jdbii, thanks for the advice. I really want to try ST thought because it's 3GB of LTE vs 2.5GB with Aio. Not a big difference to most but I do sometimes cross that threshold.
For the sake of knowledge I'll provide the full story of my transition from T-Mobile to Staight Talk for future readers. This WILL be long!
SIM Card #1
I bought a ST BYOP Starter Kit from WalMart. Used the online tool to activate my SIM and port my phone number. I somehow screwed something up to where the activation succeeded but the port failed. So I called ST, explained my situation, and they said they can't port my number and will have to send me a new SIM. Sounds strange to me, but whatever. Waited for new SIM.
SIM Card #2
SIM arrives. I decide to be brave and try activation+port online again. I get the error message:
"Unfortunately we don't offer service for the zip code you entered. Please enter a different zip code or call our Customer Care Center at [toll_free_number] for further assistance." So I call ST and go through the activation+port process again with a rep and they read to me basically the exact same error message. I think it's stupid that they are telling me an AT&T SIM card will not have service in Houston, TX and nicely hang up. Then I created this thread looking for help. Then I convinced myself that it must just be a faulty SIM. So I call ST and talk to a pleasant rep that was very patient and I believe tried really hard to get my SIM card working. But nothing worked so they shipped me another SIM card.
SIM Card #3
SIM arrives. I decide to be brave and try activation+port online again. I get an error message basically saying this is not a Straight Talk SIM card. So I call ST and go through the activation+port process with a rep. She says she got an error, but didn't tell me what it was, and then transferred me to what I assume was the next support tier. This lady actually dug through everything including my prior SIM cards and activation attempts. Then she began the process of activation+port. She asked for the SIM number of SIM Card #1 (the one that did activate and this one was supposed to replace). She also asked for the first 5 digits of SIM Card #3 (as opposed to the last 15 digits) which nobody had ever mentioned before. She then did a lot of computer magic on her end. Then told me it was successful! I quickly logged into my ST account and confirmed that I had a SIM card listed in their with a status of Port in Progress. Hoooooraaaaaayyyy!!!!
APN Hunt
After waiting about 2 hours my account showed that the phone number port was complete. So I swapped SIMs and booted my phone. I immediately had AT&T cellular service with my original phone number. However there was no data or MMS (that was expected). So then began the hunt for an APN configuration that worked. I tried a lot of things, but I'll try to summarize with only the noteworthy attempts. Keep in mind there are basically 3 APN configurations for Straight Talk: tfdata, att.mvno, and wap.tracfone
Somewhere in the ST BYOP part of the website there's a page that has APN settings for LTE devices. This was the tfdata APN and therefore the first one I tried. It did not work.
I began Googling like a maniac and discovered the 3 basic APNs and tried them all. The only APN that gave me any success was wap.tracfone.
Code:
APN: wap.tracfone
Proxy: Not set
Port: Not set
MMSC: http://mms.tracfone.com
MMS proxy: 216.155.165.40
MMS port: 8080
Authentication type: Not set
APN type: default,supl,mms
These settings resulted in HSPA+ data. I was not getting LTE or MMS.
Another Chapter
After some more Googling I found the ST page where you can enter your SIM Number + phone OS and it will tell you the APN you need (
HOW TO UPDATE DATA SETTINGS). So I entered my SIM and selected Other (because they didn't have Android 4.4), and it returned an error message basically saying that is not a Straight Talk Bring Your Own Phone SIM Card. So this time I switched things up and used the Straight Talk live chat (I don't really like talking on the phone a lot). I told the guy I was using the wap.tracfone APN and was getting HSPA+ but not LTE. I believe he made some changes to my account. Then he told me what APN I should be using:
Code:
APN: wap.tracfone
Proxy: att2.tracfone.com
Port: 80
MMSC: http://mmsc.cingular.com
MMS proxy: att2.tracfone.com
MMS port: 80
Authentication type: Not set
APN type: default,supl,mms
These settings resulted in HSPA+ data and MMS. I was not getting LTE. He gave me a phone number to call with a support reference number for further help.
Last one I swear
I call the number and tell them LTE is not working. She makes some changes to my account then gives me a new APN:
Code:
APN: tfdata
Proxy: Not set
Port: 80
MMSC: http://mms-tf.net
MMS proxy: mms3.tracfone.com
MMS port: 80
Authentication type: Not set
APN type: Not set
These settings resulted in LTE data. I had already hung up when I realized I was no longer receiving MMS.
According to the internet, a lot of people that are in my current situation (everything works except receiving MMS) with my same APN configuration magically started receiving MMS at the start of their next billing cycle. I'll probably try another live chat with ST later and see if there's a quicker fix. If there isn't, then I'll probably wait another 27 days and see what happens...