So, I finally broke down and bought a pair of new phones. Cynthia's old phone was essentially dead, and I didn't like the deal that T-Mobile offered us, so we switched to AT&T Wireless. Their plan is the same basic price with a few more minutes per month; it's basically a push.

Picking service plans is easy; actually picking phones has been killing me. My basic requirements are:

• Must sync with the Mac, preferably via Bluetooth
• Must have a usable calendar/to-do list implementation
• Must be under $300, ideally under $100

Amazingly enough, only a few phones make it through this filter. I was looking at the Nokia 3650, but AT&T has just dropped it, and I could only find one store in the Seattle area with one in stock, and they wanted over $300 for the phone. So that's out. That leaves only two Bluetooth phones in AT&T's lineup, the Sony-Ericsson T616 and the Siemens S56. We've had Sony-Ericsson T68s for over a year, and they've been okay, but there are a bunch of little things that I don't like about the T68 (the interface is generally clunky). So, we looked at the S56, and it didn't look any better then the T68, while the T616 seems to be a bit of an improvement. And, no matter how you slice it, it isn't any worse then the T68.

So, during The Big Snow, I stopped off at the AT&T store, planning on getting a pair of T616s. One little thing got in the way--I read an announcement that PocketMac is now shipping a version of their sync software for MS Smartphones, like the Motorola MPx200 that AT&T is selling. That means that the MPx200 can sync with the Mac, which puts it back onto my list. It doesn't do Bluetooth, but most reviews claim that it's actually a decent phone, not just a gizmo like a lot of the early palm phones, so I figured I'd give it a try.

The short version is that the MPx200 is a decent phone, and the rest of the software on it doesn't seem to totally suck. Plus, it was on sale, so I walked out with a MPx200 and a T616. I'll have a longer review of the MPx200 soon.