Database Users

tmobile requires data?

so i was just browsing the tmobile site, and i noticed that if you add the snap to your cart as a new contract data is selected by default. why are they doing this, i know several people who just use the dash for a phone with no internet because of the lovely keypad and the many useful apps.
so if i upgrade to the snap are they going to make me add the 25 dollar plan?
if so im not upgrading through them. no 3g in my area, totally not with the extra money right now.
(yea this seems more of an hofo question but i decided to ask here cause i like this forum better)

Yes you are required to get the Data plan, you however are not required to keep it. 24 hours after you place your order simply go back into T-Mobile's web site go into your account and remove the data plan option. Simple as pie

good info to have, just might have to get a snap before the end of the year

skaroger867 said:
good info to have, just might have to get a snap before the end of the year
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I love my Dash, but I cant live without my new Dash 3G. I have only begun to customize it. While I did have 6.1 on my old Dash it was nothing compared to this new one, its so damn fast (even with T-Mo's junk on it). So far the only 'problem' I am having with it is the GPS is a bit slow to lock on (about 10 seconds average), it is faster if I turn on the assisted but there has to be a way to speed up the sat lock

is it really that much better than the dash? how is the cam quality? i have two dash's and one takes great pics, and the other takes so-so pics.
my wife wants sprint when out contract ends. so i might so on a single tmo contract with data and the dash 3g

skaroger867 said:
is it really that much better than the dash? how is the cam quality? i have two dash's and one takes great pics, and the other takes so-so pics.
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I posted why I think it is better in another thread so I will save repeating myself. With that said it has a Bigger battery, Bigger Keyboard, Faster processor. Seems a bit more user friendly too(unless you are using the cooked roms on your old dash) You be the judge.
They updated the cam to 2mp so it is a little improvement over the old dash. It does seem to have a lot more Cam features.
Well worth the upgrade IMHO.

I had an interesting experience upgrading my dash to the dash 3g. When I finally made up my mind to purchase the new version I went to the T-Mobile store (corp store) where they told me that I could not purchase the upgrade without a data plan. I decided to hold off and try it on their website. Viola, If you upgrade through the website you are not required to add the data plan. Just a little FYI if you already have T-Mo. Don't know how long it'll be before they catch that but it worked for e

dash 3g
just got the dash 3g and wondering if it could be flashed to wm 6.5...... anybody know?

mre2u2003 said:
just got the dash 3g and wondering if it could be flashed to wm 6.5...... anybody know?
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ookba is making a rom. note the sticky'd wishlist.

Upgrade to T-Mobile Dash 3G (HTC Maple)
I just upgraded my step son's Blackberry Curve to the Dash 3G (HTC Maple..Snap...Ozone) and there was no mention of having to upgrade to a data plan with the purchase of the Dash 3G. I configured his Curve to run with web2go, the $9.99 plan and currently on my Wing, I run T-Mobile Web (grandfathered) $5.99 using APN epc.tmobile.com. I had a conversation with Tier 2 support and they told me the Dash 3G would only run on their higher priced plans, but they said the same thing about my Wing and his Blackberry and I can tell you it's a breeze to edit "Manage Connections" in Windows Mobile 6.5 and I have no proxy settings on either phone and they work. One note, for Blackberry users the APN is "internet2.voicestream.com" with web2go; take care.

Dash 3G or Sprint Snap?

Which is the better phone? I'm currently using a Dash Excalibur with Tmobile but my contract is up and I can go where I want.
I do like the look of the Dash 3G over the Sprint Snap. However, to sync my email, I need to purchase a Good Messaging license for $240/year with Tmobile. With Sprint, the Good Message license is included.
Tmobile has been my only cellphone carrier. 3G is not in my area but it is rumoured to be available in December.
So if I go with the Dash 3G, I'm looking at +$20 more for the phone and then the additional $240 year for email syncing.
I did not really care for the plastic look of the Sprint Snap. But Sprint throws in a few cool things such as NFL Network etc... Any idea of the cost of the Sprint Navigator GPS that is included? The Dash 3G has Telenav which is $14.95/month I believe.
Also, the Verizon Ozone is an option, but I have not see or read anything about that device.

heres all 3 side by side as per phone scoop..
http://www.phonescoop.com/phones/compare.php?id[]=2246&id[]=2020&id[]=2062&id[]=&id[]=
feature wise imho the Ozone wins...ive had the chance to play with the Dash 3g and the Snap..but Ozone won over all with the wifi quickness, cdma & gsm compatibility and most importantly PRICE!
check it out..and read the reviews that should help u make ur decision.
Late.

i have the dash 3g it has basically all the features as the ozone but it has a the track ball instead of the d pad which i find a lot better with web pages and just getting around without a touchscreen plus with it being gsm its a bit thinner..... and the battery life is a little better compared to the other 2..... i don't think u can go wrong ether way there great phones

I owned a dash for a few years, loved it. I have the Ozone now, and tell you what, GET IT. spec for spec they are really about the same, but the price on the ozone. $50. Get the data package, but get WifiRouter for $20 flat fee I think, then you can teather via USB or WIFI and bypass verizons additional charge.
I have not had this thing lock up lick my dash did, and 6.5 will be available for it soon.

