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Review by Zenit  - Location: N. VA, USA
- Cost: $100 per month
Good "Cheap, 4 lines with unlimited talk/text + 500mb of 4G data then unlimited EDGE, Great CS, Constantly improving network"
Bad "Network in many places is obsolete 2G. Coverage not as strong as the more expensive competitors."
Overall "A great value, and a newly invigorated challenger to AT&T"
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Update Sept. 29 2013:
T-Mobile has recently begun re-farming towers near my house. I see 3G popping up on my iPhone at random while at home. Unfortunately, an EDGE only tower is closer, and overtakes it.
They ARE investing in their network, and once all the early-2000s EDGE 2g equipment is replaced, their network will look a LOT better.
Looking forward to it. A healthy T-Mobile is good for competition.
-Original Review-
We switched from AT&T in March of 2013. AT&T CS was apathetic to our concerns of high cost with limited features (no texting, unlimited talk, and only 200mb of data on 2 lines + 2 plain lines was $200 a month!). AT&Ts representatives were so bad that we decided to switch to T-Mobile. We kept our AT&T phones (iPhone 4, and 2 Android devices + 1 dumbphone)
The savings have been worth it. No longer do we have to worry about sending a text, or using the data features on our phones. While the data is not unlimited, most of T-Mobiles network in Virginia is EDGE anyways, so we never use up our high speed data cap. In areas where the re-farmed 3G is present, the service is excellent. Data speeds are a consistent 4Mbit down, 1 up. Tethering works very well.
Even the EDGE network is OK. It is sufficient for checking email, navigation, iMessage, and quick lookup of information via the Opera browser (which compresses images to make the internet bearable on a 20k connection).
There are more dead zones than what we had with AT&T, but we can forgive this easily.
T-Mobiles CS is excellent. In the beginning we had some SIM activation issues, as well as billing. They actually gave us back more money than they owed due to the billing issue, as a gesture of good service.
I hope they will continue to improve their existing network and upgrade the EDGE only towers to modern equipment. If they continue doing what they have been doing, they will be in a position to compete with AT&T for customers that dont need coverage in deep rural areas. T-Mobile tends to cover small towns, highways, and cities well. (Of course, its EDGE for the time being in most places)
member for 1.4 years, 181 visits, last login: a few hours ago
updated 6 days ago
Comments:
 Reviews:
 ·CableOne
·Allegiance Commu..
1 edit | AT&T Prcing Actually AT&T has unlimited talk,text and 6 GB of data which includes 4 phones for 250 a month, that's the plan I have with them and the service and internet speed away better than T-Mobile any day, even the call quality is much better, I have a business plan with them since I have my own company, Premiere support is AMAZING and they will bend over backwards for you, I have 4 lines on my account, 1 for my brother and 1 for his fiance, 1 for myself and 1for my partner.. I would give AT&T another look, and honestly they are not that bad, I have never dropped a call or lost service with them, were as with T-Mobile we struggled to even get service even though supposedly provide perfect service here.. PLUS I can have 10 lines on one account with no deposits ever and even start a second account with the same amount of lines and still no deposit lol | |
| | | | Re: AT&T Prcing except not everybody can have premier access like you...they only give you that since they can milk more money out of your business that you're giving to them...
even after you're paid for the phone unit, you're still paying for the price which in the end amounts to almost 3 phones after paying for service for 24 months...
let's see if you can figure that out and do the math... | |
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| Review by BR549 - Location: Commerce,Jackson,GA
- Cost: $110 per month (month by month)
- Install: about 1 days
Good "Super value for a family of 5"
Bad "Only 2g service were we live"
Overall "Very good value at $22. per month per line unlimited everything"
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We have been TMO customers for several years now and with the new plan are happier than ever.
Even though we only have 2g service were we live there is 4g service in the more populated areas around us so hopefully TMO will eventually provide us with faster service.
Some places we travel have no TMO service but roaming on ATT for voice and text is fine. Areas that lack both ATT and TMO we use WIFI calling provided by TMO and it works great, better than any other VOIP solution I have found.
member for 8.3 years, 184 visits, last login: 6 days ago
lodged 6 days ago
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| Review by fenix_jn - Location: Hialeah,Miami-Dade,FL
- Cost: $124 per month
- Install: about 1 days
Good "Reliable service, better signal penetration than Sprint's CDMA"
Bad "A bit slower speed on LTE compared to Sprint...might change in the near future"
Overall "Very decent service with very decent pricing"
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Well finally jumped from Sprint to TMo about a month ago: service has been very good when compared to Sprint at my new location: Sprint got dumped for two main reasons: $200+ charge (after corp discount) AND really bad service (non-existent) at my new house.
