swintec

4 minutes ago, mc_gusto said:

I kept asking them what the purchasing option would be after the lease was over in 18 months and they both quoted the full price. I just wanna make sure. Maybe they've gotten hip to it. I thought theyd have a lot of calls about it. Maybe I should stop in a store.


Sent from my SM-G935P using Tapatalk
 

try checking out on the website.  somewhere towards the end it will have a copy of the lease agreement and costs associated, even if you have to do it as a new user it should at least show you the costs.

6 minutes ago, mc_gusto said:

Tried chat and calling. They both won't let me pay full amount of lease up front.

Sent from my SM-G935P using Tapatalk
 

Whats the rush?  get everything up and running, lease established, etc.  then take care of paying off.

2 hours ago, jefbal99 said:

Under contract, My mom needed a new phone, so I used a subsidy upgrade a bit over a year ago to get her a 128gb Galaxy S6 for free.  It's got 9 months left, so it'd would cost me $180.

THis would be a great deal if it worked out.

its a very straight forward process.  call care and tell them you want to pay off the ETF on the line.  also be clear at the end that you want the upgrade eligibility reset so you can take advantage of a lease.

if you have an older smart phone or even a flip phone kicking around, add that in place of the S6 and the ETF will drop significantly.

i did this in store / out in the parking lot of the store so maybe they can do it for you.

1 hour ago, MileHI38 said:

That's my biggest question is if the RF issues that might plague some (not all essential phones) phones can be fixed with software?? Or is it a hardware issue or antenna placement?

Not all essentials have the problem?  its a fringe coverage area type thing that is causing the problem.  Living in a city blanketed with decent LTE all around one wont really notice it and think its a problem.

EDIT- Fringe coverage, but for me, all prior phones gave me satisfactory service in the house while the essential can not.

12 minutes ago, jefbal99 said:

Nope, I think because my account still has the subsidy flag.  I got the option to add a line for 29.99/month, Plus the $5/month lease, plus $25.00 up front.

what is your subsidy?  like under a contract or like a loyalty credit or something?  i was still in a 2 year contract so i paid off the ETF and had the upgrade eligibility reset and i was able to get this deal.

12 minutes ago, MileHI38 said:

I'm glad you said this.......set mine up yesterday/night and noticed the difference in RF signal quality vs V20 unfortunately.

marginal differences are understandable but putting it side by side to the POS htc bolt, there is a 9-12 dBm difference between the two for 1x.  EVDO is a bit better i suppose but it still doesnt feel very usable.  Simialr results to my nexus 5X.  In my case, i had okay service in my house with all past phones but it was usable, albeit at 3G.  With the essential, im not even sure if i could walk around the house and talk on it.

 I think many are probably connected to LTE even at home these days so they may not notice the poor levels.  Me, I am worried about what will happen when the foliage comes back on the trees in the spring.

i hate to be the outlier here but this thing is absolute crap RF perf. wise.  I got it all set up last night and just using it around the house had me asking myself how this made it into real world usage.  i havent even got to really try things out with LTE.  Just trying to use it for voice / evdo was a nightmare.  i dont have high reception in my house anyways but all prior phones ive had before handled it fine and allowed light browsing and what not and making / receiving phone calls without issue.  Now i am lucky for it to maintain EVDO while i hold it and if it does that, 10-15 second page loads are the norm.  I am scared to see what happens if i try to use it in the spring when foliage comes back.

Could it be because im left handed?  Could it just be a lemon?  god i hope so.

i will try the Oreo beta tonight to see if that helps any but i am not very optimistic.

11 hours ago, greenbastard said:

That's odd. Google has their own type of Caller ID that shows the names of businesses and services. It only works with Sprint if you have WiFi (since we have no simultaneous Voice+Data).

Are you sure it wasn't that? Sprint still hasn't gotten around to adding visual voicemail or Wifi calling to Android BYOD (except for the Essential, but that's a huge exception). I doubt Android BYOD devices will ever see Calling+ tbh.

This was working without wifi even on but i know what you are talking about but it was not that.  this is true caller id with name.  it is also listed in the add-ons for my account as a 10 day trial.  Strangely, it was shown as $2.99 for my 5X but $4.99 for the essential.

Sprint seemed to have updated the premium caller id service to support a bunch more handsets.  What is surprising to me is that my Nexus 5X is also included.   All day today calls were coming in with caller id name being shown which was never the case before.  Then i get a text from sprint talking about the premium caller id add on and how its $2.99 per month and how they just added the 10 day trial to my account, which explains why the above happened.  I loved this service on my Bolt but didnt think it would ever come to the nexus devices because you had to use sprints caller id app, well not anymore i guess. 

anyone else seeing this?

could it explain why the network initiated a profile update late tuesday night, in prep for this?

also, i ask this every time i talk about it, but how does this work in the background technically, since now it is being used without the caller id app?  it works whether im connected to LTE or not.  any reason why this has not always been available on smart devices?  is this something at the network level?

57 minutes ago, MileHI38 said:

WTH!!! Lol......are they basically giving this phone away!! with a total buyout of $145 

So you can pay off the phone lease immediately without penalty?!

Correct.  Just have to pay the remaining lease payments plus $30 so about $145 out the door.

