If you’re not one of the thousands and thousands of world citizens that have subscribed to the idea that you need a smartphone to function normally in society, you undoubtedly have you reasons. Cost is of course prohibitive, and some people just don’t see the need (weird!), but I’d wager to guess one of the most giant reasons people do not seek to further their understanding of this new handheld device world is the fact that they’re confused about data costs. Verizon today seeks to change your mind with an easy-to-read fact sheet.
What this fact sheet appears to be is a response to last year’s FCC fiasco for Verizon in which they were investigated on “mystery fees” billed to 15 million users of their services. Verizon’s sheet (pictured above and below) is being sent out to subscribers who use their “pay as you go” data plans. One side of the sheet is title “Understanding your Data Charges” and shows all the ways a user can get charged for data usage, including downloading apps, mobile web surfing, using apps that regularly update themselves or your info, browsing online application stores, and more. It also shows the maniacal price of Verizon’s pay as you go plan ($1.99 per megabyte) and shows its tools for tracking said data usage.
The other side of the sheet lists 15 Verizon apps often/always installed on Verizon-purchased smartphones including V Cast Music, which has no charges outside of its SONG ID feature, and Verizon’s ESPN MVP app and VZ Navigator GPS app that don’t use bandwidth for use but do for upgrades. Email, in contrast, uses data no matter what you’re doing with it.
This move comes right on top of AT&T receiving a heavy charge insinuating it’s been overcharging for iPhone and iPad data. Verizon spokeswoman Debi Lewis told Forbes today that these sheets did indeed find themselves born out of the “mystery fees” case last year, the case resulting in Verizon singing a consent decree noting how transparent they had to be in the future.
These sheets, in combination with free text message updates on data usage as well as a dedicated section inside it’s user homepage “My Verizon,” are meant to deter themselves from ever making as costly a mistake as was made last year. The case with the FCC last year cost Verizon a $25 million dollar fine as well as a $52.8 million dollar refund to customers.
Is this sheet, that site, and the text messages enough? Or is Verizon (and not to mention every other carrier with smartphones) bound to repeat a history of pain?* *History of Pain would be an amazing name for Slayer’s next album. You hear me Slayer?!
Click the thumbnail in the gallery below to see the Verizon sheet larger.
A new federal class action lawsuit alleges that “AT&T’s bills systematically overstate the amount of data used on each data transaction involving an iPhone or iPad account.” The legal document submitted on behalf of plaintiff Patrick Hendricks, goes on to say that AT&T’s scheme is similar to a rigged gas pump that “charges for a full gallon when it pumps only nine-tenth of a gallon into your car’s tank.”
A two month study done by a consulting firm hired by the plaintiff ‘s lawyer discovered that web traffic was typically overstated by 7 to 14 percent and potentially in excess of 300 percent. For instance, if an iPhone user downloaded 50KB of web data that AT&T would bill that as 53.5KB and potentially as high as 150KB.
The suit also alleges that AT&T not only over bills but bills customers even when they aren’t using data. The consulting firm purchased an iPhone from an AT&T store and left it inactive for 10 days—no push notifications, locations services, email accounts or apps—and the account still received a billing for 2,292KB of data spread over 35 transactions.
AT&T has just responded with the following: “Transparent and accurate billing is a top priority for AT&T. In fact, we’ve created tools that let our customers check their voice and data usage at any time during their billing cycle to help eliminate bill surprises. We have only recently learned of the complaint, but I can tell you that we intend to defend ourselves vigorously.”
AT&T subscribers, it’s time to finally get a taste of Android on HSPA+. Well, almost. On February 13th the HTC Inspire 4G will release, bringing not-quite-4G speeds and Android 2.2 for a quite affordable $99.99. It’ll feature AT&T’s Mobile Hotspot service, so you can share that bandwidth, while offering a generous 4.3-inch WVGA display up front and an eight megapixel camera on the back, all packaged in a “premium” unibody aluminum design. We know, it’s all very exciting, but don’t get so enamored that you forget to make reservations for you and your special someone on the following day.
AT&T has confirmed pricing and availability for the HTC Inspire 4G, announced back at CES 2011, which is now expected to hit shelves on February 13 2011. Priced at $99.99 with a new, two-year agreement, the Inspire 4G has a 4.3-inch touchscreen, runs Android 2.2 Froyo with HTC Sense and has access to AT&T’s HSPA+ 4G network.
It’s also the first smartphone on AT&T to run the carrier’s mobile hotspot application, sharing the 4G connection out with WiFi-connected clients. As we’ve heard before, AT&T says the Inspire 4G will be the first of “more than 20 4G devices” launching in 2011.
