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Ask Slashdot: A Cheap US Cellphone Plan With an Unlocked Phone?
metrix007 writes "I am a recent immigrant to the U.S. I am used to going to countries and paying a small amount, say, $30, for a simcard and using it with my unlocked phone. I can't seem to do that in the U.S., where the only options seem to be to buy a phone and buy minutes as I need them such as with Tracfone, or a contract where I pay an amount per month to pay off a phone and a certain amount of minutes. I have a Google Nexus One, which is better than any phone offered on the basic plans from all the cell providers. Is there any way I can use it as a cell phone in the U.S. for about $30-$50/month? It seems a shame to waste it and have to pay for a lesser phone."
Simple Mobile. Enough said.
I love how long this post has gone without replies (25 minutes, unless there's some sort of database lag I don't see). I guess that's a damning indictment of the US telecom industry and their pricing practices...
get the online/walmart $35 plan which has unlimited data or pay by the minute at 10 cents a minute if you don't use it much. You can also get unlimited text/data/voice on at&t or t-mobile through net10 for $45/month - check their website as the deal is online only. tell it you are using an at&t locked phone if you want at&t otherwise they send t-mobile by default
Get a web developer
T-Mobile have a Value series of plans specifically for people who own their phone already that have a discount on the monthly rate. It's actually the plan I'm on right now. Also I'm 99% sure both T-Mobile and AT&T offer the ability to buy pay-as-you-go SIMs that include data.
You cant take your nexus to them but they and republic wireless are about the best bets fro cheap reliable phone service.
No sir I dont like it.
They don't advertise it via the Web, but T Mobile appears to be the vendor of choice among people who want minimum commitment mobile phones. Devices start at $20, unlimited SMS is $15 month to month.
http://prepaid-phones.t-mobile.com/monthly-4g-plans
We downgraded from smartphones to unlimited text + pay to talk, and haven't looked back. I already carry a 4G wifi and a laptop at all times, so the ~$100 a month for a fragile device (hardware and software) with 4 hours of battery life and probable spyware just seemed insane in hindsight.
Those are pretty much your only options on the GSM front. T-Mob has a 30 USD/month plan for 100 minutes and unlimited text/data, but all of their other plans are more expensive than straighttalk for smartphones (probably featurephones as well).
--- Ãther SPOON!
My new favorite plan is PlatinumTel. I just bought an Android handset for $60 and signed up for a plan that only requires a minimum of $10 every three months. Texts are 2 cents, voice is 5 cents, and data is 10 cents/MB. However, it's an Android phone, so anyplace that has wireless is free. (e.g., it's a great phone for the wife and kids)
My personal phone is currently an Android handset on a $25/month unlimited data + 300 minutes Virgin Mobile plan, but I'm pretty sure that plan's not available for new folks. I dropped the family's last TracPhone (too expensive) last year. I also used Net10 for a while, but Virgin beat that, and now it looks like PlatinumTel is the least expensive one out there.
BYOP (bring your own phone) T-mobile value plan. Here in Chicago the coverage seems better than AT&T (e.g. no holes at Lake Shore & Monroe and near UIC).
T-mobile prepaid plans can cost as little as $10/year. Once you have bought $100 worth of minutes, the top-up period increases to 1 year with the smallest amount being $10. No, there is no data, but if you're on a budget you can always find free wi-fi somewhere.
I did a quick search on the AT&T site and came across this.
http://www.att.com/shop/wireless/devices/att/3g-sim-white.html#fbid=cJveSn40ZqE
You can buy the SIM, enter the IMEI of your phone and then choose what plan you want. Seems like you'd be able to do this in stores, too, but I have no idea.
There's also this support page (http://www.att.com/esupport/article.jsp?sid=KB113269&cv=820&_requestid=334233#fbid=Vd1k_ywKiST) for getting a SIM card for a phone you already own.
Your Google Nexus One is T-Mobile compatible for high speed data access, so check out the Monthly4G offering.
They offer unlimited talk, text, and web for $50/mo, and a plan with 100 minutes of talk, unlimited text and web for $30/mo with additional minutes for $0.10/min.
Also, if you are willing to spend a little money to get a more advanced phone later on, I'd recommend picking up either a Samsung Galaxy Nexus ($349) or the Samsung Galaxy S Blaze 4G ($300). Both options do not require a contract and are compatible with T-Mobile's HSPA+ network.
