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More Details on AT&T's Data Plan Changes for iPhone and iPad
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This is total B.S. AT&T Steve how could you let this happen
Don't get me wrong. I like AT&T as my phone service. Just this new deal is enough for me to wait and see what Verizon and Sprint will do with 4G and data caps.
It also stopped me dead in my tracks buying my new 3G I-pad.
I think AT&T had a good thing going. I rarely go over 200 megs on my unlimited data plan on my I-phone. I was also going to go with the $30 unlimited plan on the I-Pad.
Now I need to rethink it all.
Verizon or Sprint I hope your watching closely. You want my business.
Provide me with a unlimited data plan and tethering; sign me up !
Sure AT&T you may say they don't have an I-Phone but with a Droid or Palm Pre + a I-Touch or I-Pad will work just fine for me. I use about 10 minutes a month for voice calls.
So last chance you better rethink this one !
Don't get me wrong. I like AT&T as my phone service. Just this new deal is enough for me to wait and see what Verizon and Sprint will do with 4G and data caps.
It also stopped me dead in my tracks buying my new 3G I-pad.
I think AT&T had a good thing going. I rarely go over 200 megs on my unlimited data plan on my I-phone. I was also going to go with the $30 unlimited plan on the I-Pad.
Now I need to rethink it all.
Verizon or Sprint I hope your watching closely. You want my business.
Provide me with a unlimited data plan and tethering; sign me up !
Sure AT&T you may say they don't have an I-Phone but with a Droid or Palm Pre + a I-Touch or I-Pad will work just fine for me. I use about 10 minutes a month for voice calls.
So last chance you better rethink this one !
Actually it's a word, that plays on other words which are really abbreviations of other words. I'm not sure if the abbreviations count as acronyms though.
Wifi, really Wi-Fi, plays on Low-Fi and Hi-Fi audio terms which mean Low Fidelity and High Fidelity.
Wi-Fi would then mean Wireless Fidelity, but I don't know if that means anything other than a marketing phrase.
Figure about 2MB/minute of standard def youtube. Perhaps 10MB/hour of general surfing. Email will be highly variable depending on how often Aunt Gladys sends 8MB pictures. But I'd guesstimate that kind of usage at ~100MB/day. With a substantial standard deviation based on what youtube movies you watch, what sites you surf, and what kinds of email you get.
I currently do not have a data plan but was planning on getting one with the new iPhone when it is released. Assuming we will not have to choose one of the new data plans with the iPhone 4, is there any way for me to add the current $30 unlimited iPhone data plan to my account right now? Could I borrow a iPhone, call AT&T, tell them that I now have an iPhone and to add the $30 data to my existing plan? Or maybe tell a rep that I just bought a 3gs online, which is in transit to me, and to add the unlimited plan to my account? I would be paying ~25 for the unlimited plan with my discount and will not be tethering, so why pay $25 for 2GB...
what is the number to call for adding features to your plan? i can not find it on their website?
what is the number to call for adding features to your plan? i can not find it on their website?
Not rip off so much may more that they found out just how much streaming folks were doing on the iPad. Replacing it with the laptop with the iPad and streaming content endlessly.
I nursed my first 250mb to about 200mb before renewing today to the unlimited plan. Though I would normally fall in to the realm of under 2GB a month, I wanted to be sure to if I need more it was there.
Things must have fallen apart with Apple and AT&T for sure. My concern is that this change on AT&T's part may substantially affect iPhone and iPad sales regardless of new players in the US market.
"Unlimited Data Plan" has been a major factor IMO for the success of the iPhone and iPad on AT&T; and the devices in general so far. Consumers like the words "unlimited" and "free". And that drove Apple sales....
Unlike the fanboys here, I know damn well ATT isn't doing this out of the goodness of their hearts to lower the costs for those poor souls only using 200 meg or less a month. They're doing this rather than fixing the plethora of issues traffic is creating on their already lousy network.
Now back to your regularly scheduled Fanboys Say The Darndest Things episode.
And don't forget, ATT rapes you for 20 a month for unlimited texting with pics. Are they going to count those texts/pics against the 200 meg? If so, WOW double raped.
From what they have said, it looks like this should work. I've been considering that myself.
I may end up paying the same for Verizon service, and that is fine with me. Here in San Francisco I would actually be okay paying a higher monthly fee because Verizon offers a better product.
I have been carrying a Verizon prepaid cheap-o phone around me and my iPhone for the past few weeks, as a test. There is no comparison- Verizon's service in the Bay Area is far, far better.
On a related note, my $30 Walgreen's flip phone has a better speakerphone and hugely better battery life than the Apple phone too. Too bad I can't live without the large touchscreen and GPS any longer
So Apple thinks Flash diminishes their products' performance? They must have overlooked this concern back when they partnered with AT&T. Ah, what a few billion dollars will do to compromise one's values.
Thank God I got out of the ATT contract a month ago (paid $150) early termination fee (I heard their raising it as well) but I just sold the iphone 3gs for $360 to cover it and got myself an nexus one.
