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Comment by elq | Hacker News Reader

The still have that plan - http://prepaid-phones.t-mobile.com/prepaid-plans it's just a bit hidden.

I just called in to activate this plan (I'm already on a prepaid TMO plan). I couldn't get it on the phone, but the CSR told me that I could order the activation kit from walmart.com, call in, and activate it using the code from the kit. The code can be applied to either a new line or an existing line. The kit sells for ~$30 but includes $30 of service.

Here's the kit: http://www.walmart.com/ip/T-Mobile-SIM-Kit/24099996

Wow, but that is some very stealthy work.

T-Mobile isn't exactly going out of its way to let people know this exists. It's not featured in the way you do for a plan you envision as the future cornerstone of the business.

Well, to be fair, it's officially a walmart plan - http://see.walmart.com/t-mobile/

I have this plan. Had to call customer service to get them to honor it. Bit of a hassle, but they did it. It's not available in their regular plan settings; clearly they'd rather people buy the more expensive plan with unlimited minutes instead. I won't be particularly surprised if they discontinue it at some point soon. For the time being, the plan meets my needs quite well though.

$30/mo for 5GB 4G (then I assume 2G after) is quite a deal! If the minutes were higher, I'd use this as my primary provider. As a data-only plan though, that's not too bad!

Yes. It is quite a deal. I pay .10 per minute after the small allocation is used up, but I've only use all 100 minutes twice in the last year I've had this plan.

If I were less lazy and needed more minutes, I'd setup grooveip (or something similar) with my google voice account.

I use my phone quite a bit due to having a widely dispersed family and an upcoming wedding. I also occasionally use my phone for work, but do not get reimbursed for the cost. You have this plan? Do they do the "nights and weekends free" thing? Do they charge for "in network" calls?

I'm actually seriously thinking about switching, as my Net10 experience is sub-par compared to an actual carrier, and $30/mo is better than $45/mo no matter how you split it. 100 minutes is just too low for me, though. I love my Windows Phone, but that means no Google Voice or realistic VOIP offering.

I've had this plan for a bit over a year. No nights and weekends free. I don't even think there is free in network calling, but I'm not sure.

It's really not a good plan if you use a lot of minutes, but for people like me, it's great.

Donating to GVGW ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6524728 ) to use the GSM codec combined with csipsimple ( http://code.google.com/p/csipsimple/ ) has actually been surprisingly usable over HSPA+.

First link wrong? Seems like a useful service.

https://simonics.com/gvgw/

That's the one! I don't know how I missed that...

3G after

Not 3G, EDGE.

You're right, it's not 3G:

    Me:  On a plan that says "First N GB at 4G speeds", what
         speed do I get after I hit the cap?

    Rep: Once the allotted high-speed data has been used
         speeds will be throttled down to our 2G speeds.
         This would be comparable to about twice the speed
         of dial-up which translates to about 100 kbps.

Thanks for the correction!

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