I use a provider called TruPhone. They are pre-paid and charge $0.15 per minute, and $0.15/MB for data in the USA. If you spend a lot of time talking on your phone or using data while you're out, this isn't the option for you. If you're within wifi 90% of your day, paired with google voice, it could be an option.
Go to the T-Mobile web-store and buy a SIM activation kit for $1. When you receive it, follow the activation instructions on the web and when it asks you to choose your plan, select "Monthly 4G $30"
* Unlimited internet*
* Unlimited Text
* 100 minutes talktime
It's basically a prepay deal where the available balance will drop by $30 a month, so you just need to top-up once a month, and make sure you have enough credit to cover any calls you make over the 100 minutes No ongoing contracts.
Deal is web-only.
*Unlimited internet means up to 5GB at HSPDA+ speeds.
There are a few smaller carriers that lease AT&T's GSM network.
Boost (They seem to cater to people with bad credit)
Cricket($55 unlimited everything but data is throttled after 2.5GB.)
Consumer Cellular(Great if you just make phone calls, data costs an arm and a leg)
One of our competitors trademarked the term "hypothesis". From now on, we will call them "boneheaded ideas".
Or an indictment of that damn sun, rising and setting, creating this silly "day" that we have to put up with, lots of people being "asleep" when this was posted.
It is much harder in the USA to just get a sim-card and go. T-mobile do offer it though. It was funny when the salesperson tried to sell me a phone tooand I pulled out my Galaxy S (which was unavailable there at that time) and said I was covered. It was better than any phone in the store so that upsell attempt was quickly over.
You might confuse them but they'll figure it out.
Buy the sim for 14.99, then for 49.99 you get unlimited talk and text, they claim unlimited data but they warn and bitch if you use too much.
"T-Mobile or AT&T would be happy to sell no commitment service on your existing GSM phone."
At full price. He asked for "CHEAP". and nothing AT&T is cheap.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
http://www.mysimplemobile.com/ I use simple mobile with my unlocked/jailbroken iPhone. It's $40 for unlimited voice/text/data. Best deal on the market. Only downside is that I don't get 3G data speeds because iPhone is intended for AT&T. But you can get full 3G if you use a phone that was intended for use with T-Mobile. Also, don't buy the SIM card through SimpleMobile -- get one on eBay for $1 (plus free shipping)
On my last couple trips to the US, I've picked up a $25 SIM for my unlocked iphone at an AT&T store. It's good for up to 3 months, with 250 minutes and unlimited SMS. No data, but wi-fi is everywhere. You can buy more time if you need to
-- "At Microsoft, quality is job 1.1" -- PC Magazine, Nov. 1994
Sorry, but is this really a Ask Slashdot-worthy story? Better placed to ask on any of a dozen different travel forums, or to raise it in mobile phone forums (of which I hear the kids these days have quite a few).
A quick LMGTFY link to help wrap up the conversation
I used them for a while. They're fine if you don't need customer service. It's outsourced to India and I never got one that spoke decent English or could fully understand what I said.
Also, their data speeds are limited a fair bit. About dial-up speeds in my experience.
I'm surprised to see that nobody has mentioned frequency bands yet. It sounds like your phone is a European model. The problem is that different parts of the world use different frequencies for mobile phone service, and now even different technologies, too.
From what I understand, pretty much all of Europe uses the GSM on the same frequency bands, so you can shuffle around SIM cards all day. But in the US, the frequencies are different from Europe. Even more of a problem is that GSM isn't dominant here. And now 3G and 4G are coming.
So sure, you could stick in a SIM card, but can your phone even talk on the right frequencies? If it is a "quad band" phone, you may be in luck.
#naabhaprzrag, #sverubfr-000, #agi-fcbafberq, negvpyr[pynff*=' negvpyr-ary-'] { qvfcynl: abar !vzcbegnag; }
http://www.cellguru.net/prepaid_compare.htm I think you'll find something you can use.
I just bought one of their SIM cards with their $45 unli everything plan and popped it into my Nokia N9 when I was back in the States for a few weeks recently.
