If you're in Iowa --- iWireless prepaid $45

[webOpete]

Don't ask any of the IW representatives. They don't know $hit.
They keep saying yes they do have their own tower, not true. Yes, but not in IOWA. It's all from TMO.
When I asked about frequency, they have no idea. Specially the 611 peeps. "Oh they didn't teach us that"
I got most of my answer from internet and KB Wireless in Des Moines, also sell IW phone/plans.
Tho, Iowa is not listed yet in the refarming from TMO, but it did get upgrade to 1900mhz for ATT phone compatibilty, happy iphone user.
So now, most of ATT unlocked will work with IW/TMO cuz of the upgrade. I pop my sim in one of his used ATT phone and it works, i mean 3g/4g.
I just ordered me a chinese phone with 1900mhz ATT, also capable of 1700/2100 TMO/IW. Arrive tomorrow, we'll see how that perform to my tiny alcatel ot-918 with 3mBts speed.

 

[electrochoc]

Don't ask any of the IW representatives. They don't know $hit.
They keep saying yes they do have their own tower, not true. Yes, but not in IOWA. It's all from TMO.
When I asked about frequency, they have no idea. Specially the 611 peeps. "Oh they didn't teach us that"
I got most of my answer from internet and KB Wireless in Des Moines, also sell IW phone/plans.
Tho, Iowa is not listed yet in the refarming from TMO, but it did get upgrade to 1900mhz for ATT phone compatibilty, happy iphone user.
So now, most of ATT unlocked will work with IW/TMO cuz of the upgrade. I pop my sim in one of his used ATT phone and it works, i mean 3g/4g.
I just ordered me a chinese phone with 1900mhz ATT, also capable of 1700/2100 TMO/IW. Arrive tomorrow, we'll see how that perform to my tiny alcatel ot-918 with 3mBts speed.

Uh, all the coverage in Iowa is theirs. They just recently acquired the DSM area. They are owned almost half and half between T-Mobile and INS. Unfortunately they had a delay in CR with conflicting frequencies so it delayed the I wireless owned towers. If you live in a local area with a INS provider then it will not affect you. They are now projecting to be fully covered by Q2-Q3 2014.

 

[webOpete]

Update!!
Playing with my new 5.7 HD quadcore phone on iwireless. Everything seems to work great until my wife text'ed me picture(MMS) of the kids. It won't let me. So I tried to send one, nope, no go. #611 no help at all, they are just trained from a manual to give me the APN that's already in the sim. So today, i went to the office and have Antonio there mess with it and he couldn't figure it out. I'm still getting 3-4mb download speed but the bar doesn't say H+ nor 3G, only "R". So I thought it might be the phone. I took it to it's sister store TMOBILE, pop in his sim and MMS work test speed of 7mb. Went to ATT and woila! MMS also works. Both ATT and TMOBILE shows H+/3G above the bar.
This issue is minor enuff for me to stay with them. I can't find any no contract that is $45 with 3.5gb hi speed internet. Was going to try Straight Talk, but heard it throttle really bad even when you are not at your max.

 

[dscahfer82]

Have you thought about AIO wireless? I am looking at either AIO wireless or iwireless starting next month

 

[jschmidt96]

After having US Cellular for over a decade and tired of paying close to $80 bucks a month for 5gb of data. I decided I wanted to save some money. Since I usually use around 1gb a month. I decided I wanted no contract because they are so cheap compared to contract plans. And I usually buy a phone out of contract (used) about a year or so into the contract. So the cheaper phone when I sign a contract is a moot point. I was looking at iwireless and straight talk since they were cheap. And I can get whatever phone (gsm) I wanted.

For anyone in the Iowa City/Coralville/North Liberty area. I tried iwireless last month because of the $45 plan for 4g (HSPA). Coralville area 4g works good. North Liberty area where they state they have 4g, dies between Coralville and North Liberty on 965. And you only have edge which is extremely congested. I usually got around 30kbps for dl and ul. Which is unusable in my opinion.

I was going to try Straight Talk (at&t service) but they didn't state what there data actually was and didn't want to lose my phone number. They now show there data cap is 2.5gb for high speed. Then 2g speeds after that. But I decided to try Ting (sprint mvno). Since I'd be paying around 45 to 50 bucks a month. Phone service is good. Data speeds are okay (3g cdma speeds).

At&t shows they have hspa in North Liberty. Has anyone here used the service in North Liberty and wants to comment on it. Or say what they get for data speeds.

