[ba] Re: OT: cellphones in the US

[Bernard Littau]

Hi Tom,

Your continental phone will likely not work here in the states.  Europe 
tends to be GSM, while the US is not.  I am sure your roaming rates will 
be way higher than a pre-paid local rate.  The issue will be the cost of 
the phone.  It will also be advantageous to have a US number for your phone.

I have first hand experience with Verizon and AT&T.  Other options are 
Xingular and Sprint.

Both Verizon and AT&T offer pre-paid plans.  These should work just fine 
for you for a short term use.
See:
http://www.freeup.com/  for verizon wireless
http://www.attwireless.com/personal/gophone/index.jhtml  for AT&T

I recently switched from AT&T to Verizon for my cell service, so even 
though the AT&T site looks a lot better to me, I would steer you to 
Verizon.  These pre-paid plans tend to be marketed toward kids :-)  
Either carrier should do fine here on the US West Coast. 

My wife was already on Verizon, but we upgraded her phone, so we had her 
2 yr old phone as a spare.  I hooked it up to Verizon Free-up and got a 
number and the phone working in 10 minutes at a Verizon store.  If you 
can wait to get a number until you get here, just walk into a Verizon or 
AT&T store and walk out with a month-to-month or pre-paid phone.  If you 
can scam a recent old phone from someone, you can use that, but you need 
a verizon phone for verizon and an AT&T phone for AT&T.

Our Free-up phone is charged with a $30 card which has a 60 day life, 
but the unused $ roll over beyond the 60 days if you recharge with 
another card.  I would assume one could recharge the phone $ with a 
credit card.

I have my recently decommissioned AT&T cell phone here on my desk with a 
wall charger and a car charger.  If you were coming to Seattle I would 
just loan it to you for your trip and we could set it up with AT&T gophone.

Why don't you, if you have not already done so, subscribe to the San 
Francisco Bay Area (ba) Audi list, as I think I recall you are flying 
into ba and driving south.  Ask if anyone there has a recently 
decommissioned phone they can loan you.
See:
http://www.audifans.com/mailman/listinfo/ba-group

I've cc'ed the ba group in this reply.

Best,

Bernard Littau
Woodinville, WA
'88 5ktq



tnas at euronet.nl wrote:

>Hi all,
>
>Please reply privately, as this has nothing to do with Audis in a direct way,,,
>
>Here in Holland, you can buy a cellphone with pre-paid call tariff. You buy a phone for peanuts and 
>you get a certain amount's worth of calls with it. When you've used that up, you can upgrade the 
>account by buying a new card and entering a code into the phone. The provider relies on you 
>upgrading your account regularly for the profit in this deal.
>
>Does this system also exist in the US, and what do phones generally cost? For a CA trip, which 
>phone networks are best? Or would it be a better idea to buy a tri-band phone here and rely on my 
>network's roaming service?
>
>TIA for your replies!
>
>Regards, Tom
>_______________________________________________
>quattro mailing list
>quattro at audifans.com
>http://www.audifans.com/mailman/listinfo/quattro
>
>
>  
>