Palm Pre definitely coming to Canada on Bell Mobility: 2H 2009

What the CEO wants, the CEO gets -- right? Evidently so, as just four months after Ed Colligan proudly stated that he wanted the Pre in Canadian hands, Palm has revealed that the to-be launched handset will indeed grace the cellular airwaves in the Great North. Canucks will have to rely on Bell Mobility (a CDMA carrier, for those unaware) for service, and they'll have to wait until "the second half of 2009" to indulge. Check the read link to get yourself signed up for notifications, and feel free to start the countdown until 11:59PM on December 31st, 2009.

[monkey with glasses Posted May 6th 2009 1:32PM]

I'm DOWN with that.

[(Unverified) Posted May 6th 2009 1:35PM]

The National Operators suck but MTS and Thunder Bay Tel are usually pretty good

[blueskyv201 Posted May 6th 2009 5:26PM]

Everyone hates their phone company. They're not terrible, their rates are just ridiculously high.

[cbstryker Posted May 6th 2009 6:02PM]

My good sir, you clearly have not used Bell Mobility before....

[avanti Posted May 6th 2009 11:00AM]

Not in North America...
Europe either!

[tintinto Posted May 6th 2009 11:02AM]

this is interesting. Bell is actually starting the switch to GSM this fall...

[(Unverified) Posted May 6th 2009 11:02AM]

I will never deal with Bell again. I guess with choosing between the Pre and the new iPhone launching in June, I pick the iPhone and Rogers.

Pity, because I was originally leaning towards the Pre.

[(Unverified) Posted May 6th 2009 11:37AM]

This has to come out on Telus too. Bell doesn't cover the whole country (i.e. Manitoba). I'm hoping that it'll be released on both carriers, like the Storm. I can't imagine that they could just not sell the Pre in an entire province.

[nothingnewunderthesun Posted May 6th 2009 4:29PM]

Coverage is the problem. Rogers only covers about half the country. If you live in the southern part of Central Canada, say Toronto to Montreal, the service is good. If you go north, east or west of that it gets iffy to non-existent. They cover ONE city in the entire province of Newfoundland! The Canadian military, emergency measures organization, police, etc., would never think of using Rogers tiny network.

Part of the reason CDMA is so good in Canada is that Bell has been around forever and had the advantage of both a monopoly and subsidies when installing their network in the boonies, e.g., the mining town of Thompson, Manitoba (pop. 15,000). Another reason is that they share Telus' network (Belus) as they allow their customers on each other's network. Rogers is on their own. Btw, the new Belus network is not the antique GSM. It's HSDPA, on up to LTE.

For those demanding great service, Virgin Mobile (Mobile Virtual Network Operator) is way up there, according to the Jan. issue of Consumer Reports (CDN edition). They use the Belus comprehensive networks and they scored solid red dots (i.e., Much Better than Average) right across the board in CR's survey of 18,000 Canadians.

Just because Bell is run by sub-morons and gene pool skimmings does not mean you can't use their great network.

[(Unverified) Posted May 6th 2009 12:04PM]

This post among others do not appear in the palm pre featured area; only posts tagged "pre" appear there and recent posts dont have that

[WebOn Posted May 6th 2009 12:25PM]

whats a canuck?

[NinjaMonkey Posted May 6th 2009 12:33PM]

It's awesome it's coming to Canada, but why Bell? Telus is such a better network.

Both Telus and Bell are switching to HSPA, which will allow for GSM and CDMA.

[ae86takumi Posted May 6th 2009 12:41PM]

Palm better step up and expand their market share. CDMA won't make them much money alone, they need to target the GSM crowd by selling an unlocked version.

[Wally Posted May 6th 2009 12:53PM]

Again, enough with the pre updates, release it already, and stop boring me to death.

[(Unverified) Posted May 6th 2009 1:01PM]

Bell? Ugh.

[dpaul420 Posted May 6th 2009 1:56PM]

I want I want, dont disappoint me Bell or Palm...

[Widgetech Posted May 6th 2009 3:58PM]

As much as I love the Pre, I hate Bell even more... Sorry, no Pre for me...

[Widgetech Posted May 6th 2009 4:23PM]

Just a follow up, this is live o Bell's site now @ pre.bell.ca - and it says it will be EXCLUSIVE to Bell! NOOOOOOOO!

Sorry, guys...

[DJManoloco Posted May 6th 2009 5:18PM]

So what GSM provider will carry the Pre outside of the US? I'm contemplating getting this for my wife who loves her Centro, if it wasn't for the shit battery life. I have At&t by the way (More bars in more places...bullshit!)

[Nimer55 Posted May 6th 2009 7:34PM]

I have bell , and im stoked!


BELLS DATA PLANS ARE ALOT CHEAPER THE ROGERS!

[Widgetech Posted May 6th 2009 9:20PM]

Not in most cases.

Rogers Plans: http://www.your.rogers.com/business/wireless/plans_services/business_plans.asp?plan=dataservice&cat=2&typ=2

Bell Plans: http://www.bell.ca/shopping/PrsShpWls_RtpDetails.page?wlcs_catalog_category_id=DataRatePlans#1

Telus plans: http://www.telusmobility.com/on/plans/pcs/bundlesforsmartphones.shtml

Around $15 Plans:
Rogers - 2 MB of data, $5/MB for the first 5 extra MBs and 5cents a MB thereafter. $15/mnth
Bell - Windows Mobile or PalmOS only. 2 MB of data. $8/MB extra. $15/mnth Must add to voice plan.
Telus - Blackberry Only; Unlimited E-Mail and IM. No other data. $15/mnth Must add to voice plan.

