Thanks for all info. Vonage and hangouts works on wifi only or works on LTE too?
Do we get the initial 10gb data stash on this plan?
Ian B
T-Mobile $30 Prepaid Plan Users Thread
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Thanks for all info. Vonage and hangouts works on wifi only or works on LTE too?
Do we get the initial 10gb data stash on this plan?
Ian B
Hello, all. I have a question to all on this plan: are you aware of there being separate pricing for buying a phone outright from T-Mobile depending on whether you're a prepaid or postpaid customer?
I went to purchase the LG G4 at the heavily advertised discount price of $479.99 earlier this evening. They asked what my phone number was and then told me there was a "slight" price difference if I wanted to keep my phone number and stay on a prepaid plan. I told them that I had no interest in changing my plan and they proceeded to tell me I'd have to pay a whopping $629.99 for a new LG G4. I asked them if they were sure of this and if there was any way around it and they insisted they were completely sure of themselves and there was definitely no way around it.
I saw nothing stating as much in any of the articles or ads advertising this new discounted price, and most directly say that $479.99 is the OFF CONTRACT price. Am I missing something here or just dealing with incompetent T-Mobile employees?
I went to purchase the LG G4 at the heavily advertised discount price of $479.99 earlier this evening. They asked what my phone number was and then told me there was a "slight" price difference if I wanted to keep my phone number and stay on a prepaid plan. I told them that I had no interest in changing my plan and they proceeded to tell me I'd have to pay a whopping $629.99 for a new LG G4. I asked them if they were sure of this and if there was any way around it and they insisted they were completely sure of themselves and there was definitely no way around it.
I saw nothing stating as much in any of the articles or ads advertising this new discounted price, and most directly say that $479.99 is the OFF CONTRACT price. Am I missing something here or just dealing with incompetent T-Mobile employees?
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My understanding is that that is the primary difference between any contract and non contract phone.
When you buy a contract phone you pay a higher monthly charge because you are paying off - during the length of the contract - the amount of money the company has subsidized the phone. That is why the price of contract phones are lower than the full phone price.
If you don't agree to a contract, with its higher monthly cost, nobody is subsidizing the price of the phone so of course you pay the full cost of the phone.
---------- Post added at 11:54 AM ---------- Previous post was at 11:50 AM ----------
Does the $30 Walmart T-Mobile no contract plan include the option of having a second line (on another phone) for $10?
Thanks.
When you buy a contract phone you pay a higher monthly charge because you are paying off - during the length of the contract - the amount of money the company has subsidized the phone. That is why the price of contract phones are lower than the full phone price.
If you don't agree to a contract, with its higher monthly cost, nobody is subsidizing the price of the phone so of course you pay the full cost of the phone.
---------- Post added at 11:54 AM ---------- Previous post was at 11:50 AM ----------
Does the $30 Walmart T-Mobile no contract plan include the option of having a second line (on another phone) for $10?
Thanks.
Except all the articles clearly stated that $479.99 is the price....OFF contract. Which seems to kinda contradict what you just wrote.
Just to confirm for anyone else dealing with the same BS in an attempt to not get raped on phone price: this deal (and others like it) are definitely doable whether you are prepaid or postpaid. They just made me buy $40 in "credits" for my next month's bills. Just gotta talk to someone who knows what the hell they're doing.
I've been using the $30/5gb plan for almost 2 years, and it has been mostly great, but this new family plan that T-Mobile is taking right now is pretty tempting ($30/month for unlimited talk/text and 10gb data per line).
Has anyone done this? If yes, I'm curious what the "taxes and fees" come out to, generally speaking. Assuming that you're not financing a phone, did this track on an extra $4-5? Or is it more than that?
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Has anyone done this? If yes, I'm curious what the "taxes and fees" come out to, generally speaking. Assuming that you're not financing a phone, did this track on an extra $4-5? Or is it more than that?
Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk
I suppose it's at least 4. Otherwise, I would jump right in.
---------- Post added at 07:31 PM ---------- Previous post was at 07:28 PM ----------
It is generally close to 10%. My guess is $12 for $120 plan for 4. If the corporate discount works on this plan, then you may get 10-15% off on the $120 base price.
You need at least two lines and that's $50/line. You only get $30 for 4 people so if you can find 3 friends it might be worthwhile but you get only 2.5GB each.
Actually, this promotion (availability ends in September) includes 10gb per line, not 10gb total shared data.
explore.t-mobile.com/simple-choice-family-plan-with-10gb-data
Twice the data for almost the same price is the main reason I'm interested, though not relying on hangouts for phone calls will be nice too.
If the per line cost added on by taxes and fees is $5, it might be worth finding 3 other people to do this with...
Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk
t-mobile coverage definitely varies by location a lot. i live in a big metro area, so my t-mo coverage is pretty great and the $30 prepaid plan is perfect for me. if i travel to the far suburbs or into the country, i generally expect to have zero service. i actually have an AT&T gophone SIM handy sometimes, just in case i am traveling somewhere that may not have reliable t-mo coverage. if you don't get signal where you live/work, t-mo probably isn't a good idea for you.
THE GOOD
Watched a Netflix movie on LTE and my data moved .1mb
THE BAD
Looks like the prices in California are going up 10% for prepaid cell service.
http://www.mtsnotice.com/
Watched a Netflix movie on LTE and my data moved .1mb
THE BAD
Looks like the prices in California are going up 10% for prepaid cell service.
http://www.mtsnotice.com/
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Some weird stuff happening with Binge On and our $30 plan, or at least my $30 plan.
