Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Virgin Mobile USA Launching iPhone on June 29 with Plans Starting at $30
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
Maybe if you read the terms on VM site, like I just did... You would see tax is included in the price.
Sounds great to me! Heck, 5KB/s was fast enough for Android to stay synced up, let alone broadband speeds.
Questions
Can anyone tell me if your unused minutes roll over each month on this new Virgin Mobile plan?
I don't own an iPhone yet. And would like to know if there are any hidden costs other than a monthly rate to pay.
I like the $30 plan for minutes and emails.
Any info is appreciated.
Thanks!
Can anyone tell me if your unused minutes roll over each month on this new Virgin Mobile plan?
I don't own an iPhone yet. And would like to know if there are any hidden costs other than a monthly rate to pay.
I like the $30 plan for minutes and emails.
Any info is appreciated.
Thanks!
Very true.
Don't expect ATT type download speed.
No roaming on other networks.
Can't use it in Canada on CDMA at all. No travel options.
The system does cash occasionally. I suspect when iPhone goes on sale the system may get overloaded
BUT for $30. This is a great deal! My wife is grandfathered in $25 plan per month and I love the deal.
To add to that, I think right now AT&T is the only company with "rollover" minutes...but remember that they're not free, you're paying TONS more with AT&T. You can get an unlimited minute plan with Virgin for far less than the 450 minute plan from AT&T.
If you are thinking about VM, read this:
VM uses the Sprint Network. Here is an official link to a Sprint Forum Website that has almost a million hits with Sprint users complaining about iPhone coverage/speed/service.
http://community.sprint.com/baw/thread/78766?start=0&tstart=0
You have been warned.
VM uses the Sprint Network. Here is an official link to a Sprint Forum Website that has almost a million hits with Sprint users complaining about iPhone coverage/speed/service.
http://community.sprint.com/baw/thread/78766?start=0&tstart=0
You have been warned.
This is great news! I'm on VM using an Optimus V on the grandfathered $25 plan. I've never noticed any outages. The signal quality is great and I've never had a dropped call. Unfortunately 3G seems to vary depending on your location with some people reporting some pretty bad speeds. I'm in Conway, AR though and have never had a problem with 3G and it stays consistently around 700 kbps - 1400 kbps DL. I just did a speed test and got 183 ping, 1272 kbps / 795 kbps. Sure these are not absolutely blazing speeds but at $25 (or even $30) it's a pretty good deal!
I'm constantly sending pix in messaging; dunno about video.
Starting up/using camera/video is atrocious on my Optimus Slider Android phone (I have an iPod Touch just to do this; can get a dozen good pix in the time it takes the camera app to start on my Optimus), so I haven't tried video. It would be nice to combine the two as I'm often w/o the iPod and miss many photo ops of daughter.
Good stuff you guys w/ big brains wrote here; LOTSA great info. I've been happy w/ VM for a couple years. Aside from the camera, everything else I use is great/acceptable: SMS, Yelp, Dolphin Browser, Mail, a half dozen other apps I used frequently and a dozen or so that are more infrequent.
It would be nice to get better data speeds; contrast what happens at home when connected to wi-fi against what happens away and the gap is pretty big. How close to wi-fi speeds is Clear Talk?
I had an 3gs for a couple weeks; signal at my home was abysmal (north side Astoria, NY) and friends w/ iPhones in other parts of town and the city were constantly dropping calls; that was over two years ago. Hopefully its better now. Rarely dropped a call on VM.
Again, the only complaint was the data speeds. I travel between DC and Boston, and also to Buffalo and only occasionally the signal drops.
Last edited:
Anyone know if they will let you keep your grandfathered rate at $25? That would be pretty awesome.
----------
Portland OR has great Sprint coverage as VM.
AFAIK, all three pre-paid carriers that you mention (ST, Cricket, and Virgin) rely on AT&T, Verizon and Sprint's networks to provide their customers coverage.
It'll be interesting to me to see what happens to the pre-paid carriers when their contracts with the big carriers are up. You'd think that if the big carriers end up losing a ton of customers to the pre-paids, they're definitely going to up the rates that they charge the pre-paid carriers to use their network.
My guess is that until a pre-paid carrier builds out their own network to be as large as AT&T or Verzion's, there's going to be no real long-term freedom from the big carriers. (And as T-Mobile has clearly demonstrated, if you don't have a big customer base and your game plan is just to offer cheap plans, you won't earn enough revenue to be able to afford to build out decent nationwide network, plus be ready to deploy whatever the next new wireless technology is).
That's it. I'm jumping ship from ATT this plan would save me over fifty dollars a month. Gonna wait for the new iphone and my contract to expire in a few months.
Unfortunately no. Any phone released after May 1st cannot be used with the $25 plan.
I ported my # to VM from AT&T
Pretty straight-forward and happened w/i an hour or so.
Just keep in mind to keep your old account active until you've moved your number.
