T-mobile cell/broadband offer from Radio Shack - too good to be true??
 

I pop into Radio Shack today. I've been thinking about changing from Verizon to AT&T as they have an offer for a land line to your house to be then coupled to in house wi-fi, available for $30 a month if you have an AT&T cell account.

I've been hesitating to go for the normal broad band anywhere wi-fi from Verizon or AT&T as it's $60 a month and there's a limit on usage, or pay more.

Anyway, whattayaknow, the sales lady available is one hot babe, but the offer she tells me about is hotter. She claims that they have a deal with T Mobile that only goes with the Sony Ericsson TM506 where I get 1000 monthly minutes, the fave 4 or 5 thingy, AND unlimited web with the phone as modem for $50 a month. This is way better than anything else I've found. And, the camera is free with 2 year contract.

I'm with Verizon now, have an older Moto V710, a bit large by modern standards, crappy camera, and 450 minutes a month for $49 and I've gone over 2 or 3 months in a row and will do so again this month w/o major rationing.

The Bay Area maps for T-Mobile coverage are pretty good and I'm right on the verge of biting this apple.

I can't find the offer on Radio Shack's website but I sorta doubt the lady would try to hose me. I mean, if I have it in writing, it must be right, no?

The only reason I have Verizon is their coverage. I could not get the same coverage from T-mobile when I had them. It was terrible.
I think all mobile plans have a trial period so if you find that T-mobile doesn't deliver, you can all ways go back.

Using Tmobile's edge network for broadband is very slow. It is twice the speed of dial up, but doesnt make a good substitute for broadband.

Hmmm . . .

The lady claimed they had a test demonstration that day and that it was way fast. Of course, she gets a sales commission. She claimed that youtube videos would load and play right away w/o the little spinning asterisk thingy.

If I could see a hands on demonstration, I'd feel a lot better.

If it is only running at 2x dial up....that'd be about 8-10kb a second. Massively slower than the 100kb/sec+ you can get with AT&T or Verizon....I can download a 2 meg app to my verizon phone in about 5-10 seconds....very fast.

I would surely want to see a real demonstration to believe it was that fast.

I just found this:

EDGE's maximum speed is considered to be 236.8 kbit/s, which is called Class 10. The Samsung t809 cellular phone sold by T-Mobile can handle this Class 10 bandwidth.

236 kbits does not sound fast. Sometimes I get stuck on 1 mbyte on this or that wifi system and it's doable but not way speedy.

Damn.

236kbit is 23.6 kb/sec max....thats ultra slow. And thats the "max" speed, so with optimum service coverage. They're really lagging if that is really all they can offer. Average Verizon broadband speeds are about 150kb/sec down and over 50kb/sec up.

The AT&T thing is looking better all the time. It's 3 mbps, land line to the house, not sure but they offer it only as a wifi modem hooked to that land line. It's $30 a month, coupled with a $40 dollar 450 minute cell package, not too bad, probably about $75 a month after all is said and done.

Then I'd get a magic jack so I won't be using my cell minutes up while at home. Not sure how solid the magic jack is though.

I'm going to have to insist on a demo before I sign on to that, for absolute certain. The lady was really selling it and she is some kinda hot looking but I don't want to get stuck with a turkey.

T-mobile has 3G in San Fran. Simply ask for a demo. Tmobile 3G is the latest 3G and it has been upgraded in the last few months. One thing about all mobile carriers is the latency during peak times since data is throttled to allow voice traffic.
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How EDGE got into this is beyond me.

So you're saying EDGE is ancient history with T mobile in the Bay area?

I'm going to go in and tell them they might sell me if I can see a demo. If it's acceptable, it would be a good deal - one of my clients uses T Mobile and he says he rarely has a problem - the 450 minutes I have with Verizon is getting to be a pain - 1000 minutes with my most talkative clients on the fav 4 or 5 (whatever) would really help me to relax.

My address is within their optimum signal range though I'm close to a boundary between 'best' and 'good.'

So, your planning on tethering the T-Mo phone for internet? Or are they running a dedicated line out to your home?


The T-Mo 3G is pretty good. I played on a friends G1, and the internet seemed just as fast as the 3G on my ATT Blackberry Bold.


I would ask the T-Mo rep to demo the tethering, so that you can get a feel for the internet speed. I have an ATT 3G card, and with 4 bars of service, it still feels slower than my comcast connection.

We have 3G in Sacramento too. I should see my friend later today, and I will ask him to run a speed test to see how fast it is.

There will always be higher latency over a cellular connection than on a broadband DSL/Cable connection.

That's good news - for the price they're offering, I'm not going to expect the fastest of the fast, I just don't want dinosaur speeds - my nephew in IT tells me that EDGE speeds are about 3 to 5 times faster than dial up but I gather, as Med Mech points out, that's not operational. I went into Radio Shack today and they say it is indeed a 3G network but that they don't when and if there will be another demo, as the one they had was from a T-mobile rep. I'm going to call other Radio Shacks and T-mobile to see if any others are happening.

They claim the offer is Radio Shack only, which might be true, and that it might only be good through tomorrow. I know, could be BS arm twisting, OTOH, if this is as fast as the AT&T and Verizon 3G, the price is good.

And tethering is the concept they spoke of - the dedicated line deal was with AT&T for an extra $30 over the cell contract, but I'd be looking at $100 a month with an iPhone, at least $70 - to $75 with a 450 minute contract on a simpler phone. I'm reading that T-mobile has good customer service ratings. I might do this with a bit more research.

Not true, the reason for latency on a wireless connection is inferior switching equipment theoretically wireless should be faster with less latency.