Help me pick a new wireless carrier...

[Borachio 417]

I have AT&T wireless, Gigapower and Uverse.  Looking to drop the bundle package and find a better (cheaper) way to get TV besides cable.

Since I will be free of AT&T I am looking at other carriers.  

I live in Austin and travel to rural East Texas to visit family once a month or so.  No business travel, but vacation out of state/country once or twice a year.

The phone I have is paid for but outdated so I will need to get a new one.

What carriers have the most reliable signal for Austin/Texas, good rates on unlimited data plans and good phones?

Or are they all about the same for my area and I should just stick with AT&T?

It seems most unlimited plans across carriers are about $60 to $85 for one line from what I found.  I just need one line, single no kids.  Verizon or T-Mobile seem like good options?  What about some of the smaller ones?

Watching TV without getting cable options are welcome too.  :)

[Gil Bang 26048]

T mobile includes Netflix IIRC

[zork 629]

get a sony xperia phone(unlocked android phone from frys or best buy)(allows an add in memory card to boost your available storage)and use the AT&T sub carrier like H20 or others.  it isn't perfect but works well enough and is way cheap.

BTW, I'm an old who doesn't use it more than for calls, texts, taking photos of kids, and occasional web browsing.  

Edited July 29, 2018 by zork

[Borachio 417]

Same here.  I use the phone for texting, web browsing, some social media and some audio when I jog.  No video streaming or gaming.

Edited July 29, 2018 by Borachio
Elaborate my audio use

[zork 629]

I use old time warner, now spectrum, for broadband internet. 

From a recommendation of Clark Howard years ago, I bought a $100 Voice over IP phone thing to plug into the broadband for my phone that is under $10 a month with OOMA.(first one lasted 5 years and then another is on the 3rd year so far, OOMA Telo device) We have a phone system that is wireless(not cellular, wireless phones) attached to that.  It has been great but we don't use it much since we have cellular as well.

Use cut the cord systems like slingbox and now I moved to VUE from playstation because it has LHN.  It is month to month.  I turned it on for NBA playoffs and Longhorn baseball and was going to turn it off till football but have left it on for now.(has ESPN, ESPN II, and ESPNU and FOXSSW in Texas)

Plus the aforementioned Xperia phones(~$200 price point) with H20 at $35/month(unlimited text and calls but limited internet) or $45/month for unlimited all three(they say they will throttle you after 5GB but I have yet to get there to find out)

We have Netflix and Amazon Prime as well.

All of that has brought my family technical budget to about 50-55%(or less since VUE is not 12 months of the year) of what it was at full bore everything.

Edited July 29, 2018 by zork

[Jkwellborn 6748]

T mobile doesn’t work in east Texas. If you had a video game network subscription, you get channels thru those too. I’m pretty sure I get hbo now thru att.

[Buzzrock 14948]

Cricket uses the same network as AT&T but throttles the speed some.

[Gil Bang 26048]

6 minutes ago, Buzzrock said:

Cricket uses the same network as AT&T but throttles the speed some.

same with Boost and Virgin with Sprint.

[Borachio 417]

Sprint has a deal for a new S9 and unlimited data, talk, text for $69 month.  After a year you have to pay the phone off in full(minus what you already paid, $9 a month).  That doesn't sound too bad of the coverage is good in Austin.

Also going to look more into the Xperia phone and using a sub-carrier.

Maybe slingbox for tv.  I do have a "smart" t.v.

[Lobwedgephil 1139]

Do not go with Sprint. 

[Jkwellborn 6748]

Sprint also sucks cock in east Texas.

[tokamak 6443]

If you're happy with AT&T's coverage, just switch to Cricket.

[Borachio 417]

Buying an Xperia phone and using Cricket is sounding like a pretty good option.

[Seasick Sailor 3747]

Bumping this. I have been with Verizon for years now, but just had my first experience with their customer support. Long story short: Fuck Verizon. I'm think of moving to Xfinity mobile. I'd save about $350 a year. Does anyone have any experience with them?

Edited April 29, 2022 by Seasick Sailor

[Telegraph_it 3359]

7 minutes ago, Seasick Sailor said:

Bumping this. I have been with Verizon for years now, but just had my first experience with their customer support. Long story short: Fuck Verizon. I'm think of moving to Xfinity mobile. I'd save about $350 a year. Does anyone have any experience with them?

Xfinity Mobile throttles your data after 20 GB. And the throttled speed is frikin slow. I used them for all of two weeks and switched to T Mobile which has been good for the most part. 

[Handcruser 2805]

T-Mobile slams and goes hard.

[Jkwellborn 6748]

T-Mobile slams and goes hard.

The few people that I know that have used it, hate it. Of course, I’m in BFE.

[CooterBrown 18032]

I used to have T-Mobile back around 2010 and was unpleasantly surprised to find out they had zero coverage in Seattle when I traveled there. I don’t mean shitty coverage, I mean zero bars anywhere. Had no issues in Austin though.

[MonkeyDoughnut 10357]

On 4/29/2022 at 11:39 AM, Seasick Sailor said:

Bumping this. I have been with Verizon for years now, but just had my first experience with their customer support. Long story short: Fuck Verizon. I'm think of moving to Xfinity mobile. I'd save about $350 a year. Does anyone have any experience with them?

I'm in the same frame of mind regarding Verizon. They aren't who they used to be. I'm having more and more issues with them 

[Stunns38 3559]

I'm in the same frame of mind regarding Verizon. They aren't who they used to be. I'm having more and more issues with them 

Agreed. Verizon’s service has noticeably declined.

[NeverMarryAStripper 21943]

Were they bought by United Airlines or an investment group out of Chicago?

[luke duke 6414]

T-Mobile slams and goes hard.

T-Mobile sucks

[Dewey 3295]

Depends on where you live. When I lived in Galveston,  t mobile sucked, they rented space from att, so when the shitheads flooded the island on the weekends,  you literally could not make a phone call, forget using any apps. Moved to El Paso and I wondered why I paid for wifi, worked great. Moved to New Braunfels and it's good, not great. 

See who owns the most towers in your area and get their plan. 

[Seasick Sailor 3747]

I went ahead and switched to Xfinity this weekend. Got $200 back for bringing my own phone, and, even with a new iPhone 13 Pro for the wife, I am saving about $50 a month. I'll probably upgrade my phone in a few months, which will cut into my savings, but it'll still workout to about $300-$400 less a year than what I was paying Verizon. Xfinity uses Verizon's towers, and we never se more than 8 GB of data a month, so I think it'll be a smart move for us.