Being a SmartPhone geek, I receive the questions “What phone is the best phone?” and “What phone should I get?” all the time.  I’ve heard others asked these questions and provide quick, fan boyish responses.  ”iPhone, it will cook your dinner too”, “Don’t get Android, there aren’t as many Apps”, or “Get a BlackBerry, because that’s what I use”, etc “Get a Pre, well because no one else did”.  So how do you figure out which SmartPhone is the best for you?  What questions should be asked?  What decision points should be evaluated?  Hopefully I can provide insight on these other related questions.

Disclaimer: If you are one of those people who “Has to have an iPhone”, you can skip this guidance and hit up attwireless.com, apple.com/iphone, your local Apple or AT&T retail store. At this time, Verizon has yet to formally announce the iPhone joining their line up as the rumors and the reliable Wall Street Journal has reported on for the past two years.

The following are two main decision points to use when selecting your carrier.  For some, the decision points could be swapped in terms of importance.

The first carrier decision point is service in your region.  It might be beneficial to use your network of friends and peers and survey their experiences. Verizon may be great in one city, but horrendous in another.  AT&T is generally horrendous everywhere.

The second carrier decision point is cost.  This is pretty straight forward, if you’re not willing to pay the premium for Verizon’s service vs. T-Mobile, then it should narrow down your decision rather quickly.  For example, Verizon, AT&T, and Sprint offer a basic 450 minute plan for $40.  T-Mobile has a 500 minute plan at the same price point.  Where things get dicey is when you lump on the Messaging(Text, Picture, and Video).  Most carriers want $20 for unlimited, Sprint for example wants only a $10 premium for such an offering.  Throw in your data plan and you’re looking at another $25-$45 depending on carrier and device.  So determining what you want and are willing to spend every month including taxes is important as these monthly service costs range from $85-$105 depending on your basic plan selections.

I’m not going to dig in further into plan comparisons as they change so frequently the data will be invalidated quickly.

There are other decision points when selecting a carrier, but none are as important as the two listed above.

Next article: Mobile OS Selection. The fun, extremely emotional and personal decision.