[ale] fyi - cheaper way to add a smart phone to verizon account

Mon Jul 15 00:43:11 EDT 2013

Verizon lost the 7 phones my family had with them for too many years years
ago over exorbitant mandatory data charges. We wound up with an assortment
of carriers. All seem to work pretty well "in the big city" but Verizon
probably still has better nationwide coverage than any other, though
T-Mobile has gotten much better since the breakup with AT&T because they
got a bunch of AT&T's GSM towers as part of the split. They also offer a
"WiFi preferred mode on some phones like my Galaxy S2 which extends
coverage beyond their cellular network.

Take a look at Straight Talk and Page Plus. Page Plus offers several
prepaid plans on the Verizon network for much less than Verizon. I have 2
kids doing that now and the cellular service is great, though customer
service is a little lacking if you do have trouble. Straight Talk
(Wal-Mart's offering of Trac Phone) used to have phones that ran on either
T-Mobile or AT&T and also phones that ran on Verizon. You can bring your
own phone for the T-Mobile or AT&T plans and I expect you can for the
Verizon network too, but I haven't verified that.

If you shop Kroger and Sprint coverage works for you iWireless through
Kroger has prepaid plans, plus you get an extra 20 minutes talk time for
each $100 you spend at Kroger with your plus card. My wife is on iWireless
and it has worked well for her. We have found coverage to be better than
expected even in the boonies (as in S. GA and FL). I noticed last week that
they are now offering the Galaxy S4 with LTE service for about $550. The
coverage map looks pretty good, but that is more than I am willing to spend
on a phone at this time.

There is also Boost, Cricket and Virgin as re-sellers of Sprint service.
One super cheap option on Sprint is Republic Wireless, which defaults to
WiFi service where available and only uses the Sprint network when WiFI is
NOT available. As ubiquitous as WiFi is becoming, that may soon be a viable
option at least for city dwellers. Unfortunately their phone offerings are
still rather limited.

I am on T-Mobile and got a notification recently that they were rolling out
LTE in the Atl. market (expect service interruptions). They are also
merging with Metro PCS which already offers LTE service. It will be
interesting to see how the coverage map will change with the merger. I'll
probably switch to Straight Talk once my contract is up in Feb.

I had thought that once all carriers converted to LTE there would be near
universal coverage, but it seems that every carrier is using a different
frequency band so they won't be compatible for tower sharing like earlier
versions of GSM or CDMA service. Also, in times past, you didn't pay the
federal taxes on the prepaid phones like you do with traditional phones,
but that was "fixed" a year or two ago.

On Sun, Jul 14, 2013 at 10:47 PM, Ron Frazier (ALE) <
atllinuxenthinfo at techstarship.com> wrote:

> In my opinion, Verizon is the best for working out in the boonies.  My
> folks are in Jasper and my wifes' are in north central Ohio.  Verizon is
> the only thing that works.  (Haven't tried ATT.  Don't like them.)  That's
> one reason I keep it.  Ting works on the Sprint network.  If they had
> coverage out there, I might switch.  But, you still pay $ 60 / mo for 3 GB
> of data I think.  As it is, I still have two dumb verizon phones and a myfi
> 4g modem that I only pay to turn on when I'm on a trip to Ohio.  Otherwise,
> I have to stick to wifi.
>
> Sincerely,
>
> Ron
>
>
> Neal Rhodes <neal at mnopltd.com> wrote:
>
> >I couldn't make the Verizon Shared device dollar numbers work to my
> >advantage and got my wife a phone from ting.   So far it's just fine if
> >you consciously don't use the data size much.   (i.e. use wifi when
> >possible)
> >
> >I'm retaining my Verizon unlimited account for the time being until
> >they
> >really piss me off.   But it's getting harder and harder to cost
> >justify.
> >
> >On Sun, 2013-07-14 at 18:08 -0500, Brian Mathis wrote:
> >> I was looking into Share Everything for my parents, and after running
> >> the numbers (and seeing other comments online), those plans are only
> >> designed to get more money out of you.  It might be worth it for a
> >> family of four where everyone has their own phone and some members
> >use
> >> a lot while others don't, but for one or two people, it just didn't
> >> seem to make sense.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> ❧ Brian Mathis
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> On Sun, Jul 14, 2013 at 1:50 PM, Ron Frazier (ALE)
> >> <atllinuxenthinfo at techstarship.com> wrote:
> >>
> >>         This message is for those of you, if any, who have verizon
> >and
> >>         don't have any smart phones on your plan.  I have an old
> >>         family share plan with two dumb phones, 750 shared minutes,
> >>         and 250 text messages on one phone.  I talked to a verizon
> >rep
> >>         yesterday to see what my smartphone options are.
> >>
> >>         For purposes of this discussion, I'm talking about bringing
> >my
> >>         own used device rather than buying one from verizon.
> >>
> >>         One option they rave about is the share everything unlimited
> >>         plan.  For this, the dumb phone costs $ 30 / mo, the smart
> >>         phone costs $ 40 / mo, and the 2 GB (used to be 3) data plan
> >>         costs $ 60 / mo.  So, that totals to $ 130 / mo.
> >>
> >>         However, the rep said I could actually keep my old plan,
> >which
> >>         costs $ 75 / mo, and add a smart phone for $ 30 / mo.  So,
> >>         that only adds up to $ 105 / mo.  So, while I would not have
> >>         unlimited minutes and texts, and would still have 2 GB of
> >>         data, that's $ 25 / mo cheaper.  I don't know if I'll do
> >this,
> >>         since I can still use my tablet at wifi hotspots.  But, I
> >>         thought I'd pass it along.
> >>
> >>         Sincerely,
> >>
> >>         Ron
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>         --
> >>
> >>         Sent from my Android Acer A500 tablet with bluetooth keyboard
> >>         and K-9 Mail.
> >>         Please excuse my potential brevity if I'm typing on the touch
> >>         screen.
> >>
> >>         (PS - If you email me and don't get a quick response, you
> >>         might want to
> >>         call on the phone.  I get about 300 emails per day from
> >>         alternate energy
> >>         mailing lists and such.  I don't always see new email
> >messages
> >>         very quickly.)
> >>
> >>         Ron Frazier
> >>         770-205-9422 (O)   Leave a message.
> >>         linuxdude AT techstarship.com
> >>         Litecoin: LZzAJu9rZEWzALxDhAHnWLRvybVAVgwTh3
> >>         Bitcoin: 15s3aLVsxm8EuQvT8gUDw3RWqvuY9hPGUU
> >>
> >>
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> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
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> >
> >
> >
> >
> >------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
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>
>
> --
>
> Sent from my Android Acer A500 tablet with bluetooth keyboard and K-9 Mail.
> Please excuse my potential brevity if I'm typing on the touch screen.
>
> (PS - If you email me and don't get a quick response, you might want to
> call on the phone.  I get about 300 emails per day from alternate energy
> mailing lists and such.  I don't always see new email messages very
> quickly.)
>
> Ron Frazier
> 770-205-9422 (O)   Leave a message.
> linuxdude AT techstarship.com
> Litecoin: LZzAJu9rZEWzALxDhAHnWLRvybVAVgwTh3
> Bitcoin: 15s3aLVsxm8EuQvT8gUDw3RWqvuY9hPGUU
>
>
> _______________________________________________
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