New S9 can send/receive texts (SMS) but not text pix (MMS)

[syc0path]

This is a new unlocked phone I recently got from eBay for my wife. We have PagePlus Cellular service (a Verizon MVNO). This phone is a replacement for her old S7. I swapped the SIM card into the new phone and everything seemed to work. But it soon became apparent that the phone can't send or receive pix or other media via text.

I searched online and found some tips (reboot the phone, reseat the SIM card, clear the cache, etc, all to no avail). Eventually I checked the Access Point Names. The S9 didn't have any entries. I have an S8, so I tried manually copying my APN info to her phone, but it didn't work. Then I tried resetting the network settings. At this point, the phone lost all mobile network connections, and after trying every option I could find (both online and from customer service) to get it to connect, I had to factory reset the phone.

After the factory reset, I tried MMS again before I ran Smart Switch. Even without any additional apps on the phones, MMS still doesn't work. It doesn't work in Safe Mode either.

I also tried swapping SIM cards with my S8. My phone works properly with either SIM card, but the S9 doesn't get MMS with either SIM.

Right now the phone can send and receive calls and texts (SMS), but the original text media (MMS) problem remains. Can any1 offer some insight?

 

[B. Diddy]

It may ultimately have to do with AT&T. Carriers can be pretty picky about which phones they allow to use their VoLTE network. As they phased out their 3G networks (and therefore required phones to use VoLTE), there were a bunch of threads here about people being unable to use certain phones on their network, even though they were working on VoLTE on other networks. The best AT&T could do was to offer their customers a free phone replacement that did support VoLTE (although, as you can imagine, that phone was usually not very fancy).

Sorry, I wish I had more of a solution for you.

 

[mustang7757]

Re: Samsung Galaxy S9 can't make/receive calls, possible VoLTE issue

As I mentioned in my other thread, my wife has an S9. I couldn't get MMS to work no matter what I tried. So finally I changed carriers from PagePlus (Verizon MVNO) to RedPocket (ATT MVNO).

Now MMS works, but voice calls don't. VoLTE is required to make voice calls on ATT, so that setting must be enabled in Settings\Connections\Mobile Networks. The setting doesn't even appear. But I remembered seeing it before. After some testing, I discovered that the VoLTE setting is present and turned on when the PagePlus SIM is installed, but it disappears when the RedPocket SIM is installed.

Once again, the carrier's tech support advice is limited to reboot and reset. As if I haven't already tried that...

When trying to make a call, it starts the dialing process and then immediately says "call ended" as soon as u try to connect. When trying to call this phone, it immediately goes to voicemail.

Any advice?

Those MVNO been problematic on Samsung through the years , Verizon , TMobile,Att sim dont a issue once their sims installed, its going to take time and playing with settings, APN to get it going .
Might be better off buying prepaid plan from one of them

Sent from my Pixel 7 Pro using AC Forums mobile app

 

[J Dubbs]

Re: Samsung Galaxy S9 can't make/receive calls, possible VoLTE issue

Those MVNO been problematic on Samsung through the years , Verizon , TMobile,Att sim dont a issue once their sims installed, its going to take time and playing with settings, APN to get it going .
Might be better off buying prepaid plan from one of them

Sent from my Pixel 7 Pro using AC Forums mobile app

That or I would just get a pixel and be done with it I would never have the patience to go through all that :-\

 

[syc0path]

So I tried buying an S10 directly from Red Pocket. U would think their phone would work on their network, right? Nope. After going thru all the trouble-shooting steps again on the S10, they finally sent me a new SIM card, under the theory that the original SIM was old and didn't have the correct programming to provision VoLTE. That didn't work either.

I cannot be the only person having this problem -- Galaxy's are very popular phones. I've asked their tech support to put this issue thru to their network/software engineering teams. I've made it clear that until VoLTE is provisioned on the phone, no amount of reboots, resets, or fiddling w/ the APN settings is going to correct the problem.

As for buying a new phone or changing carriers, I've already done that. If I change phones or carriers again and the problem remains, I have to start all over w/ the troubleshooting. Yeah, I could try a phone other than a Galaxy, but that's another couple hundred bucks, and who knows if it will work or if we will like the phone.

At this point, I'm just about ready to switch back to PagePlus. The reception sucks and the phone still doesn't have MMS, but at least it will have voice service. Which reminds me -- the main original reason I switched to Red Pocket was becuz the phone didn't have MMS w/ PagePlus and they couldn't fix it. After I switched, MMS worked but voice didn't. At some point, after installing a bunch of updates to try to fix the voice issue, MMS once again stopped working. So right now she only has SMS and data

 

[VidJunky]

Sorry to hear you're still struggling with this. I know what a pain not being able to text can be. Just curious as I was reading through the comments I didn't see anyone ask if there is a splash screen when you boot up for a carrier. I know you're with PagePlus but does the phone have a splash screen for Verizon, AT&T, TMo or anyone? I ask because I've also seen similar issues with a device that was still "locked" to a foreign carrier.