So far service has been really nice: got LTE/HSPDA almost anywhere (in Miami that is) and it is also 'unlimited'... although not as 'unlimited' as Sprint's: Sprint's service did not mind how I was using my data, be it on the phone or tethering... TMo does mind: it is unlimited only on the device itself, even though they include a 500 MB tethering plan, after you hit the 500MB mark then you get redirected to a page to add 2G more for some price. Sprint NEVER had this issue at all regardless of data destination. Although this can be bypassed, some websites do not like the bypass itself.
Speed-wise, on LTE I have been able to hit 10 - 15 Mbps down / 1 - 2 Mbps up which is decent for mobile service. For gaming, it can run some FPS games with acceptable latency (25 to 50ms). As far as equipment, T-Mo BYOD policy allowed me to bring over a Nexus 4 from Google Play and get service on it (yes Nexus 4 supports T-Mo's LTE service), I only asked for the micro-sim.
BE AWARE: T-MOBILE WILL RUN A HARD CHECK AGAINST YOUR CREDIT. I thought that since there was no contract, similarly to prepaid service, I would just walk with my phone activated... well they do check your credit to get service.
member for 6.7 years, 2072 visits, last login: a few hours ago
lodged 7 days ago
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| Review by Network Guy - Location: New York
- Cost: $30 per month (month by month)
- Install: about 1 days
Good "Overall good data and voice network.. Good customer service"
Bad "Mediocre indoor coverage"
Overall "Very good bang for the buck"
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I subscribe to T-Mobile's $30 prepaid cellular monthly plan. This plan includes 100 minutes of anytime national minutes, unlimited text and multimedia messaging, and up to 5 GB of full-speed 3G Internet after which is throttled to 2G speeds. After you eat through your minutes, additional national minutes cost ten cents per minute; excluding international of course. I could not say what actual speeds it throttles down to after consuming the included 5 GB as I've never exceeded this limit.
There are two $30 plans, and T-Mobile purposely make it challenging to subscribe to. There is a 1500-minute or text plan that includes 30 MB of data and the 100-minute plus unlimited texting and 5 GB of data plan. The former plan you have to activate at a T-Mobile store; the latter you can only activate at Walmart or purchase a SIM kit online from T-Mobile and activate it over the phone. All other plans you can purchase and activate online at T-Mobile. For the price, I didn't mind this slight inconvenience.
The voice portion of the service is excellent. Calls sound very clear for what one would expect from a GSM carrier. I do most of my phone calls through Google Voice and a SIP client so the included minutes are mostly for urgent or emergency calls as needed.
The data portion of the service is very good. I use a smart phone that operates on T-Mobile's HSPA+ network with typical peak speeds up to 3.5 MBps down and 2.7 Mbps up. The fastest speeds I've experienced are 6.7 Mbps down and 3.7 Mbps up. You can improve your actual speeds by using a handset that operates on T-Mobile's LTE network which is much faster. But for my purposes, needs and cost, this brings excellent value.
My only gripe with T-Mobile is indoor coverage. There are places where there is no signal even above ground while other carriers work. I've researched this thinking perhaps I need to switch phones, but general consensus seems to conclude the frequencies that T-Mobile use don't penetrate buildings very well. Where I happen to use my cell phone most; work and home; service works very well and there is plenty of reception.
T-Mobile is a BYOD-friendly carrier. As long as the IMEI hasn't been blacklisted, you can activate and use any GSM phone you want as long as it supports their cellular network band. As of this review, T-Mobile operates 3G HSPA+ on the 1700 MHz UMTS band.
For my particular needs; inexpensive service with very good data network and unlimited texting as an added plus; T-Mobile works well for me.
member for 13.1 years, 5426 visits, last login: a few hours ago
updated 23 days ago
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| Review by fredthomsen - Location: Germantown,Montgomery,MD
- Cost: $30 per month
Good "Fast and cheap, good coverage in urban areas, gives me exactly what I need"
Bad "Coverage in rural areas can be terrible to nonexistant, customer support seems clueless at times"
Overall "Great for data heavy users who live in an urban area"
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I did BYOD with a Galaxy Nexus with Google Voice to use on T-Mobile's Prepaid Monthly4G $30/month for 100 minutes, unlimited texting, unlimited data (up to 5GB on 4G). This plan works great for me as I am a heavy data user who rarely used voice minutes or SMS.