I tried the Netflix sample short to get a bitrate, and it seemed to cap out at 750kbps on the stream. Perfectly watchable, but I wanted to see what it was like with Binge On disabled. I went to the site and checked the box to modify Binge On, but it would never progress to the next screen. I tried three different browsers and all were the same.
Ok, so I downloaded the T-Mobile My Account app and tried to do it through that instead. Success, and I was able to disable Binge On. Now Netflix showed as capping out at 1750kbps over 4G, so a little difference. I went to toggle Binge On back on and... the option is gone. Both on the site and in the app, there isn't a Binge On option anymore. Either it's teething issues, or perhaps they only let you disable it once a day? I'll see if the option reappears tomorrow I guess...
I tried the Netflix sample short to get a bitrate, and it seemed to cap out at 750kbps on the stream. Perfectly watchable, but I wanted to see what it was like with Binge On disabled. I went to the site and checked the box to modify Binge On, but it would never progress to the next screen. I tried three different browsers and all were the same.
Ok, so I downloaded the T-Mobile My Account app and tried to do it through that instead. Success, and I was able to disable Binge On. Now Netflix showed as capping out at 1750kbps over 4G, so a little difference. I went to toggle Binge On back on and... the option is gone. Both on the site and in the app, there isn't a Binge On option anymore. Either it's teething issues, or perhaps they only let you disable it once a day? I'll see if the option reappears tomorrow I guess...
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5Go with 5gb of 4g LTE. Especially now that Google voice can take and make calls for free on Wi-Fi and data through hangouts. In California I've never paid tax for refill cards and target always gives me 5%-15% off the price.
The plan definitely includes music freedom I'm using it now and it never touches my 5gb of LTE
I've made calls and taken calls with my Google number through hangouts on Wi-Fi and LTE without costing me any plan minutes.
The calls go over LTE for me and use almost no data
sent from my note 34
I'm using CSipSimple (you need a nightly build after Nov 2nd due to some KitKat changes) which is a SIP VOIP client based on the pjsip SIP library. I've been using this SIP client for over a year now with really good results. The Nexus 5 just makes it better, with improved speaker/mic setup compared to my last device. For SIP service, I am using voip.ms. They provide a number for 99¢/month and calls for 1¢/minute. They also provide a bunch of additional functionality, including voice mail, call forwarding, ring groups, interactive voice response menus (press 1 for.. press 2 for..) and some other toys, pretty much the full compliment of Asterisk PBX features -- Including the ability to create subaccounts for all your devices/computers/ip phones (on their own extensions and everything). They also have servers in a range of locations, so you can pick the one with the lowest ping time from your area. They also provide toll-free numbers, if you're doing any sort of business, for 99¢/month + 2.4¢/min -- If you like to hand out your card for extra $$ helping the less tech-savvy, 99¢ gets you an 800 number and PBX-style call routing/voicemail possibilities for cheap professional telephone presence.
VOIP over a good WiFi connection is very solid, and I've also had pretty good luck on mobile networks, as long as latency is <100ms and packet loss / jitter is low. Don't expect it to be great when you're driving, movement presents some significant challenges for mobile broadband, which digital voice networks (such as GSM/CDMA in voice mode) go to great technical lengths to address. However with good (not overloaded) 4G (HSPA+/LTE) service in a stationary state both T-mobile and AT&T's networks do better than I had expected.
One thing I found today is that T-mobile's network appears to have a fairly short UDP NAT timeout, somewhere in the order of 5-10 minutes. CSipSimple has a default SIP register timeout of 30 minutes, meaning it re-registers the connection with the server every 30 minutes or so. Changing this to 4 minutes was necessary to ensure incoming calls always came through, otherwise the NAT mapping would expire and incoming calls wouldn't come through as the SIP packets weren't making it back to the device.
Since I ended up giving out my Google Voice number as my primary contact number, I added my VOIP number as a forwarding phone and changed the outgoing caller ID to match my Google Voice number. If I'm at home, I'll pick up on the headset via gmail, on the go, via CSipSimple.
I can't speak for any of the free VOIP apps, I figured $1/month for full Asterisk PBX functionality and 1¢/min is more than fair -- Especially when with subaccounts I get service to all my devices at no additional cost..
I was hoping to do just that, but I guess their system was completely hosed when I tried -- Gave me an error on the clickthrough to activate, didn't even get started. Between that an the lack of numbers for my area code problem, I guess I picked the wrong day to activate.. Ah well, at least it's done. Still stoked at the quality of service for $30/month for 5gb.
Awesome! Glad to be of help4
As someone who has used Talkatone/Groove IP/Vonage and Hangouts, a lot has changed in the last year or so.
1.) RAM has improved. The first phone I tried VoIP calling on was a Samsung Galaxy Exhibit II. It had maybe 1GB of RAM. Issues like the phone not waking out of sleep quick enough for me to answer were major issues.
2) Integration is better: Things were hit and miss with other providers but with Voice and Hangouts in-house, the compatibility is a lot more evident.
3) LTE: My Nexus 4 experience was better than my Galaxy Exhibit II but my Alcatel Idol 3 w/ all T-Mobile bands is even better. I made an international VoIP call while walking around for 40 minutes and it was great. Before, I could make a decent call over HSPA if I stayed stationary, but LTE allows much more freedom.
I feel like I am becoming a cheerleader for Hangouts, but you really owe it to yourself to try it again imo. Especially since it is free. Project Fi uses Hangouts for all Wi-Fi calls so you can also check there to see if any complaints are being lodged by Nexus 6 users,4
XVoicePlus just came out on the 5th. You do need Xposed framework though to use this. It acts like Voice+ in that you send from your Google voice number while using hangouts.
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