and so far we've been happy with them. It looks as if any smartphone package would require us to bump ourselves up to a web-browsing, email sending phone plan that I don't need and don't want to pay for....so I'm wondering: If I buy an unlocked phone on ebay or wherever, is there a way to use the calendar and contacts software on the phone and just stay on my current cell plan? My husband says that many of these phones synch wirelessly with the computer and without the added service package I would find it very hard to synch my phone calendar with my desktop calendar. Is this the case? Is there a workaround? As I mentioned, I don't need the phone to do anything other than make straight phone calls. I'd just like to combine the calendar and contacts features I had in my palm, since that's pretty much dead. I'd much rather carry just one device than two.

Please help!

Thanks

EllieJ

[palmgeek5394]

You should be able to buy just any unlocked GSM smartphone and pop your T-mobile SIM into it, but I would ask Tmo about it first to make sure.

[EllieJ]

Thanks!

Does that mean that there are phones out there that synch with my computer via a cord (like my old Palm did)? Sorry for my ignorance in this area... I just want to be sure that I wouldn't have the problems my husband suggested I would come up against in trying to synch my phone to my computer without the full Internet package. I don't need to surf the Internet, but I would need to be able to synch the information between my phone and my desktop.

Does anyone have a phone to recommend that you feel would fit these needs?

[Hook]

Most smartphones will sync with a cable to your computer. The Pre I believe is the exception. Even iPhone uses cable connection to iTunes. Nokia, Winmo, Blackbery all use a cable.

If you want to stay with old Palm OS so as not to have a learning curve, you could try an unlocked GSM Centro, although there have been complaints of them freezing. Otherwise, I would recommend either winmo or symbian. Either will be a learning curve.

[Dick Tracy]

Welcome to Brighthand EllieJ.

You don't mention which model Palm device you were using. That said, I'd recommend looking for a used (and unlocked) Treo 680 or Centro. These models came in AT&T and unlocked branding.

Follow the upgrade directions at the very top of the TX forum to ensure you get your PIM data and third-party applications synced, but not the system files which would create problems on the new hardware.

[EllieJ]

Thanks so much for that information! I'll check out all of those suggestions. I'll also look at my crippled Palm to see which model it is (was). I use it all the time, but didn't pay attention to the details (obviously!)

EllieJ

[Inner Prop]

Does that trick with the sim card work for Verizon too?

[palmgeek5394]

Does that trick with the sim card work for Verizon too?

Verizon and Sprint are CDMA and don't use SIM cards. Instead, they use IMEI numbers (GSM uses IMEI in addition to a SIM card) to identify each device. AFAIK, there isn't any practical way to change the IMEI on most phones. So the answer is no.

[aerogowest]

I have a Blackberry 8830 that I want to use as a PDA only (similar to Ellie's quandary), except that I don't want to use it as a phone, just the contact and calendar function. When I connect it (with USB cable) to BB Desktop Manager 5.0, it won't let me type in the device PIN and the BB doesn't connect. Any suggestions?