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My son's cell phone broke and we only have about 8 months to go on our current plan. Cingular (ATT) said that a new one would cost $150.
A friend said that I could buy an inexpensive prepaid phone and just switch out the sim chips. Has anyone tried this? I need to get him one for his birthday this week, but want to spend under $50.
My son's cell phone broke and we only have about 8 months to go on our current plan. Cingular (ATT) said that a new one would cost $150.
A friend said that I could buy an inexpensive prepaid phone and just switch out the sim chips. Has anyone tried this? I need to get him one for his birthday this week, but want to spend under $50.
As long as it's an unlocked, multi-band GSM phone, I see no reason you shouldn't be able to do this. You just need to make sure that the phone operates along the same band as ATT. I think it's 1900 megahertz, but anyone here should correct me if I'm wrong. Acutallly I think 1900 is the PCS band...
Geek talk aside, make sure the phone is unlocked and operates on a GSM network before you buy. Also mobile phones are very expensive devices. We pay less for them here in the U.S than other countries because our cellular companies lock you into expensive 2 year contracts.
My son's cell phone broke and we only have about 8 months to go on our current plan. Cingular (ATT) said that a new one would cost $150.
A friend said that I could buy an inexpensive prepaid phone and just switch out the sim chips. Has anyone tried this? I need to get him one for his birthday this week, but want to spend under $50.
Yes, we did this before for my hubby. You can just go to Walmart and get one of the Cingular prepaid cells and put your sim in it...it will work fine! Usually, those phones aren't the greatest though. I would actually suggest going onto Ebay and finding a used older Nokia (Nokia 6010 is a very good phone!)...they are the BEST phones and you can get them for around the price you're looking for. They don't have all the music and camera perks, but you're not going to get that with the prepaid ones either.
Here's a couple of them on ebay...Btw, Tmobile will work for Cingular as well.
NOKIA 6010 CELL PHONE GSM TMOBILE - (eBay item 130177581672 end time Nov-25-07 19:05:00 PST) (broken link)
NOKIA 6010 Cell Phone UNLOCKED Cingular T-Mobile AT&T - (eBay item 130173550955 end time Nov-25-07 19:27:19 PST) (broken link)
Nokia 6010 GSM Unlocked Cell Phone for Cingular AT&T - (eBay item 320187576507 end time Nov-26-07 11:16:11 PST) (broken link)
Last edited by kawgpz550; 11-25-2007 at 07:56 PM..
Reason: spelling
Wow, I was thinking about that phone as I wrote that post as a phone to stay away from. I had three of those phones. They just didn't work. One didn't know how to stay on during a call (just randomly shutting off), the other never recognized the sim card (just randomly ending calls), and when the third one did BOTH, I threw it out the window. LOL. Just my luck I guess, because I am usually very gentle with my stuff and things tend to last me a long time.
Wow, I was thinking about that phone as I wrote that post as a phone to stay away from. I had three of those phones. They just didn't work. One didn't know how to stay on during a call (just randomly shutting off), the other never recognized the sim card (just randomly ending calls), and when the third one did BOTH, I threw it out the window. LOL. Just my luck I guess, because I am usually very gentle with my stuff and things tend to last me a long time.
That figures . We never had problems with those phones. My husband even dropped his in the toilet and it still worked without a problem...lol.
I know there is nothing like those old Nokias. They just don't make em like that anymore.
The Nokia 6010's we bought were great phones for our family. Then we upgraded (if that's what you want to call it ) to one of the Motorola camera phones...those were the worst phones we ever had. All 4 were trash in less than 6 months.
I guess everyone has different luck. Too bad you had such bad luck with yours, they really are strong and durable phones with great call quality.
Also, I should have added this earlier...make sure you go to this site and check the editor and ESPECIALLY the USER ratings on any phone you get...it really helps to make a good decision. Just type the phone model you're interested in at the top. Cell phones: Cell phone reviews, Mobile phone reviews, Wireless phones - CNET
We were in the AT&T store when a lady came in with the same problem. The same thing was suggested...take the sim card and either put it in a prepaid phone from WalMart, etc or hit ebay. Any phone that works with AT&T/Cingular will work just fine.
Unlocked is NOT an issue with AT&T/Cingular (I raised that issue in the store that day). Apparently that is a Verizon problem. Liz
We were in the AT&T store when a lady came in with the same problem. The same thing was suggested...take the sim card and either put it in a prepaid phone from WalMart, etc or hit ebay. Any phone that works with AT&T/Cingular will work just fine.
Unlocked is NOT an issue with AT&T/Cingular (I raised that issue in the store that day). Apparently that is a Verizon problem. Liz
Yes, any phone that is GSM will work. It has to be a phone that requires a sim card. Verizon and Sprint are NOT compatible with Cingular/Att. However, Tmobile is.
I have a friend that is BAD about loosing his phones or having them stolen. He went and bought a prepaid phone, had a friend go with him to the Cingular store and he told them that friend was loaning him a phone and needed his number switched to that phone and they did it without batting a eye...
However when he called them just before that, and asked them if he could do that, they told him NO!
Yes definitely. My sister had to do that when a phone I gave her stopped working. She replaced the expensive contract phone with a pre-paid phone from the AT&T store. No problems and no perks. Who needs them anyway.
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. We never had problems with those phones. My husband even dropped his in the toilet and it still worked without a problem...lol.
) to one of the Motorola camera phones...those were the worst phones we ever had. All 4 were trash in less than 6 months. 
Just type the phone model you're interested in at the top. 