There’s also an 8-megapixel camera with HD video recording, Dolby Mobile and SRS WOW HD surround sound, and access to the HTCSense.com management site. AT&T Mobile Hotspot will require a DataPro Tethering Plan.
Press Release:
HTC Inspire 4G Arrives for AT&T Customers on Feb. 13
AT&T 4G Smartphone is the First of Many Planned for the Nation’s Fastest Mobile Broadband Network
Key Facts
AT&T* will begin selling the HTC Inspire™ 4G on Feb. 13.
The first 4G mobile phone offered by AT&T, the HTC Inspire 4G is the first to run the Android 2.2 platform and AT&T Mobile Hotspot application.
The 4.3-inch super LCD display on the HTC Inspire 4G will be the largest in the AT&T portfolio, and the first to offer the next-generation HTC Sense experience.
HTC Inspire 4G will cost $99.99 after a two-year agreement beginning Feb. 13 in company owned retail stores and online at www.wireless.att.com.
4G Portfolio
AT&T is the leader in smartphones and expects to widen that lead in 2011. In January, AT&T committed to an industry-leading Android portfolio in the U.S. in 2011 and said it plans to offer two 4G smartphones in the first quarter. The HTC Inspire 4G is the first of more than 20 4G devices AT&T plans to deliver in 2011. AT&T has completed the deployment of HSPA+ to virtually 100 percent of its mobile broadband network, which enables 4G speeds when combined with Ethernet or fiber backhaul.
HTC Inspire™ 4G
The HTC Inspire™ 4G will be the first 4G smartphone in AT&T stores and will have the largest screen of any AT&T smartphone, with a 4.3-inch super LCD display, and will offer an 8-megapixel camera with HD video recording. Running on the Android 2.2 platform, the HTC Inspire 4G will be the first smartphone in the U.S. to feature the next-generation HTC Sense™ experience with cloud services. The HTC Inspire 4G will also be the first to introduce AT&T Mobile Hotspot service built into the smartphone, allowing users to connect additional Wi-Fi-enabled devices.
Exclusively available to AT&T customers for $99.99 after a two-year agreement, the HTC Inspire 4G will include a 1 GHz processor, Dolby® Mobile and SRS WOW HD sound, and a premium, aluminum unibody design. HTC Inspire 4G comes preloaded with a Blockbuster and eReader application to keep users entertained on the go. For more information, visit www.att.com/inspire4G.
With the next-generation of HTC Sense, the HTC Inspire 4G offers even more ways to stay connected, including FriendStream™, which delivers Facebook, Twitter and Flickr updates in a consolidated view. The HTC Inspire 4G also offers customers the ability to pinpoint the location of a lost phone on a map and send a command to make the phone sound an alert – even while on “silent” mode – through the htcsense.com website. If needed, owners can also remotely wipe all of the phone’s data with a single command in addition to forwarding calls and text messages to a different number.
Quotes
“We are kicking off an exciting year for AT&T’s smartphone portfolio, and leading off with our first 4G phone,” said Jeff Bradley, senior vice president, Devices, AT&T Mobility and Consumer Markets. “With its iconic design, 4G speeds and awesome features, Inspire 4G is going to attract new customers and please existing AT&T subscribers.”
“With a 4.3 inch screen, latest version of the HTC Sense experience and a sleek unibody aluminum design, the HTC Inspire 4G is the first true superphone to launch at under $100, bringing unparalleled power to more people than ever before,” said Jason Mackenzie, president of HTC Americas.
1 Mobile broadband coverage is not available in all areas. 4G speeds delivered by HSPA+ with enhanced backhaul. Will be available in limited areas. Availability increasing with ongoing backhaul deployment. Learn more at att.com/network.
2 Limited time offer. Two-year contract required. Qualified customers only. Early Termination Fee up to $325. HTC Inspire 4G requires a minimum data service starting at $15/mo.
3 Mobile Hotspots requires a DataPro Tethering Plan. Devices connected to your Mobile Hotspot use data from your DataPro Tethering Plan. DataPro Tethering Plans are not unlimited and significant charges may be incurred if the included data allowance is exceeded. Performance may vary depending on the number of devices connected and other factors.
*AT&T products and services are provided or offered by subsidiaries and affiliates of AT&T Inc. under the AT&T brand and not by AT&T Inc.
Ambitious news out of AT&T, with a leaked slide suggesting that the carrier plans to release a full 12 new Android devices in 2011. That’s not all, though; the slide – passed to Phandroid – confirms that AT&T expects not just two exclusive 4G devices in Q1 2011, but to have a range of twenty to choose from by the end of the year.