It used to be that the carrier would flash their software to devices. Anymore though I think the user can flash their carrier's firmware with Odin. @mustang7757 knows more about that than I. I'm not sure a carrier like PagePlus has locked devices or their own firmware so maybe there's a generic firmware that would either make the device appear as factory unlocked and just remove whichever carrier's firmware or what because I would be willing to bet that it isn't the device.

Howard forums is hosting a Page Plus forum page, perhaps you can converse with other PagePlus users here for more insight and a different perspective. https://www.howardforums.com/forumdisplay.php/364-Page-Plus-Cellular

It looks like PagePlus' official forum is hosted on Facebook. I'm not a user so I am not able to tell you much beyond that. This looks like a link to that forum but I'm not sure. https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct.../ppcellular/&usg=AOvVaw3IWyLKlWO2g4hTXfSfjhKo

 

[mustang7757]

Sorry to hear you're still struggling with this. I know what a pain not being able to text can be. Just curious as I was reading through the comments I didn't see anyone ask if there is a splash screen when you boot up for a carrier. I know you're with PagePlus but does the phone have a splash screen for Verizon, AT&T, TMo or anyone? I ask because I've also seen similar issues with a device that was still "locked" to a foreign carrier.

It used to be that the carrier would flash their software to devices. Anymore though I think the user can flash their carrier's firmware with Odin. @mustang7757 knows more about that than I. I'm not sure a carrier like PagePlus has locked devices or their own firmware so maybe there's a generic firmware that would either make the device appear as factory unlocked and just remove whichever carrier's firmware or what because I would be willing to bet that it isn't the device.

Howard forums is hosting a Page Plus forum page, perhaps you can converse with other PagePlus users here for more insight and a different perspective. https://www.howardforums.com/forumdisplay.php/364-Page-Plus-Cellular

It looks like PagePlus' official forum is hosted on Facebook. I'm not a user so I am not able to tell you much beyond that. This looks like a link to that forum but I'm not sure. https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct.../ppcellular/&usg=AOvVaw3IWyLKlWO2g4hTXfSfjhKo

For US versions you can flash any stock carrier firmware or go to unlock firmware from a carrier and vice versa all interchangeable, but sounds like a issue with OP carrier

 

[syc0path]

I know you're with PagePlus but does the phone have a splash screen for Verizon, AT&T, TMo or anyone?

It used to be that the carrier would flash their software to devices. Anymore though I think the user can flash their carrier's firmware with Odin. @mustang7757 knows more about that than I. I'm not sure a carrier like PagePlus has locked devices or their own firmware so maybe there's a generic firmware that would either make the device appear as factory unlocked and just remove whichever carrier's firmware or what because I would be willing to bet that it isn't the device.

Howard forums is hosting a Page Plus forum page, perhaps you can converse with other PagePlus users here for more insight and a different perspective. https://www.howardforums.com/forumdisplay.php/364-Page-Plus-Cellular

It looks like PagePlus' official forum is hosted on Facebook. I'm not a user so I am not able to tell you much beyond that. This looks like a link to that forum but I'm not sure. https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct.../ppcellular/&usg=AOvVaw3IWyLKlWO2g4hTXfSfjhKo

My wife's S9 (her main phone) has an AT&T splash screen. The new S10 that I bought from Red Pocket doesn't have a splash screen. I also tried the Red Pocket SIM in my S8 (the VoLTE option disappeared and I couldn't make voice calls) and my phone has a TracMobile splash screen. I purchased both the S8 and the S9 from eBay, and the listings said they were factory unlocked.

I'd prefer to stay w/ Red Pocket (it's $10/month cheaper and provides better signal), so maybe I can flash Red Pocket's firmware to the S9 w/ Odin? Although, the S10 I bought from them should already have their firmware installed, and that doesn't work either.

So I will check out the PagePlus forums u mentioned and see if I can get some info there... thanks!

 

[VidJunky]

I'm not saying the listing was incorrect but there is a slight difference between Factory unlocked and Carrier unlocked. I feel like your wife's phone may be carrier unlocked because of her splash screen. If you both have the same service and have SIM cards from the same carrier, if the SIM affected the splash screen they should both read the same, or at least that would stand to reason. Either way the device could be considered unlocked with unlocked meaning that device is free to be activated on any compatible carrier. This really doesn't help us that much because your device has no splash so we cannot blame it on a carrier's restrictive firmware.

In the meantime, I would definitely look at those other forums and post your question there because as you said previously, surely someone else has had similar issues, and those would be a better place to cast a net trying to find that someone. Here at AC your net is a little too small with all of the variables. Same or similar device, same issue, same carrier etc etc etc.

Let us know what you find so that we're prepared if anyone else comes looking. Sorry I don't have better advice though.

Best wishes.