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mamamia88
January 9th, 2012, 10:24 PM
I've been looking at how to cut out unnecessary expenses in my life. I look at cable tv and cell phone to be 2 areas that I can get rid of. I appreciate the always connected aspect of smartphones but I find that I don't use the phone funcionality very often. I don't really like talking on the phone and the people I do call usually are free and don't count against my minutes. I don't like paying for minutes I don't use. I would much rather get something like an itouch that has data. I listen to a lot of podcasts and music and it would be nice to walk around town streaming music. I know they offer an ipad with 3g and you don't need a contract you can just pick and chose the months. I'm getting a vita and was thinking of paying the extra money for the 3g version but wouldn't want to waste the battery on something that already doesn't get great battery. Do they sell something like an itouch but with 3g connectivity? If I wait until my contract expires and use buy a prepaid 3g card would that work?

Paqman
January 9th, 2012, 10:31 PM
Are you just asking if you can stick a mobile broadband SIM into your phone?

1clue
January 9th, 2012, 10:31 PM
Take out the sim card. That's all you gotta do.

BrokenKingpin
January 9th, 2012, 10:39 PM
Take out the sim card. That's all you gotta do.
But then he would loose 3G data, which is what he wants... he just does not to pay for the calling side of things.

What is an iTouch, are you talking about an iPod Touch? If so you could look at the Archos devices. They are Android devices, like an iPod touch or and Android phone without the phone. The only thing is I am not sure if they offer 3G plans.

mamamia88
January 9th, 2012, 10:46 PM
But then he would loose 3G data, which is what he wants... he just does not to pay for the calling side of things.

What is an iTouch, are you talking about an iPod Touch? If so you could look at the Archos devices. They are Android devices, like an iPod touch or and Android phone without the phone. The only thing is I am not sure if they offer 3G plans.

nah so far all i could find where tablets with 3g. I don't want a tablet because i don't want to carry a bag with me or hold onto the device while listening to music. I basically just want something I can stream audio on while walking around. Wifi only doesn't cut it because you are restricted to a certain area close to router

Simian Man
January 9th, 2012, 10:50 PM
How about an FM radio? You can stream unlimited music for free and the devices only cost about $5.

mamamia88
January 9th, 2012, 11:00 PM
How about an FM radio? You can stream unlimited music for free and the devices only cost about $5.

true but there are still commercials and you are forced to listen to what dj thinks is good.

satanselbow
January 9th, 2012, 11:18 PM
Surely you just need to shop around for a good PAYG data plan? In the UK Hutchinson 3G do 500MB for £5 - if you use wifi where you can it can go a long way ;)

... or you could just not use the phone facility of the phone...

mamamia88
January 9th, 2012, 11:24 PM
Surely you just need to shop around for a good PAYG data plan? In the UK Hutchinson 3G do 500MB for £5 - if you use wifi where you can it can go a long way ;)

... or you could just not use the phone facility of the phone...

true but they force you to pay the minutes even if you don't use it. thats why i'm thinking payg is for me after contract expires. right now my phone is in airplane mode with wifi on. I have it setup so that my phone calls are forwarded to my google voice number and straight to voicemail. I then get a transcription (albeit erreanous most of time) which i can use to decide if it's worth calling someone back. Just not a huge fan of talking on the phone. But, I do very much think that a phone is the perfect media device because of it's ability to pull pretty much any video/audio that you could want directly to your phone.

Simian Man
January 10th, 2012, 02:39 AM
true but there are still commercials and you are forced to listen to what dj thinks is good.

Yes, but if I was trying to cut back on expenses, I think I could live with a combination of the music I own and the radio while on the go.

1clue
January 10th, 2012, 02:52 AM
The only plan I've seen like that, you save maybe $20 a month. Can't remember what carrier though. All I remember was that it was ridiculous to go with a data plan only.

A tablet on the other hand, they're more than eager to give you a plan for that. But they assume a larger amount of data, and they charge accordingly so you're really not saving anything.

