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Runs4Brains:
Glad to read someone else feels similar to myself. I too have a difficult time with the whole cellular data thing in terms of prices and caps. I guess I am one who believes in not playing word games and all of the carriers now use very different terminology when describing what the contract covers. The use the terms "web browsing" and "data" as if the content is somehow different. We all well know there is zero difference. sure "web browsing" could be, and likely is defined, in the EULA as viewing websites using a browser, fine, but where is the line between embeded video being billed as data verses it actually being "web browsing" as it comes along in the course of basic browsing.
I do use a 3rd party service provider for my mobile broadband needs and they offer plans with pretty much every technology. The name of the company is Millenicom and right now I am using their uncapped CDMA service via Sprint's network for $60/mo and I get a consistent symmetric 1-2mb service. I get faster here with AT&T, as high as 6mb/4mb which is not quite symmetric but pretty darned speedy. Only problem is there is a very small data cap on that service which pretty much makes the speed of no more value than the slower CDMA service we get here. But in general you are dead on correct, the cost will be around $60-$120/mo no matter how you look at it, well it will be that much if a person wants a service that actually provides real usefulness rather than just being able to say "...I have the fastest connection." I mean great for the 5-minutes/day on average you can use it before hitting the cap in a month and needing to sell a kidney to pay the bill.
Your take on the Safari browser is in line with my experiences as well. It's just OK, as in good enough for most needs. but to really be assured of complete access I feel one needs to juggle a couple different browsers to have all the bases covered and what a PITA is that? In fact it is like the old days on PDA's running Netfront, you needed three more browsers if you wanted anything close to reasonable access. And on the Nokia N800 running OS2008 the browser was, well, not great either. This is part of the fiddly nature of these devices I find so frustrating and really just disappointing. And also why I pretty much am leaning toward spending that mega-buck on a Win7 device once the dust settles. Do I want to spend that much? Not a chance. Am I going to like the battery life? Not even close and it's this last issue which may be why I just walk away from the whole idea period. The devices simply have not matured as they should have in the two-and-a-half decades we've had portable notebook/laptop computers. And most of that lay within the whole market system.
Last my concerns are we now must buy into a new buzzword, the ecosystem, great. But really it is great if you can handle the limits such a thing will have. And also only if that ecosystem does not suffer from it's own form of deforestation and global warming. Or if they do not force perpetual device replacement every 18-months or so. There might be my biggest issue, I don't need these devices to be replaced more than every 5-6 years at the soonest, my needs are static. It is the commercial content providers which demand these things as well as the device makers themselves simply because they stop supporting a device. Maybe I have been bitten by that too many times now so that my enthusiasm is not where it could be. Still, of all the devices i actually do like the Touch a lot. And by extension how the iPad works, I just need to decide if they are not going to screw us in 2-3 yrs or sooner in terms of content access. But as you say there is the jailbreak options but man I so don't want any more "fiddly" in my daily activities. life is far too short to waste it on that sort of thing.
I hope ya find something which works for your needs. I would think something is out there and hopefully it is not shackled to the ball-n-chain of a data plan.
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