iPad II 3G : traveling abroad & replacing sim

[kharma99]

If I buy the At&t version (GSM model), can I simply swap out the sim card and use a european one?

I read somewhere that some people were having trouble using a non-At&t sim if the iPad wasn't first activated in the U.S. (w/At&t). Does someone have experience with this?

Thanks!

 

[Gav2k]

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[kharma99]

Sorry... don't understand the reply...

 

[smetvid]

I did this when I traveled to South Africa last December but I had it activated in the US already. It was a major pain getting it to work there and I had to jump through a few hoops but eventually I got it working, sort of. The problem was I had no idea how many MB's of bandwidth I had left since the South African careir uses the cell phone number to check the usage. I'm sure there could have been a better way to get it working but I just kept really good track manually and if I knew it was getting close I just bought more airtime. I ended up adding way too much bandwidth to the sim card in South Africa but it was worth it being able to get online no matter where I went.

 

[macingman]

You would be fine. Just buy a iPad microsim in Europe and you'll be good to go. If your really worried you could just put an AT&T sim in it to be sure.

 

[nightfly13]

And if you can't get a microsim, it's easy to cut a normal sim down to micro-proportions. The actual chip-size is standard, just the surrounding plastic needs to be trimmed down.

It is a challenge to monitor usage sometimes, I need to swap my sim into my iPhone to check the balance if I really need to know it. I typically just keep using it until it stops working and then recharge it and it works well. Not super elegant, but it works. You can, of course, monitor the 'usage' in the iPad settings, although the precise balance (in money or MB) from your ISP will vary somewhat. I suggest you reset your usage statistics when you get started on a new sim.

 

[raymanster]

If I buy the At&t version (GSM model), can I simply swap out the sim card and use a european one?

I read somewhere that some people were having trouble using a non-At&t sim if the iPad wasn't first activated in the U.S. (w/At&t). Does someone have experience with this?

Thanks!

Yes you can. My friend bought a At&t iPad from New York while on holiday, it wasn't activated. And when back in London I took out the At&t SIM and put in a Three sim card and it works fine.