I went and visited Verizon and TMobile today and checked out each phone. The Sprint Snap is out, no Wifi.
I liked the Dash 3G much better than the Ozone. The styling was nicer, bigger keyboard and trackball was great. The Ozone was good, but I did not care for the shiny plastic on the front and the D-pad was sunken in a bit, unlike my Dash Excalibur. The trackball seemed like a major improvement. I only used it for a bit and I liked it. But I'm wondering if prolonged use would cause problems with soreness in the wrist.
I am also wondering about the Verizon vs TMobile data network. I do not live in a TMobile 3G area so I will be using Edge (rumor we may have TMobile 3G by end of the year). I would have 3G with Verizon. I have not web browsed much since my Excalibur would not load many sites due to memory issues. This may change with a newer device. I did some speed tests and on TMobile (non-3g) I get 180kb/sec. With Verizon, the first 2 tests were also 180kb/sec but then the 3rd went up to 580kb/sec. I have heard that Verizon has a much faster data network than TMobile.
Tmobile rep said the GPS was unlocked so I could use it with Google Maps. I do not wish to pay extra monthly for GPS. I heard Verizon is unlocked as well.
Verizon gave me a quote on a contract and it's $1 more than what I'm paying with T-Mobile. (unlimited data, no tethering)
So if I go with the Dash 3G, I'm looking at $100 more for the phone and the $240 for my corp email sync plus non-3G network. I am not sure if the Dash 3G is worth $340 more over the next year. I'm going to think about it this week but I'm still up in the air.

modding the dash 3g
Does anyone know if you can mod out a dash 3g for instance can you port android to it? I'm interested in buying one but I'm not a winmo fan and I'm on a rooted g1 so I would at least like to be able to mod it out if possible

I tried Dash 3G at corp store
tethering works 100% out of the box, and under 3 modes
USB
bt DUN
bt PAN
once I figured out how to add Trad Chinese support, I'll buy it

Is t-mobile 2g faster than at&t's?

So I ordered my N1 yesterday, and currently have at&t. wasn't too worried about the whole 3g thing, because I figured one of the smart guys here at xda would figure out a way to make it work. After looking in to it further, I realize the hardware just won't allow that. I would just switch to T-mobile, but they have no 3g coverage anywhere near me yet. this brings me to my question. is it worth switching to tmobiles coverage for faster 2g possibly, or in the hopes that they'll soon expand their network. I don't mind getting out of my contract with at&t, tmobiles rates seem to be a lot better. I'm just wondering if anybody has heard anything on T-mobiles future plans.

I think most anecdotal evidence by most users is that EDGE on TMO is much faster than ATT. Why? Even though the "transport" 2G technology is the same, ATT still suffers from not enough bandwidth at its towers for all the heavy 3G areas due to heavy usage. -- In other words, backhaul contention.
Also, the fact that in places where there is no TMO 3G... EDGE works quite well for the very same reason... Even with towers that only have several T1/DS1's in place instead of T3/DS3's or fiber
Cheers,
Kermee

In NYC, where I have 3G coverage as well, EDGE tops out at 10-15KB/s

hurrycaine3000 said:
So I ordered my N1 yesterday, and currently have at&t. wasn't too worried about the whole 3g thing, because I figured one of the smart guys here at xda would figure out a way to make it work. After looking in to it further, I realize the hardware just won't allow that. I would just switch to T-mobile, but they have no 3g coverage anywhere near me yet. this brings me to my question. is it worth switching to tmobiles coverage for faster 2g possibly, or in the hopes that they'll soon expand their network. I don't mind getting out of my contract with at&t, tmobiles rates seem to be a lot better. I'm just wondering if anybody has heard anything on T-mobiles future plans.
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I personally have ran on EDGE for awhile on tmobile and have never had a problem with wifi while I am at home/school... however the 3g is nice, though my house seems to have 3g signals
its simple business really, though 1 man cannot make a difference... as the company grows, the service grows... verizon has the best service because it has the most customers... i think the reason tmobile has struggled in the US (as opposed to being the number 1 world wide carrier) is because of the lack of appeal from phones... with more phones rolling out and tmobile always having its doors open to unlocked phones i see the company gaining some momentum and it starts with these new android phones making it big as well as now having the fastest network in the nation...
ive had bad experiences with both verizon (contract issues) and att (terrible customer service), tmobile has yet to steer me wrong (other than not giving me an upgrade for the N1 haha)
with that said, try em out, idk if companies still let you trial their service for a week or so but you could ask?

