

Galaxy Nexus + data plan + VoIP support = free calls - nextparadigms
http://gigaom.com/mobile/galaxy-nexus-data-plan-sip-voip-support-free-calls/

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jerrya
My Nexus One, and several little cheapo tablets I have make free outoing calls
over wifi and receive incoming calls using GrooveIp (which hooks into Google
Voice).

The Nexus One can also make GrooveIp calls over 3G, and I have it also set up
using sipgate to receive sip calls, but also receive "real world" phone number
calls using a free phone number from ipkall.

It all works so well, that I've considered just buying a Xoom LTE tablet, and
using that as my primary phone. The only reason I've decided against this, is
that sometimes, I really want a phone I can stuff into a pocket.

What is intriguing about this article is the mention of a $40 unlimited data
plan from T-Mobile.

Is that for real? Does that still exist?

I assume it's not LTE, but HSPA+.... but still, that has me thinking....

~~~
jerrya
The $40 unlimited plan would seem to either not exist, or be this 2Gb plan
with reduced speeds after 2Gb: [http://www.t-mobile.com/shop/plans/mobile-
broadband-plans.as...](http://www.t-mobile.com/shop/plans/mobile-broadband-
plans.aspx)

Last night, I determined an hour of netflix on my at&t nexus is the better
half of a gig, and twice that on a xoom lte I am testing. 2Gb of data is
nothing -- but that does seem to be the $40 "unlimited" plan, in which
unlimited means throttled speeds after 2Gb.

~~~
technomancy
I ran my Nexus One off the unlimited $40/mo data-only plan for its first two
years and saved around $USD2000 vs buying subsidized, but it appears that they
dropped it in favour of the $50/mo plan. You'd still save a bundle vs the
subsidized phone+full plan over the life of a 2-year contract.

I'd always get the weirdest looks when I went in to a T-Mobile shop since I
was grandfathered in to the old plan and they had never seen it, so that was
always fun.

~~~
patja
You can also get a plain old bring-your-own-phone pay by the month plan from
T-Mobile for $30/month that gives you 100 minutes of voice, unlimited texts,
and sorta-unlimited data (1st 5GB at 4G and then it degrades)

~~~
edward
Can you provide a link? Best I can find on T-Mobile is "First 100 MB at up to
4G speed" for $50/month.

~~~
davidmathers
<http://prepaid-phones.t-mobile.com/monthly-4g-plans>

It's the one with this disclaimer: "New activations only. Available
exclusively in-store at Walmart, on Walmart.com, and T-Mobile.com."

They also released this $200 phone to go along with the plan:
[http://www.engadget.com/2011/10/26/samsung-exhibit-
ii-4g-to-...](http://www.engadget.com/2011/10/26/samsung-exhibit-ii-4g-to-be-
shown-off-for-t-mobile-at-walmart-to/)

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seanp2k2
Carriers will disable this as soon as it gets even remotely popular, because
carriers don't understand what business they're really in.

Carriers think they're communications platforms that add value (Visual
Voicemail only from AT&T!) and content channels (Exclusive Droid Bleeding
Rocket Glass Metal Extreme Explosion DROIIIIDDD NASCAR app!).

Savvy users understand that they're just wireless dumb pipes and know that
cellular voice has been VoIP for many years now and also remember how long ago
links between COs ran on fiber.

~~~
polshaw
It's not that they 'don't understand' it is that they don't WANT to be (seen
as) a dumb pipe. Funnily, they quite like charging ~10c for a text message
that costs ~0.0001c in data, etc. Price only competition isn't attractive.
It's about time we got a proper wireless ISP!

~* not accurate. and i know text message transfer works in a different way but
it is not relevant.

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vegardx
How does this affect battery life? I know that GSM have been highly tuned to
drain as little battery as possible just to listen for calls and such, but i
recon this has to poll some kind of service other then the cell tower, which
should consume more data and take longer time?

Personally I use Google Voice (or skype for that matter, I just prefer GV) for
international calls, and my provider in scandinavia. And yeah, I got GV for
some strange reason, I guess it has to do with Nexus One and a glitch with
Google or something...

~~~
viraptor
Probably not much. Unless you have a provider which loves bruteforce approach
of nat handling (callcentric forces a refresh every 70 seconds or so, resizes
the window based on some behaviours), then you can be ok with around 2 packets
every 10 minutes. If your connection is already live (email check takes much
more traffic), then you shouldn't see much difference in usage.

~~~
technomancy
Gingerbread's built-in SIP client is great; I couldn't see a noticeable
difference in battery life running it all day. Before Gingerbread, I ran
Skype, which couldn't get through a full day on a single charge. Before Skype
I tried SIPDroid, which was a lot better than Skype, but not as nice as the
built-in Gingerbread one.

My Skype account had lots of contacts and lots of chats open, so that may have
had an adverse effect on battery life given that the communication is all P2P
and required keeping an insane number of sockets open.

