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Information came out last week that T-Mobile would be introducing some new data plan elements, and much to the surprise of almost nobody an official press release has hit the wires detailing new service options. The first is a 200MB data plan pegged at $15 per month for existing subscribers. New contracts can get the same deal for just $10.
The $30 unlimited data plan lives on, and now subscribers who choose this option can additionally add “Tethering and Wi-Fi Sharing” for $15 extra per month. Tethering will only be available for those with unlimited plans. See the full release below for more info.
T-Mobile Kicks Off the Holidays With a Compelling Lineup of Affordable Android-Powered Smartphones and New Low-Cost Data Service Plans
T-Mobile Is Making It Easier for Families to Stay Connected This Holiday Season and Beyond
BELLEVUE, Wash. — Nov. 1, 2010 PDT T-Mobile USA, Inc. today announced new products and service plans designed to help families stay connected without busting their holiday budgets. Beginning Nov. 3, T-Mobile is planning to offer a variety of new Android™ smartphones, including the T-Mobile® Comet™, LG Optimus T™ with Google™ and Motorola DEFY™ with MOTOBLUR™, each for less than $100.
“We’re heading into this holiday season with our strongest and most affordable lineup ever of Android-powered smartphones,” said Cole Brodman, chief marketing officer, T-Mobile USA. “Combine that with low-cost data service plans and even easier ways to give T-Mobile products as gifts, and we believe families will make the move to smartphones — enriching how they communicate in the new year.”
Affordable Android Smartphones for All
T-Mobile’s compelling suite of affordable Android smartphones appeals to each member of the family, even first-time smartphone users. In addition to providing access to the mobile Web while on the go, Android-powered smartphones provide customers with one-click access to their favorite Google services, such as Google Maps™, Gmail™, YouTube®, and over 100,000 applications in Android Market™. For less than $100 with qualifying rate plan on a two-year agreement (plus taxes and fees), T-Mobile customers can purchase any of the following devices during the holiday season:
The T-Mobile Comet offers a compact form factor, 528 MHz processor, 2.8-inch full touch screen display and a 3.2 megapixel camera. Perfect for customers who are ready to make the affordable transition to their first smartphone, the T-Mobile Comet is also available for prepaid customers at less than $200 (plus taxes and fees), the lowest-priced 3G Android smartphone in the T-Mobile portfolio. The T-Mobile Comet is available in a black finish.
The LG Optimus T is an easy-to-use smartphone with a user customizable home screen, 600 MHz processor, 3.2-inch full touch screen display and a 3.2 megapixel camera with video capture. Featuring Voice Actions for Android pre-loaded on the device, the LG Optimus T allows customers to perform commands through voice entry, such as calling, texting, e-mailing and navigating to a specific destination. The LG Optimus T is available in a burgundy or titanium finish.
Slim and pocket-able, the Motorola DEFY is equipped to withstand all that life throws your way. The DEFY is scratch- and water-resistant, as well as dust-proof, combined with MOTOBLUR™, an 800 MHz processor, a 3.7-inch full touch screen and a 5-megapixel camera with flash and video capture. The Motorola DEFY is available in a black and linen finish.
The Motorola CHARM with MOTOBLUR features a full QWERTY keyboard for easy messaging, a 2.8-inch touch screen paired with a BACKTRACK™ pad for simple navigation, and MOTOBLUR, making it easy to keep up with family and friends. Also featuring a 600 MHz processor and a 3 megapixel camera, the Motorola CHARM is available in a golden bronze or cabernet finish.
Services Families Can AffordIn addition to affordable Android-powered smartphones, T-Mobile is delivering new low-cost data service plans expected to be available this holiday season, making data even more accessible for families. New value offers include these:
Mobile data plans. With T-Mobile data plans, customers will have two options for data: the Web – 200MB plan or the Web – Unlimited plan. The Web – 200MB plan will be available for $10 per month with a new two-year service agreement or contract extension for a limited time or for $15 per month, which will not require a two-year contract extension. The Web – Unlimited plan will be available for $30 per month. Both data plans will be sold paired with a new or existing voice and text message plan.
