It looks like the Virgin Mobile iPhone is a flop

[Pukey]

Originally Posted by lordofthereef

AFAIK, no. It's the same reason why we cannot use a Verizon phone on Sprint. Technically everything is compatible (in terms of the CDMA network) but the companies don't want to sign "foreign" ESNs.

I should also add that Sprint will not let you pay your ETF until you are locked into contract (your return period has expired). With Sprint you would essentially pay your first month's fees (around $85 after taxes) PLUS the ETF. The $100 you were planning on saving would be closer to $15. Not worth the hassle IMO, even if it did work.

There has been a lot of discussion on the topic, and a lot of people feel that buying an unlocked GSM model and then going the $45/mo straight talk route (uses AT&T's towers) is the way to go. Better coverage, faster data, with only a slightly higher monthly rate. The resale value of the phone if/when you are wanting to sell it will likely more than make up the extra $5-10 you spend a month on the plan.

Thanks again lordofthereef. What you say makes sense. I might consider Straight Talk, the only thing is I've heard if you want to have the option to tether, that is not supported on Straight Talk. Maybe that is a misconception though?

[lordofthereef]

Originally Posted by Pukey

Thanks again lordofthereef. What you say makes sense. I might consider Straight Talk, the only thing is I've heard if you want to have the option to tether, that is not supported on Straight Talk. Maybe that is a misconception though?

tethering on straight talk can be done via jailbreak. AFAIK there isn't an officially carrier supported option.

[Pukey]

Originally Posted by lordofthereef

tethering on straight talk can be done via jailbreak. AFAIK there isn't an officially carrier supported option.

I didn't realize tethering wasn't allowed on other carriers either. I found on Virgin Mobile's site that they are going to allow tethering at an additional charge of $15/month. It's in the bottom section of this chart
From their site here (click on the "Plan Rates" tab):
http://www.virginmobileusa.com/cell-...elaunch-062812

Interestingly, overseas apparently tethering is free!:
http://virginmobile.custhelp.com/app...-and-tethering

[lordofthereef]

Originally Posted by Pukey

I didn't realize tethering wasn't allowed on other carriers either. I found on Virgin Mobile's site that they are going to allow tethering at an additional charge of $15/month. It's in the bottom section of this chart
From their site here (click on the "Plan Rates" tab):
http://www.virginmobileusa.com/cell-...elaunch-062812

For the most part, light tethering is "allowed" via jailbreak. There is a moral dilemma. Some people argue they are paying for bandwidth, they should be able to do with it what they want. Others argue you are paying for a specific service and using said service in ways it wasn't deemed allowable. I suppose that it is yours to interpret. Right now it is a legal gray area.

[BiggAW]

Originally Posted by sracer

I supposed that you are one of those who aren't cheap and like to spend money needlessly. Do you measure your self-esteem by how much you pay for your cellphone?

HUH? Buying an iPhone on VM is a waste of money. It's overpriced. The folks who are on VM are cheap, they are buying a low-quality service for a low price. They want cheap phones, and cheap phones are small Android phones. I have a friend I recommended to VM, and he's fine with it and it's limited coverage, but he certainly wouldn't have spend hundreds on a phone.

Originally Posted by NoCleverSNForMe

People told me about the iPhone's CDMA radios being terrible...I didn't want to believe it; now I do. Holy CRAP!

It's not the CDMA radios. It works great on Verizon. It's Sprint's network.

Originally Posted by mbell1975

The iPhone ruined Sprints network.

Yeah, I agree. Post-iPhone, their speeds were in the crapper, even in areas where there are very few Sprint customers to load the network down.

Originally Posted by lordofthereef

For the most part, light tethering is "allowed" via jailbreak. There is a moral dilemma.

If you have tiered bandwidth, you're in the clear. You're paying for it, so you should be able to do with it what you want. That's what I do on postpaid AT&T. AT&T is welcome to manage me from their end in terms of bandwidth, but on my device, which I own, I do what I want.

[andyx3x]

Originally Posted by mbell1975

The iPhone ruined Sprints network.

This is 100 percent correct. I had the Evo in 2010 and I loved Sprint's 3g network back then. It was so fast that I didn't really notice a huge difference between that and wifi.

When the iPhone came last October, everything changed. It has made the network basically unusable.

[ktjensen]

so six months later. iphone 5 is out, but not on virgin.

costs are $30 per month. virgin is fast enough with unlimited data, but using wifi mostly anyway in my state and iphone 4s cost $500 with taxes, plus $100 drop insurance.

dumped verizon at $85 monthly. so first year its the same price. second year will save $600 to $700.

thought about AT&T iphone unlocked on GSM but always see that coverage is very random, and worse than CDMA Virgin. and trying to activate a simm card with voice-data-text in an iphone 4s is mental gymnastics that would rather not play for $45 monthly on a low-low cost provider. buy an unlocked iphone, something goes wrong(bricking, infinate reboots, etc). who you going to call to fix it?

can you pay AT&T To unbrick your iphone?

example: bought new virgin iphone. started update to 6.1 and iphone got caught in a restore loop. brand new. apple store claimed it was virus-firewall on my PC. they restored in 2 minutes.