One of the devices sitting in both those categories will be the Motorola ATRIX 4G, the touchscreen smartphone announced at CES 2011 and which has an optional dock for using it as a notebook replacement. There’s also the HTC Inspire 4G; both devices are expected to arrive before the end of the first quarter.
The remainder of the devices are yet to be announced, but we’re hoping there’s at least one Windows Phone 7 device among the line-up, and we wouldn’t argue with an LTE webOS smartphone either. Of course, “devices” can also include tablets, so it’s not just handsets on the cards here either.
Welcome to this week’s edition of the SlashGear Week in Review! If you are a PC hardware geek an AMD spokesman causally showed off an unannounced video card on Monday called the HD 6990. The card has dual GPUs and should be very fast. We heard a bit of early detail on the PSP2 from Nikkei that claimed the new portable would have an OLED touchscreen, 3G and a new CPU. That would make for a very impressive portable indeed.
NVIDIA will be sampling its new Tegra 3 T30/AP30 mobile quad core processors by the end of 2011. These things will bring a whole new breed of portable devices and more with loads of power. One of the coolest DIY projects I saw last week was the pedal-powered snowplow that a guy built. He used a couple old bikes and some wood to build the plow that appears to work pretty well.
The 10 billionth app was downloaded last weekend and Apple called the person who made the download to give the $10k gift card price that was offered. The catch was that the winner hung up on them. Luckily for her an Apple rep called again and she ended up with her gift. Samsung conducted a strange experiment early in the week where they launched a bunch of paper airplanes in space. They launched 200 paper planes from 36,500 meters above Berlin and each plane had a card with a text message that the folks who found it could enter online for others to read.
The Verizon iPhone 4 will cost the off-contract user $50 more on Verizon that it does on AT&T. The upside is that that extra $50 should let you talk without your call dropping if you hold your face wrong. The Acer Aspire One E100 Android netbook turned up this week and the thing dual boots Android and Windows. The netbook has a 10.1-inchscreen and is your basic netbook.
Notion Ink issued an update for the Adam tablet that was bricking some of the tablets that installed the update. The update was later pulled and only a few users were affected. It was confirmed this week that Verizon will offer a $30 unlimited data plan for the iPhone 4. The catch is that it’s a limited time offer and will go back to the normal tiered plan after a while.
NVIDIA unveiled a new video card this week called the GeForce GTX 560 Ti. The card promises to be 46% faster than the Radeon HD 6950 that is already on the market and the new GTX 560 Ti sells for about $250. Ben Heck took a flashlight with a crank, a USB charger, and some geek mojo to create a cool kinetic charger. The charger puts power into the battery of your phone as you turn the crank.
The tiny Compulab Trim Slice nettop turned up this week with Tegra 2 inside for desktop PC use. This thing would make a really good HTPC; it looks more like a memory card reader than a computer to me. Details on several new Samsung smartphones turned up this week including the Samsung Galaxy Ace, Fit, Gio, and Mini. The Ace is the coolest of them all with a 3.5-inch screen, 800MHz processor and more.
The HTC Facebook phone that we keep hearing about has been tipped to land at MWC next month. The phone will reportedly use the Facebook color scheme, branding, and push the Facebook news feed. An awesome 12-foot long DIY LED matrix display turned up mid-week. The thing is really cool and uses 512 blue LEDs to show your text message.
A Verizon BlackBerry outage rolled on mid-week and to start with the blame was placed on an update by Verizon. Apparently the outage spanned a number of states and users that were affected only received email in batches an hour or so apart. The Sony Xperia Play was the subject of a pre-release preview video this week. This is the PlayStation phone and the thing looks really cool.
Thursday the Sony PlayStation Suite and PS Store for Android devices landed. The store is for Android 2.3 and up devices and has a lot of cool games for mobile gamers to download and enjoy. The Sony NGP “Next Generation Portable” went official this week. The device is the PSP2 we have been hearing about for a while and has an ARM Cortex A9 processor, 5-inch OLED screen, and a lot more. This should be one seriously cool portable game console.
A “secret” AT&T unlimited data plan is available to keep iPhone users from migrating to Verizon. One user is claiming that when he called AT&T and threatened to go to Verizon they moved him to an unlimited data plan. Hulu is reportedly in talks within the video streaming site to change from a free offering that it is right now to a virtual cable operator where we would all have to pay to use the streaming service.
