Google Voice - Sprint to T Mobile Question

[mooechili]

I'm probably making a bigger deal out of this than it is. I've been with Sprint for years, have a few months to go and will early terminate soon. Currently have a NS4G ported to GV through Sprint. I have a Google Nexus coming in today and want to try T Mobile first, but want to keep my same # and not lose any info I have on GV. I love GV and need my info that is currently stored.

Went by T Mobile and the rep hadn't even heard of GV so he was no help. I'm thinking I will get a month with T Mobile, get a new number and immediately port my new # via GV and test the signal hoping for the best. (for me has to be better than Sprint, need a signal booster to make/receive calls from home) Of course AT&T is my other option but will try that in case of T Mobile signal issues.

I'm sure some of you have been through this and any help would be appreciated.

 

[MooPenguin32]

I'm a little confused as to what you're trying to accomplish. Do you want to try T-Mobile before leaving Sprint to make sure it meets your needs and use your current phone number to do so?

Also, are you using Google Voice to make and receive calls?

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Android Central Forums

 

[mooechili]

Yes, I feel it necessary to first see if T Mobile will provide adequate reception before making the switch. As to using GV to make/receive calls, not sure the answer exactly. My GV settings have my # enabled by Sprint and forwarded to same #. Best Buy set up GV for me when I got the phone over a year ago, I didn't do it. Always have a tab open on Chrome to GV, can't afford to lose that data. As I said, I need a signal booster in house simply to make/receive calls with Sprint. On my iPad I have Talkatone, without the signal booster my iPad (and desktop) would ring but not my phone. Hope that helps answer the question.

My wife is also on Sprint, her 2+ yr old Evo has no reception problems in the house, my NS4G does. On launch day, 11 days ago, I got her a HTC One X from AT&T to try for 30 days (temporary #). I hate the AT&T bloatware on it, what I may do is, if reception is good, return that phone and give her this Nexus (as much as I hate to).

On a side note, she hasn't been out of the house much since she's had the HOX, we have wifi in house. I have been out obviously more. Exactly 7 days of data usage on both phones, mine has used 31 MB and her phone 43.60 MB. Got to be the AT&T stuff using up the extra data which concerns me. Can't force close it or delete them.

Thanks, and sorry for the rambling..just confused as to transferring and not losing data with GV.

 

[mooechili]

OK, phone came in, went to T Mobile got my first month, signed in and quickly and ate up 363 MB of data synching everything..very fast. Have a T Mobile voice mail telling me how to set up TM VM, but haven't done anything - don't want that. Ported to this new # on GV, calls works like a champ, and am getting SMS for GV voice mails. Have an option in settings on GV to enable this # to GV, again will wait until I know more what I'm doing. Nobody at T Mobil has even heard of GV..funny.

Ran a quick speed test Download at 17933 kbps, upload at 1897 kbps. Noticed the battery is charging over 95%, NS4G always stopped at 95%. Thanks for the help, I'll get this figured out sooner or later. So far so good!

 

[Andrew Martonik]

Since people are calling your GV #, your voicemail should work just fine. You don't have to set anything up more than going to voice.google.com and telling your GV # to forward to your new T-Mo number for calls. And of course go into your Google Voice app and tell it to use your GV # for all calls, so you never accidentally call out from your T-Mo #.

You can just disable your T-Mo Voicemail (or set it up to get rid of the notification and leave it untouched), if no one will be calling that number then you don't need to use it and will never see anything of it.


And wait, I'm confused... why did you port your new T-Mo # to Google Voice (and pay for that???)? You can just tell your old # to forward to this new carrier # and not have to give out another number... You refer to your "info" in Google Voice, but there really isn't any info there. It's all associated with your Google Account, not Google Voice. The only thing you have there is the #.

 

[mooechili]

martonikaj - Thanks for your answer, been a little late checking in. I bought the phone for me, signed up with TMo and got a temporary # until I could figure out how to change GV from Sprint to TMo. Ended up giving my wife the phone, she loves it as much as I miss it.

