Is there a prepaid blackberry service provider?

[slicksilver]

I'm coming to the states for 2 months on a business/leisure trip and was wondering if I a prepaid blackberry service is available. Is there one?

My international roaming bb rates are over the roof.

Thanks

 

[BigSmooth]

I know Boost Mobile offers a BlackBerry Curve.

 

[Slick5150]

MetroPCS has the Curve as well.

You could also use a Blackberry with one of T-Mobile's Flex Pay plans, which basically work like prepaid.

 

[Pliablemoose]

Your BlackBerry has a SIM card?

then you'll be using ATT or TMobile pre paid

 

[BigSmooth]

Your BlackBerry has a SIM card?

then you'll be using ATT or TMobile pre paid

Ah... this would make more sense. Yeah if you just want to use an unlocked BB on a GSM network for a few months then you'll want to stick with TMo or ATT. I know T-Mobile has offered prepaid BlackBerrys through "TMobile Complete" packages offered at Walmart and Best Buy, and they also do the no-contract plans like Slick mentioned, so I would start there.

 

[cbn]

http://www.virginmobileusa.com/cell-phones#/detail-phone/VMB853

Virgin Mobile has a Blackberry also.

P.S. Just wondering, do any of these prepaid services allow flash movies to be played or pictures to be downloaded?

 

[slicksilver]

Should have been more clear. I have an unlocked BB 9700 with me which I'd like to use. I'll check tmobile and att.

 

[uli2000]

No GSM prepaid provider Im aware of will offer BIS/BES services. If you want BIS/BES (which is required if you want push email/BBM), you should sign up for Tmobile Flexpay and add BIS/BES (BIS is personal service, BES is enterprise).

 

[cbn]

Should have been more clear. I have an unlocked BB 9700 with me which I'd like to use. I'll check tmobile and att.

(If you have time) could you kindly let us know about pricing and whether or not web browsing is still possible. (I have read that switching providers, in some cases, disables 3G)

 

[pm]

(If you have time) could you kindly let us know about pricing and whether or not web browsing is still possible. (I have read that switching providers, in some cases, disables 3G)

In the case of all shipping phones, changing from T-Mobile USA to AT&T or visa-versa, will disable 3G. The frequency bands are different so a phone with 3G on one, won't work on the other. That may change in the future when they make phones that support both, but there are no phones available currently that can do this.

Web browsing usually still works using EDGE (~100kb/s) on a phone that changes from AT&T <-> T-Mobile.

 

[cbn]

In the case of all shipping phones, changing from T-Mobile USA to AT&T or visa-versa, will disable 3G. The frequency bands are different so a phone with 3G on one, won't work on the other. That may change in the future when they make phones that support both, but there are no phones available currently that can do this.

Web browsing usually still works using EDGE (~100kb/s) on a phone that changes from AT&T <-> T-Mobile.

Thank you for the answer.

Do you happen (by any chance) to know what module is responsible for "frequency bands"?

 

[DivideBYZero]

Thank you for the answer.

Do you happen (by any chance) to know what module is responsible for "frequency bands"?

The US 3G UMTS bands are different to the rest of the world, hence using a Rest Of World device in the US will result in getting a 2.5G signal, AKA EDGE.

 

[pm]

Thank you for the answer.

Do you happen (by any chance) to know what module is responsible for "frequency bands"?

Here's a list of the bands:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UMTS_frequency_bands

Here's a better description of what I was trying to say:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Univer...ns_System#Interoperability_and_global_roaming

Most UMTS licensees consider ubiquitous, transparent global roaming an important issue. To enable a high degree of interoperability, UMTS phones usually support several different frequencies in addition to their GSM fallback. Different countries support different UMTS frequency bands – Europe initially used 2100 MHz while the most carriers in the USA use 850Mhz and 1900Mhz. T-mobile has launched a network in the US operating at 1700 MHz (uplink) /2100 MHz (downlink), and these bands are also being adopted elsewhere in the Americas. A UMTS phone and network must support a common frequency to work together. Because of the frequencies used, early models of UMTS phones designated for the United States will likely not be operable elsewhere and vice versa. There are now 11 different frequency combinations used around the world—including frequencies formerly used solely for 2G services.

On most phones (all of them), there are two separate chipsets (or CPU's). The first is responsible for the OS, web browsing, apps, etc. The second is responsible for all communications, so WiFi, Bluetooth, 3G, EGDE, GPRS. The second CPU would be the module that supports the various frequency bands, but even beyond this CPU supporting various frequencies is the tuned output driver and the antenna which enables communication.

There's pretty much no practical way to take a 3G phone for T-Mobile and enable it for AT&T's 3G bands. You'd need to be an expert in antenna design, redesign the antenna, and then reprogram the baseband communication CPU to use the new frequencies and protocols. It's really not feasible.

There's an example of a 3G chipset including ARM CPU, here (Adobe PDF required):
http://www.infineon.com/dgdl/X-GOLD...f0004&fileId=db3a30431be39b97011c09549f077a1a

You can see the chipset diagram on page 2. The output antenna is in the lower left - you'd need to reconfigure that and then reconfigure the UMTS controller firmware... it would be implausible. As an electrical engineer, I personally would rather try to make a CDMA iPhone (by merging the guts of an iPhone with the guts of a CDMA phone and then use the serial interlink between them to abstract the protocol differences) than to try to get a 3G phone on one UMTS band to work on another.