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Carrier AT&T's base iPad plan - $59.96 per GB

iMas70

iMas70

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Sep 4, 2012
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I've had AT&T's 5GB plan for my iPad for a couple years. I don't use it as much as I used to outside my home. Most month's data usage is just 1-2GB. I noticed what the pricing is for the base plan tonight. It's $14.99 for 250MB and $14.99 for each additional MB. I understand volume discounts but damn.... that's expensive!

I'm going to drop down to 3GB. It will save me $20.00 per month. Actually, $15.40 after my 23% FAN discount. Then I'll just pay extra for months that I use more. I kick myself for having the 5GB plan as long as I have. Probably wasted at least $500.00 on data that I haven't used.
 
Why not use your phones personal hotspot and eliminate any charge for iPad data? Is your phone on ATT?
 
I wish I could but the phone has an unlimited data plan. Can't use that as a hotspot.
 
iMas70 said:
I wish I could but the phone has an unlimited data plan. Can't use that as a hotspot.
Click to expand...

That's right, when I bought new iPads I switched to a GB plan, still might be worth it depending on how much phone data you use, check how much data all your devices use together.
 
They now have 3 plans available -

250MB - $14.99
3GB - $30.00
5GB - $50.00

Looking at my iPad usage, it's been 1-2GB most months. Once in awhile it's higher. My iPhone used to use 4-6GB. AT&T stopped throttling the Unlimited plans a few weeks ago so i used 35GB last month. I'm happy about that. Would be golden if I could use it as a hotspot!
 
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And this is why I love my iPad unlimited plan. 29.99. Never throttled, unlimited.
 
Truefan31 said:
And this is why I love my iPad unlimited plan. 29.99. Never throttled, unlimited.
Click to expand...

OK? Congrats? Doesn't help the OP in the slightest.

OP - not sure if you've explored this option, but I think you can tether if your phone is jailbroken.
 
af21187 said:
OK? Congrats? Doesn't help the OP in the slightest.

OP - not sure if you've explored this option, but I think you can tether if your phone is jailbroken.
Click to expand...
You can. Use tetherme or mywi.

Seems like op would start using a lot more with no throttling since he used 35 gb. If he was to get an iPad unlimited plan he wouldn't have to constantly tether though and use battery. And he'd be paying less every month. See that helps
 
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Truefan31 said:
You can. Use tetherme or mywi.

Seems like op would start using a lot more with no throttling since he used 35 gb. If he was to get an iPad unlimited plan he wouldn't have to constantly tether though and use battery. And he'd be paying less every month. See that helps
Click to expand...


Except that you can't get an unlimited plan any longer, AT&T did away with them a long time ago. Only those grandfathered in get to keep them.
 
Wyvernspirit said:
Except that you can't get an unlimited plan any longer, AT&T did away with them a long time ago. Only those grandfathered in get to keep them.
Click to expand...

I'm talking about getting an iPad unlimited plan. He's already got the upd iPhone right?
 
I've never had a jailbroken device but I might go that route with this phone. I looked into it and don't see that it can be done with software version 8.3. And from what I've read, 8.4 will be out soon so there might not be an option until after that's available.

Is there any way for AT&T to see if a person is tethering a jailbroken phone with the unlimited data plan? Don't want any chance of losing that. And if they can't, then that would allow me to totally cancel my iPad data plan and my kids could go online with their WiFi iPads when we're not home. I'd jailbreak the phone to do that!
 
Truefan31 said:
I'm talking about getting an iPad unlimited plan. He's already got the upd iPhone right?
Click to expand...

I've considered buying one of those plans but I don't use the iPad that much away from home. It would take awhile for it to pay for itself.
 
iMas70 said:
I've had AT&T's 5GB plan for my iPad for a couple years. I don't use it as much as I used to outside my home. Most month's data usage is just 1-2GB. I noticed what the pricing is for the base plan tonight. It's $14.99 for 250MB and $14.99 for each additional MB. I understand volume discounts but damn.... that's expensive!

I'm going to drop down to 3GB. It will save me $20.00 per month. Actually, $15.40 after my 23% FAN discount. Then I'll just pay extra for months that I use more. I kick myself for having the 5GB plan as long as I have. Probably wasted at least $500.00 on data that I haven't used.
Click to expand...

What about t-mobile ? Would you ever consider switching just the iPad to them?

I don't work for them. But the iPad plans are
$20 1 gb
$30 3 gb
$40 5 gb

If you go over your data is just slowed down for the rest of the month.

You do not get data stash ( roll over data ) on prepaid, as far as I know

For data stash you need a post paid month to month iPad plan

As a bonus , you do get music freedom, which is unlimited music streaming for up to 27 music providers on the iPad as well.. A lot of people think you only get music freedom on the iPhone if you pay $50
But that is not true. The lowest 1 gb plan for $20 a month will give you unlimited music streaming

They will give you 200 mb for free for you to try out. But they will likely charge you for the sim
In case you don't have one.

If your iPad isn't LTE then it will might work on T-Mobiles 4g network, which is still pretty fast

I've seen T-Mobile provide faster 4g speeds then att and verizon provides using LTE in San Jose, California

Looks like every iPad is stuck to tmobiles 2g speed except the newer iPad Air and iPad Air 2 and the iPad mini 3??
 