i honestly cant tel a diff between edge and 3 g lol they both are friggin fast as hell

VoLoDaR1 said:
i honestly cant tel a diff between edge and 3 g lol they both are friggin fast as hell
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Click to collapse
It all depends on what you're doing Tweeting and reading tweets... probably not so much
Cheers,
Kermee

are you crazy? 3G is AT LEAST 10+ times as fast as EDGE.

I know on my touch pro using att 3g over edge. they have 3g where I work, but not at my house. so I always just use wifi at my house, but don't bother at work because the 3g is fast enough. I can definetly tell the difference. granted there is wifi almost everywhere these days, but with my touch pro I have to turn it off and on when I'm using it so my battery half makes through a day. It will be nice if the N1's is more of a automatic thing, if that makes sense. I guess if I knew that t Mobile would actually be implementing 3g in my area at all soon, it would be an easier decision, but I haven't found anything to make me think they'll be adding towers in York, PA any time soon.

Im in Dallas TX and just activated my phone. I was worried because people in some forums where saying phone kept switching to 2g. I just activated my phone and its been on 3 out of 4 bars on 3g last 30-40 minutes...I know this is kind of off topic, but thought it was important do to the nature of all the talk about speed on tmobile.
Ok im scared now, i just looked at the USA map on tmobile https://my.t-mobile.com/Plan/CoverageMap.aspx and looks to hardly be any 3g coverage! What! Tell me it aint so!

that's what I'm saying, I want 3g on this phone, but it's just not in my area on tmobile. we've established it's pretty much going to be impossible to get att's to work on this phone. It doesn't look like tmobile has 3g anywhere, atleast not hardly. what to do, what to do.

dallastx said:
Im in Dallas TX and just activated my phone. I was worried because people in some forums where saying phone kept switching to 2g. I just activated my phone and its been on 3 out of 4 bars on 3g last 30-40 minutes...I know this is kind of off topic, but thought it was important do to the nature of all the talk about speed on tmobile.
Ok im scared now, i just looked at the USA map on tmobile https://my.t-mobile.com/Plan/CoverageMap.aspx and looks to hardly be any 3g coverage! What! Tell me it aint so!
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Click to collapse
thats called #4 carrier coverage
as for that map, its ancient... the thing has never worked properly and the maps take forever to load yet i wish i could get a decent detailed coverage map for tmobile somewhere...

hurrycaine3000 said:
I know on my touch pro using att 3g over edge. they have 3g where I work, but not at my house. so I always just use wifi at my house, but don't bother at work because the 3g is fast enough. I can definetly tell the difference. granted there is wifi almost everywhere these days, but with my touch pro I have to turn it off and on when I'm using it so my battery half makes through a day. It will be nice if the N1's is more of a automatic thing, if that makes sense. I guess if I knew that t Mobile would actually be implementing 3g in my area at all soon, it would be an easier decision, but I haven't found anything to make me think they'll be adding towers in York, PA any time soon.
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Click to collapse
OMG i live in york to lol. ive asked tmobile many times if we'll ever have 3g and they told me december 09 but that never happened. who knows if we'll ever get it. but edge for me on tmobile works good unless u use media functions like youtube and streaming video but its good for web browsing and email

Make sure T-Mobile has EDGE all around your area because I've found that there are many places that don't even have EDGE on T-Mobile and are GRPS only. That being said, I do find that usually T-Mobile EDGE is faster.... The difference is so small that I wouldn't change networks over it though..

I get around 25KB/s or so, which works fine for streaming music and such. This is quite a bit faster than the AT&T users seem to get here.