Tethering and Wi-Fi Sharing service plan. T-Mobile is offering a new tethering service plan that enables select smartphones to function as wireless modems for connecting devices, such as laptops, tablets and netbooks to the Internet through the T-Mobile network. Customers can add the Tethering and Wi-Fi Sharing plan to their Web – Unlimited $30 monthly plan for an additional $14.99 per month.
AvailabilityThe T-Mobile Comet, LG Optimus T and Motorola DEFY are expected to be available starting Nov. 3 at T-Mobile retail stores, select dealers and online at http://www.t-mobile.com. The T-Mobile Comet will also be available as a prepaid Android smartphone at Best Buy, Radio Shack and Target. T-Mobile expects its new mobile data plans and tethering service plan will be available this holiday season.
Making it even easier for consumers to give T-Mobile devices and accessories to their friends and families this holiday season, T-Mobile Gift Cards can be purchased and redeemed at select T-Mobile retail stores nationwide.
For more information on T-Mobile products and services, visit http://www.t-mobile.com.
Pay for tethering? I think not. I push a button on my N1 and it happens.
No COMMENT!! wait that was a comment!! Lol seriously i think this sucks but hey its business.
@Noah.. mu girl has the N1 and shes pissed at the possibility that this (tethering) may change to a pay for service even with the n1! smh does anyone know if tat will be true. will n1’ers have to pay also?
As I am not in the US this does not affect me directly however this seems relatively sensible – pay a low amount of $ for a low amount of data if you are not a “power user” or pay more for a lot of data if you need it. You pay for what you get and certainly more favourable than the stepped approach other providers have used (such as $15 every time you need another 150MB if my memory is correct).
I still think that someone is having a laugh with trying to extort more cash for allowing you to tether though!
this tethering fee is better than the $30 fee that Sprint charges for theirs.
Yea, still better, but people know how to work around it regardless, lol.
This is crap, i have tethering for free right now on my N1. Would this count as a change in contract, so I can just leave tmobile? Tmobile barely has great signal to begin with so it’s not like I can really use tethering that much
Yeah as had as their coverage is I don’t know what makes T-Mobile think they can hang with the other, much better carrier’s price hikes.
Afaik they don’t know if you’re tethering or not if it’s native to the OS like in Froyo on the N1. It will most likely just be t-mobile branded phones that will require the extra fee.
Unlimited data & root access tether! :D
Tmobile claims that they have their new network w/ up to 4g speeds in my area. I’ve noticed my phone connect to that new network, but I haven’t had any faster speeds. If tmobile was actually a good network, then yeah they could charge it and i would think that makes sense. But to come up w/ this business model is going to sink Tmobile. The “kids join for free” campaign was pretty much tmobile begging parents to sign a contract. So if they have to beg people to join, they must know that they have either 1) an inferior product or 2) too high of prices. We know the 2nd one isn’t true, since tmobile is pretty reasonably priced (normally speaking), but they need to improve their network first.
if i am given the chance, i might change my data plan on my vibrant. i’ll drop to the smallest plan allowed. i don’t need much on the data plan, considering the fact that where i live i am on the edge network, i prefer to use wifi. the only time i don’t use wifi is when i am on the go, and i’m one of those responsible enough to stay off my phone while driving.
Can I just buy one of those phones, put my simcard in and have service ? I have a Cliq XT, so I am not looking for the fastest or best phone out there….
I bought my vibrant out right from someone other than Tmo and it works fine with my old Tmo sim card. I bought a third party gps maps out right so I could get that functionality. Nothing that requires a Data plan works, but that is fine with me since Wifi works when I am home or near an open network. I am saving $30 dollars a month and the amount I save each month will pay for the phone in less than a year.
Why do I want to pay $15 a month when a simple PPP app with appropriate add on to the tether device will suffice? The PPP app is just another network client. Sorry TMO, but your smoking crack on this and the IQ of the Engineer Community at large is higher than than the combined Engineering staff of you and your phone makers.
hahaha, try and make me pay for tether when i have root :P
I’m using the tethering feature of my Nexus One, and I was surprised to hear that I’m using a feature that will apparently cost extra in the future, and I started wondering how T-Mobile might even tell that I was using this feature given that they do not control the Android build on my phone. After a little research I have a hypothesis regarding how T-Mobile may detect tehering.