Scosche shipped its new version of the flipSYNC called the flipSYNC II this week. It is available for USB charging devices and Apple gear for about $20 and the new version has a larger USB plug. The dorkiest iPad accessory ever turned up late in the week called the Assero Defender. It’s like one of those reverse backpacks parents use to carry babies, but the Defender is for your iPad.
Details for pre-orders of the Verizon iPhone 4 were offered Thursday. Verizon is going for AT&T’s throat and is offering some big discounts if you trade in an AT&T iPhone. A 16GB iPhone 4 from AT&T will get you $280 off your Verizon iPhone. Thursday we heard that the Sony NGP console would come in both 3G and WiFi only versions. That is good news since many people have no desire for 3G if they will only use it in the house.
The FCC posted up the teardown pics of the Notion Ink Adam Friday. The Adam the FCC had used what appear to be handmade connections leading some to wonder about build quality. We know the specs on the Sony NPG, but we still don’t know the price. Some speculation has been that the console might cost around $600. Sony has said the NGP won’t be $599, but still hasn’t offered pricing yet.
Microsoft is reportedly working towards 16-core Atom processors. The 16-core Atom would apparently be an alternative to traditional CPUs inside servers. Thanks for reading this week’s edition, see you next time!
Oh Verizon, you guys so crazy. They’ve got splash screen after splash screen up on their iPhone site saying that Existing Customers will be allowed to ram their buttons down at exactly 3 AM EST on the third of February, 2011. The site will crash at that moment, and everyone will cry.
To see if you can find the images you see above and below this paragraph, head over to Verizon and do some soul searching. Be sure to sign up for updates, click around the site for hours, and sell your soul, because you’re gonna need the cash. The iPhone will cost you ladies and gentlemen $199 for 16GB and $299 for 32GB models, the data and talk plans starting at $70 total for 450 minutes and unlimited data. If you’d like to also be able to tether your laptop to your phone’s internet, you’ll be paying another $20 a month. Is it worth it?
Verizon and AT&T can’t seem to stop fighting. They’ve fought over ads pretty extensively in the recent past. And the upcoming Verizon iPhone isn’t going to smooth any feathers. Instead, the two are gearing up for another public shouting match. AT&T’s 2010 numbers have lead some blogs to speculate that the carrier now beats Verizon.
Apparently, both companies count “subscribers” differently. AT&T considers every connected mobile device on their network to be a subscriber. That includes e-readers with dedicated market connections, iPad users, etc.
By contrast, Verizon counts each rate plan as a subscriber. They file everything else in the “other connections” category. If you add that in to Verizon’s subscriber total, they again beat AT&T. Which is probably why the latter didn’t exactly make a huge fuss out of “beating” their biggest rival.
This whole mess may have been a ploy by AT&T to get the tech blogs and news sites to advertise for them. Rather than calling themselves the biggest in an ad and immediately facing a lawsuit, AT&T goes with the subtle route and trusts word-of-mouth to spread the message.
Well two can play at that game. Verizon has just “leaked” a slide that reveals their total subscriber number: 102.2 million, nearly 7 million ahead of AT&T. Big Red also showed off their postpaid net adds for Q4, 872,000. Which is more than twice what AT&T managed.
The ball is in AT&T’s court now. Will they back down, or will iPhone madness lead these two titans into yet another multi-billion dollar slugging match?
It’s taken AT&T long enough to push a MiFi mobile hotspot out of the door, but finally the AT&T Novatel Wireless MiFi 2372 is available. As with the original MiFi units, the premise is straightforward: take one 3G connection and share it between a number of WiFi devices. Still, with 4G mobile hotspots on the market, and many smartphones offering integrated hotspot functionality, is the AT&T MiFi 2372 too late? Check out the full SlashGear review after the cut.
Hardware
There’s not a huge amount of difference between the MiFi 2372 and the original GSM MiFi 2352 we reviewed a couple of years ago. Inside the small, glossy box – 2.44 x 3.86 x 0.60 inches and 2.86 oz – is a UMTS/HSPA modem good for up to 7.2Mbps downlinks and 5.76Mbps uplinks on AT&T’s 3G network, together with a WiFi b/g router that shares out that connection between up to five other devices. That might be an iPad, a notebook, a portable games console or even a phone; basically, as long as your gadget has WiFi it should be able to get online via the MiFi.
Unlike the original CDMA MiFi units, the AT&T version also gets GPS functionality and a microSDHC card slot, the contents of which can be accessed by any of the WiFi-connected clients. It basically turns the hotspot into a tiny, portable NAS. Finally, there’s a rechargeable, replaceable 1,500 mAh battery, which AT&T reckon is good for up to 4hrs use, and a microUSB port to recharge it.