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Thanks for the info! It's an LTE iPad Air 2. I'd like to stick with AT&T. Have been with them since the company was Cingular (way back). The other night I dropped my plan down to 3GB. I think that is their best deal. It's $30. ($23.10 with my discount) and I just pay $10 per GB if I go over. With the 5GB plan, you pay for 5GB even if it's not used. I've been doing that for a few years. They made some money on me with this one.

I going to research jailbreaking my iPhone and will most likely do that when it's available for the software version I'm using.
 
iMas70 said:
Thanks for the info! It's an LTE iPad Air 2. I'd like to stick with AT&T. Have been with them since the company was Cingular (way back). The other night I dropped my plan down to 3GB. I think that is their best deal. It's $30. ($23.10 with my discount) and I just pay $10 per GB if I go over. With the 5GB plan, you pay for 5GB even if it's not used. I've been doing that for a few years. They made some money on me with this one.

I going to research jailbreaking my iPhone and will most likely do that when it's available for the software version I'm using.
Click to expand...

I would not risk jailbreaking your iPhone in order to tether your iPhone unlimited plan to your unless you set it up a certain way.

For the record, ATT has a specialized team that watches people on these iPhone unlimited plans, and if they catch you doing unauthorized activity you can risk losing your plan, usually they do deep packet research to make sure that the phone data is being used on the phone and not tethered to any other device.

So your best bet is to purchase a VPN service such as Vikingvpn or LiquidVPN. Download OpenVPN to your iPhone and connect to a VPN. Once you jailbreak your phone invest in "TetherMe". It's a application which allows you to tether not only over "Cellular" but over "OpenVPN". So you can tether your encrypted data to your iPad without ATT having the ability to see how you are using your data, this is what I recommend doing, if your going to jailbreak your phone for tethering purposes.
 
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Honestly looking at the prices on eBay it might take awhile for it to pay for itself if he went that route. Mine was only $800 not long ago and it's already paid itself back.. but keep in mind I use anywhere from 200-300GB a month (sitting in my hotspot, providing data for every device I own). For someone just using a handful of GB a month it's probably overkill.
 
east85 said:
Honestly looking at the prices on eBay it might take awhile for it to pay for itself if he went that route. Mine was only $800 not long ago and it's already paid itself back.. but keep in mind I use anywhere from 200-300GB a month (sitting in my hotspot, providing data for every device I own). For someone just using a handful of GB a month it's probably overkill.
Click to expand...


Jesus, u paid for it in the first month lol
 
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TECHNOLOGE said:
I would not risk jailbreaking your iPhone in order to tether your iPhone unlimited plan to your unless you set it up a certain way.

For the record, ATT has a specialized team that watches people on these iPhone unlimited plans, and if they catch you doing unauthorized activity you can risk losing your plan, usually they do deep packet research to make sure that the phone data is being used on the phone and not tethered to any other device.

So your best bet is to purchase a VPN service such as Vikingvpn or LiquidVPN. Download OpenVPN to your iPhone and connect to a VPN. Once you jailbreak your phone invest in "TetherMe". It's a application which allows you to tether not only over "Cellular" but over "OpenVPN". So you can tether your encrypted data to your iPad without ATT having the ability to see how you are using your data, this is what I recommend doing, if your going to jailbreak your phone for tethering purposes.
Click to expand...
I agree. Dont tether off your phones unlimited. I did that with a jailbroken iphone using pdanet.about 3 years ago. Got the text on my phone fom att saying tethering isnt allowed on my plan...if i didnt call them back and promise them that i wouldnt tethr on my plan again then they wouldve automatically cancelld my unlimitd phone plan and swiched me to the 5 gig 50 buck tether plan.....so i stopped.....then boughtt the29.99 per month ipad data unlimitd off of ebay for 869 budks about a year ago. Love this plan. But way too expensive now.. 23 bucks for 3 gigs with fan is about the cheapest you gonna find....just dont watch too much videoand turn off lte to use less data.
 
TECHNOLOGE said:
I would not risk jailbreaking your iPhone in order to tether your iPhone unlimited plan to your unless you set it up a certain way.

For the record, ATT has a specialized team that watches people on these iPhone unlimited plans, and if they catch you doing unauthorized activity you can risk losing your plan, usually they do deep packet research to make sure that the phone data is being used on the phone and not tethered to any other device.

So your best bet is to purchase a VPN service such as Vikingvpn or LiquidVPN. Download OpenVPN to your iPhone and connect to a VPN. Once you jailbreak your phone invest in "TetherMe". It's a application which allows you to tether not only over "Cellular" but over "OpenVPN". So you can tether your encrypted data to your iPad without ATT having the ability to see how you are using your data, this is what I recommend doing, if your going to jailbreak your phone for tethering purposes.
Click to expand...
This is good information. I just always assumed that they knew we were tethering because our phones connected to the broadband APN when tethering. Typically, when NOT in tethering mode, the phone is on the mobile APN. I knew they had a team set aside to crack down on people tethering with phone UDP's, but didn't realize they were doing deep packet research too. Interesting.
 
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