Process was straightforward enough to set it up. I had decent coverage (AT&T, YMMV), unlimited everything was nice to have. Unsure what experience the previous poster had with their 3G speeds. I found it to be quite speedy. Able to watch YouTube, etc. as fast or faster than my connection at home in the Philippines.
Overall, if I were living in the States, I'd surely go with this company as I like my phones unlocked and without the bloatware of the mobile companies.
Even at that, I'll still use them when I return the US so that I have a mobile number where friends and family can reach me, while I'm there.
The great thing about Straight Talk is that is uses the AT&T network. Because most unlocked phones are built to use AT&T frequencies for 3G, you'll generally get faster data speeds than T-Mobile -- if your phone is built to use the AT&T frequencies. This would generally be an argument against using Simple Mobile.
It's $45 a month for unlimited everything.
I'm using both StraightTalk and T-Mobile sims on unlocked gsm phones. The StraightTalk coverage has been surprisingly good. The T-Mobile is good too, but more expensive. Based on my experiences with both I'd go with StraightTalk.
T-Mobile's coverage is extremely limited, AND their 3G network is incompatible with most phones sold by them. The only non-TMo phones that work are the HSPA+ Galaxy Nexus and AT&T LTE devices running hacked radio firmware.
Straight Talk provides MVNO service on both T-Mo or AT&T networks (you choose when you purchase the SIM).
$15 for initial SIM purchase, $45/month thereafter. Plan includes unlimited voice and texts (with no apparent "stealth limits") - the one disadvantage is that they claim "unlimited" data but it's really 2GB.
Personally I only use 500MB or so a month, so I'm going to them when my AT&T contract is up.
ST's BYOD plans are a fairly recent development, not many people are aware of them.
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
A SIM car for an unlocked phone costs $15. Unlimited talk, text and web costs $45 per month.
I dumped AT&T and T-Mobile a few months ago and haven't looked back. This is cheaper and the same networks.
Avoid T-Mobile compatible phones for this service. Straight Talk is an MVNO and T-Mobile is a bunch of dicks. They won't let outside SMS messages thru. AT&T doesn't do that to MVNOs and SMS/MMS works fine.
I currently have a Google Samsung Galaxy Nexus and a HTC Glacier (MyTouch 4G) using this plan.
If you don't need unlimited, and it isn't a smartphone, ST has a $30 plan that might suit you. No commitment or contract, just get a new card at Walmart or refill online.
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
This really is a topic for mobile phone specific forum. My favourite is HowardForums. Here is a link to the US pre-payed/MVNO forums: http://www.howardforums.com/forumdisplay.php/325-US-Prepaid-MVNO-Discussion
There are lots of people there who know what's up with pre-paid and low-cost options.
I second that. T-Mobile is the only major carrier in US to allow buying a phone elsewhere. It's coverage does not match that of Verizon but I was fine everywhere in NE save some wild mountain ranges.It also offers best bang for the buck compared to AT&T and Verizon.
I believe this is the correct link: http://prepaid-phones.t-mobile.com/monthly-4g-plans
I'm using them right now with a Galaxy Nexus. So far so good. It's been great being free of a contract. I had some issues porting my number over due to the zipcode not matching the area code of the phone number I was porting. Their customer service was extremely helpful in getting it resolved. Once they made the needed changes everything was up and running within an hour.
You can get an Android phone for less that $100, plans start at $35 for 300 minutes, unlimited data/text. Data gets throttled after 2.5GB. They piggybank on Sprint's network. I've had it for nearly two years and can't really complain.
I now pay 40% less for the same service I had before on this phone, given that there is no iPhone Tax this way. You can get the SIM card at you local WallyWorld, or online.
I plan to switch my other phones over, after I see if this year's crop of new "smartphone deals" makes it worth sticking to the Old Way for a while.
Just FYI, T-Mobile doesn't let outside SMS/MMS messages thru for the MVNOs.
That is, using Straight Talk, you won't receive any text message sent to you from anyone who is not on T-Mobile or Straight Talk. They were blocking the 2-factor text messages that Bank of America sends when I had them.
I switched to an AT&T SIM and it works fine.