Yeah you should be happy with what you've got. EDGE isn't amazing but at least with the 900mhz range you've got coverage. I'm not sure about T-mobile US thought but it has to be better than UK. I live in the UK just outside of town with 3 basestations surrounding my house just out of range with 2100 3g and 1800 2g. I can get signal occasionally with my Iphone 3gs, until I touch it...
The coverage is okish but I get Black-spots everywhere; literally, I can walk round the corner away from a basestation and lose signal. I can only use my phone if I'm underneath a basestation and even then the crappy 4.2Mbit/s (It may even be less than that) limited basestations are overloaded. Each user is then further capped at roughly 1.8Mbit/s
That's 3G and above, which I rarely get as I mentioned. When you get 2G you get EDGE. When I get 2G I don't get EDGE, I don't even get 2.5G, I get slower-than-dial-up GPRS which is unusable. None of T-mo UK's basestations are EDGE enabled; with common black-spots and poor 3G reception, this makes for an appalling network. I can't wait to switch to Three UK. Blanket UK 3g coverage with amazing deals: £15/mo rolling contract with 300 mins, unlimited texts, Unlimited (7.2Mbit/s) data. The only problem is they have shockingly bad phones (no problem for me, or so I thought...)

melterx12 said:
are you crazy? 3G is AT LEAST 10+ times as fast as EDGE.
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That pretty well sums up the problem with TMUS users.
They have no f***ing clue.

[Q] Simple mobile and the galaxy tab

So im thinking about switching over to simple to see how it is. Anyone know if theyve figured out how to get 3g and voice on simple mobile.

no
not yet, i don't think it will ever happen i got the simple mobile with the tab too.but my model is the euro version unlock.

The simple mobile guy in my local mall said that all tmo devices should work with their sim. they also seem to use tmobile towers.
I haven't confirmed this, but would love to know if anyone with a tmo tab can try it.

it will work with simple mobile
but you will not get 3G & VOICE at the same time. it's one or the other lol.

But 3G data should work with a simple mobile sim?

yes it should, i dont see why not?
try it and let us know.

so everything works just as it did with tmobile. i pay 60 bucks for unlimited everything.

Will you use Roto's modem switcher to get your 3g or voice? We need your feedback.

Simple Mobile w/SGT
I have been with Simple Mobile for 1 full month now. The rep that I bought the card from, who also installed it and set it up, stated that I'd get 3g speed, for $50 a month. NOPE, not even using the Roto modemswitch!!!! $50 a month only gets 2g(edge) and at that, it's slower than slow can be. And the tech support at simple mobile, well they just don't understand anything I explain, or maybe I'm just expecting the edge network to be faster.
My experience is, they don't care about your problems, you signed up for $50 a month, and this is what you'll get: Unlimited Calls, Text, & Internet(Limited to 2g)
I signed up on 8/16 and I got phone calls, but never could send out any MMS or download anything from the market, or download any songs using the "edge" cause it was just too slow. The download rate was actually slower than a 56k modem dial up connection. I have a photo of the speedtest.net outcome. Ping was 455ms, download speed was 11kbps, upload was the same.
Now I may be expecting a bit faster internet, but I tried to download a song, 4MB. It took 30 minutes to download........anyone else think that's a little slow?????
My biggest issue is, they put the blame on the rep who signed me up, stating that it's his fault and they aren't able to give me a break on this next months service. I tried to give them the best example I could, "What if I bought a Phone from Best Buy and the service was with t-mobile(which I'll never do again)?" I don't think tmobile would say, sorry Mr. House, but you're going to have to go back to Best Buy and tell them they didn't program your phone correctly. But anyway, we'll take your money and you can pay more next month......
Oh Kay, well I did pay the extra $10 a month and my 3g speeds are between 2-3MB per minute download, so it's quite an improvement.
I use the Roto Modemswitcher for 3g network when I'm driving. I haven't yet figured out how to forward my phone calls to my OnStar phone, but hopefully I'll figure it out soon.
All in all, the call quality is great, I'd recommend Roto Modemswitcher for all, cause the 2g is slow slow slow, and mostly, you aren't going to get wifi everywhere you are, so when you wanna look something up, having the switcher to go back to 3g while out on the town, will come in very handy.
Well, NOW, i'm paying $60 a month.