The info I was referring to was all my voice mails, texts, call history, etc. Some are starred, easy to keep track with GV. Always have a tab open to GV on my browser.

I'm still not clear how to do it, don't need to know right now obviously. Under settings, my GV is "enabled by Sprint". I could disable it, button right there, but not sure how to "enable" TMo. And porting worked great, the only problem is when I call people from a # they don't recognize some don't want to answer. From what I can understand, Sprint works well with GV, if I understand correctly some people seem to have trouble with GV on other carriers.

Appreciate your response, still fighting the urge to get another for me..paying some unexpected bills first.

 

[angrymanhands]

so let me re ask this question. if im on sprint with GV integration, i would need to
1 disable my GV integration
2 pay google $20 and port my number to google
3 start a new service with another provider, T Mobile, and take whatever number they assign to me
4 log in to GV make appropriate settings
5 use phone with my google voice number
??

 

[joelkamp]

Yep, you have the right steps. I just did this on Monday. Fyi...When Google says it takes up to 24 hours to port, they mean it will take 24 hours on the nose.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Android Central Forums

 

[angrymanhands]

Yep, you have the right steps. I just did this on Monday. Fyi...When Google says it takes up to 24 hours to port, they mean it will take 24 hours on the nose.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Android Central Forums

thank you for the response.

 

[mooechili]

Yes, thanks for that, I copied those steps for future reference. Guess I'm dumb, want to be clear. What is the final result after these steps, you have your google voice # AND the # assigned by TMo, or do you end up just with your original #?

 

[angrymanhands]

well, im still working on it. it seems you will have both.
I was hoping I could bypass the minute usage by using my google voice number, but that appears to be wishful thinking. at least I still get to use my GV number as my main number.
these instructions are pretty important.
http://www.talkandroid.com/guides/g1/replace-t-mobile-voicemail-with-google-voice-visual-mail/

 

[mooechili]

Thanks. So you have your old # with GV and calls ported to your TMo #, and making calls show your TMo #? So with TMo there is no way to enable GV with TMo as I do with Sprint? What about AT&T, any difference with them?

 

[angrymanhands]

hold on. i ported my sprint number to GV for $20, which in turn canceles my sprint service. I then started a new line of service with T Mobile. on my computer I went to www.google.com/voice and added my T Mobile # as a forwarding number. I checked where it asks if you want to recieve call, and Texts on that phone from GV.
then you want to either clear the data for GV on your phone, or install it on your phone if its not already there and go through the setup. you should be good to go. also check the link I posted above for forwarding instructions, but it seems that the app takes care ofthat now.

 

[mooechili]

So you have 2 numbers, your old Sprint # (which now is through GV) and your new TMo #. You ported your calls to your TMo #, people can call you at either #, but now when you call it's from your new TMo #...right?

 

[rhea]

well, im still working on it. it seems you will have both.
I was hoping I could bypass the minute usage by using my google voice number, but that appears to be wishful thinking. at least I still get to use my GV number as my main number.
these instructions are pretty important.
A Guide To Replacing T-Mobile Voicemail With Google Voice Visual Mail | TalkAndroid.com

In fact, you can, if you install a VoIP service. Many people talk about Groove IP; however, I chose Talkatone after reading user experiences of both. I'm sort of in the same situation. I'm in the process of moving away from Sprint (after 10 1/2 yrs). Reception has gone from iffy to nil in my house. I bought the Google GNex and am testing T-Mobile. Reception is still pretty bad in my house and within at least a mile radius, but I'm using Google Voice (Talkatone runs in the background) to make wifi calls--and sms texts, too. I'm not a big phone user; however, I have made a few calls of 20 minutes lately, and my call usage with T-Mobile has remained at 2 minutes which I used the first day. I am even able to check T-Mobile voicemail through my GV line (although T-Mobile is the only one with my number). I got the same phone for my son and set up Straight Talk/AT&T sim. When he was at my house, it seemed to work better than T-Mobile so I will try that next month (I can keep the T-Mobile # active for 60 days without paying). If there's no difference, I will stick with the 100 talk unlimited everything else $30. a month T-Mobile. If there is a difference, the $45. unlimited Straight Talk plan is still a good deal. Once out of my neighborhood, I've been able to get T-Mobile service quite well. Currently, I am the only one of three in my house who can use a phone inside because of wifi. When the other two Sprint contracts are up (end of Sept,), they will be getting Android GSM no-contract phones. They, too, will use GV and wifi calling.