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
If you want to use your existing phone, you probably don't have a lot of choice. I assume it's a GSM phone which means you're either going to use AT&T or T-Mobile. If you want to use data and want 3G speeds, then you need to know what frequency bands your phone supports. T-Mobile and AT&T use different frequencies for 3G, and I don't believe the Nexus One supported both. So it's either a T-Mobile compatible phone or an AT&T compatible phone. Either way, you can probably use it for either carrier, but you can only get 3G speeds on one of them. And if you want a data plan, you're probably looking at something closer to $100 per month.
Welcome to America! Our infrastructure sucks, but at least we pay a lot for it!
Definitely go with an MVNO http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_virtual_network_operator http://gigaom.com/mobile/why-are-mvnos-so-hot-right-now-thank-the-carriers/
In the US I can walk into a store, and buy a contract free phone for under $40 and use it immediately. When I visited Canada, such an option did not appear to exist. And unfortunately my US cell phone didn't seem to work at all in Vancouver. I suppose if I got a more expensive US carrier I could have at least did some roaming, but $25/mo for unlimited data is pretty hard to pass up, even if the data is a little slow.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
It sounds like you want non-contractual mobile service, but you didn't mention whether you wanted to make international calls or how often you planned to use the service. I'm basing my advice on the assumption that you'd like daily usage with occasional international calls.
Many US providers offer data-only plans for $20-40/mo and may also offer pre-paid data service. Because you have a smartphone running Android, you could potentially use SIP/VOIP using cellular data only or WiFi with a service like Google Voice or Callcentric. If you're running ICS (Androd 4.0), there's native SIP support, but earlier versions will require you to download an app (like Gizmo5) to tunnel cellular voice over data because of legacy service standards in the US, which isn't a problem if you have LTE.
However, if you're running a custom ROM like CyanogenMod 7.x, you have the much simpler native option of "Internet Calling Only", which will use either data or WiFi for all calls. Use that with a SIP/VOIP service and a cheap data plan, and you're set for free nationwide and cheap international calling.
If you only planned to make non-international calls and your phone is unlocked (or not carrier restricted), you can pick up a pre-paid sim card just about anywhere. BoostMobile, T-Mobile, Cricket (if it still exists), and places like convenience stores and Wal-Mart all sell them. Service per minute is more expensive this way, but if you don't plan on making calls frequently, it may be your cheapest option. Several of those services offer $50 Unlimited Voice/Data/Text plans.
Actually, looking at the timestamps, it was some sort of timestamp/database issue...the story nominally posted at 9:26 EST, but no posts at all show up until 9:48, at which point there are quite a few. You're right that the West Coast folks were blissfully snoozing.
I have been using various unlocked iPhones on T-Mobile US for the past four years. There are two drawbacks with that approach. You can't use 3G (only EDGE) data, which makes for somewhat slower and less reliable data service. The second is coverage - T-Mobile just isn't great. Cost is $50/month, plus about $400 for the phone itself (found on Craigslist, had to look one that had an older baseband firmware). One advantage is that I can pop in a European SIM card whenever I go to Europe. When the new iPhone comes out next month, I'll probably switch to Verizon with a regular plan. Total cost of ownership (over 2 years) is much higher and my data will be limited to 2GB/month or so, but at least I'll have reliable service. If it is dual GSM/CDMA (and I expect it to be), I should be able to use it in Europe without much trouble.
Avoid T-Mobile compatible phones for this service. Straight Talk is an MVNO and T-Mobile is a bunch of dicks. They won't let outside SMS messages thru. AT&T doesn't do that to MVNOs and SMS/MMS works fine.
While you are correct about Straight Talk being a better overall value for a primary phone (and T-Mobile being a bunch of dicks), it is patently false that T-Mobile does not allow SMS from other carriers. They most certainly allow SMS/MMS to and from all major carriers foreign and domestic. They DO block non-mobile SMS short codes for obvious billing reasons (prepaid users racking up huge charges with 3rd parties that they don't have the funds to cover).
The main reason NOT to get T-Mobile for any service in my opinion is because they censor their internet access unless you give them your (valid, verifiable) ID/SSN. That is a complete joke, their WebGuard blocks many perfectly acceptable sites that they deem "unacceptable to minors", whatever that means. Avoid them like the plague if you care about freedom, but their SMS/MMS system actually does work fine.
The best deal I can find in Canada is Koodo, and even they suck.