Bam-Bamm said:
I have been with Simple Mobile for 1 full month now. The rep that I bought the card from, who also installed it and set it up, stated that I'd get 3g speed, for $50 a month. NOPE, not even using the Roto modemswitch!!!! $50 a month only gets 2g(edge) and at that, it's slower than slow can be. And the tech support at simple mobile, well they just don't understand anything I explain, or maybe I'm just expecting the edge network to be faster.
My experience is, they don't care about your problems, you signed up for $50 a month, and this is what you'll get: Unlimited Calls, Text, & Internet(Limited to 2g)
I signed up on 8/16 and I got phone calls, but never could send out any MMS or download anything from the market, or download any songs using the "edge" cause it was just too slow. The download rate was actually slower than a 56k modem dial up connection. I have a photo of the speedtest.net outcome. Ping was 455ms, download speed was 11kbps, upload was the same.
Now I may be expecting a bit faster internet, but I tried to download a song, 4MB. It took 30 minutes to download........anyone else think that's a little slow?????
My biggest issue is, they put the blame on the rep who signed me up, stating that it's his fault and they aren't able to give me a break on this next months service. I tried to give them the best example I could, "What if I bought a Phone from Best Buy and the service was with t-mobile(which I'll never do again)?" I don't think tmobile would say, sorry Mr. House, but you're going to have to go back to Best Buy and tell them they didn't program your phone correctly. But anyway, we'll take your money and you can pay more next month......
Oh Kay, well I did pay the extra $10 a month and my 3g speeds are between 2-3MB per minute download, so it's quite an improvement.
I use the Roto Modemswitcher for 3g network when I'm driving. I haven't yet figured out how to forward my phone calls to my OnStar phone, but hopefully I'll figure it out soon.
All in all, the call quality is great, I'd recommend Roto Modemswitcher for all, cause the 2g is slow slow slow, and mostly, you aren't going to get wifi everywhere you are, so when you wanna look something up, having the switcher to go back to 3g while out on the town, will come in very handy.
Well, NOW, i'm paying $60 a month.
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Click to collapse
Are u still on simplemobile? How is the service so far with the galaxy tab? Does mms work and does Internet and voice work at the same time? Thanks

T-mobile opinions

I was just wondering what the opinions of T-mobile was for the members here. I have been on a Radioshack/AT&T employee plan since 2006 and even though I quit in 2008 I have continued to be on this plan. It was amazing (2000 minutes, unlimited text, and unlimited data for $25 a month), however I just received notice today from my old AT&T rep that I will finally be taken off it. I am currently looking at switching to one of the major US carriers and am looking at the plan prices. I want to stick with an Android phone, so I'll need data. Verizon's cheapest plan looks to be $89.99/month for what I want (450 minutes, unlimited text, 2GB of data), with AT&T and Sprint's around $10 cheaper. I rarely use minutes (average of 250 a month), but I text quite a bit so I would want unlimited text. I also don't use data much. My max in the past year has been 134MB, however I know if I have a faster phone I will probably use data more. I was looking at T-mobile's plans and noticed they are drastically cheaper. $49.99/month for 500 minutes, unlimited text, and 2GB of data. Is their service much worse than AT&T, even though they are both GSM? I'd hate to switch to them and end up hating my service.
So in short, does anybody who has had AT&T and T-mobile notice a major difference between the two? Would I be better with sticking with Verizon or AT&T or are they all about equal nowadays?
Thanks in advance!

I recommend you buy an unlocked phone (hello Nexus!) and get a sim card from Straight Talk. They are a MVNO that runs on the AT&T network. I believe plans are $45.

It always depends on your area. For years I used Cingular(now At&t) and I had pretty decent service. About 5 years ago, T-Mobile was carrying a phone I wanted, so I decided to switch. (This was before I knew about the glory of unlocking ;P). T-Mobile's network was so horrible I never (read:NEVER) got service within a 2 mile radius of my home, and about the same at work.
I couldn't make a phone call with out it dropping, so I was forced to switch back to At&t. The guy at T-Mobile pulled up a "coverage map" and it claimed I should have the best service right in the area I needed it. So it was a bunch of bull if you ask me.
My suggestion has always been to talk to people who you know in the area of where you will be using your phone. I know some people from around my area who get great reception with T-Mobile and get awful service with At&t. I honestly have no idea how it happens, but it does.
Another route would be to get the phone to test (perhaps one of their pre-paid, no contract options?) and use it for a few days. If you are unhappy, simply return it. If you are returning it because of bad coverage they HAVE to take it back and give you a full refund.
I still think the asking people around the area is the best option. Perhaps you could give a general location, and ask people on the forums who are located near by to give you some of their opinions on their coverage? Its probably the best way to be sure, if you ask me.

T-Mobile was great to me in the East Bay area of northern California, until last November, when they instituted traffic-shaping policies that meant every single JPEG image on the internet was horribly compressed into an ugly mess of artifacts and banded gradients.
I really miss T-Mobile's HSPA+ speed. AT&T just can't quite get as fast. But I'll take a 20-25% slower connection that isn't adulterated over a faster one that's been tampered with.