There was a service to check if your # is portable; probably a simple web search will yield whether your's is. Seems VM told me that mine could be ported.
Pretty straight-forward and happened w/i an hour or so.
Just keep in mind to keep your old account active until you've moved your number.
There was a service to check if your # is portable; probably a simple web search will yield whether your's is. Seems VM told me that mine could be ported.
Not exactly.
Straight Talk is a discount brand of TracFone (which itself is a discount MVNO). TracFone is the American subsidiary of America Movil, the Mexican telecommunications giants. They buy wholesale access from AT&T, Sprint, and T-Mobile USA since they do not operate their own network (i.e., cellular towers).
Cricket Wireless is a brand of Leap Wireless. Leap Wireless actually has its cellular network (towers) in some places in the nation. They have a roaming agreement with Sprint for areas where they don't have cellular equipment.
Virgin Mobile is an entirely owned discount/prepaid subsidiary of Sprint.
----------
You can check the individual carrier's FAQ.
I was able to port my old T-Mobile USA prepaid number to Straight Talk.
Don't bet on the new iPhone being available direct on any of the prepaids all that soon. It doesn't seem like this is an accident that a bunch of prepaids are announcing the 4S being available soon near the end of the product cycle. I'd love to see it happen, but I'm skeptical that the prepaids are going to be on the same release cycle as Verizon and AT&T. It seems like a lot of effort to support the 4S if there's going to be a replacement in 4 months.
Yeah, I think you're right. My guess is these will be if not a year behind, a ways behind, to give the more expensive brands some point to their higher prices.
My guess though is that the iPhone 6 will be less of an upgrade over the 5...at least that's what I'm hoping since I don't want to feel bad if it turns out it's actually another big jump LOL
EDIT: Come to think of it, another obvious clue with this stuff is that like Boost and Virgin (and most other cheaper services) only have low and mid range Android phones.
Like I THINK the best Android phones on Virgin/Boost are single core. Not jokes, and actually fairly recent, but clearly behind what's available on regular Sprint/Verizon/US Cellular/T-Mobile.
Of course, that could also be as simple as a price issue-the subsidies are either smaller, or non-existent in order to have cheaper plan prices (something I appreciate), but fewer people may be willing to pay that much for an unsubsidized phone.
The iPhone 5 will actually end up being the best prepaid phone available regardless of OS. I mean it's higher end hardware than any of the Android phones....I think.
Last edited:
To the people complaining about coverage issues in Chicago, that is because Sprint is now doing their Network vision update to Chicago. Once complete, the coverage and data speeds will be far better than before.
More more info about Sprint's network Vision: http://s4gru.com/index.php?/forum/9-network-network-visionlte-deployment/ Tons of info as well as Sprint LTE maps. Really good site.
I have an iPhone 4S on Sprint and never need to roam on Verizon unless I am way out in the boonies. As in no people or towns for 20 miles around. I also get really good speed here in GA, averaging between 800k to as high as 2.1M. Network Vision will massively improve Sprint and Virgin Mobile's network. All that old Nextel 800Mhz spectrum that is good for penetrating walls and travels further will be repurposed for Sprint and Virgin CDMA use. They will also make it 1X advanced which is a big improvement.
If I wasn't already on a great plan and only paying $50 a month on Sprint for unlimited everything, this Virgin Mobile deal would be very attractive. And if you want to see actual user coverage experience, a good place to look is root metrics. It compiles voice, data, and coverage from actual users phones. http://www.rootmetrics.com/check-coverage/
More more info about Sprint's network Vision: http://s4gru.com/index.php?/forum/9-network-network-visionlte-deployment/ Tons of info as well as Sprint LTE maps. Really good site.
I have an iPhone 4S on Sprint and never need to roam on Verizon unless I am way out in the boonies. As in no people or towns for 20 miles around. I also get really good speed here in GA, averaging between 800k to as high as 2.1M. Network Vision will massively improve Sprint and Virgin Mobile's network. All that old Nextel 800Mhz spectrum that is good for penetrating walls and travels further will be repurposed for Sprint and Virgin CDMA use. They will also make it 1X advanced which is a big improvement.
If I wasn't already on a great plan and only paying $50 a month on Sprint for unlimited everything, this Virgin Mobile deal would be very attractive. And if you want to see actual user coverage experience, a good place to look is root metrics. It compiles voice, data, and coverage from actual users phones. http://www.rootmetrics.com/check-coverage/
Whoa! How are you on $50/month? I'd sooner go Sprint if I could do that, but the cheapest I've seen is $70/month for 500 minutes.
Is this some old SERO type plan? Hang on to that!
And thanks for the info-so I take it they're finally taking down the Nextel network in pieces and using everything for Sprint? Makes sense...I hadn't thought about that, that that bandwidth could be used (and used more efficiently) by combining it with Sprint's other bandwidth.