It's $20 a month for 50 minutes / 50 outgoing texts, and I owe them the balance on the phone price when I leave them.
I I lived in a different city, I could get Wind for unlimited text / talk / data for $29.
---
ECHELON is a government program to find words like bomb, jihad, plutonium, assassinate, and anarchy.
No, I am not incorrect. However, I might have been unclear. Let me try again.
When using an MVNO like Straight Talk that resells using T-Mobile's network, T-Mobile *does not allow non-network text messages thru*.
If you have standard T-Mobile service from TMO themselves, they do allow those messages.
Using T-Mobile I can get text messages from Google, my bank, and friends on other networks like AT&T, Sprint and Verizon.
Using a Straight Talk account with a T-Mobile SIM I can only receive text messages from other Straight Talk or T-Mobile sources.
For example, using Bank of America's or Google's 2-factor authentication which sends a text message to your phone *does not work* using Straight Talk with a T-Mobile compatible SIM. It did work when I had service from T-Mobile directly. It worked again when I switched SIMs to an AT&T-compatible on Straight Talk.
Interesting about those WebGuard service. I did not know that.
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
Recently started Ting ( http://www.ting.com/ , from venerable http://www.tucows.com/ ) is an interesting MVNO. Since it is backed by an "old" company, I expect them to stick around as long as it works out for them in the first place.
You pay what you use each month depending on what tier you fall in separately for voice, texts, and data. Each device you have registered is $6 a month, but you have to buy your device from them at pretty much full cost. But frankly, over time that comes out much cheaper (I have been doing this for many years - I tend not to break my phones, though).
Works great if you have variable usage patterns and are not a really heavy user. Their data is a bit expensive, but I have read that they are working it and point their fingers at Spring charging them too much to begin with. Use home/free other Wifi if you can, and it's all good. No iPhone, but Samsung S3.
Yes, I know it's Sprint, which many don't like. But so far (joined right when they started) it has worked great, and I have cut my monthly cell phone expenses (3 lines) to $60-$80, half of what I paid before. We are mid-level users, using home-wifi if we can.
Cellphone addicts are, of course, better served by an all-unlimited plan from the big firms. I just don't see the point of supporting their profit margins that much.
Do your own thing. And overdo it!
+1 on StraightTalk. Just got my daughter and wife refurbed iPhones and signed them up. Coverage is great and the plan is month-to-month.
****
"I'd never want to join a club that would have me as a member" - G. Marx
$100 + sales tax gets you 1000 minutes good for a year. Any subsequent refills, even if smaller $ amounts are good for a year and extend current balance as well. Text msgs are 10c each way (used to be 5). So if you don't text a crazy amount and instead call people, its a pretty good deal. You would have to be a very heavy user of minutes ot justify a monthly plan and it sounds like you are not.
Their network is incompatible with most phones NOT sold by them...
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
http://www.prepaidgsm.net/en/usa.php -- A good list of prepaid providers both in the US (on that page) and in every country in the world.
As for your case in particular, you don't really say how you plan to use your phone, but since you have a smartphone and assuming you want to use it as such, the T-Mobile $30/month no contract plan (online or through Walmart, as others have mentioned) is probably your best option. However, if you're in an area with poor T-Mobile coverage, check the link above for other virtual providers that offer service on AT&T's network.
www.gaiageek.com
https://www.safelinkwireless.com/Safelink/
You can't get any cheaper then free, if you are eligible of course. Do NOT know if the phone is unlocked, but unlike Assurance Wireless http://www.assurancewireless.com/Public/Welcome.aspx the phone uses a sim card, so you can buy a better phone then the cheap one they give ya.
But hey, it's free, I use it. Why the hell should I pay any money monthly for the extra bullshit I don't use?
Be seeing you...
However, Americans use their phones far more than other nations, too. The price per minute of use in the US is lowest in the world.
Degaussing scares the bad magnetism out of the monitor and fills it with good karma.
If you absolutely have to keep using that nexus 1, then you may be stuck with t-mobile or (maybe) at&t. Make that "trying to use that nexus 1". I reluctantly gave up on GSM phones in the US when I couldn't get signal any more. At first, everything was fine. Good signal. Solid connections. Then t-mobile "optimized" something and I rarely got signal at home. My signal at work was sketchy. The signal was fine down the road a bit. A new phone had the same symptoms. I live and work in a typical sprawled out american city. T-mobile gave me a one time refund on my bill and then refused to budge because I still got service when I wasn't home.
