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A comment on T-Mobile quietly hardens part of its U.S. cellular network against snooping.

Re:T-Mobile quietly hardens part of its U.S. cellular networ... by x1798DE on Monday October 27, 2014 @03:16PM (#8517516)
I have T-Mobile, and I have to say, I've been quite happy with it and I've been just waiting for the other shoe to drop. The only negative thing I hear about them is people don't like the coverage area - which doesn't bother me because when I switched to them they were the only company that offered wifi calling (meaning I can comfortably use my phone at work and at home, where I spend 99% of my time, for the first time in 6-8 years).

Do I just have a rosy outlook, or is T-mobile's limited marketshare such a problem that they're somehow disciplined into being an actually good mobile carrier?

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Re:T-Mobile quietly hardens part of its U.S. cellular networ... by qeorge on Monday October 27, 2014 @03:32PM (#8517650)
Same story here. Have had T-Mo for ~3 years, wouldn't ever switch to one of the other big carriers (I would move to Republic Wireless if I was going to change). My wife moved from Verizon -> T-Mobile last year after finally getting tired of the ridiculous prices from Verizon, and is also very happy.

Coverage is fine. Sometimes on road trips to the beach here in North Carolina we will lose service for say 5-10 miles when we are really in the middle of nowhere (the sprawling metropolis of Elizabeth City, NC in particular gives me trouble). This is acceptable in return for nearly 50% savings and not having to do business with AT&T/Verizon.

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Re:T-Mobile quietly hardens part of its U.S. cellular networ... by anonu on Monday October 27, 2014 @04:31PM (#8517990)
I've been a VoiceStream, then T-Mobile customer for over 16 years. There's been ups and downs in the relationship over the years. The most notable "down" was the $800 international roaming charge they refused to remove from my bill a few years back. Even though I really wanted to leave them then, a thorough cost analysis of the competition showed they really were still cheaper...

More recently, the Simple Choice plan they introduced last year which includes "free" international data roaming has ensured I stick with them for even longer. I travel quite a bit, so that + the wifi calling which works pretty much anywhere in the world has been a great thing.

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Re:T-Mobile quietly hardens part of its U.S. cellular networ... by Spooky23 on Tuesday October 28, 2014 @12:29AM (#8519546)
I dropped them many years ago over a similar issue, except in my case I was almost 40 miles from the Canadian borders and picked up a Canaidam tower... They slapped me with a huge fee for international roaming.

This was late 90s, so I think a 10 minute call cost like $150!

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Re:T-Mobile quietly hardens part of its U.S. cellular networ... by hnarn on Monday October 27, 2014 @04:39PM (#8518032)
Why would they remove the $800 international roaming charge?
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Re:T-Mobile quietly hardens part of its U.S. cellular networ... by praneshp on Monday October 27, 2014 @06:53PM (#8518641)
A lot of the time, such charges come up because the customer was unaware, not because they used it. I once made a call from whatsapp not realizing it wouldnt go through wifi, and ran up almost $150, but T-mobile was kind enough to remove it off the bill. Just customer-friendliness, more than anything else.
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Re:T-Mobile quietly hardens part of its U.S. cellular networ... by fixedd on Tuesday October 28, 2014 @01:11AM (#8519634)
The wife and I took a cruise a few years ago and I tried my damnedest to turn off anything even remotely resembling "yes, you can have a data connection". I wanted to leave my phone on in case something happened with the kids (and so I'd have a watch), I just didn't want it to DO anything other than allow incomming calls. Got home to a $200 phone bill because there was a checkbox somewhere I'd missed and cruise-ship mobile data is abhorrently expensive.

It happens.