 

[angrymanhands]

So you have 2 numbers, your old Sprint # (which now is through GV) and your new TMo #. You ported your calls to your TMo #, people can call you at either #, but now when you call it's from your new TMo #...right?

Yes technically I have 2 numbers, but the way I have it set up im only using my GV number. Im not even telling people about the T Mobile number, because it will never show up, and it might be confusing. When you are setting up google voice it gives you an option to use GV for all calls, international calls, or always ask. I chose all calls. So when I call out it it showing my GV #

 

[angrymanhands]

In fact, you can, if you install a VoIP service. Many people talk about Groove IP; however, I chose Talkatone after reading user experiences of both. I'm sort of in the same situation. I'm in the process of moving away from Sprint (after 10 1/2 yrs). Reception has gone from iffy to nil in my house. I bought the Google GNex and am testing T-Mobile. Reception is still pretty bad in my house and within at least a mile radius, but I'm using Google Voice (Talkatone runs in the background) to make wifi calls--and sms texts, too. I'm not a big phone user; however, I have made a few calls of 20 minutes lately, and my call usage with T-Mobile has remained at 2 minutes which I used the first day. I am even able to check T-Mobile voicemail through my GV line (although T-Mobile is the only one with my number). I got the same phone for my son and set up Straight Talk/AT&T sim. When he was at my house, it seemed to work better than T-Mobile so I will try that next month (I can keep the T-Mobile # active for 60 days without paying). If there's no difference, I will stick with the 100 talk unlimited everything else $30. a month T-Mobile. If there is a difference, the $45. unlimited Straight Talk plan is still a good deal. Once out of my neighborhood, I've been able to get T-Mobile service quite well. Currently, I am the only one of three in my house who can use a phone inside because of wifi. When the other two Sprint contracts are up (end of Sept,), they will be getting Android GSM no-contract phones. They, too, will use GV and wifi calling.

I have never had a problem with GrooVe IP, but maybe I should look into Talkatone.

 

[waynew73]

I also went to T-Mo from Sprint and also wanted to test the network connection before finally ending Sprint connection. One thing to note that I did not originally know was that you have to be on a regular "post-paid" plan in order to enable GV to replace your T-Mo vmail. You cannot have it replace your T-Mo inbox using a pre-paid plan. So if you're trying to test T-Mo you should know this. I only found this out when I went onto the G-voice site and tried to register my T-Mo pre-paid number. A big warning from GV came up telling me that I needed a post-paid plan.

I bit the bullet and just ported my sprint number over after a few days. I have been happy on T-Mo and GV has been running fine...both my GV phone number and GV taking over my vmail inbox.

Sent from my Sony Tablet S using Android Central Forums

 

[mooechili]

What a pain, still have not been able to disable Sprint # from GV. Long story short, my NS4G became unreliable on voice calls, needed something and got a One X from AT&T. Tried to disable via settings, no luck. Called Sprint, no luck, they were to have their Google "team" call me back which never happened. Went to Sprint store, no luck. AT&T store, no luck since enabled with GV. Just called Sprint again, no luck but are to call me back possibly on Monday.

I got my wife a new GV #, then tried to port her existing # to GV but says it does not support the area code (her GV page has more options than my Sprint enabled page). I do know that there are available #s in this area code, however the closest towns they support are 30 miles away. No problem with that, but don't think I will be able to use my old # with GV.

And with her and T-Mo, I did find out it doesn't work with pre-paid as was mentioned.