Now with an aftermarket 3200 mAh battery on my nexus one, I can 3g tether to my laptops or my iPad using my nexus one for 30 continuous hour. And no extra fees! Oh yea and t-mobile's hspa 3g is much faster than what I was getting with ATT! I'm getting 1800 kb/s downloads (already d/led 2tb in 3 days) lol.
Now with an aftermarket 3200 mAh battery on my nexus one, I can 3g tether to my laptops or my iPad using my nexus one for 30 continuous hour. And no extra fees! Oh yea and t-mobile's hspa 3g is much faster than what I was getting with ATT! I'm getting 1800 kb/s downloads (already d/led 2tb in 3 days) lol.
I may end up paying the same for Verizon service, and that is fine with me. Here in San Francisco I would actually be okay paying a higher monthly fee because Verizon offers a better product.
I have been carrying a Verizon prepaid cheap-o phone around me and my iPhone for the past few weeks, as a test. There is no comparison- Verizon's service in the Bay Area is far, far better.
On a related note, my $30 Walgreen's flip phone has a better speakerphone and hugely better battery life than the Apple phone too. Too bad I can't live without the large touchscreen and GPS any longer
So Apple thinks Flash diminishes their products' performance? They must have overlooked this concern back when they partnered with AT&T. Ah, what a few billion dollars will do to compromise one's values.
Nothing has changed since the release of the first iPhone - the biggest problem with it is, and always has been, the phone part of it.
This 2 gigs and start over with iPad doesn't make sense.
$10 overage per gig would be better.
At $25 per 2 gigs, you pay 12.50 per gig of data. With $10 overage, you pay $10 for 1 gig of data. How is being able to just buy another $25 2 gig pack end up being better than just paying overage?
I guess they have to do that for the iPad because of no contract billing but still seems silly.
$10 overage per gig would be better.
At $25 per 2 gigs, you pay 12.50 per gig of data. With $10 overage, you pay $10 for 1 gig of data. How is being able to just buy another $25 2 gig pack end up being better than just paying overage?
I guess they have to do that for the iPad because of no contract billing but still seems silly.
Jobs' intelligence
Ok, a couple a people on this particular forum have discounted Apple's take on this debacle.
There's two answers to the willful ignorance of Apple's possible role in this mess.
1. If ATT and Apple indeed have an exclusive relationship, then I think it would be somewhat safe to say that Jobs, et al knew about this decision ahead of time. I'd like to think that Jobs is a smart man, and knows that his products are well-designed for high-speed networks (though I have to question it w/his decision to join w/ATT). So if this is true--and it might be--then we must assume that Jobs agreed, or was bought off. If not, then ATT and Apple aren't quite as close as advertised. Logically following, Jobs is out of the loop, and I hope he realizes that ATT just royally screwed Apple's customers. Jobs' 3rd generation and 4th generations iPhones and the new iPad will be severely restricted in terms of actual data usage.
2. Pay extra, extra attention at Jobs' next major speech. If he's the maverick that he claims to be, he'll attack ATT and its new rather asinine policy. While ATT might not change its mind, at least Apple will publicly register its disgust. If, on the other hand, if he doesn't mention the new policy and/or praises it, there can be only one conclusion.
Jobs was somehow cajoled/bought/tricked into going along with this scam.
***********
Disclosure: I have sprint, and am looking forward to getting its new 4g phone and getting on its true 4g network. While on the network, sprint is on record saying that tethering will be allowed, and there will be NO bandwidth limits.........
What say you, Apple and ATT?
Ok, a couple a people on this particular forum have discounted Apple's take on this debacle.
There's two answers to the willful ignorance of Apple's possible role in this mess.
1. If ATT and Apple indeed have an exclusive relationship, then I think it would be somewhat safe to say that Jobs, et al knew about this decision ahead of time. I'd like to think that Jobs is a smart man, and knows that his products are well-designed for high-speed networks (though I have to question it w/his decision to join w/ATT). So if this is true--and it might be--then we must assume that Jobs agreed, or was bought off. If not, then ATT and Apple aren't quite as close as advertised. Logically following, Jobs is out of the loop, and I hope he realizes that ATT just royally screwed Apple's customers. Jobs' 3rd generation and 4th generations iPhones and the new iPad will be severely restricted in terms of actual data usage.
2. Pay extra, extra attention at Jobs' next major speech. If he's the maverick that he claims to be, he'll attack ATT and its new rather asinine policy. While ATT might not change its mind, at least Apple will publicly register its disgust. If, on the other hand, if he doesn't mention the new policy and/or praises it, there can be only one conclusion.
Jobs was somehow cajoled/bought/tricked into going along with this scam.
***********
Disclosure: I have sprint, and am looking forward to getting its new 4g phone and getting on its true 4g network. While on the network, sprint is on record saying that tethering will be allowed, and there will be NO bandwidth limits.........
What say you, Apple and ATT?
Although off to a great start the iPad 3G is still unproven as to how much data folks will consume on average.
If the average iPad 3G users sucks down 480-500MB a month then effectively they'd make 29.98 off of the average user. That's more than the $15.00 of the iPhone users on the lower plan.