Yes - that's right. T-mobile thought it was perfectly reasonable to bill me because I could go down the road a mile and make a call, check voice mail, etc.
Anyways, I now have a contract with verizon. I pay more. I can't swap a phones by moving a GSM sim card. I can't play with the cool new google phones. But I -can- actually make calls, receive calls, message, use that data plan, etc.
I'm going to buy a simplemobile sim card today just to test things out.
I am a lawyer, but not yours. Anything I tell you might be a total lie intended to benefit my clients at your expense.
Buy a VirginMobile LG or Samsung phone on eBay for $40-$75, sign up for VirginMobile's $35/mo 300 anytime minutes/"unlimited" data/text plan. Easy-Peasy.. I've had an LG Optimus on this plan since it was $25/mo, and still grandfathered at that rate. I use the phone primarily for the internet capability, to vpn/ssh/remote desktop to customers/my systems as needed when I'm on the go.. The phone has been rooted and CyanogenMod 7 rom installed, which gives me a wifi tether capability without adding any apps. Even using the tether fairly frequently, I've never hit the 2.5GB "cap" that the "unlimited" data carries..
THANK YOU, Edward Snowden!! Americans owe you a debt of gratitude (whether they know it or not..)
+1 to straight talk. The only issue I had was I have a locked iPhone, so I had to jump through a couple of hoops to get data & MMS working.
Taking guns away from the 99% gives the 1% 100% of the power.
If you do not have a smartphone you can get another plan through Straight Talk that is $30 a month for 1000 minutes, 1000 texts and 30mb of data. Here is a link to all the "plans" they have: https://www.straighttalk.com/secure/ServicePlans
I have Straight Talk for my son and so far - so good. I am thinking of switching my own phones over to it. On the torture test in my rural area, we drove to where the Verizon signal sucks and Straight Talk (AT&T) was about as good (or as bad). I love the cancel anytime system :)
I actually did get the very nice Indian girl to set me up and she used her caller ID to call me back when the call dropped. No worse than Verizon IMHO.
the West Coast folks were blissfully snoozing.
Some still are, especially those in government. Oh, offtopic!
Comment removed based on user account deletion
There is a very useful table of prepaid plans over at Howard Forums. Since you have a GSM phone, you'll want one of the carriers that uses AT&T's or T-Mobile's network.
I'm pretty happy with T-Mobile's $30 monthly prepaid plan, since I rarely need many talk minutes and I'm willing to live with 2G data speeds until they refarm their 1900 MHz spectrum to support 3G later this year.
But can you pop in the SIM to use it in another phone, and stay on the same plan?
Or do they somehow limit it to phones that were bought *as* GoPhones?
jrnl: http://tinyurl.com/c2l8yr / foes: http://tinyurl.com/ckjno5
Since you're on GSM (You'll have to see which bands yours supports... if you have a Pentaband, then you're golden for any of the following): Large carriers: AT&T GoPhone, T-Mobile Monthly MVNOs (lease towers from the two above): Simple Mobile, StraightTalk/Net10, H20 Wireless, Jolt Mobile, Pure Talk, Red Pocket Mobile
In the US, there are two major "flavors" of cellphone technology: GSM (also used in Europe) and CDMA (also used in some parts of Asia). There are four major carriers: Verizon, AT&T, Sprint, and T-Mobile. There are also some (very good) regional carriers and a whole bunch of companies who re-sell from the big 4.
CDMA providers (in the US, Verizon and Sprint are the two big ones) don't have removable SIM cards, and they're not particularly friendly or helpful about unlocking existing phones. Verizon has, by far, the best coverage for the more rural parts of the US. So, if you're going to be out in the sticks, you might be stuck buying a shitty Verizon phone.
GSM providers WILL sell you a SIM, just like you're looking for, but they don't talk about it, and they don't offer any sort of commission to their store employees for it, so they won't offer it unless you ask. You walk in and buy a pre-paid SIM card, just like in Europe. The data prices suck if you don't get a data package (AT&T charges $2/MEGAbyte without a plan (or $2048/GB), but you can get $2/day unlimited data or pay $25 for a 1GB block of data), but you can get "Unlimited daily" plans for a few dollars per day. AT&T has better coverage than T-Mobile, but both are usually adequate in bigger cities. Neither's quite as good as Verizon in rural areas, but I've had better luck with AT&T than with T-Mobile.
