ericgooch.com

So I get back from a convention where I've been taking pictures, and grab my Sidekick II to make a call. I look at the screen, and get one of those awful, sinking feelings.

NOOOOOoooooooo......

My trusty Sidekick sports a large and nasty crack running right across the screen, rendering it pretty much useless. At first I'm doing that thing where you tell yourself that it's probably just temporary, maybe it got too hot...maybe it's an electronic abberation that will pass...maybe......no, I'm screwed.

So I go online and find other horror stories about cracked Sidekick screens, and one guy says that because the crack was on the inner screen, and there was no damage on the outside of the screen, that T-Mobile replaced his phone. Awesome! So I send an email to T-Mobile describing the same problem, and I get this back:

"Thank you for taking the time to contact T-Mobile. We understand the LCD is cracked on your Sidekick. We appreciate how this can be frustrating, and we will be more than happy to assist with your issue. We regret we cannot replace or repair phones with broken or cracked LCD screens. We suggest you upgrade to a new phone at this time."

I love the way they started off with "we will be more than happy to assist with your issue" and wrap it up by telling me to buy a new phone. Now if the T-Mobile reception I get here in Burbank had ever been anything other than a complete joke, I might have considered looking at other phones. But the crappy customer service, combined with the laughable signal quality caused me to cancel my account.

I'll go with another carrier and another phone.

Moral of the story? Before you buy a Sidekick (or any T-Mobile device for that matter)

1) check with everyone you know in your same home/work area and make sure they get good reception. The greatest gadget in the world is worthless if it's got crappy reception.

2) Buy a reinforced steel case for it, because the Sidekick screens crack easily. When I went to eBay to look for replacement screens, I saw these:

 Ouch!

Ack!

Doh! 

Gaah! 

Looks like there's a lot of them out there!