I've had ok experiences with T-Mobile. When I lived in Atlanta there were many areas where I simply didn't get a signal, but that's probably due to to the terrain. As suggested you should probably ask others in the area where you will be how their coverage is. In regards to plans, I'm on a contracted unlimited talk/text, 2GB data for $90. I'll be modifying that at the soonest opportunity... I guess at least the phone itself was cheaper at the time :/

Thanks for info!

.
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I've had T-Mobile for a few years now, and I can't wait to leave this company. I'm currently in the process of jumping ship. I've driven from California to Tennessee, Tennessee to Iowa, Iowa to Michigan, and back again. I've never seen such garbage coverage from a cellular company. I have a 4G compatible phone, but I've only ever seen 4G when I fly through Chicago's O'Hare Airport. Their 3G coverage area is also terrible.
So, Cons are as follows:
4G: What 4G?
3G: Doesn't exist
2G: Covers the entire country with data speeds barely faster than dial-up, unless you live more than 25 miles outside a big city, or in North Dakota in general.
Reception: It's a well known fact that T-Mobile cannot maintain or even guarantee any sort of standard level of service indoors.
Pros:
Pricing: They are cheap for a reason.
"Unlimited" Data Plans: They "throttle" them after a certain amount of time, and it's throttling to less than 2G speeds. In fact, you should try being throttled while trying to drive across the country using Google maps...
Customer Service: The only pleasant part of my time with T-Mobile.

cdchris12 said:
I've had T-Mobile for a few years now, and I can't wait to leave this company. I'm currently in the process of jumping ship. I've driven from California to Tennessee, Tennessee to Iowa, Iowa to Michigan, and back again. I've never seen such garbage coverage from a cellular company. I have a 4G compatible phone, but I've only ever seen 4G when I fly through Chicago's O'Hare Airport. Their 3G coverage area is also terrible.
So, Cons are as follows:
4G: What 4G?
3G: Doesn't exist
2G: Covers the entire country with data speeds barely faster than dial-up, unless you live more than 25 miles outside a big city, or in North Dakota in general.
Reception: It's a well known fact that T-Mobile cannot maintain or even guarantee any sort of standard level of service indoors.
Pros:
Pricing: They are cheap for a reason.
"Unlimited" Data Plans: They "throttle" them after a certain amount of time, and it's throttling to less than 2G speeds. In fact, you should try being throttled while trying to drive across the country using Google maps...
Customer Service: The only pleasant part of my time with T-Mobile.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Those may have been YOUR experiences and I'm not discounting that BUT....
I have FIVE LINES with T-Mobile
NEVER HAVE I HAD an issue with signal or coverage indoors.
Full bars in my home, excellent signal (68dBm-72dBm).
Very good coverage in Jersey City, NJ where I live.
My husband whom travels all over the tri-state area (NY,NJ,CT) doesn't have any reception issues either.
Fast HSPA+ (yes, it's a 3.5G technology) speeds depending on the device used. (I have the Amaze,,Sensation and, a Nexus S on T-Mobile ATM)
Wasn't me!! I didn't do it!

I completely disagree with cdchris12 however I always lived in area with good T-Mobile coverage and their throttle speed is fast enough to view website and use Google Maps. I do find that depends on the phone, usually older ones can have problem keeping data and gps in door, unless you're next to a window. With newer big phones with good antenna is not so much a problem.
I'd say get an unlocked phone and go with T-Mobile prepaid $50/month plan which give you unlimited everything and throttle to 2G after 2GB of usage. Unless you need roaming which isn't available with prepaid. I have family and friends who use ATT 3G and T-Mobile 3G network is always faster to me. In fact, with a Galaxy SII with dual HSPA+ antenna I get speed excess of 20mbps. Straight Talk has the same plan for $45 I believe and they go through T-Mobile network.
T-Mobile also allows you to tether which ATT don't, although recently I heard they changed that for people with $70 plan.
You might also find this useful: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=21604722&postcount=2
To get T-Mobile 3G you need a phone that support 1700/2100Mhz band.

In the East Bay area T-Mobile's HSPA+ speeds are really quite fast. I often saw 8-9Mbps downstream on my Galaxy Nexus before I switched to AT&T.
Unfortunately a fast internet connection is useless if your carrier alters all images on the internet so everything looks like dogpoo.