Ordering a SIM from T-Mobile's website was simple and it arrived a few days later. I stuck the sim in and fired up Chrome to start the activation process. The activation process should have been simple, just give them the SIM serial, the activation code, and phone’s IMEI number. However, I hit a snag immediately, the activation code that was provided with my SIM didn’t work, so I was forced to call pre-paid support. They lady on the line was very nice and gave me a new activation number, and once I entered the number provided, the phone registered with the network within minutes and everything seemed ok; however, this only lasted for 5 minutes. I asked them to turn off the voicemail on the number as well, and after the rep was finished he told me to reboot and after that the phone then got kicked off the network and could not register again. I called T-Mobile back and complained and they said that provisioning could take up to 2 hours, and I said ‘well that’s all well and good, but how would I be provisioned and then unprovisioned’, but the rep said he’d call me back in 2 hours. Of course, he didn’t call back, so I ended up calling T-Mobile again to complain. This rep had me change the APN settings from the default I had obtained online by tweaking a few parameters and while telling me repeatedly that they could not offer me any support with the phone since it wasn’t T-Mobile branded. This was the worst kind of technical incompetence, because not only was a tweaking APN settings when I wasn’t even able to register on the network, but he was trying to let himself off the hook a bit by suggesting my phone may be the culprit. I played along and changed the APN settings, but told him, now it isn’t my phone because it was working for 5 minutes previously. He said to give it some more time, so I just hang up and decided to try a little experiment. I wondered if somehow the screwed up activation code they had fixed earlier had potentially messed up the SIM provisioning. I called the T-Mobile number that I had been given and sure enough some very unhappy lady picked up. That was all I needed to know, so I called T-Mobile back again and got a rep to verify the SIM serial number associated with my account and sure enough, the wrong one was in there. After fixing that my phone, registered within a minute and I received a few test texts sent by the rep. Now everything seemed alright, but certain apps (twitter and facebook) didn’t load any updates when they were on T-Mobile’s network and not WiFi, and immediately I started thinking about those APN settings I changed and how that’s the only thing it could be, so I changed those back to default and behold facebook and twitter updates streamed in. T-Mobile pre-paid (monthly4g is what they used to call it) customer service definitely has their B-team group on call.
However, with the service itself, I was very surprised that I had HSPA all around germantown, gaithersburg, DC, and up into the baltimore area with good speeds of up to 2Mbps. I have been using it for the past year and a half and I have been really pleased with it, and although the customer service was a pain, the service itself has exceeded my expectations. I have streamed netflix, music, and other media over the cell connection and for this most part it handles it all great. However be warned, in rural areas the coverage can be non-existent, so if you live or spend lots of time in the country I would not suggest this plan or even T-Mobile period. For $30/month this plan has great value provided it meets your needs and I would gladly deal with that hassle again.
This plan kind of hidden away on T-Mobile's website and is tough to find. You need to go to their prepaid monthly4g site to find it and it's not one of the main plan's listed, rather it's towards the bottom of the page, but it's still there!
member for 2.6 years, 92 visits, last login: 10 days ago
updated 43 days ago
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| Review by cmarslett - Location: Pflugerville,Travis,TX
- Cost: $70 per month (month by month)
- Install: about 3 days
Good "Good coverage except near the Texas campus."
Bad "wish data was as cheap as DSL or Clear, but I am happy with TXT and voice."
Overall "Excellent on the road, at the airport, and tethering works great!"
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My Google Nexus GSM (bought direct from Google) and T-Mobile service are working out better than I expected (especially since T-Mobile doesn't provide a lot of info before you sign up). Unlimited voice/text is $60+, adding unlimited Android Web bumps it to $130. And I have been capped one month with my 3G service last year, and one of the last two months with 4G on the GNEX (I re-downloaded all the US and EU maps for my ALK CoPilot when I got the phone - about 2.5 GB over a day or two).
I settled with 700 minutes voice/unlimited TXT/unlimited Android data (2 phone family plan). That costs me half of the unlimited across the board deal and I was quite happy with it. Switched to their new u/u/u plan and have 3 phones for what we paid for two, all with unlimited data. I don't recall running over 700 minutes in the more than 2 years we have been with T-mobile but two months I've run over the soft cap of 2.5 GB. That results in throttling and I get only about another 1.5 GB by the end of the month.