Software
While many of the mobile hotspots we’ve seen of late have included small displays to show network, battery and device status, the MiFi 2372 falls short of that complexity. Instead, the power button changes color to indicate connectivity and battery status; green, for instance, means it can only connect at GRPS or EDGE speeds, while blue or violet mean UMTS or HSPA is available. A second LED shows WiFi status.
To make up for that shortcoming, there’s an AT&T-branded landing page hosted by the MiFi itself, and accessible by visiting http://att.mifi on a WiFi-connected device (the default SSID and network key are printed on a label on the underside of the unit). The default “guest” page shows battery, network and GPS status, along with customizable widgets for things like weather forecasts (based on GPS position or your choice of location) and a geographic search with Google Maps powered data.
Log into the admin area and there are more widgets and access to the MiFi’s settings – things like changing the admin password, SSID, encryption (up to WPA2) and the like – together with the ability to send and receive SMS messages. It’s a definite advance over the somewhat basic UI of the original MiFi units, though we’d like to see Novatel Wireless and AT&T expand the number of widgets on offer there’s a third-party SDK available, but so far take-up has proved underwhelming from a consumer perspective.
Performance
The exact speeds you’ll see with the MiFi 2372 will of course depend on the strength of AT&T’s network wherever you are, but we can’t really fault the Novatel hardware. Though it would be useful if it supported HSPA+ for 14.4Mbps and above, AT&T’s service at those speeds is still patchy at best. We observed download speeds ranging from 3-6 Mbps on average, while upload speeds came in at 2.5-4 Mbps.
Battery life, meanwhile, will depend in part on 3G signal strength, as well as reducing the more WiFi clients are connected. AT&T’s 4hr estimate is based on sharing the MiFi’s connection with a single device; in that situation, with 4-5 bars of service shown in the status page, we generally managed 3.5-4hrs of use before the MiFi expired. In a perhaps more realistic test with two or more clients using the connection, we were more likely to see 3hrs.
As we’ve notice on other MiFi units, the 2372 did show a tendency to reset itself – kicking us off the network in the process – if it got hot, usually a side-effect of simultaneously charging and using the MiFi at once. Leaving it to cool down for a few minutes fixed the problem.
Pricing
AT&T offer two ways of picking up the MiFi 2372, either on a new, two-year agreement at $49.99, or without a contract for $299.99. Either way, data plans are $35 for 200MB or $60 for 5GB, with each extra MB costing $0.10. There’s a dashboard widget which will keep a running total of how much data you’ve used.
The 200MB plan is likely to be insufficient for most users, which leaves the $60 5GB as the probable choice. In contrast, AT&T offers smartphone users 2GB of data for on-device and tethering use for $45 per month, with each additional 1GB priced at $10. Use your iPhone 4 or Android device as a mobile hotspot, then, and it would cost you $75 for the same 5GB (on top of your regular voice plan).
Wrap-Up
There’s no denying that a mobile hotspot is more useful on the move than a USB modem, with greater flexibility on what devices can take advantage of the connection. However, AT&T’s data fees do mean that it can work out as an expensive way to get online; it’s worth doing some basic calculations to see whether 3G-enabled versions of devices (like the iPad WiFi + 3G) will work out cheaper. We’d also recommend stumping for the off-contract MiFi, which while more expensive upfront does at least mean you can choose to cancel service the months you don’t need it.
The absence of HSPA+ support and sub-4hr battery life are the key flaws of the MiFi 2372, but they’re not unusual among mobile hotspots. The bigger challenge will be 4G hotspots, though you’d obviously need to live or work in an area served by 4G coverage to make the most of them, and battery life can be worse than for their 3G counterparts. A boosted battery would go a long way to improving the MiFI 2372, but the surprisingly useful microSDHC sharing and widget dashboard do mark it out among the competition. Just make sure you’ve worked out the numbers first to see if AT&T’s plans do offer the best package for your needs.
Never would we have guessed that third-party wireless retailers would be aiming to launch AT&T’s powerhouse Atrix 4G for just $150 on contract — $200 or $250, sure, but not $150. Alas, just a few hours after AmazonWireless’ peep show, we’re seeing an alleged leaked screen shot of Costco’s inventory system showing the same blockbuster price. Now, bear in mind that AT&T itself will probably sell the phone for at least $50 more — third parties usually have a second ETF on top of the carrier’s that allows them to subsidize a little more heavily — but it’s a good sign regardless.
