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winsyrstrife
River City Bounce
Premium Member
join:2002-04-30
Brooklyn, NY

winsyrstrife

Premium Member

Prepaid for about 1 month now

$30 - 100 minutes & 5GB data for myself
$30 - 1500 minutes & 30 MB data for my wife

Having a hard time managing 100 minutes, since it counts for every single thing involving a phone call. Even so, my bill is no longer $110 a month for things my wife and I barely use.

I love T-Mobile. In the (about) 10 years I've had their service, I never had serious problems. For me, it's simply a question of cost.

Groove IP, in my personal experience, has been a terrible supplement. Lag, failed calls, etc. I may try Skype and see how that goes. Anyone have any other suggestions?
ssavoy
Premium Member
join:2007-08-16
Dallas, PA

ssavoy

Premium Member

I haven't found one good VoIP client for Android. They all have one problem or another and have terrible integration. ICS has built-in VoIP, but carriers strip it out. I take a more complex route and use Anveo (since it can mask caller ID to my number) and Zoiper...which isn't too bad. Anveo is about $0.01/min.
elefante72
join:2010-12-03
East Amherst, NY

elefante72

Member

I struggled with it, and decided that straighttalk/Tmo was better because my wife is not technical and a smartphone to begin with is pushing her technical ability So it's $45, but the service is awesome. I was on VM/$25 plan but there was no joy in sight for them upgrading their backhaul. On a good day the phone would get 128 kbps. That's old skool edge speeds, and it was on 3G. She now is getting 9 Mbps which is 72x faster for $20 more a month and unlimited voice (she uses a lot of voice).

In any case with her employer discount I could have gotten a good deal for $67 + taxes but in NY taxes are like $20 so that would have been $87 which is $350/yr or $700 over the life of the contract more and you are locked into the contract. If I don't like this, I put in a new SIM and off to the races. The Nexus 4 is the perfect defector's phone.....
tkdslr
join:2004-04-24
Pompano Beach, FL

tkdslr to winsyrstrife

Member

to winsyrstrife
100 minutes/month.. don't worry.. Each minute over the 100/(30 days), costs only 10 cents/minute.

Just keep a little surplus in your prepaid account.. When you go over the monthly limit the appropriate amount will be automatically deducted. I usually keep 10 to 20 dollars surplus in my prepaid account.

Simple, easy.. no hassles.. It sure beats paying XXX$ a month extra for a plan with more minutes..

Suggestion, send more text messages(unlimited), instead if calling each time.
tkdslr

tkdslr to elefante72

Member

to elefante72
In my area.. South Florida.. Prepaid plans are only have sales tax(6%) added to air-time/service purchase. It sure beats the typical POT's(40-50%)/cable(13.2%)/wireless (postpaid)20-30% tax rates by a long shot.

All this is beat by using SKYPE/Laptop tethered to Android.. Zero tax.. 2 cents a minute(zero, if to another Skype user).. (note: requires rooting, Browser ID changes, etc..)

winsyrstrife
River City Bounce
Premium Member
join:2002-04-30
Brooklyn, NY

winsyrstrife to tkdslr

Premium Member

to tkdslr
Oh, so that's the trick. I did go over my 100 minutes and it said I would be charged 10c per minute, but I could never make any calls. It's because my account balance was $0.00. I'm still getting used to prepaid systems. I assumed I'd just get a bill for how many minutes I went over 100 minutes, but it sounds like there MUST be a positive balance in the account.

Erb1969
@cavtel.net

Erb1969 to winsyrstrife

Anon

to winsyrstrife
I have Sprint, I downloaded Google Voice while I had my Android phone active, worked fine with my separate GV phone number. Sprint had offered to integrate my Sprint number with GV, but I declined for the privacy issue on principal alone. When I later re-activated my windows phone back on my Sprint account, GV stopped working on my android phone thru WiFi, but I could use GrooveIP thru WiFi without being active on Sprint except a lot of echoing. I want to try Talkatone with GV next.

