end of cheap prepaid data?

There used to be a $5 for 10MB data plan for the $0.1/min prepaid users. The
plan is now $5 for 50MB but requires a minimum of $25/month prepaid plan.

Is there a better deal for prepaid users who use very little voice (less
than 20 minute per month) and very little data (less than 20M?

On 5/4/2012 10:50 AM, bob wrote:
> There used to be a $5 for 10MB data plan for the $0.1/min prepaid users.
> The plan is now $5 for 50MB but requires a minimum of $25/month prepaid
> plan.

Yes, AT&T wrecked the GoPhone plans for data users. Apparently too many
AT&T contract customers were realizing that they were paying for far
more voice, texting, and data than they needed.

> Is there a better deal for prepaid users who use very little voice (less
> than 20 minute per month) and very little data (less than 20M?

Not on any GSM network.

The cheapest GSM service with data is probably RedPocket. $30 buys you
250 Minutes, unlimited text, 10MMS messages, and 10MB of data. No
roaming off of AT&T's native network.

On Pageplus you get 250 Minutes, 250 Texts, & 10 MB Data, for $12 per
month. Extra data is 20¢/MB so to bring it up to 20MB would add $2 more.
You would need a Verizon compatible smart phone to use Pageplus.
<http://www.pagepluscellular.com/Plans/12%20Plan.aspx>

My family currently has four Android phones on Pageplus.

On 5/4/2012 2:41 PM, Elmo P. Shagnasty wrote:
> In article<4fa426b6$0$16184$742ec2ed@news.sonic.net>,
> SMS<scharf.steven@geemail.com> wrote:
>
>> The cheapest GSM service with data is probably RedPocket. $30 buys you
>> 250 Minutes, unlimited text, 10MMS messages, and 10MB of data. No
>> roaming off of AT&T's native network.
>
> T-Mo, $30 gets you unlimited web, unlimited text, and 100min of voice.

That is a good deal. Standard caveats about T-Mobile apply.

At 04 May 2012 15:59:52 -0700 SMS wrote:
> On 5/4/2012 2:41 PM, Elmo P. Shagnasty wrote:
> > In article<4fa426b6$0$16184$742ec2ed@news.sonic.net>,
> > SMS<scharf.steven@geemail.com> wrote:
> >
> >> The cheapest GSM service with data is probably RedPocket. $30 buys
you
> >> 250 Minutes, unlimited text, 10MMS messages, and 10MB of data. No
> >> roaming off of AT&T's native network.
> >
> > T-Mo, $30 gets you unlimited web, unlimited text, and 100min of voice.
>
> That is a good deal. Standard caveats about T-Mobile apply.
>

Less so on prepaid. Unlike AT&T prepaid and most off their MVNOs, T-Mo
prepaid includes roaming. Not quite as much as on their contract service,
but pretty darn close. So while AT&T's contract coverage is bigger than T-
Mo's, T-Mo prepaid has better coverage than AT&T prepaid.

At 04 May 2012 20:35:30 +0100 Anthony R. Gold wrote:
> On Fri, 4 May 2012 10:50:39 -0700, "bob" <nospam@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> > There used to be a $5 for 10MB data plan for the $0.1/min prepaid
users. The
> > plan is now $5 for 50MB but requires a minimum of $25/month prepaid
> > plan.
>
> 10MB? That could be enough for a few dozen emails but with zero web
> ormedia.

Zero media, yes, but for web, you'd be surprised. With a dumb-phone WAP
browser viewing only mobile-formatted sites (or using Google's mobile
reformatter) 10MB used to be plenty. Most mobile site pages are about 5-
50kb, closer to the lower end if your browser can turn off image downloads.
Besides media, it's the silliness of expecting "the real web" on a 3-4"
screen that drives data usage up.

In the early days of GPRS data, 10MB was about the biggest plan AT&T
offered in the USA.

In article <tnb8q754skus7pjhmlj0n37ucmt254spfb@4ax.com>, Anthony R.
Gold <not-for-mail@ahjg.co.uk> wrote:

> > There used to be a $5 for 10MB data plan for the $0.1/min prepaid users.The
> > plan is now $5 for 50MB but requires a minimum of $25/month prepaid plan.
>
> 10MB? That could be enough for a few dozen emails but with zero web or media.

actually quite a bit more than that. 10 meg is plenty for casual use.

On 5/4/2012 10:48 PM, Todd Allcock wrote:

> Less so on prepaid. Unlike AT&T prepaid and most off their MVNOs, T-Mo
> prepaid includes roaming. Not quite as much as on their contract service,
> but pretty darn close. So while AT&T's contract coverage is bigger than T-
> Mo's, T-Mo prepaid has better coverage than AT&T prepaid.

Hopefully, AT&T follows through with the increased roaming deal which
was part of the penalty for the failure of the acquisition. Not clear if
that includes data though, I expect that it doesn't.

On 5/4/2012 12:35 PM, Anthony R. Gold wrote:
> On Fri, 4 May 2012 10:50:39 -0700, "bob"<nospam@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
>> There used to be a $5 for 10MB data plan for the $0.1/min prepaid users. The
>> plan is now $5 for 50MB but requires a minimum of $25/month prepaid plan.
>
> 10MB? That could be enough for a few dozen emails but with zero web or media.

Very little media for sure (one hour of Pandora uses 30M. No
navigation with downloaded maps. But a pretty large number of e-mails
and a moderate amount of web access. You don't want to be e-mailing
photos and videos of course, you wait for Wi-Fi access to do data
intensive tasks.

I'm on the Pageplus "The 12" plan, $12/month for 250 minutes, 250 texts,
and 10MB of data. I can't use up all the data each month, so I'll likely
go back to pay as you go now.