I’ve found that T-Mobile deploys some sort of transparent web proxy on their wireless network. For the technically inclined, this can be proven with a simple telnet test from your tethered laptop. Any connection attempts will result in a successful connection on port 80 even when that IP on the internet has no services listening–i.e., a connection to ANY public IP address on port 80 will successfully connect. T-Mobile is simply routing your TCP connection to their own proxy server for handling.
Here’s a sample session where I issue an HTTP GET request for a web page like a browser would:
$ telnet 123.123.123.123 80
Trying 123.123.123.123…
Connected to 123.123.123.123.
Escape character is ‘^]’.
GET / HTTP/1.0
HTTP/1.1 502 Bad Gateway
Content-Length: 137
Connection: close
Error 502 – Bad Request
The server could not resolve your request for uri: http://123.123.123.123/
Connection closed by foreign host.
While on a regular Internet connection, you’ll find that the host 123.123.123.123 listening isn’t up on the Internet at all, and this same telnet request will time out.
On T-Mobile’s network, hoever, the proxy has answer all connection attempts even to hosts that aren’t actually listening on the Internet as in the case of our made up host on iP 123.123.123.123. In cases where the host is not listening, the proxy server needs to return an error to the client which is different from a connection failure giving away the presence of the hidden proxy server. In T-Mobile’s case, the HTTP error “502 Bad Gateway” is the give away; this is an HTTP status code reserved for web proxy servers.
This condition can also be detected with a web browser that shows the actual error codes (not Internet Explorer) by visiting a URL for the test IP. I find that Google Chrome is good for this. Try visiting this URL while tethering to see if you get the 502 Bad Gateway message in your browser:
http://123.123.123.123/
T-Mobile most likely deploys these transparent proxy servers to cache Internet content being requested by subscribers to optimize performance of their network. The logs from these servers could easily be analyzed to detect what browsers are in use by subscribers to detect if a desktop browser is being used via a tethered connection.
the 200 mb data plan is only $10 if you are on contract. It’s $15 if you are not on contract… that’s a rip-off when you consider that all of their previous plans have been $20-$40 cheaper if you WEREN’T on a contract!
T-Mobile staff is very confused on the pricing of the new plans.
But first, on the prior subject, bigendian is right . .. t-mobile can easily detect Tethering by content, browser, screen resolution, operating system all being logged on their proxy servers.
Re Pricing confusion at TM:
The T- Mobile Nov 1 Press release said there would be a limited time pricing of $10 for 200MB for existing customers with a 2 year contract extension. No one at T-Mobile seems to know about this and they try to tell you it is not availabe when you call in.
It took a customer service escalation 3 levels to get my plan converted to $10/month 200MB Data from Unlimited – with a 2 year extension.
In brief in order to get the $10.00 for 200MB they had to convert my family plan of 4 lines to to a “PROMO” that wasn’t on their internal computers until I escalated the issue 3 levels.
Its important to read-on . .
I did this with 2 Vibrants on a family plan. They tried to tell me the $10 for 200MB was for existing customers with G4 phones only. I argued the press release didn’t say that and how many existing G4 customers are there compared to G3?
It sort of sounds like the press release was a mistake because their internal system don’t have this promo.
They are trying to charge $15 for existing customers if you call in or not let you convert at all depending on your phone.
They had a lot of excuses saying the 200M plan wasn’t available at any price for the Vibrant because it was “too advanced of a phone” even though we only use about 100M per month because we are always on WiFi.
Bottom line, if you have trouble getting 200MB for $10.00 you have to ask for the Promo. But remember the press release said this price would be for limited time for existing customers . . so who knows how long limited is.
Regarding the T-Mobile proxy servers bigendian wrote about. If you perform a “connect” port scan using common ports to 123.123.123.123 or any other IP with nothing on it, The T-Mobile proxy servers answer on TCP ports 21,25,80,143,443 and 8080. This suggest that you could use other applications without the traffic being logged at the application level. The only question about T-Mobile Tethering Detection is . . . do they have a reporting system to correlate the proxy logs to your cell account ?