I have no idea what you are talking about, you might be accessing website through some kind of proxy like Opera Mini/Turbo. I know you will reply that that isn't the case, but I really can't think why that would be the case, but it has to be through some kind of proxy. I also notice some roms are set to connect to SimpleMobile by default instead of T-Mobile, which also causes problems. With Opera Mobile using desktop user agent, it looks exactly like my PC, and I've tried 5 different Android phones with T-Mobile. I haven't heard of millions other T-Mobile users complaining about degrading pictures quality from browser.

eksasol said:
I have no idea what you are talking about, you might be accessing website through some kind of proxy like Opera Mini/Turbo. I know you will reply that that isn't the case, but I really can't think why that would be the case, but it has to be through some kind of proxy. I also notice some roms are set to connect to SimpleMobile by default instead of T-Mobile, which also causes problems. With Opera Mobile using desktop user agent, it looks exactly like my PC, and I've tried 5 different Android phones with T-Mobile. I haven't heard of millions other T-Mobile users complaining about degrading pictures quality from browser.
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It's a proxy, but the proxy is on T-Mobile's end, not mine. It's a transparent proxy and it works exactly like the Opera Mini proxy, but I can't choose to turn it off. Connecting through a VPN would obviously fix the problem, but there's no easy way to force Android to auto-connect to a VPN every time I open the browser.
Trust me, I was thorough. The user agent wasn't an issue. The APN was set correctly. I spent over ten hours on the phone with T-Mobile's technical support and I hard reset the phones on both lines multiple times, restored to unrooted stock multiple times, and nothing fixed the issue. When I bought my Galaxy Nexus, I tested it before unlocking the bootloader and rooting it, and had the same exact issue.
Just to be absolutely sure, I even tested the issue on an iOS device (iPhone 3GS) and a WP7 device (HD7) with the same results--heavily compressed JPEG images when viewing any unencrypted page.
It no longer matters since I left T-Mobile for AT&T, which uses no such proxy.
Edit: I should note that I'm not the only one with this problem. Every person I know in the SF Bay area who uses T-Mobile has this problem. It may be automatic traffic shaping algorithms used on a tower-by-tower basis (which would explain why some people don't have the problem), but yeah, it's all over the place here. I tested demo phones in every T-Mobile store I could easily reach in the area--three in SF, two in Oakland, one in Berkeley and one in El Cerrito, and they all exhibit the same problem.
For example:
Actual quality, downloaded over wifi (180kb)
Very low quality, downloaded over T-Mobile 3G (55kb)

Yea, the compression thing on TMo is a well known thing. It doesn't bother me personally.
To throw in my experience with AT&T/T-Mobile here, I review phones as a side project. I've noted several differences in the two networks. Most are well known things that others have commented on. T-Mobile EASILY has better customer service. They always have. They pride themselves in their outstanding customer care. As long as you aren't being retarded or yelling at them, they will do everything possible to make you a happy customer.
As far as coverage goes, check the maps. AT&T has a bigger network footprint. T-Mobile has better network speeds. I get better speeds on T-Mobile 3G than on AT&T LTE. Obviously this is very dependent on location, but that's how it is here.
If you have coverage from T-Mobile and don't mind the picture compression, I strongly suggest it. I lived without 3G from T-Mobile for 2 and a half years while I was in the Army on base in Georgia. EDGE speeds are respectable from them. Their customer service and my ridiculously old $50 unlimited everything plan kept me going.
T-Mobile does throttle users once you reach your limits. I've never been throttled personally, but I've maxed out a test SGS2 just to see what it's like. You are still able to browse the web. No videos or streaming music, though. Speed tests put the throttling at around 70-110 Kbps. This is within EDGE speeds. Their unthrottled EDGE speeds are between 160-320 Kbps here. By comparison, GPRS speed drops down to about 20-40 Kbps.
My preference is for good customer service. T-Mobile has always been there for me, even when things got tight for me. I see no reason to leave them now. Look at the news just within the last 6 months. AT&T couldn't care less about its customers. It doesn't change anything until it gets sued.