 

[mmtowns]

For anyone in the Iowa City/Coralville/North Liberty area. I tried iwireless last month because of the $45 plan for 4g (HSPA). Coralville area 4g works good. North Liberty area where they state they have 4g, dies between Coralville and North Liberty on 965. And you only have edge which is extremely congested. I usually got around 30kbps for dl and ul. Which is unusable in my opinion.

I was going to try Straight Talk (at&t service) but they didn't state what there data actually was and didn't want to lose my phone number. They now show there data cap is 2.5gb for high speed. Then 2g speeds after that. But I decided to try Ting (sprint mvno). Since I'd be paying around 45 to 50 bucks a month. Phone service is good. Data speeds are okay (3g cdma speeds).

At&t shows they have hspa in North Liberty. Has anyone here used the service in North Liberty and wants to comment on it. Or say what they get for data speeds.

I have been using Straight Talk (AT&T) for the past eight months. I get HSPA in the North Liberty area. I haven't ever used SpeedTest in the area to find out, but it's pretty workable from my perspective.

 

[redleader36]

I've had one phone on iWireless for about a week now and made a few trips around Iowa. I can say their data coverage is pretty poor with the green data spots on their maps meaning Edge. I do have great HSPA+ signal around Mason City, but it's all over once I leave this bubble. I have never successfully registered on an AT&T tower either. I have no speed tests because every time I try to run one (Sensorly), I get unregistered from the network for tethering.

I am not expecting Verizon's coverage, but I do want Google Maps to work in most of the state. With iWireless I was not able to keep Google Maps going from Mason City to Des Moines.

My AIO wireless sim arrives tonight.

 

[mmtowns]

I've had one phone on iWireless for about a week now and made a few trips around Iowa. I can say their data coverage is pretty poor with the green data spots on their maps meaning Edge. I do have great HSPA+ signal around Mason City, but it's all over once I leave this bubble. I have never successfully registered on an AT&T tower either. I have no speed tests because every time I try to run one (Sensorly), I get unregistered from the network for tethering.

I am not expecting Verizon's coverage, but I do want Google Maps to work in most of the state. With iWireless I was not able to keep Google Maps going from Mason City to Des Moines.

My AIO wireless sim arrives tonight.

Update:
I had a similar experience -- HSPA+ in the most populated parts of the state, but then down to Edge. I ended up switching to a Straight Talk (AT&T) sim card. Data coverage has been much better.

 

[dunni88]

Update:
I had a similar experience -- HSPA+ in the most populated parts of the state, but then down to Edge. I ended up switching to a Straight Talk (AT&T) sim card. Data coverage has been much better.

Yah, I am a bit disapointed that iWireless does not seem to have very good coverage in Iowa. I'm on Straight Talk (AT&T SIM) and while it's far from perfect, it has pretty decent coverage in the Cedar Falls/Waterloo area. Speeds are 5-7 mbps in good areas and 2-4 mpbs in the worse areas. Seems about as good as you can get for the $45 range. If AT&T ever decides to bring LTE to Iowa we will have full access to that included as well.

 

[jschmidt96]

To update my previous post. I left Ting and went with Straight Talk (at&t). Speeds are pretty good but ping times are unusually slow (I found out they route all data through a server in Arizona, which is why it is slow). But for the price I'm happy with it. I've gotten LTE Speeds in Iowa City and Coralville. But North Liberty is still HSPA for some reason. And this may be my phone (Nexus 4, which only has 1 LTE band).

 

[redleader36]

Good to know, jschmidt96! I have been on AIO in the Mason City area for about a month and am loving their service. After several trips to the Des Moines area, their coverage has been very agreeable. I originally chose AIO because it was $55/month and the 3rd month is free because of a BYOD promotion. After 5 months I may switch to Straight Talk or Net10.

For reference, a few things we have discovered. iWireless seems to do tower switching poorly and it is hard to get straight answers from them. We were assured to be able to use AT&T towers -- which we've never been able to connect to nor do we show that AT&T is actually a roaming partner with iWireless (if anyone knows different, I'd like to hear it). iWireless does not allow voicemail forwarding so you cannot use Google Voice with your iWireless number (although you could use it exclusively with your GV number). iWireless also seems to be unsure of their APN settings for phones they don't sell. The most annoying thing was trying to run speed tests. I wanted to get an idea of speeds before I committed to iWireless -- every time I ran Sensorly I would get the tethering warning and my connection would shut down.