Sprint has a deal going on, started yesterday.  $25 down, $5 a month for 18 months and then the buyout is only $30.  I got in on this yesterday and just need to wait for the phone to come in.  Once thats set up i am simply going to pay the phone lease off immediately which will end up being $145 plus tax and then i own the phone.  Pretty crazy.

I went to Best Buy last night (in the area) to at least get a quick hands on with the device to see how it is, before I get mine.  Asked where it was and told we dont have it at all (despite having a sprint display among the others).  Fine.  Go further into the mall to the Sprint kiosk expecting them to have it (being a sprint exclusive and all) and i get blank stares.  They have no idea what it is and point me to a Moto thinking that must be it.  i didnt try the sprint brick and mortar store but may head out that way saturday night (but will call first) however i dont think i will hold my breath. very strange.

bit the bullet and ordered one tonight.  cant wait to see if i can finally retire my nexus 5X.

On 10/31/2017 at 12:32 AM, lilotimz said:

Most sites from every carrier uses battery backup units. Fuel based backup generator are on the whole fairly rare and location dependent as there is steadily increasing upkeep cost as the equipment ages. In most circumstances battery powered backup units would suffice with minimal upkeep costs.

Sent from my Pixel using Tapatalk
 

Welp..power is back and the site is only broadcasting LTE now.  EVDO and voice did not come back online for some reason.  Any call I try when connected to Sprint LTE has the phone fall back to USCC 1x for the call.  Also, if i receive a text while connected to LTE on this site, the phone kicks over to USCC 1x to get the text.  Very weird.

7 minutes ago, sarcoptic said:

That is actually incorrect.  If you have a Sprint sim card in your Essential phone you will not get the update straight from them.  You have to wait for Sprint to push it out.  Hence you can either use adb and sideload the update leaving your Sprint sim card in or have another carrier sim (doesn't even have to activated) and plug that in.  At that point the phone will update straight from Essential.  

that is so silly.  wonder why they would go that route and hope pthat does nto cause problems down the road.  i automatically assumed we benefited from a pixel type update method, straight from them.

6 hours ago, sarcoptic said:

Essential pushed out an update...for those on Sprint you can either wait till Sprint pushes it or learn to use ADB.  The update definitely made the fingerprint faster and the screen touches/scrolling even better.  This phone is approaching hell of a deal territory if only Essential would release the system dumps so developers can run with it.

updates are not done like with the pixel / nexus phones, straight from google / essential?  the draw of these types of phones is that you get updates quicker and do not have to rely on the carrier.

1 minute ago, lilotimz said:

Sprint uses battery backup cabinets the majority of the time. They're rated for a few hours. The other carriers likely had a fuel based backup generator which lasts longer.

Sent from my Pixel using Tapatalk
 

Are they usually on top of battery maintenance?  Seems like a lot more of a headache.  Hopefully they handle them better than the cable companies do.

heck of a storm in new england last night.  power is out for thousands.  "My" 3 primary towers that cover about 5 or 6 towns all died within a few hours of losing power in each of their respective areas.  Problem I have found is that sprint simply does not bother to keep up with their generators at cell sites around here.  I suppose someone did the math and the number of subs is not really worth trucking fuel out to the sites.

The newly rolled out USCC native LTE coverage is coming in very handy and their sites remain up and functioning fine.  Verizon appears okay and while AT&T is up, they appear to be having data issues depending on the site connected to.

8 hours ago, imex99 said:

I put request in for code, one person in front of you Jeff. If he doesn't use it, I'll have him pass it along to you.

Sent from my Pixel 2 XL using Tapatalk
 

Crap I misread your initial post and thought once you actually received the code we would have to PM you. Add me to the bottom of the long list then. lol

2 hours ago, jefbal99 said:

Wow, if you can get a discount code from someone that paid full price, you can get one of these for $300

http://www.androidpolice.com/2017/10/28/essential-phone-goes-incredible-300-friends-family-discount/

 

Any early adopters able to score a code that they want to get rid of?

https://www.essential.com/pages/friends-and-family-offer

i may jump on this now with the recent price cut.  this might be a loaded question but...how does essential compare with the pixel 2 (not XL)?  my other plan was to wait and see if the pixel 2 has a sale during black friday time frame.

9 hours ago, lilotimz said:

There isn't one unless you want to make one. I don't think a lot of people were enthusiastic about it.

Sent from my Pixel using Tapatalk
 

Specs wise it is about as good as the XL right?  Less excitement comes from the smaller size?  I am leaning towards the 2 versus the XL just because i like being right around the nexus 5x size.

6 hours ago, RAvirani said:

USCC is now extended (which is super awesome).

 

Called it!

Surprised there is no love for the Pixel 2 for the most part.  Maybe its because its made by HTC?  After the bolt i swore i would never go HTC again but i have to think google wouldnt let a product like the pixel get HTCs suckiness all over it would they?

30 minutes ago, S4GRU said:

People were still getting post content behind the paywall via email notifications.

Seems like that is what they should have addressed specifically, instead of throwing the baby out with the bathwater and going the way they did.  A real shame, more so for this site, as it is a hindrance to further participation and posting in important topics.