You may want to ask T-Mobile to integrate GV with their network, then you should be able to use GV alone without needing GrooveIP or anything else besides GV. I take it Sprint would not use subscribers minutes if activating GV onto their phones with their number, but would use your data without WiFi. When I do have Sprint active on my android phone, everytime I went to make a call it would ask if I want to make the call with GV or without GV, I should be able to change it in settings if I wanted. Also with Sprint I can call Canada for free with GV; although I read Sprint to credit accounts in the beginning.
thor793
join:2005-09-10
Schaumburg, IL

1 edit

thor793 to winsyrstrife

Member

to winsyrstrife
pbxes.org

free voip up to 2000 minutes...integrates with Google Voice and can be integrated with the stock dialer. What I have been using for a few months now.
»forum.xda-developers.com ··· =1646755
openbox9
Premium Member
join:2004-01-26
71144

openbox9 to ssavoy

Premium Member

to ssavoy
said by ssavoy:

ICS has built-in VoIP, but carriers strip it out.

Root and fix. Or buy a Nexus and avoid the restriction from the get go. I use the built in SIP/VoIP with my GSM GNex all of the time. Works wonderfully.
tanzam75
join:2012-07-19

tanzam75 to winsyrstrife

Member

to winsyrstrife
said by winsyrstrife:

I'm still getting used to prepaid systems. I assumed I'd just get a bill for how many minutes I went over 100 minutes, but it sounds like there MUST be a positive balance in the account.

If you were to get billed for it, then that would be postpaid.

Prepaid means exactly what the word says. You pay for the service before using it. This is why there are no credit checks for prepaid service -- they aren't extending you any credit at all, not even for one month.

buddahbless
join:2005-03-21
Premium

buddahbless to tkdslr

Member

to tkdslr
said by tkdslr:

In my area.. South Florida.. Prepaid plans are only have sales tax(6%) added to air-time/service purchase. It sure beats the typical POT's(40-50%)/cable(13.2%)/wireless (postpaid)20-30% tax rates by a long shot.

I believe thats all of FL, Central FL taxes as well if you purchase a prepaid refill it has the same tax of 6%. Thats why I purchase mine on ebay and the callingmart not only is there no tax I also get a 5% discount ( which makes a$50 refill $48.50) and ebay bucks for each purchase.

Selenia
Gentoo Convert
Premium Member
join:2006-09-22
Fort Smith, AR

1 recommendation

Selenia to thor793

Premium Member

to thor793
Pbxes is sort of unreliable without using a paid account. The trunk also requires another sip or iax provider. I use Linphone with a few free providers, including pbxes, and let Google voice ring them all, including my cell. Something to be said about redundancy. To call out, I have Voice+ which gives me a choice of my cell line or letting gv call one of these lines, straight from my normal dialer. All calls show as my gv number, which I give everybody. That way, I can flee carriers without porting my number, but everyone can still call me. Been with AT&T on the lowest minute plan, unlimited text, and 3GB of data-in the $90 range per month postpaid. I get away with tethering, using OpenVPN. I make unlimited calls that work great over 4G and wifi. Data usage is low but I am under wifi 90% of the time or better. Linphone is great. Csipsimple(used to be excellent but now suffers bugs and bloat, as well as insane battery usage), 3cx, and Sipdroid are all overrated. Only issues with Linphone is using Bluetooth requires hacks(don't use it as I prefer my wired headset) and the need to manually set partial wakelock to keep calls smooth with screen off, as the app never requests one(prolly more a phone issue than an issue with Linphone). Call quality beats cell and rivals a landline.

jap
Premium Member
join:2003-08-10
038xx

jap to winsyrstrife

Premium Member

to winsyrstrife
said by winsyrstrife:

Having a hard time managing 100 minutes, since it counts for every single thing involving a phone call.

If you don't like texting and inbound texts are eating up your mins know that T-Mo will disable text capability at the network level for you. I love that they're truly ala carte. I use the flat $30 = 1500 plan (no text).

dnoyeB
Ferrous Phallus
join:2000-10-09
Southfield, MI

dnoyeB to ssavoy

Member

to ssavoy
How does Zoiper work? will your cellphone and your home phone be online at the same time? Or do you only use Anveo with your cell or what?

I recently started using Anveo.