The amazon deal is for *new* customers only.  You do not qualify.  If
you want to take out a new line of service you may qualify.

- -
         

Number portablity is from one provider to another, not within one
company phone to phone.  What you want is considered an Upgrade and
what is offering is a rebate for NEW contract account.  Visit a
Cingular store, tell them what you want and they will explain what
they can offer.

Comparison shop, try cnet.com, phonescoop.com.  Cnet gives you a nice link
to comparison prices.  Although you might want to use us as well for better
prices for phones with a new line of service as well.  My first suggestion:
cnet.com, followed by phonescoop, and then free.better-price.biz  dr

OK, thanks.  I'll have the 'ol 'hey, I'm thinking about cancelling my
service' conversation with the Cingular rep and see if they will do
anything.  I don't suppose I'm alone thinking it's prejudicial to offer a
free, nice, phone to new customers and charge me, the loyal longstanding
customer, $200 for the same arrangement.  I realize, of course, they'd be
hard pressed to do that for millions of current subscribers.

It's still not clear how they'd view me, customer long past the minimum
service comittment period who wants to upgrade from a now-obsolete plan to a
new one that has more minutes and gets them $10 more per month from me.

I did threaten cancellation to DirecTV last year and they sent me a new
receiver for free to keep me from cancelling.

Check out http://www.simplywireless.com - they allow upgrades and offer a
great price on the silver RAZR and a not so bad price on the black RAZR.
They may require that you accept one of the new service plans which offer
more minutes but cost more $$$ to get the good subsidized phone deals.

In that case just go to http://www.myworldphone.com and just buy the black
RAZR for about $400 shipped.  Sure, it's a lot of cash to lay out at once
but you get an unbranded, unlocked RAZR that can be used anywhere in the
world with GSM so long as you get the prepaid SIM for wherever you are
travelling.  This means that you don't get the Cingular version with some
menu items locked out.  It will require some extra work on your part to get
it configured correctly to work perfectly on Cingular's network but you can
find all the info you need at http://www.howardforums.com .

If you allow yourself to be hooked into a 2-year contract that costs you an
extra $10/month, but don't even use all your minutes now, it's a better deal
to buy the phone outright than to pay Cingular $200 for the phone now plus
another $240 over the next 2 years.  Additionally when you get to the end of
that 2 years the RAZR will be very obsolete on Cingular's network since it
doesn't even offer EDGE (fast data speed) and by then 3G/UMTS may be the de
facto standard anyway.  If you don't do web surfing or data-related stuff on
your phone then this shouldn't be a concern.  From all reports the RAZR is
great at being a phone and it's on my short list as I'm due for an upgrade
soon.