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Re:T-Mobile quietly hardens part of its U.S. cellular networ... by jacquesm on Tuesday October 28, 2014 @06:38AM (#8520271)
Android: Apps/Settings/mobile networks/mobile data/checkbox off
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Re:T-Mobile quietly hardens part of its U.S. cellular networ... by ryanSrich on Tuesday October 28, 2014 @12:08AM (#8519498)
T-mobile is the only carrier in the U.S. with good coverage and unlimited data + iPhone support, so for me it's really my only option. They've been really great so far; only charge what they say they are going to charge, no contract, and no overages. It's incredibly disheartening to know that these basic requirements are unheard of for other large carriers.
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Re:T-Mobile quietly hardens part of its U.S. cellular networ... by reustle on Monday October 27, 2014 @05:39PM (#8518343)
Regarding coverage, I'm feeling the pain. I've been a TMobile customer for over 2 years now and their service in NYC is great, but out in Pennsylvania (where I am almost weekly) is terrible to non existent.

On top of coverage being bad, their plans are limited to around 10MB of data roaming per month. Yes, MB. That is only domestic though, if you're international you get unlimited data roaming. I guess that is what happens when you bad-talk other carriers then ask them about letting your customers roam on their networks.

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Re:T-Mobile quietly hardens part of its U.S. cellular networ... by imaffett on Monday October 27, 2014 @05:41PM (#8518362)
which part of PA? I'm in south central and we get LTE, but I also go through parts with no coverage. It has been better then sprint though.
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Re:T-Mobile quietly hardens part of its U.S. cellular networ... by DINKDINK on Monday October 27, 2014 @06:59PM (#8518668)
http://opensignal.com/ is a great website showing coverage data
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Re:T-Mobile quietly hardens part of its U.S. cellular networ... by reustle on Tuesday October 28, 2014 @11:16AM (#8521383)
Generally around Schuylkill County and Lehigh Valley
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Re:T-Mobile quietly hardens part of its U.S. cellular networ... by jordanpg on Monday October 27, 2014 @05:19PM (#8518243)
They really did refund my early termination fee with Verizon, and it only took about a month. I was expecting the worst (as is the norm in the world of rebates) and was pleasantly surprised.

The slam dunk for me is the JUMP (Just Upgrade My Phone) program which allows you to upgrade phones much more frequently and easily. Doesn't save much money, but I am tickled knowing that I will get new phones much more frequently now.

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Re:T-Mobile quietly hardens part of its U.S. cellular networ... by dopamean on Monday October 27, 2014 @04:20PM (#8517938)
I've been a T-Mobile customer since 2004 and I've been really happy with them the whole time. The customer service has always been what kept me there even when I (briefly) lived in poor coverage areas. My feeling is that if you live in a good coverage area and you don't do a ton of travel then theres no good reason not to use T-Mobile.
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Re:T-Mobile quietly hardens part of its U.S. cellular networ... by matwood on Monday October 27, 2014 @11:14PM (#8519369)
My feeling is that if you live in a good coverage area and you don't do a ton of travel then theres no good reason not to use T-Mobile.

Actually if you go to the EU often t-mobiles included data and texting come in handy.

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Re:T-Mobile quietly hardens part of its U.S. cellular networ... by dopamean on Saturday November 01, 2014 @03:07PM (#8544201)
I completely forgot about that. Thanks for the reminder. I think they started that a year or two ago?
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Re:T-Mobile quietly hardens part of its U.S. cellular networ... by uptown on Tuesday October 28, 2014 @08:32AM (#8520589)
I checked them out, but their coverage just doesn't exist where I need it. Ended up going with the Verizon Allset plan. Requires that I buy my device up-front, but I get 4G LTE with a gig of base data, the ability to add-on data as-needed, and the ability to tether with no contract, and no activation fees.
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Re:T-Mobile quietly hardens part of its U.S. cellular networ... by chimeracoder on Monday October 27, 2014 @04:55PM (#8518126)
Depends on your definition of "actually good". I've been a T-Mobile customer since they first entered the US, and I've generally been happy, but I was incredibly upset when I saw that they started zero-rating "approved" music services[0] .

I have unlimited data, but as a strong supporter of net neutrality, I take issue with that.

[0]https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2014/07/net-neutrality-and-glo...

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Re:T-Mobile quietly hardens part of its U.S. cellular networ... by jschwartzi on Tuesday October 28, 2014 @04:00AM (#8519911)
Wifi calling is especially amazing if you're in a foreign country and you need to take a conference call in your hotel room.
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