Gordon Banks» TMobile

4G Wireless reaches Boulder

Gordon — Wed, 20 Jul 2011 14:45:11 +0000

As of mid July, 4G wireless connectivity has just started to reached Boulder. TMobile and Verizon have 4G coverage now with a MIFI hotspot device, AT&T and Sprint’s 4G networks have not been completed in Boulder yet. The speed tests, in the table to the right, show that wireless carriers have a fair amount of tweaking to do to reach their goals of downloads “up to 12Mbps”. At this point, 4G LTE technology looks very over-hyped compared to Comcast’s cable results.

New iPhone Plans

Gordon — Thu, 03 Feb 2011 14:12:24 +0000

I recently had to find an individual iPhone plan for the U.S. I didn’t need many monthly voice minutes, so the plans I mention basically represent the cheapest iPhone plans by carrier. These plans are for people who already own their iPhones and don’t want a phone contract or a subsidized iPhone. AT&T is now about $75/month*, Verizon $80/month**, and TMobile is $60/month*** (Feb 2011). The TMobile 500 minute plan dropped approx. $20 since last year. All the prices above do not include taxes and career’s standard “phantom fees”. It is possible to have slightly cheaper plans with all these carriers, but this would require signing up for metered text and data options, which come with heavy penalties for over usage, so beware.

*AT&T/450 minutes/1000 Texts/2GB Data/unlimited AT&T hotspots
**Verizon/450 minutes/500 Texts/unlimited Data
***TMobile/500 minutes/unlimited Texts/unlimited Data (EDGE only)

Traveling with Google Voice

Gordon — Sun, 28 Mar 2010 04:41:30 +0000

Transcribed call in Google Voice

This is how to get all your voice messages forwarded and transcribed to your GMail account while you are out of the country. Before you leave, initiate call forwarding with your phone carrier and you must have a Google Voice phone number as well. For TMobile you dial; **21* (Verizon **73*) Google Voice Number# from your phone, to activate call forwarding. On a TMobile iPhone you will see a displayed message stating that voice call forwarding is on for all incoming calls. When someone calls your phone, they will immediately be forwarded to your Google Voice number and can leave a voice message associated with your Google Voice number. Google Voice will transcribe the audio message and send your GMail account an email with the transcribed message. When you return home just call ##21# to terminate call forwarding (TMobile).
Checking voice messages from a foreign country can be difficult or not even possible if don’t have local phone service. If you have phone service in a foreign country, international roaming fees will be applied and they are expensive. Getting your voice messages via email is much more convenient when traveling abroad.

Google Voice Mobile

Gordon — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 03:39:43 +0000

Here are some screenshots of Google Voice Mobile on an iPhone. I have only played around with it for a day, sending calls back and forth, and checking Google’s transcribe performance (voice mail to text messages and voice mail to email voice messages). The call quality seems very good, possibly better than Fring or Skype calls. Google Voice seems very confusing when dialing your first calls. What is going on? Everything is being routed through your Google phone number and at the same time, all your call activity is being transcribed within your Google account. Our test calls didn’t seem to use any of our TMobile minutes, though Google Voice uses your phone carrier’s voice network calling your Google number, thereafter, it seems to work over your wifi network. Google Voice does not work over an Edge network. As a amateur GV user, I don’t full understand how all this technology works yet. But you must have a jail-broken iPhone, to get GV Mobile, or until Apple changes it’s mind about allowing the Google Voice App back into the Apps Store (Apple pulled it last week). I can’t even imagine how someone at Google came up with this idea/technology. It will be interesting to see if this technology will be readily adopted by users or if it seems too clunky for placing phone calls.

iPhone 3.0 TMobile

Gordon — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 22:52:13 +0000

New copy/paste feature

Said my prayer and pushed the upgrade button in iTunes this afternoon, committing to the iphone 3.0 firmware upgrade. As TMobile is my iphone carrier, I live in the murky zone of the unsupported and the untested. I have an unlocked 2G iphone without being jailbroken. The good news is that my virtual unlock is preserved and my phone works. Initially, my wifi seemed dead and nothing loaded into Mobile Safari. Shit… no more online NYT or GMail, life was going to be harsh. But after about 15 minutes, my wifi connection was back (sleepy wifi syndrome) and my appendage (Schimmelism #254) was connected to the world again. The only thing I had to do was re-enter my TMobile setting for the APN number (internet2.voicestream.com, no username, no password; love TMobile’s logins).
Now the bad news about firmware 3.0 upgrade. Most of my 49 apps are broken, including Tweetie. They crash immediately upon launching. I have read online that this means the app was not yet updated for the iphone 3.0 OS. I can’t believe 49 iphone developer forgot about 3.0′s arrival, but a fair amount of iphone users seem to be reporting app crashing, or maybe this problem will require the new ultrasn0w hack, which is supposed to be available tomorrow. Either way, another iPhone firmware update survived but with injuries.