cajunflavoredbob said:
Yea, the compression thing on TMo is a well known thing. It doesn't bother me personally.
To throw in my experience with AT&T/T-Mobile here, I review phones as a side project. I've noted several differences in the two networks. Most are well known things that others have commented on. T-Mobile EASILY has better customer service. They always have. They pride themselves in their outstanding customer care. As long as you aren't being retarded or yelling at them, they will do everything possible to make you a happy customer.
As far as coverage goes, check the maps. AT&T has a bigger network footprint. T-Mobile has better network speeds. I get better speeds on T-Mobile 3G than on AT&T LTE. Obviously this is very dependent on location, but that's how it is here.
If you have coverage from T-Mobile and don't mind the picture compression, I strongly suggest it. I lived without 3G from T-Mobile for 2 and a half years while I was in the Army on base in Georgia. EDGE speeds are respectable from them. Their customer service and my ridiculously old $50 unlimited everything plan kept me going.
T-Mobile does throttle users once you reach your limits. I've never been throttled personally, but I've maxed out a test SGS2 just to see what it's like. You are still able to browse the web. No videos or streaming music, though. Speed tests put the throttling at around 70-110 Kbps. This is within EDGE speeds. Their unthrottled EDGE speeds are between 160-320 Kbps here. By comparison, GPRS speed drops down to about 20-40 Kbps.
My preference is for good customer service. T-Mobile has always been there for me, even when things got tight for me. I see no reason to leave them now. Look at the news just within the last 6 months. AT&T couldn't care less about its customers. It doesn't change anything until it gets sued.
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This^^^^ %110. That being said, I've only experienced image compression in NYC, in a few areas (mostly midtown Manhattan). I live in Jersey City, NJ and haven't experienced it here. Even with image compression, images don't look THAT BAD....at least IMO.
Sent from my GT-N7000 using Tapatalk

Babydoll25 said:
This^^^^ %110. That being said, I've only experienced image compression in NYC, in a few areas (mostly midtown Manhattan). I live in Jersey City, NJ and haven't experienced it here. Even with image compression, images don't look THAT BAD....at least IMO.
Sent from my GT-N7000 using Tapatalk
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For me, they looked so bad I was willing to pay $40 more a month to AT&T in order to make it go away permanently. The other line on my account is used by my partner, and she would frequently read manga raws on her phone. When the image compression started, the Japanese characters in the raw manga scans became totally illegible. She was, to put it mildly, rather upset. This is probably 90% of why she owns a smartphone and is willing to pay for it, so I'm sure you can see the issue here.
For me it was an aesthetic issue, but for her it was a functionality issue. In any case, we pay a little more a month, but we also get more--and I personally prefer AT&T's method of handling data. At least on AT&T if I want more than 3GB a month I can pay to get extra GBs. On T-Mobile, you'd get throttled regardless and EDGE in the East Bay is completely unusable.
I would have stayed with T-Mobile had I been able to figure out how to automatically log into a VPN every time I opened an app that pulled image assets from the web (the browser, the Android Market, etc). Unfortunately, the only solution I found also wakelocked the phone permanently, preventing it from sleeping and killing any semblance of good battery life.

synaesthetic said:
For me, they looked so bad I was willing to pay $40 more a month to AT&T in order to make it go away permanently. The other line on my account is used by my partner, and she would frequently read manga raws on her phone. When the image compression started, the Japanese characters in the raw manga scans became totally illegible. She was, to put it mildly, rather upset. This is probably 90% of why she owns a smartphone and is willing to pay for it, so I'm sure you can see the issue here.
For me it was an aesthetic issue, but for her it was a functionality issue. In any case, we pay a little more a month, but we also get more--and I personally prefer AT&T's method of handling data. At least on AT&T if I want more than 3GB a month I can pay to get extra GBs. On T-Mobile, you'd get throttled regardless and EDGE in the East Bay is completely unusable.
I would have stayed with T-Mobile had I been able to figure out how to automatically log into a VPN every time I opened an app that pulled image assets from the web (the browser, the Android Market, etc). Unfortunately, the only solution I found also wakelocked the phone permanently, preventing it from sleeping and killing any semblance of good battery life.
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I think that's the main problem with the way TMo handles it. It's not consistent. It seems to be worse based on location and usage. More compression in more populated areas or something. For me, I can tell that the images are compressed if I zoom in inside a webpage, but otherwise, it's business as usual.
Same with the data speeds. A lot of people say that it drops to regular GPRS speeds when they get throttled. I only tested it the one time with that review unit SGS2, but it wasn't that bad. 100Kbps is fine for web browsing. The problem seems to be that it's all very much a "your mileage may vary" situation.
AT&T is evil, but at least they are consistent.

They're all evil. We simply pick the lesser evil in any given location.

I'm kind of surprised that nobody's mentioned T-Mobile's Wifi Calling. It allows you to get service anywhere that has a Wifi network available, and you can do everything as normal (Call, text, internet) through your plan. I use it everyday, and I think it's great.

theholyfork said:
I'm kind of surprised that nobody's mentioned T-Mobile's Wifi Calling. It allows you to get service anywhere that has a Wifi network available, and you can do everything as normal (Call, text, internet) through your plan. I use it everyday, and I think it's great.
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It's nice to have, but kind of crappy that it still counts against you, even though you aren't using their towers...