Winner for $15/month packages: Telus

Telus clearly has the best deal here. While the other two carriers give you 2MB, Telus gives you unlimited E-Mail and IM. And Don't complain about web browsing, E-Mail and IM are pretty much all thet a 2MB plan would be good for anyway. Unfortunately, the Telus plan is restricted to BBs. The Bell plan is restricted to Wino and PalmOS and Rogers plan is open.

Around $25 CAD Plans:
Rogers- 500MB of data. 5cents a MB thereafter. $25/month
Bell - 4 MB. $12/MB thereafter. $25/month Must add to voice plan.
Telus - BB only. Unlimited IM, E-Mail and Texting. $25/month Must add to voice plan.

Winner for $15 plans:
Rogers. Unlimited IM, E-Mail and Texting on Telus probably don't even take up 500MB anyways, and you can use the Rogers one for any app, not just E-Mail, IM, and Texting.

$30/month Plans:
Rogers - 1GB of data, 3cents a MB for extra. $30/month.
Bell - Not available.
Telus - Any SmartPhone. 500MB of data, plus unlimited Texting. $35/Month. Must add to voice plan.

Winner: Rogers. Do I really need to explain this one?

Around $40 CAD Plans
Rogers - Not available.
Bell - 8MB of data, $8 a meg thereafter.
Telus - 1GB of data. Unlimited texting and Visual Voicemail. $45/month. Must add to voice plan.

Winner:
Rogers, for offering what Telus does for $40 for ten bucks less.


Around $60 CAD Plans:
Rogers - 3GB of data, 3cents a meg after.
Bell - 400 Anytime minutes, Unlimited evenings and weekends. Unlimited data, restricted to E-Mail, Internet, IM and Texting (MMS). Don't need to add to voice pack, it's included. $70/Month
Telus - Not available.

Winner:
Tie between Rogers and Bell. I personally like the Rogers plan better, 'cause it can be used in any app. Bell is restricted but unlimited. (If that makes sense.)

Around $80 CAD Plans:
Rogers - 5 GB of data, 3 cents a meg after.
Bell - Not available, the next up is $100/month, and offers virtually nothing over the $70/month plan.
Telus - Not available.

Winner: Rogers.

Final Score:

Rogers - 5/6 times they had the best deals. That's about %80 of the time.
Bell - 1/6 times, and only cause Rogers and bell tied in one round, Bell had a good deal 1/6 or %16 of the time.
Telus - 1/6. A shame, I like Telus. (Telus has the best deals for Non-Smartphones, though. Though sometimes (rarely) Rogers is cheaper. Rogers usually matches Telus' pricing for Pay as you go on Non-Smartphones.)

So really, Rogers has the best value. Not Bell. In fact, until you get higher up in Price point, Bell is the worst for data (and "higher up" means $70+. AKA Crazy.).

This only includes data packs, Rogers has unlimited browsing for $7/month on monthly and Pay as you Go as a package to add to voice plans. Telus has this for $7/month too, but only for prepaid. Bell has it, but it's $10/month and only for prepaid. I also didn't include the much cheaper telus SPARK bundles, which don't include any separate data (like a certain amount of Megs or Gigs), but include "Unlimited" of certian things the more money you pay. Unfortunately, these are only available for Non-Smartphones. Also, the SPARK packages' only feature that catches my eye is unlimited Web Browsing and Video Straming. Luckily, in this day and age, we have sites like meebo and webmail to let us use IM and Email in the web browser. ;-)

Rogers also has "Flex plans", whick I LOVE. It bills you a different amount of money each month based on how much data you use in any given month.

The truth just is that cell phones cost too much in Canada.

T.T

[rav1luv Posted May 6th 2009 11:45PM]

So it sounds like if your a verizon customer and you are willing to pay full price, you can hook this up on an existing vzw account...

[Mmmm Donuts Posted May 7th 2009 4:19PM]

Cuz' yer fifty pounds over
and eighty percent fat,
no matter what I do
you always snaaack,
and Iiii, just turn a blind eeeyyyee
baby you are really fat

[(Unverified) Posted Jun 5th 2009 5:52PM]

Has Bell recently changed their rate plans because comparing them to Rogers is really no comparison at all. I know for a fact that Rogers just changed their plans on June 1, dropping the option of MY5 for the family plan, as well as free evenings at 6 (through costco).
Oh and for basically the same price (well $5 more on rogers you get 2GB of data compared to Bell which gives you unlimited data)

The way I look at it Rogers plans stink now and while the competition improved their plans Rogers made their plans worse (individual as well).

[webterractive Posted Jun 28th 2009 7:58PM]

I talked to a couple of people from Bell Mobility and they're predicting the Pre in mid July to early August. I cannot wait, but too bad it's Canada and we have to agree to a 3 year contract. But unlike Rogers AT&T Bell and Telus do allow for 2 years to be selected, I don't know if Bell for the 3 years I hope they don't. Rogers AT&T forces 3 years on popular phones like the iPhone. And jacks up the price for devices on 2 or 1 year terms. They're respectively $50-$100 cheaper than no contract phones.