...begats cellphone...

so my kid is a technophille just like her dad. and she seems to have inherited my obsession with all things cellphone lol. having played with my new phone (see previous post i.e. helio), she instantly hated her Razr *surprise surprise* luckily, her new disgust with her phone coincided with her mothers desire to no longer pay for it LOL

so... long story short...here is my daughters new phone...


and here she is enthusastically enjoying it lol its actually a cool phone, one that I would carry myself, were i not a "helion" lol its a definate texting oriented phone. virgin mobile is the company. so far so good, decent rates, excellent signal (uses verizon towers). the phone itself was only $99. i love how you can do everything online. their website could be a bit more intuitive, especially since their target market is the younger demographic, but its still pretty good. something wacky is going on with her text messaging regarding how many messages she does/does not have, but I'm sure that will be fixed with a call to customer service.

bottom line is she loves it, so i love it...thats what count right?

i can hear the Ocean...

i upgraded!!! lol well the full story is i was seriously considering jumping ship from Helio to either ATT or Verizon. not because i was unhappy with Helio service, i get signal almost everywhere and the plan i have is awesome. i just HATED my phone. i did the typical consumer thing, buy jumping on the 'free' phone they offered during the holidaze instead of picking a good phone. caveat emptor right? lol

so anyway, i was all set to make that move, actually had the ATT Tilt on order when i decided to give Helio a call. they made me an offer i couldn't refuse. so here i am with my new Helio Ocean.
as you can see, it is a dual slider. full QWERTY keyboard on one side, dedicated keypad for dialing. the software is top tier. Helio really has made this phone their flagship model. It has totally intergrated the all of the popular IM, email, and social sites smoothly into the interface. total pocket communication. it also has a 2mp camera with flash and zoom. plays mp3s and videos. total web browsing. it can even stream Youtube videos. not much more i need in a phone lol

i'll post a more definitive review one i've had it a couple weeks... ciao!

helio...don't call it tech support!

[the following is a re-post of a blog from my myspace page. i find it still relevant enough to share here also. enjoy.]

Have you heard of it? Helio is a new "piggy back" phone company. Sort of a boutique style thing. I call it a "piggy back" company because it dosent own its own net work. It leases it from Sprint. So if you get them, you basically are getting Sprints signal with Helios services. Just like if you go with Virgin Mobile. Or Net10, or Boost Mobile, etc. They all lease fromt he big boys - ATT, Sprint, Verizon, maybe even T-Mobile although I don't know who would be that desperate LOL

Anyway, after long consideration and research I decided on Helio. Why? Because for $65 I get 500 anytime minutes, free nights/weekends, UNLIMITED text messages, UNLIMITED picture messages, UNLIMITED internet, MOBILE MYSPACE (which rocks btw), IM (Yahoo/Aim/MSN), and more. Plus even the cheapest phone (The Heat) is HOT. Of course I got the Heat cuz it was FREE during the holidays LOL

As far as the phone goes - LOVE IT! As far as the services and features - LOVE IT! The signal is so-so. Thats not Helios fault. It's Sprints. Not that big of a deal.

What IS a big deal is the technical support AND the customer service. The customer service wouldn't be that bad but apparently Helio is yet another company that outsources its customer service to a foreign country where English is NOT the native language. How does that make sense? I am sooo tired of getting a "specialist" who I cant friggin understand because they cant speak proper english. Then they have the nerve to get frustrated with me because they have to repeat things over. But at least they try to be helpful.

Helios tech support is a whole nother story all together. They just plain suck. They dont know anything! You ask them the simplest of questions, that any "tech" should know, any they put you on hold for 5 minutes to "confer with their technicians". I thought I was talking to a technician?? I've had to call twice now and both times were 40+ minute calls with NO resolution for relatiely minor issues. The first one I figured out myself. The second issue (an overheating battery) their solution was to "find a battery at some store" and they would credit my account. Why should I have to do that? I'm paying them for insurance! They said "Because the phone wasn't dropped or damaged, insurance wont replace the battery...". That is insane. SO because I didn't break my phone, I'm being punished. I swear if I wasnt in love with the Helio services and the phone I break this contract and go elsewhere. I still may if they keep pissing me off LOL

Ranting aside... I do love my Helio. Especially MySpace Mobile. I can do almost anything in Myspace from my phone. I can check my email (Yahoo/Gmail), plus Helio gives me a free email (me@myhelio.com) which works just like Gmail for the most part. I can IM...and not using text msgs either LOL [edit: this is the phone that i mobile blog with :) ] I think later I may upgrade to the Ocean. All the stuff I mentioned is even better on that handset. Dont call it a phone! lol

If you're thinking of trying Helio.. hit me up with any questions. I'll give you the real deal....peace!!

old folks and cell phones part deux

well. my gran did what i suggested. she went and paid her bill, and then canceled her cell phone. good right? well, maybe. instead of coming home to get me, so WE could go shop for a new phone, she let the sales guy at centennial wireless talk her into keeping her old phone, but replacing her contract SIM with a pre-paid SIM. to his credit he did give her a $20 minute card for free. gran says that he said, when she comes back to get more minutes he's going to give her another $20 card for free. well if thats true, then i suppose this will be a good deal. my only caveat with the process is that i kinda wanted to get her into a bit of an upgrade to her phone. she says she never would use any of the 'fancy' features, but she always asks 'can my phone do that?' whenever someone is talking about what their new phone can do. oh well.. cie la vie. the good thing is centennial is a gsm company so can always get an unlocked gsm phone for her. now that i think of of it.. thats what i'll do...

old folks and cell phones

my gran has a cell phone. i have no idea why as she has given no one the phone number (i have it but i dont think anyone else does), she dosen't answer it when i call it, and she has no clue how to do anything more than answer it.

now you're probably think thats as a good grandson, i should take it upon myself to 'train' her in the proper usage of said device. well i have. over and over again. it just dosen't stick. i love my gran to death. i'm closer to her than my own mother (thats a whole nother blog trust me). but there are some things that she just dosen't get. technology is one of them.

she needs a cell phone due to the fact that my grandfather (gramps) is recovering from prostate cancer and is still very weak at times. plus he has complications from heart disease and other issues. she frequently has to take him to the hospital for various reasons. so its good that she has a way to call for help if needed, while traveling.

my issue is she has a contract phone. basically she is just giving centennial wireless $40 every month for nothing. she dosen't use the phone. so today i told her that at the end of her contract she should ditch them and get a pre-paid phone. that way she controls how much she spends each month. and the phone is gonna be at least the equal of what she has now, probably better! turns out, she's not on a contract (thank God), so when she pays her bill this month she's gonna cancel it. then we are going to walmart and pick out a new prepaid phone for her. any suggestions? i'm thinking something simple like trac phone or maybe cingular go phone. help a brother out LOL