AIO seems to not support CMAS alerts. This might be a deal-killer for some people.

- - - Updated - - -

To update my previous post. I left Ting and went with Straight Talk (at&t).

Can I ask how your experience with Ting was? What kind of coverage did you get in this area?

 

[jschmidt96]

For Ting I really like the company and the plans were good. They needed more data buckets. For coverage it was good in Iowa city/Coralville/Cedar Rapids. But North Liberty was very hit and miss. Some parts of Cedar Rapids and Iowa City had LTE. But when you were on old cdma 3g it was very slow. After having LTE for a few years I was used to the speed.

I was thinking about switching to AIO. But with the Leap/cricket deal going on and At&T shutting down aio after the deal I wanted to wait and see what happens with this. Since Cricket has some good deals on there plans. Hopefully the Cricket prices will stay. Then I will move over.

Also straight talk has some roaming in Iowa. Where Native at&t isn't available. Another bonus for Straight Talk. But I also have problems with friends that have us cellular try and text me. I don't get there texts. Pic messages I do though, Which I don't understand.

 

[jcmbmx]

I am in Cedar Rapids so this is why I am using 770 for MNC.

Just purchased HTC My Touch 4G Slide (aka doubleshot) from a tmobile subscriber. Phone was unlocked with Cyanogen Mod 10.2 (AOP 4.3.1). Permarooted

1st thing I did was setup CM 10.2 with all of my google services registered to me. Created a backup and saved it onto the SD card.

After going back to a stock ROM, then performing simunlock (my hboot was the newest and couldn't do the Revolution unlock method so went JuopunutBeat method) then I did a restore from the copy I mentioned.

SPEED TESTING
I used the speedtest app from GooglePlay. Their homepage is Speedtest.net by Ookla - The Global Broadband Speed Test

Speed Test results in Cedar Rapids roughly (was showing 4g)
8.7 Mbps down
2.6 Mbps up

Speed Test results in Linn County outside of Cedar Rapids roughly (was showing 2g)
1.8 Mbps down
1.1 Mbps up

I will tinker more with APN settings, especially if anyone has any ideas, but I used 310 and 770 for MMC and MNC respectively with good results.

 

[droidrev71]

Anyone use an unlocked tmobile lg g3 on iwireless? Hspa+? Or? Thanks

 

[CLIowa]

I'm not sure about other MVNOs affiliated with T-Mobile, but my wife just found out today that SIMple Mobile doesn't have coverage in Ottumwa, IA. They have T-mobile coverage, she's seeing t-mobile's network, but she has no service because the gsm carrier in that area is iWireless (formerly known as Iowa Wireless). So an MVNO may be partnered with T-mobile, they will likely have coverage in T-Mobile's "core" network coverage area (that is, the infrastructure they own and operate), but they may not work in area where T-Mobile's coverage comes from agreements with smaller, localized providers. It's possible one may face similar situations with smaller carriers partnered with T-mobile. It's also possible that smaller carriers that partner with T-mobile may partner with each other as well, so that they have the benefit of being able to offer their customers coverage that approaches or rivals that of T-mobile.

 

[Chad Streeter]

I live in Oelwein and my mom and I got our 1st smartphones in December and we got the data plan before we looked at the coverage map. The internet here in Oelwein is horrid, can't connect most of the time. No 3 G service, just EDGE service and even that is slow as dial up, maybe worse. The I Wireless rep in Waterloo never even said anything, probably our fault, we never asked. However if we go to Waterloo or near by the internet is great. No biggie, i use the wifi at home mostly anyways.

 

[jschmidt96]

Iwireless posted last month they are going to upgrading almost all of there towers to upgrade 3g/4g/LTE in the future. Some areas will be done by 2/3rd quarter with almost all the rest by 2nd quarter 2016.

I'm currently with Verizon and hate how they lock down every phone. So I will be looking at Iwireless when my contract is up early next year to see how they've come along.

 

[bigrich272]

At&t unlocked phones no longer work on iwireless 4g so beware has to be a tmobile phone

 

[bigrich272]

Iwireless posted last month they are going to upgrading almost all of there towers to upgrade 3g/4g/LTE in the future. Some areas will be done by 2/3rd quarter with almost all the rest by 2nd quarter 2016.

I'm currently with Verizon and hate how they lock down every phone. So I will be looking at Iwireless when my contract is up early next year to see how they've come along.

Verizon phones a r e GSM unlocked and work fine on iwiress