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I've never had much problem getting a good signal with T-Mobile in the San Francisco bay area. It really depends where you live. The best advice is to talk to people in your area and find out what carriers have good networks there.
"I'm too busy to research this and form an educated opinion, but I do have time to tell everyone my uninformed opinion."
The only non-TMo phones that work are the HSPA+ Galaxy Nexus and AT&T LTE devices running hacked radio firmware.
The Nexus One (which the poster said he's using) works fine on T-Mobile. No hacking required.
"I'm too busy to research this and form an educated opinion, but I do have time to tell everyone my uninformed opinion."
Virgin? Nope. I've seen rocky horror picture show thank you.
The data on that chart is pretty old. I looked at Tracfone, where I get minutes for less than 5 cents, and it doesn't mention anything about those plans that were all the rage last Christmas.
That pages says that the last update was 07/29/2012, and maybe some of the data is that new, but it doesn't work as a comparison chart if they can't keep most of it up to date.
the better options are Tmo, Simple Mobile or Straight Talk. You probably want ST with the AT&T SIM for the best coverage... that is what most iphone folks go for... a Tmo plan or Tmo MVNO will not support 3G data (yet) on most non-Tmo phones.
uh VM is a Sprint MVNO (owned by Sprint itself), which is CDMA, which means that the OP could not use his GSM phone, as he specified...
Go back to where you came from :) Kidding, welcome to the US where everyone is either an immigrant or the descendent of one.. Have you tried Boost Mobile?
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Virgin Mobile in the US is $20/mo for 400 minutes (+ 15c/text). or $35/mo for unlimited data. (it was $25/mo for data when I signed up, so that's what I'm still paying)
Available everywhere in the US. but it's SprintPCS based and didn't seem to work when I went to Vancouver.
Really I wish the mobile phone mafia in Canada would just let us poor foreigners pick up a disposable phone in a convenience store. I'm starting to realized that I'm spoiled on some of the conveniences I take for granted in the US.
But other than that I don't have too many complaints about Canada, of course I almost never visit in the winter.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
just trade in the GSM galaxy nexus for the CDMA one...
I still use Boost. I have a HTC Evo Design, and it works everywhere. I pay $40 a month for full unlimited, including data, because of their shrinkage program (price drops $5 every 6 on-time prepayments, an incentive to keep your phone turned on sorta like a contract.), the price started at $55 a month. I buy prepaid cards at Walmart sometimes, other times I go online. I could call in too, or use auto-payment. I like it a lot, especially over my shitty Verizon contract I had before that.
Wrong. T-Mobile does not use ANY of the standard frequencies "the rest of the world uses" (those being 900, 1800, and 2100 MHz - right now I think 1800 is 2G-only in Europe but that's changing.)
AT&T does not use any of the above bands, but far more countries use 850 and 1900 than 1700. The only countries that use 1700 are USA, Canada, and Chile. 1900 is used throughout North and South America, 850 is used in many countries across the globe, including Australia.
As a result, many phones support 850 and 1900, but the only device other than T-Mobile's own devices which supports UMTS on the 1700 MHz band is the HSPA+ Galaxy Nexus. AT&T is using 1700 for LTE now, so some LTE devices can be hacked to run UMTS instead in that band.
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
So, how does that contradict what I said? The Nexus One with 1700 MHz support was a device specifically created for and sold by T-Mobile.
There are multiple Nexus One variants. Only the T-Mobile variant will provide 1700 MHz 3G.
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
You are lying, or live in one of the very few small markets where T-Mobile has lit up 1900 MHz service. In most of the country, they only have 1700 MHz 3G and the Atrix does NOT support that band.
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
When using an MVNO like Straight Talk that resells using T-Mobile's network, T-Mobile *does not allow non-network text messages thru*.
Interesting, do the blocked texts just go *poof*, or does the sender get an error/bounceback?
As far as I can tell, they go "poof" into the ether. SMS is the UDP of the cell phone world. No guarantees, no confirmation.
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.