Illegal to Jailbreak a phone?

[Waraji]

Someone do quick math on the +/- of buying standalone unlocked phone on month to month no contract payments vs. subsidized phone on a 2 year contract. I would except I don't know what a typical monthly bill for 2 year contract looks like.

Edit: You pay approximately 30%(+/-5) more for a 2 year contract than you would for monthly payments on a non-contract service. Not including overage charges for talk/data. Sucks to be with a contract... It "looks" to make sense on a contract to contract basis, but extend that for the life of a person paying contract to contract and it gets expensive. Part of the appeal I guess is the ability to get a whole brand new subsidized phone after your contract is up. Still from a frugal consumer point of view, its pretty terrible.

[AoE]

I know for verizon, my montly bill is like $80 and that's with a 20ish percent discount.

[Waraji]

Yeah, I calculated for an iPhone 5, $90/month plus $200(+7%) for 2 year contract VS. iPhone 5 retail $829(+7%) at $40/month for 2 years. Which comes out to 29% difference. Add in Overage charges, taxes on the monthly payments, w/e other bullshit they decide to charge you that month, etc. 30%.

On a lighter note, seems more carriers are moving forward with un-subsidized phones with no contract agreements, although I suspect they might wanna get you with the same scheme of charging you for extra stuff you might use.

I also didn't take into account the option of using the retail unlocked phone past the 2 year threshold, which would put cost savings at... w/e. But there's that whole argument of consumerism and buying into new technologies. I'm fine for now using my 3GS still on Simple Mobile unlimited for $40, as much as I want to upgrade to Android.

*Fixed prices.

[Ddz]

Just fulfilled the contract on my iPhone 4 with AT&T. They unlocked it for me via their web form request. Sold it for $200 to a coworker, upgraded to iPhone 5 for $200 (free, basically). Woot. So are companies no longer allowing unlocks after contracts are fulfilled, or is it only while the phone is still under contract? If it's the latter, too bad...you should pay fees for not fulfilling something you signed up for.

[Salodin]

Since when were plans cheaper off contract? Thats news to me.

[Waraji]

I've had my Simple Mobile(bouncing off T-Mobile lines) service running for over 2 years. They had 3 tier plans of 40/50/60 each adding more speed to your unlimited data connectivity. Now it seems they have different structured plans with different speeds.


Only drawback is you need to have your own Unlocked GSM phone.

[Kerberoz]

Since when were plans cheaper off contract? Thats news to me.

(downside = extremely limited phone selection)

[Salodin]

Those services that piggy back other carriers though, is the quality the same? Are speed and coverage the same?

When we say its cheaper with out a contract, i was assuming were saying the big carriers are offering the same contract plans at a lower, out of contract price. So far I feel like were comparing apples to oranges here.

[archibaldcrane]

Tmobile, Att and Verizon at least have monthly no-contract plans. You just have to read what you're paying for. The piggyback services should be the exact same quality, but again read what you're paying for.

[Salodin]

I had verizon out of contract for a few months waiting to get a good deal on a s3, and the price was exactly the same as contract price. Now im on att, with employer discount. Id love to pay 25bucks a month for service, but not if it drops as many calls as att is dropping now for me (not a lot but enough times to notice it and get ever so slightly grumpy over it).

[archibaldcrane]

If you only care about 3G, look at Page Plus cellular. Verizon network (3g/Edge).

[Acevalefor]

I have verizon with 3 phones on the plan. the no-contract plan they offer for my area ends up being $10/mo more than I am paying in contract. I also purchased all my phones privately so I am getting screwed with the contract anyway. I have accepted this and my employer pays half the bill for me, so I don't feel so violated...