Live data from Hacker News

Apple SIM

apple.com

111–120 of 185 posts

Re: Apple SIM

#111
post #106
post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my travels in the EU, I've never had to even lift a finger. It all worked smoothly and reliable. When I stepped off the plane on the other side I got a text letting me know I was in roaming mode and could talk/use data from my current plan. When I returned I got a text saying "welcome back, I hope you had a good trip". Oh, and this is not a premium plan or anything. I pay 7.9EUR for unlimited calls and texts, and…

Within the EU, yea. The amazing thing about Fi is that it operates the same in pretty much any country with a stable government.

Three in the UK do the same thing and operate in 71 countries so far, however I get 13 GB of data instead of the unlimited. EE and O2 apparently offer similar deals.

Re: Apple SIM

#112
post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my travels in the EU, I've never had to even lift a finger. It all worked smoothly and reliable. When I stepped off the plane on the other side I got a text letting me know I was in roaming mode and could talk/use data from my current plan. When I returned I got a text saying "welcome back, I hope you had a good trip". Oh, and this is not a premium plan or anything. I pay 7.9EUR for unlimited calls and texts, and…

The more i learn about US telecom, the more i wonder how the hell they managed to invent both the landline and mobile phone. Their infrastructure sounds like a balkanized mess...

Not really a fair assessment. The 4 larger mobile providers are spilt between GSM and CDMA in the past CDMA phones wouldn’t work abroad, except maybe China. You would even have to buy a CDMA version of the iPhone. The big 4 just buy up all competitors and usually one tries to buy one of the others.

Geographically the US is much more expansive than the EU and more robust.

I would not compare infrastructure I would compare the regulations. The telcos created the tech and most likely the laws.

Re: Apple SIM

#114
post #56

This isn’t new and it’s fairly expensive compared to Google Fi or T-Mobile. Might be worth it for customers in some countries but US users have much better choices for roaming internationally.

Where did you find pricing information? Google Fi is already outrageously expensive for data at $10/GB

Fi recently announced some changes for large data users: https://www.engadget.com/2018/01/17/google-project-fi-bill-p...

Basically it caps off at $60 after 6GB, is free up to 15GB, and then throttles.

That's pretty great pricing especially considering it works anywhere in the world.

Disclaimer: I am a Google employee, Fi customer outside of work, don't work on Fi.

Re: Apple SIM

#115
post #85
post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know many thinkpads have an empty bay with a minipci connector that you can put modems in which do just that. I don't know why things like that aren't popular, I guess it looks "ugly?"

Because a tiny portion of people would use it. Who wants to pay an extra monthly cost on their machine? The only people who would really do this are ones where it is covered by work.

Do you mean the monthly cost of the data? I would totally do this, it's a few dollars to add on to my verizon plan, and something I already pay for for my hotspot.

Re: Apple SIM

#116
post #114
post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where did you find pricing information? Google Fi is already outrageously expensive for data at $10/GB

Fi recently announced some changes for large data users: https://www.engadget.com/2018/01/17/google-project-fi-bill-p... Basically it caps off at $60 after 6GB, is free up to 15GB, and then throttles. That's pretty great pricing especially considering it works anywhere in the world. Disclaimer: I am a Google employee, Fi customer outside of work, don't work on Fi.

Yeah that definitely kept me around for a few extra months. Even with the limit though, a total bill of $80 stung pretty bad when $40 unlimited options were available from other carriers that include international (north american) coverage.

I guess when I signed up for Fi I imagined myself travelling more outside of North America.

Re: Apple SIM

#117
post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my travels in the EU, I've never had to even lift a finger. It all worked smoothly and reliable. When I stepped off the plane on the other side I got a text letting me know I was in roaming mode and could talk/use data from my current plan. When I returned I got a text saying "welcome back, I hope you had a good trip". Oh, and this is not a premium plan or anything. I pay 7.9EUR for unlimited calls and texts, and…

The more i learn about US telecom, the more i wonder how the hell they managed to invent both the landline and mobile phone. Their infrastructure sounds like a balkanized mess...

First telephone was invented by an Italian (Antonio Meucci).

Probably the best landline system was/is in Germany. The ISDN was a complete digital system beginning from the 80s, having features that are not present in current mobile technologies. Calling was almost instant, probably only matched with VoLTE or SIP in local networks. Deutsche Telekom tried very hard to adapt most of the ISDN features to SIP.

Re: Apple SIM

#118
post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fi's "included" roaming sounds great, until you realize how pathetically expensive even their domestic prices are. Fi's base price[0] is $20/mo + tax. Hallon (my current provider) will sell you 8GB/mo of data for $18/mo, tax included.[1] With Fi that would cost you.. $80/mo + tax. Hallon doesn't actually have anything comparable to that, price-wise; their most expensive plan is 100GB/mo at ~$40. And no, population de…

As a digital nomad with Fi, its roaming and service is amazing. What you are complaining about is the US Cell market, which is awful and has horrible prices compared to the rest of the world. I usually buy a local sim card for data because it's usually cheaper than Fi per GB. However, I pick a different carrier than what I can access through Fi so I have more reliable access for work (and can use both using Speedify)…

Same here! If I'm only in a country for a couple of weeks, I'll just stick with Fi. If I'm there longer I'll pick up a local sim as it's usually way cheaper.

Do you find you need to use Speedify and tether often?

Re: Apple SIM

#119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I believe the above commenter talks about the ease/pricing of Fi as much as the experience. I'm using Fi on my iPhone (and have for a while) - and it works worldwide for $10 / 1Gb. It's actually downright magical compared to other offers (even the Apple SIM powered ones).

$10 buys you unlimited LTE in like half europe. If you can actually get these plans using Apple SIM - it’d be order of magnitude cheaper.

I ended up using a reseller in Australia to get an "EE" SIM for an upcoming trip - feeling like I've been ripped off here as I paid significantly more than $10

Most of the prepaid SIMs I saw had heavy restrictions on tethering - can you point me in the right direction?

Re: Apple SIM

#120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

... available to american customers. Wake me up when it's the other way around :/

If you're in the Netherlands, KPN offers a 100GB EU+US plan, and T-Mobile offers a Unlimited NL + 10GB EU+US plan (although you should boycott T-Mobile [1]). It's not quite the entire world, but it might be useful if you travel to the US often. [1] https://www.bof.nl/press/t-mobile-allowed-to-keep-violating-...

Is there any way I could get a decent KPN SIM prepaid while travelling (I'm not a resident)?
Post reply on HN