Brandel Valico
January 10th, 2012, 03:30 AM
You may just want to look inti getting one of these also.

http://www.amazon.com/XPMP3H1-Portable-Satellite-Radio-Player/dp/B003E7ES4A

CharlesA
January 10th, 2012, 04:56 AM
You may just want to look inti getting one of these also.

http://www.amazon.com/XPMP3H1-Portable-Satellite-Radio-Player/dp/B003E7ES4A
Just my option but XM blows since they were bought by Sirius.

+1 to FM radio from me.

BrokenKingpin
January 10th, 2012, 03:08 PM
FM radio just ins't a solution in my opinion. I drive about a half hour into work, and I maybe hear one song in that time, an the other 27 minutes are the DJs talking about **** I don't care about, or it is commercials. Also, that one song played usually sucks.

I personally get by buying music and just loading it onto my Android phone (which does not have a data plan). I can understand why people may want to pay for a streaming service though.

I am surprised it is this hard to find an iPod like device with a data plan.

Simian Man
January 10th, 2012, 03:35 PM
FM radio just ins't a solution in my opinion. I drive about a half hour into work, and I maybe hear one song in that time, an the other 27 minutes are the DJs talking about **** I don't care about, or it is commercials. Also, that one song played usually sucks.

Radio sucks in the morning because of the morning talk shows. The rest of the day tends to be much better. I still don't understand why nearly every station has talk in the morning when I've hardly met anyone who likes that. I usually just listen to classical music on the public channel in the morning and then switch to a rock channel later on. It really depends on what you like and the available stations in your area.

CharlesA
January 10th, 2012, 03:54 PM
Radio sucks in the morning because of the morning talk shows. The rest of the day tends to be much better. I still don't understand why nearly every station has talk in the morning when I've hardly met anyone who likes that. I usually just listen to classical music on the public channel in the morning and then switch to a rock channel later on. It really depends on what you like and the available stations in your area.
I never really understood that either. Granted the station I listen to is fairly humorous, there are times when I just want to listen to music, so it's either MP3s or CDs.

1clue
January 10th, 2012, 04:05 PM
Radio sucks in the morning because of the morning talk shows. The rest of the day tends to be much better. I still don't understand why nearly every station has talk in the morning when I've hardly met anyone who likes that. I usually just listen to classical music on the public channel in the morning and then switch to a rock channel later on. It really depends on what you like and the available stations in your area.

And the people on the talk shows seem intent on proving that they dropped out of the third grade. I live near Chicago and there are zero intelligent morning talk shows in that area. And my definition of "intelligent" is someone who meets all of the following criteria:

He/she is not in a chemically induced alternate consciousness.
He/she can complete at least one sentence for every 14 sentence fragments.
He/she is at least TRYING to behave like an adult.


Seriously, my phone has all of my music. My car stereo has a USB plug and an audio in. That's my solution when I'm driving, or a really good set of ear buds if I'm on the train. I have an unlimited data plan and frankly I don't see anything on any of the internet radio stations that appeals either.

BrokenKingpin
January 10th, 2012, 06:40 PM
And the people on the talk shows seem intent on proving that they dropped out of the third grade. I live near Chicago and there are zero intelligent morning talk shows in that area. And my definition of "intelligent" is someone who meets all of the following criteria:

He/she is not in a chemically induced alternate consciousness.
He/she can complete at least one sentence for every 14 sentence fragments.
He/she is at least TRYING to behave like an adult.


++

dpny
January 10th, 2012, 06:49 PM
The only thing I can find which will add 3G to an iPod is the ZTE Peel, but performance doesn't look all that good.

philinux
January 10th, 2012, 07:15 PM
true but they force you to pay the minutes even if you don't use it. thats why i'm thinking payg is for me after contract expires. right now my phone is in airplane mode with wifi on. I have it setup so that my phone calls are forwarded to my google voice number and straight to voicemail. I then get a transcription (albeit erreanous most of time) which i can use to decide if it's worth calling someone back. Just not a huge fan of talking on the phone. But, I do very much think that a phone is the perfect media device because of it's ability to pull pretty much any video/audio that you could want directly to your phone.

My sister is deaf and has a Samsung galaxy tab. She has a plan with no minutes and unlimited text and a data plan.