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mmahemoff
Personally I'm not worried about free calls via VOIP anymore. I have a plan on
3 UK with unlimited wifi and ~2000 minutes of calls a month for £25. I
certainly couldn't use any more than that, and for any overseas calls, I can
use Rebtel at next-to-nothing rates via a local number (ie included in the
2000 minutes).

~~~
technomancy
I suspect this would be a lot more valuable to US customers, where that kind
of price on mobile minutes is unheard of.

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tadfisher
I would pay Google a decent amount of money for first-party GV+SIP
integration.

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kjell
I've been doing this for 2 years. My setup is a 3GS with an iPad data plan
from AT&T. ($29.99/unlimited). Talkatone hooks into google voice for incoming
and outgoing calls. The app is free and I paid a token amount to make the ads
go away.

Compared to apple's Phone and Messages, Talkatone is complete shit. It mostly
works, all the while looking horrible and feeling worse. At least 25% of my
incoming calls don't connect when I answer them from another app. The audio
quality isn't great. (google's voice app is a bit better but it's still an
offense to any decent iPhone app. And it only does texts and connects calls to
your actual phone number with a callback.)

There are some hacky VOIP/SIP solutions for the iPhone. But having it call
through google's servers is killer and offsets the horrendous UI. So thank you
talkatone.

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valjavec
It is a killer combination and I'm doing it for a while with Nexus S and
CSipSimple App while roaming abroad.

I'm from Europe. And best part is that my mobile operator has SIP gateway, so
wherever abroad I am, I always get myself local 3G data SIM card (it's 10 EUR
for 1GB on average) so I can use data as much as I want, and I can call and
being called (with my own number) with prices just like I would be back home -
cheap.

Even better is that I can also send SMS with same app (again from my own
number). Classic way, when abroad it can be anywhere from 0.15 EUR to 0.40 EUR
per SMS when roaming.

Sending SMS works on EDGE, but for calling it needs to be 3G. Sound can delay
from time to time, but it's a small price for keeping home-network-prices
wherever in the world I am.

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tonfa
SIP support is already in Gingerbread (and possibly earlier versions too), it
just doesn't work with a SIM with voice plans.

~~~
MichaelGG
Can you explain what you mean by "it doesn't work with a SIM with voice
plans"?

~~~
tonfa
The native integration does not usually allow you to use SIP when on a data
connection (at least that's how it works for me, I have to be on wifi).

From the article, I understand that if the SIM has a data only plan, then
there are no restrictions for VoIP.

~~~
technomancy
This varies by carrier, I don't think it has anything to do with the software.

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angryasian
Not the same , but can use GrooveIP
[https://market.android.com/details?id=com.gvoip&hl=en](https://market.android.com/details?id=com.gvoip&hl=en)
, for voip calls through google voice.

~~~
jscore
I tried Groove IP, but the echo makes it unusable on my Nexus S (I've tried
all settings, etc).

Does anyone have it working flawlessly, and if so, what device?

~~~
viraptor
Echo on voip connections is very often the issue of service provider. If you
get echo on some destinations more than others, try reporting it (to google in
this case) - maybe they can tweak the handling of some interconnects.

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dshep
Hmm I'm skeptical. I tried a similar setup with a number of free Voip
services, Google Voice, and a Nexus One. The voice quality was very
unpredictable, often unusable. That on Wifi no less. I can't imagine trying to
do the same on 3G. Maybe I should have paid for a Voip service? ... What would
be nice is if Google opened up direct sip access to GVoice.

~~~
jerrya
Try GrooveIp, it's not SIP access, it's Jabber/XMPP access and it's like $4.
(I am not affiliated).

Also here: <http://code.google.com/apis/talk/open_communications.html>

_1\. What is "client choice" and how is Google Talk enabling it?

In addition to the Google Talk client, there are many other clients out there
that provide a great communications experience. We believe users should have
choice in which clients they use to connect to the Google Talk service and we
want to encourage the developer community to create new and innovative
applications that leverage our service. To enable this, Google Talk uses the
standard XMPP protocol for authentication, presence, and messaging._

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cgislason
What a misleading headline! Cheap calls maybe, but not free.

Even if you ignoring the fact that he is paying for the data plan, the author
mentions that he is paying "$0.019 per minute" for most outgoing calls within
the U.S.

~~~
w1ntermute
Well, it's just an issue of network effects now. Within a few years, enough
people will have 4G smartphones that we'll be able to rely solely on VOIP-to-
VOIP calls.

~~~
seanp2k2
Until carriers block VoIP traffic, because they can Ben under the FCC net
neutrality rules that they keep trying to lawsuit out of existence.

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bosch
People who do this are very annoying(aka CHEAP!). Mainly because most VoIP
calls have low quality and have static issues. When you call me and I can't
see the number of the person who's calling, that's annoying. It's also
annoying if you break up or I can hear a time delayed echo of everything I
just said and then have to wait for you to hear it. When this happens I don't
want to talk to you as it's a painful experience. If you can't afford
$20/month for a voice plan then perhaps you should just have a tablet and
stick to e-mail?

~~~
ajross
Most of these people (and I'm probably in the demographic, though I haven't
yet made the leap to VoIP-only) probably _would_ prefer to "stick to e-mail".
But the world still forces us to have telephones. Why should we be forced to
pay for voice plans we rarely (and grudgingly) use, and subsidize all you
bluetooth-adorned yackers in the process?

~~~
bosch
It's their own choice to stick to e-mail, that's a seperate discussion as not
using a phone would definitely affect you in this society.

My point is that using VoIP may be cheaper, but it is of vastly inferior
quality and will annoy the person you're talking to. If you only use voice
once in a while buy a bunch of minutes, you're not subsidizing anyone as the
network wouldn't have been built without voice, so one could argue the voice
users are subsidizing YOU.

~~~
dangrossman
> If you only use voice once in a while buy a bunch of minutes

Maybe you could explain that more? Smartphone data plans and prepaid minute
phones don't overlap... are you suggesting we carry two phones?

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drivebyacct2
This has been possible for sometime. Totally free calls are possible if you
have a legacy Gizmo5 account.

~~~
andrewpi
Gizmo5 shut down back in April, I believe.