The "download more content" pressure on the iPad seems more likely to be much higher than the iPhone since the screen makes dealing with web , email , etc so much more desirable (putting aside mobility differences... when using the device are you more likely to suck down more data; only matters that both are pulling content through 3G. ) The higher the rate of download the more likely will blow right through an extra 50MB.
50MB isn't all that much of a difference once start heavy consumption. Nor is $0.01 as big of a jump for 50MB range as $10 is for another GB. So 2.05GB in a month costs $10 more on 2GB plan.
If it turns out that extremely few on 250MB plans bust the cap in 30 days then they'll probably drop the cap slightly.
Hey, thank you! So it would seem that I could potentially use 3gb month. WHOA!! NOT good. There is no way I would want to risk running up the bill. I don't want to change my habits either. Sorry AT&T.
Where did they say tethering was allowed? Or are you referring to their 30 dollar a month(rape) charge for using your phone as a wireless router? Hurry up and get your EVO, I'm waiting to read a bunch of user reviews before taking that plunge too. Sprint's service completely owns ATTs, as do their prices (especially now), so for me its going to be them or TMobile.
The fear for a lot of people is real. It is for me. At one point I so abhored the way businesses were able to blow you up with minute charges and the rest I swore I only wanted unlmited fees for everything.
After a $750 phone bill when I was a kid (my parents loved me and my brother for that), or a $400 compuserve bill... Past history has shown metered usage to be screw the customer bills.
This plan is better for the most part. The overages are even attractive.. I don't blame people for being gunshy for having unlimited taken away, but once they analyze it and realize they will save money, it will be okay.
I see lots of people saying they use 500 megs a month, but want to hang on to the grandfathered unlimited just in case. Yet if you don't go over 2 gigs for 8 months, you saved $40.00. That is 4 more gigs of data, so in the 9th month you could use 6 gigs of data, and be even.
The point is people feel like they have to hoard up this bandwidth just in case, but the reality is they will not likely need it, and worse case if they do the overage charges are not horrible. Sure this hurts the 2% of extreme users, but as an AT&T customer I am better off without them being AT&T customers so I don't care about them. Let them go over use someone else's network and not pay for it.
I think most people who are going to pay $5 insurance a month to protect their unlmited for the future will be disappointed. At some point down the road it will go away. Maybe it will be in 2-3 years but it will still happen. In the meantime you will likely have paid $100-$200 more than you needed to in monthly fees just in case you might have needed unlimited.
I think the lower tier plan of $15 with the ability to retroactively upgrade is going to bring a lot of new users ot AT&T and the network, and easily replace the over users and bring in more money to AT&T and use up less resources. It is a win for AT&T and a win for 98% of their customers.
Since the ATT network has already had problems with bandwidth. If you turn on tethering and add not just 3G iPhones but large number of 3G iPads to the network as well .... all the new network capacity bring on line could simply disappear under the sharp uptick in consumption. So as much as Jobs probably knows (had the pre-orders for 3G iPad sitting on desk for long while now even before shipping first one. ) going to be uptick in bandwidth consumption this was most likely a shared compromise.
The whole "all you can eat, till you bust " pricing approach was helping to fuel the fire of the bandwidth problem. There was always a cap anyway. It really wasn't literally unlimited. This is is merely a much clearer , shared intent approach to pricing. ATT expects folks to stay below 2GB. They always did, it is just written explicit now. Now if you just "have to" bust that cap you pay more. If having that extra data isn't worth it to you then don't use it and don't pay.
Of course Steve agreed to the cr@p AT$T has been pulling from the very beginning. Nothing of any consequence happens at Apple without Steve's blessings. Stuff like blocking 3G VOIP and tethering was done on behest of AT$T, and Steve happily went along with it. Why should screwing with the data plans bother him in the least, except for the fact that it might cost him sales ?
Don't think Steve loses a minute of sleep over loyal customers getting screwed.
People should get used to this type of idea. The days of the so-called "unlimited" plans are numbered due to the reality that heavy bandwidth usage is fairly lopsided towards a small percentage of customers. AT&T claims that 98% of it's customers use less than 2GB per month, for example.
Save the impertinence. I think you know how I was using property taxes as an illustration. While you can argue there is/was an IMPLIED contract I don't recall a special upfront being fee paid. I'm sure Apple would argue the additional cost was for the 3g radio itself.
Perhaps if there is really enough negative press regarding this change, AT&T will adjust and allow current owners the option to select the unlimited option so long as they do it within a certain timeframe. I urge you and others to write (not email) AT&T and voice your displeasure.
I'm not sure which I'll go with but I can use the $15 plan safely. Obviously there's a lot of free wifi around.
Can someone inform me if the Data Pro ($25) + Tethering = 4GB of data or is AT&T basically saying you're paying $20 for the "pleasure" of tethering off the same 2GB? IF so that's BS.
Can someone inform me if the Data Pro ($25) + Tethering = 4GB of data or is AT&T basically saying you're paying $20 for the "pleasure" of tethering off the same 2GB? IF so that's BS.