Visiting the US - Data packages for unlocked iPhone?

[Flore]

Hi everyone,

I will be going to the US for 5 months in January, exchange semester at Cornell University. I have a (factory) unlocked iPhone 3GS, can put any SIM card in it. During my time in the US I'd like to get a local phone number, e.g. I would buy a prepaid card of some sort from one of the carriers.

Question: Does anyone have some advice on what is the best option for that and which carrier offers some prepaid data packages? Like 50MB for 10$ per month or stuff like that?

Thanks for your help.

 

[anjinha]

Hi everyone,

I will be going to the US for 5 months in January, exchange semester at Cornell University. I have a (factory) unlocked iPhone 3GS, can put any SIM card in it. During my time in the US I'd like to get a local phone number, e.g. I would buy a prepaid card of some sort from one of the carriers.

Question: Does anyone have some advice on what is the best option for that and which carrier offers some prepaid data packages? Like 50MB for 10$ per month or stuff like that?

Thanks for your help.

I went to the U.S. in December and unless things changed this is your only option:

AT&T seems to be the only carrier that offers prepaid data that works with the iPhone but you have to go through a few hoops.

First, if you can, I would advise you to try to get an AT&T prepaid SIM on eBay or something. When I went to the U.S. in the first AT&T store I went to they tried to charge me $100 for a SIM card so if you get the SIM card beforehand you don't have to deal with that.

As far as data goes you can get 100MB for $20. But to get it to work on the iPhone you need to do this:

go to this site on your iPhone: www.unlockit.co.nz. Select Continue > Custom APN and insert the following settings:

APN: wap.cingular
USER: wap@cingulargprs.com
PW: CINGULAR1

Select US AT&T in the list of carriers and then Create Profile. Then click to install. Don't leave the settings pane until the profile is installed. And that's it. When you get back to your country just remove this profile from your iPhone.

If you have any other questions you can PM me.

 

[Flore]

Thanks for the reply, sounds like that would be an option.

Still a bit of a hassle it seems, well well..
Will do some more research, thanks!

 

[jsh]

I'm going to the US next month, and this is the best solution that I've found as well.

 

[Flore]

Just twittered to T-Mobile, why would one of their packages not work on the iPhone if you set the server information yourself?

I had this here in the UAE before their provider got the iPhone and it did work, let's see.

 

[anjinha]

Thanks for the reply, sounds like that would be an option.

Still a bit of a hassle it seems, well well..
Will do some more research, thanks!

It is a hassle, the U.S. carriers aren't very prepaid friendly. But the only other carrier that has SIM cards is T-Mobile and they don't even offer prepaid data.

But you know, if you're staying for 5 months maybe you should look into a month to month plan with no contract.

Just twittered to T-Mobile, why would one of their packages not work on the iPhone if you set the server information yourself?

I had this here in the UAE before their provider got the iPhone and it did work, let's see.

T-Mobile does work with the iPhone, they just don't offer prepaid data.

 

[0007776]

Just twittered to T-Mobile, why would one of their packages not work on the iPhone if you set the server information yourself?

I had this here in the UAE before their provider got the iPhone and it did work, let's see.

Tmobile would work if you are ok with using EDGE, 3G won't work because Tmobile uses a different frequency.

 

[anjinha]

I just checked TMobile's website and they now offer month to month plans with data. So the only problem is that you won't get 3G.

 

[Flore]

Tmobile would work if you are ok with using EDGE, 3G won't work because Tmobile uses a different frequency.

I wasn't aware T-Mobile uses a different frequency for 3G than the iPhone supports.