Last week Best Buy began a pre-order for the Motorola Triumph, and along with it comes confirmation of the July 19th release date first let loose in the pages of People magazine. The Triumph is a pretty impressive smartphone featuring a stock build of Android at a cool $300 price tag. Expensive if you think this comes as some carrier-bound handset, but quite the deal considering the phone will be available exclusively through Virgin Mobile alongside their PAYG plans.
[via AndroidForums]
Triumph, for it to poop on! Get it? no? ….nevermind
got mad respect for old school Conan fans. +1 for you.
The Triumph is not available for payLo plans only the Beyond Talk pre-pay plans. Unlimited text/web with 300 minutes for $25, 1200 for $40 and unlimited minutes for $60.
I think I’m down with that $25/month plan. Don’t do much talking, more sms/email/GV and web. Only concern is VM’s 3G speeds. I know they use Sprint’s 3G network but do they get access to full speeds?
Oh wow. it was worth the wait.
Was really hoping this was going to be priced at $200 but I guess it’s Virgins best phone yet and they really won’t be pulling in much on the monthly. Let’s hope that this is just the beginning of many great Android offerings from the prepaid field. I was also thinking about buying an Android T-Mo phone and going with Simple Mobile but then I would be dropping over $400 for a top notch Android.
Here’s the thing — this phone is GREAT if you don’t use it as a phone, and the $25 plan works for you. My problem is that 300 minutes just isn’t enough. Remember: no nights & weekends with VM. If you have a half hour conversation, you’re done for the next 2 days. For me, the $40 plan is more realistic. Which is still cheaper. But then you have to consider that you can get similar phones on contract for free. So, for folks like me, VM works out to about $54/month. And you’re stuck on Sprint’s very slow 3G network, with no roaming capabilities (Sprint-branded phones roam on VZW). The more I thought about it, the more it just didn’t add up.
I agree with your math. But VZW and other like plans cost about $100+ per month. And I know after that having a relatively useless Blackberry for 2 years is a long time. Getting out of current contracts is very expensive. I also agree with your slow Sprint only concerns. But if you spend most of your time in wifi mode, and your travel destinations keep you withing the fairly extensive Sprint network, why worry?
The real benefit of VM is that they don’t gouge you for text messages. That’s where other carriers are a ripoff. So I think that’s a good rule of thumb: if you’re a big text-er, then a service like VM makes a lot of sense (assuming coverage is okay). If you’re not a text-er, then you should probably find out if you qualify for a corporate discount at one of the “big” carriers. There are a surprising number of ways to qualify. I wouldn’t have guessed that I qualify, but I do. Both at VZW and ATT. My discounted rate is about $60/month for all the minutes and data that I need. Again, that’s a few dollars more than I’d be spending with VM . . . but not much.
TL/DR: VM can = big savings, but mostly if you text more than call.