Is Pre-Paid Verison LG Optimus Exceed good for WiFi ONLY?

[Ramix Nudles]

I got a good deal on a Verizon Pre-Paid LG Optimus Exceed at Target today. I don't want it for the phone. I want it for the Android, the games, the GPS, the touch-screen, the media player, the camera, --- in other words, I want to use it for everything thing BUT the phone. I also don't want to open it until I know I can use it -- without it locking up.

Can I use it w/out activating it? -- Can I get into the settings and select WiFi ONLY or will it lock out the phone until it's activated?

I got this to replace my HTC One V -- which has served well for music, surfing, some games, and limited GPS -- but it's slow, and the GPS use is "free" -- meaning, not great.

The Optimus Exceed is a rebrand of the Optimus Lucid. It has 8GB, a dual-core processor, and A-GPS... without activating it, I expect everything SHOULD work just as well -- but I don't want to break the seal w/out knowing.

And, lately, with work, I use the GPS (free, d/l from the store) more and more. The free apps are medeocre, and the HTC's GPS takes 10-12 minutes to get the fix.

Anybody willing to commend on the Optimus Exceed?

 

[B. Diddy]

Welcome to Android Central! You should be able to use any Android phone as a wifi-only device. If it requires a SIM card, just don't insert the SIM. From what I can tell, though the Exceed is CDMA only, which means it doesn't use a SIM--in that case, you can always turn on Airplane Mode to turn off the cell radio. After you turn on Airplane Mode, you can still turn Wifi and Bluetooth on.

 

[Ramix Nudles]

Thanks. I didn't want to pop the packaging if it was going to wind up just bricking itself if it wasn't activated.

I use my HTC mostly for (free) GPS, and music. It's only got 512M ram, and it runs pretty weak and laggy with switching back and forth and some of the larger games. Hopefully, the Exceed will be zippier. I don't know if the GPS will be any better, as it's still A-GPS.

I'll pop the shell tonight and charge it up and see how it works.

 

[Ramix Nudles]

I ran into a snag that I wasn't expecting... the device goes immediately to "Activating your phone", with only "Emergency Call" and "Activate" as options.

I've been searching for a way to bypass that, but most of what I found is from 2010, and the methods don't work ("four corners" and "voice dial").

If anybody knows how to get past the Activation screen, it would be greatly appreciated. Or am I being to paranoid? I guess I can just hit "Activate" and see if I can get to the home screen after that.

 

[Ramix Nudles]

I think that I'm in...
I looked up a couple other "bypass" posts, and none of that worked ("do Emergency Call, then enter ... etc." -- "That's Not An Emergency Number" [FAIL]).
What I think did work:
While playing with the un-activated phone, I discovered I could get into the status bar and one of the things I can do from there is mod the settings. The first thing I do w/ an Android device is to turn off server (Airplane Mode), just in case I blunder into something that tried to dial. I had forgotten about this. After the "Emgency Call" attempt failed, I tried "Activate" and then tried to cancel that. I didn't have to... the device can't call out in Airplane Mode so activation failed, and I could "skip" the rest of the steps.

I'll play with it, and see if I can connect to google play, etc.

If I can d/l some GPS apps, I'm good.

 

[B. Diddy]

I hope it works, because I hope I didn't steer you wrong!

But even if you did activate, if you kept it on Airplane Mode all the time, would you have to pay anything? Since it's pay as you go, I'd imagine there wouldn't be any charges, unless there's some sort of activation fee.

 

[Darius Singh Chiku]

hii yess if u want u can take mine i used it only for 5 days and now its brand new i am willing to give it fr $50 plzz do let me knw.[email removed by Moderator]