The iPhone can be bought for $599 USD or so, and the N900 has been sold for $379 or less as of late.

Not sure if I'm following your logic.

He's saying "Buy the iphone on contract, sell it for a profit... then you'll have enough money to buy n900 at msrp... and with the remainder of the profit you can pay for your iphone contract..."

Sounds like a scalper with a big miscalculation issue to me.

I thought the AT&T contract adds up to over $2k over the contract period.

Yeah. It would've made more sense to buy the iPhone unlocked, resell for profit.

Then you'd need to be in Europe and not in the US. They sell it unlocked there.

Playing devil's advocate... but seriously. If you're going to use a phone for 2 years in the US, what's the price of any data enabled phone on a 3G (or higher) network versus the contract price?

Either way, you're going to have a bill for voice and data.

@gerbick: right, the correct calculation would just take into account the premium that AT&T charges for iPhone users...

AT&T charges everybody a premium.

I'm on a family plan with two phones, I get a corporate discount, one is an iPhone, one is a data-less phone. I average $103 per month. That's $79.99 for the primary phone (1400 w/ rollover minutes), $30 unlimited data (I'm grandfathered), $9.99 for the other line, $5 200 SMS package on the iPhone. After all of the 911 tariffs, et al... and my 23% discount.

I've been with AT&T in one form or fashion for 15 years. So... out of contract, in contract doesn't really affect me. Unlocked phones are good for the carrier nomads... and in the US, unlocked means very few companies with widespread coverage or local yocal companies that will cover your county... and that's about it.

And most people here only list the single price(s) for phones. I can't be the only person with two lines.

And I got some more research to do. T-Mobile would have saved me about 12-18 a month, Verizon was about the same. Sprint... was more expensive. And with all of the above, I'd have to buy an expensive phone whereas I get my iPhone(s) for free.

nokia 3310. it works just fine.

or n900. you can do more without paying more.

Got numbers? I'm in the US and want a phone with 3G access, not 2G.

i dont see a misscalculation....

here in austia (europe) a new iphone 4g costs about 1000€ when you buy it from a private person.... and about 1400€ when you buy it from a online shop....
and i got my n900 in january (rel day in mid.eur) for 510€

so there are still 490€ left to pay the contract....