Should I flash phone or purchase Cricket triband phone?

[qipengart]

I was wondering whether it would be better to get a Cricket-branded triband phone or to flash a Sprint phone to Cricket instead?

Advantages and disadvantages please

[smitty68521]

Advantages to searching: You can get the answer right away without looking. You can get the satisfaction you found the answer yourself.

Disadvantages to not searching: You get dogged out by fellow members on here for not doing so. You might not even get your question answered at all.

I would get a triband phone if I am in a market that is AWS. Flashed phones do not work in an AWS market. If you are going to be doing a lot of traveling to an AWS market, make sure your phone roams and you have a lot of roaming minutes because you will be roaming EVEN if you have the extended coverage.

I hope this helped out.

[qipengart]

Thanks, I'm new to all of this as I try to port from Virgin Mobile to Cricket soon. I would search but I would love to hear all sides of the argument.

[smitty68521]

There really isn't an argument on which is better or worse. It is all in the needs. I explained that in my last post. There is nothing more to it than that really.

[James30154]

I concur with smithy. I live in Baltimore MD an AWS market so I would have no choice but to get a new tri-band phone. To get the maximum benefit of the carrier you need a new cricket phone.

[Mr._Pseudonym]

:^/ On the other hand, I live in Portland, Oregon, which is not a AWS market. So, my Palm Treo works just fine on CDMA, without Cricket's Tri-Band frequency. Since I don't roam very often, it doesn't bother me that it would be costly.

See? Each individual's needs are different. "Which is better?" is really "which is better [i]for you?[i]"

[jammis]

if you want to be able to make calls in triband areas get a tri band phone. if you go with cdma phone when you go to tri band areas you WILL be roaming.

[DarkeWolf]

again, depends on your wants and your needs. About the aws deal, yeah... find out about that, it would definitely make up your mind for you. Getting charged for roaming all the time would really EAT your wallet.

If the aws isn't an issue, consider this- Is the phone you would flash, under warranty? If you flash it and try to send it in for repairs...it's Not. (Tho you can flash it back to the original carrier before you send it in for repairs).

So something to consider there. If you want a phone that you Know is within the limits of the warranty, get one from cricket, and forget getting a flashed phone. If you have a phone that you don't care if the manufacturer may or may not work on it/replace it, go with a flashed if you want to.

Myself, I think that most of cricket's phones are pretty cheap, and pretty limited. From my avatar you can tell that I don't use one of their phones.