Believe me, I tried the very best I could to get them to budge. My arguments were similar, in that the Diamond was superior to everything they offered me (with the BIG selling point being the high resolution screen), and that I had WinMo-specific software I used and needed for work. Nevertheless, they wouldn't offer me anything except the Hero. I specifically asked over and over for the Diamond or TP, but they claimed that there was no more stock of either and that they weren't going to get any in as it's too old of a phone. Tried for a TP2 for kicks, but they flat out said no.
My Hero arrives today, so it's too late anyways to try again.
Just a quick comment on my ROM... man, the versions without Co0kie's Home Tab are FLYING! I have literally never seen my bros Diamond work this fast before. It's well worth a try if you can live without CHT's features (always a tradeoff heh)
EDIT: Just got my Hero, and now Sprint wants me to change my plan to activate it (without telling me first wtf). That's definitely NOT going to happen. Going to be an interesting ride... maybe they'll finally dig up a Diamond for me
EDIT2: Heh getting a Touch Pro 2 instead