SpeedTest.net tells me I get 70 ms pings and 3-9 Mbit down with 1-2 Mbit up these days. That's plenty fast though I think the spec for HSPA+ is 21 Mbit....
I would like better coverage (central Austin seems to be a black hole!). Otherwise, service is as good as it started out being.
Netflix looks as good as it could on a 5" screen, but there are just a few things I still want on something bigger than a phone. And of course tethering to my laptop in airports is a really good deal, too. Thank you, T-Mobile.
member for 6.8 years, 91 visits, last login: a few hours ago
updated 60 days ago
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| Review by djcrazy - Location: Minneapolis,Hennepin,MN
- Cost: $86 per month
Good "Very reliable, Unlimited 4G high speed data, unlimites talk, text. Great signal"
Bad "Phone selection a bit limited but improving"
Overall "Truly the best bang for the buck"
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Paid for my Samsung Galaxy S 3 outright so I get a reduced rate on service of about $15 a month. Services are the Value plan with unlimited talk, text and web for $49.99, $20 more for UNLIMITED 4G high speed data, and $7.99 for handset protection per moth plus taxes, fees, etc.
The call quality and clarity are second to none. I have not had any dropped calls on my end since I started the service in August of 2112. The 4G data is fast and reliable. ALL much better than Verizon ever was for me. I use it to stream music from the web both in my car and at work hooked up to a stereo and never have a problem with it.
Highly recommended!
UPDATE ( August 5 2013): Got the Galaxy S4 on Saturday which has the LTE capability and I must say WOW! Saw a top speed of over 37 Mbps and upload at 20. That upload is faster than what I get on my Comcast Blast ( 50/10) wire line at home. Sweet!
member for 4.1 years, 428 visits, last login: 11 days ago
updated 61 days ago
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| Review by aelfwyne - Location: Beaumont,Jefferson,TX
- Cost: $59 per month
- Install: about 1 days
Good "Greatly improved."
Bad "None."
Overall "I wouldn't switch."
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I used to have a bad review here. However the service has greatly improved. I don't have an LTE device, but the 4g is great with up to 6mbps on the speedtest.net app. Tethering is included so I can use my tanker anywhere also via the internet on my phone. I have good signal wherever I go.
member for 9.6 years, 1165 visits, last login: 34 days ago
updated 69 days ago
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| Review by Brian3527 - Location: Riverside,Riverside,CA
- Cost: $25 per month
- Install: about 1 days
Good "Cheap, consistant service in metro areas"
Bad "Speed in rural areas, fastest speed is still only HSPA+ in many areas"
Overall "For the money, you get what you pay for..."
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For $25 (normally $40) of 6.5 GB data at HSPA+ speeds this is an excellent value. Especially since it includes unlimited HotSpot. I have been a customer of T-Mobile for about 8 years, so a discounted rate was offered to me when they changed their plans a few month ago. Also, my phone is not 4G (Nexus 4), so it doesn't matter to me that the 4G LTE has not yet rolled out in my neck of the woods. Consider this if you want true LTE. HSPA+ is fine for me. My speed tests usually yield results around 10 mbps down/ 4 mbps up. This is more than enough for my needs. My main gripe would be when traveling. A lot of times my service will drop to edge speeds when in rural areas or on a highway in the boondocks. You can't do much on edge. Not even audio will steam well at this speed. Then again at home, work or on the road between both my my HSPA+ speeds are very consistant, so this is of no consequence to me.
member for 11.2 years, 543 visits, last login: 29 days ago
updated 82 days ago
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| Review by Leilanijj - Location: 48371u
- Cost: $70 per month
Bad "connectivity is suppose to be 3g and i get maybe 200 kbps.I leavehome it jumps to 3500 or more."
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I am seeking business else where. The network with tmobile us is shotty at best.
I think Verizon and/or att would serve me better.
I have a samsung dart that too is not my firstchoice.
I.have Unlimited data text and talk at 70 dollars .this is prepaid.
for it says 4g speeds.however my phone is equipped only for 3g.
Even still Im lucky to receive 300 kbps/sec.
not thrilled with samsung eithet.
i want mymotorola droid razr back.
member for 95 days, 0 visits, last login: 95 days ago
lodged 95 days ago
Comments:
tdumainePremium
join:2004-03-14
Seattle, WA | um why did you not get your first choice of phone? you said yes, they dont put a gun to your head | |
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