[NoCleverSNForMe]

Originally Posted by ktjensen

so six months later. iphone 5 is out, but not on virgin.

costs are $30 per month. virgin is fast enough with unlimited data, but using wifi mostly anyway in my state and iphone 4s cost $500 with taxes, plus $100 drop insurance.

dumped verizon at $85 monthly. so first year its the same price. second year will save $600 to $700.

thought about AT&T iphone unlocked on GSM but always see that coverage is very random, and worse than CDMA Virgin. and trying to activate a simm card with voice-data-text in an iphone 4s is mental gymnastics that would rather not play for $45 monthly on a low-low cost provider. buy an unlocked iphone, something goes wrong(bricking, infinate reboots, etc). who you going to call to fix it?

can you pay AT&T To unbrick your iphone?

example: bought new virgin iphone. started update to 6.1 and iphone got caught in a restore loop. brand new. apple store claimed it was virus-firewall on my PC. they restored in 2 minutes.

Yeah, I went ahead and bought an AT&T iPhone 5 on my personal line, and I'm regretting having switched from Virgin Mobile. The plans were cheap, the service was good, and the 4S effectively did everything my 5 does.

I am a little surprised that the 5 is out for Straight Talk as an official carrier, Cricket Wireless, etc., but not on the largest prepaid carrier. I don't know why Sprint is holding back on that - maybe they don't want LTE devices on Virgin yet? I don't know. Just confusing.

[bonskovsky]

There was no way I was ever going to pay 70, to 100 per month with limited data on AT&T it's too much. So I got the unlocked phone for use on Cricket which gives you unlimited.

However, I think the phone revolution is just not worth it, none of the plans are really good.

I almost went with Straight Talk, but I didn't want to go buying prepaid cards all the time.

[maflynn]

Generally speaking I think consumers are less willing to spend 650 on an unsubsidized phone even if that means a reduced monthly expense.

T-Mobile is rumored to be moving that direction but I think its easy to justify spending 199 for a phone then 650.

[Wicked1]

Is Virgin Mobile GSM or CDMA/EVDO? I can not locate that info on their site from what I see so far

[CEmajr]

Originally Posted by Wicked1

Is Virgin Mobile GSM or CDMA/EVDO? I can not locate that info on their site from what I see so far

It's CDMA and uses Sprints horrible network. That's the main reason the iPhone is a flop on Virgin.

[maflynn]

Originally Posted by CEmajr

It's CDMA and uses Sprints horrible network. That's the main reason the iPhone is a flop on Virgin.

How so? From what I've read the iPhone is quite popular on sprint, while I agree with you that sprint's network is horrible, sprint is enjoying the addition of the iPhone as its helping them get new (or retain) customers.

[CoMoMacUser]

Originally Posted by mbell1975

The iPhone ruined Sprints network. I had been with Sprint for 5 years and my Android phones ran so well on 3G, . . . Then, about a month after the iPhone was released, Sprints network took a dive. I couldn't even get .3Mbps when I was normally seeing 2Mbps before the iPhone was released. I switched to Verizon and a ton of Sprint customers have gone elsewhere now too. Hope it was worth it Sprint.

I could I have written this. My contract just expired, and I'm considering getting a Nexus 4 and moving to T-Mobile prepaid. HSPA is fast enough for my needs and faster than anything I've had on Sprint in the past year and a half.

I didn't think I could get a better rate plan than my $50 SERO, but TMO's $30 100/unlimited/unlimited is a steal.

[CEmajr]

Originally Posted by maflynn

How so? From what I've read the iPhone is quite popular on sprint, while I agree with you that sprint's network is horrible, sprint is enjoying the addition of the iPhone as its helping them get new (or retain) customers.

Not Sprint itself I was talking about a flop on Virgin. Most people aren't willing to pay $650 for a locked down CDMA iPhone even though Virgin has very low monthly rates. I think if they were a gsm carrier and the phone was sold unlocked then it would have fared better.

[maflynn]

That makes sense, It I can see a non-locked GSM being more of a draw but yeah everything in the equation spells bad news for virgin on this one.

[CoMoMacUser]

I don't think that Sprint loses by offering an unlocked iPhone on Virgin. If it sells well, then those are more units toward meeting Sprint's iPhone sales requirement. If it sells poorly, then Sprint has some more real-world research into whether it makes business sense to eliminate device subsidies.

[bozzykid]

Originally Posted by maflynn

Generally speaking I think consumers are less willing to spend 650 on an unsubsidized phone even if that means a reduced monthly expense.

T-Mobile is rumored to be moving that direction but I think its easy to justify spending 199 for a phone then 650.

T-mobile is still allowing you to get phones at a cheaper up front cost. What they are doing though is spreading the rest of the cost over the following months on top of your monthly bill. What this means is once your phone is paid for, your monthly bill gets lower. All carriers should be doing this. This is why it is pointless to bring your own phone to other carriers as it doesn't give you a lower bill.

[bohbot16]

Originally Posted by bonskovsky

I almost went with Straight Talk, but I didn't want to go buying prepaid cards all the time.

You only need to buy the first card from Straight Talk. Once your account is up and running you can set up autopay on their website.

----------

Originally Posted by bozzykid

T-mobile is still allowing you to get phones at a cheaper up front cost. What they are doing though is spreading the rest of the cost over the following months on top of your monthly bill. What this means is once your phone is paid for, your monthly bill gets lower. All carriers should be doing this. This is why it is pointless to bring your own phone to other carriers as it doesn't give you a lower bill.

I think we'll see more of this going forward. That way it removes the barrier of the high upfront cost of the phone without hiding the subsidy in the service price.