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Does anyone have any insights on obtaining a pair of Nextel Peru SIM cards in North America?

http://www.nextel.com.pe/portal/serv...hip_nextel/506

I have two people going to Peru next month, to a location where we are told there is no usable GSM coverage - only iDEN. These two are neither Spanish speaking or technical and sending them trolling for SIM cards in a local market does not seem likely to be successful.

redtop43

I have never been abroad before, so am mostly unfamiliar with this (I did get some info from my carrier, Sprint), the more specific the help you can offer the better.

Am going to Paris in August. I have a Blackberry Tour 9630, it is an unlocked GSM phone. I want to:

a) Be able to make a limited number of calls, I will not be calling back to the USA, but want to be able to call a museum, restaurant, hotel, etc. Also if my wife and I get separated, I want her to be able to go to a pay phone and call me and say "Where are you?"

b) Use the GPS on my phone. I did a crude test by trying to map the hotel we are staying at, and it worked. I have the Sprint navigation app. I also might want to check things on the internet, like looking up addresses, hours of operation, etc. So I will need some data, but not gobs of it.

I doubt I will use text messages at all.

I'd prefer if possible to get it all settled before I leave the USA. I don't speak French, and while my wife is fluent in French, she knows about as much tech as I know French.

What's my best option?

SwissCircle

If you buy a Prepay card with Orange in Switzerland you can choose several "bonus options".
One of those is internet access.
See details here:
http://www1.orange.ch/en/mobile/prep...nge-me-prepay/

Basically for
CHF 10 topup you get 7 days of unlimited internet
CHF 20 topup you get 14 days of unlimited internet
CHF 30 topup you get 30 days of unlimited internet

abqandrea

Just to add to user experience stories, here's what I did. (EDIT: I realized this thread is more for data-oriented SIMs.... oops. But I'll leave the post anyway just for general info)

1. Bought this phone off Amazon. Quad-band, two SIM slots. Cheap ($35). BLU phone
2. Waited until on the streets of Shanghai and bought a 50RMB SIM from a street vendor. Chose a number that ended in "42", just for fun.
3. Sent/received about 100+ SMS and made 20+ local calls, plus received about a dozen or more calls from both local and international (via skype) callers. Total call time maybe an hour.
4. Used phone in Shanghai, Xi'an, and Beijing. No call quality issues. Also took calls and sent SMS from Great Wall (but I've know they have had signal since 2005 when I first visited - it was much more novel then!).
5. SIM sent me messages about remaining balance a few times but could not fully comprehend due to character display on phone (they were sent using Chinese which the phone cannot show), and I was never able to login online to check balance.
6. Balance APPEARED to be going down a few RMB per day, but when it dipped below around 9RMB the phone stopped working. This was on my last day so I didn't care much.
*7. I had heard rumors of OUTGOING international calls costing $1-2 USD per minute so I never even tried, just FYI.

That's it! For a cost of $9 for the SIM I had pretty good availability while overseas and that's worth it to me.

Andrea, in ABQ

fredsxb

Just posted on my blog a complete tutorial for prepaid sims in Moscow:

http://superfr8d.blogspot.fr/2012/04...in-moscow.html

Jake Gittes

I'm in a similar boat as you.

Firstly, ditch the Sprint Navigation app and get the Google Maps BlackBerry app. You can log in destinations on Google Maps on your computer with the "My Places" feature, and it will instantly sync with your phone app.

My next trip to France is in June, and I'm going to be using an unlocked android phone. Unfortunately, France in general is notorious for expensive pre-paid data and options; sometimes it's just as bad as if you were using your US phone on Sprint's roaming rates.

That all being said, from my past experience it seems like the best prepaid SIM option changes every year depending on what carrier is running a special. Currently that seems to be Orange's M6 Mobile offer.

I've linked the fees/rates schedule here, and you can see the data rates on page 12 and 13 of the brochure. However to summarize, you get your SIM for Free, and can pay 9EUR for unlimited Internet for a month and 6EUR for unlimited email for a month. (How they differentiate between the two on their network side, I have no idea; but I digress.) Additionally just add 5-10EUR for voice credit and you should be good to go.

Anyway, I have no actual experience with Orange's M6 Mobile, but usually it's as simple as ducking into any Orange store (they're everywhere) and getting hooked up. (Be sure to have your passport handy.) Alternatively, you can go to any major electronics store like Saturn or Carphone Warehouse, and they should be able to get you going as well. (Your wife's fluency in French will come in handy.) Unfortunately there is no real way to set up your SIM in the US; France is very strict about exporting SIM cards.

My only major caveat is that sometimes it takes up to 48 hours after you've installed everything into your phone for the network to register you properly. This was annoying as hell on SFR, but I don't know if the same problem occurs on Orange.

Hope this helps!

Additionally as a tip: when you call into your new French carrier to top off voice credit or change settings, their automated voice services are of course in French. Usually they have an option to change the default to English prompts, but without knowing French, I have no idea how to change it. Your wife should be able to figure it out, but I would suggest having someone in the phone shop set it up for you.

Jake Gittes

As an aside, I've also been checking out fredsxb's find of Free Mobile which he write about in his blog. (http://superfr8d.blogspot.fr/2012/02...d-of-free.html) However it doesn't look like it's available for non-French residents.

ryandelmundo

Great story. $10 goes a long way for phones in Asia.

Most Asian countries now have super cheap outgoing international calling. You might have to look around for it or ask.

Typically you dial some funky code that puts you into VOIP. Like 0100+countrycode+number. In Thailand it was $.05/min for "regular" quality and $.1 for "best". In Indonesia, it's cheaper for me to call the USA than to call other folks in Indo.

So ask around when you're abroad for cards specializing in international calling - it's getting really really cheap - esp if you call the USA.

nwflyboy

I'm headed for Croatia and Slovenia in a few weeks. I'll be bringing my unlocked, no-contract iPhone 4S along. At home in the US, I use StraightTalk's $45/month unlimited voice/data plan. Of course, that won't work overseas, but one of the reasons I bought an unlocked, no-contract phone was for ease of use internationally - this will be my first chance to use it.

I'm going to want to purchase a micro sim for use in the iPhone for voice and data upon arrival in Ljubljana if possible. Ideally I'd like to get one sim that would work in both Slovenia and Croatia, but if that's not possible, one for each country could work. I won't be making lots of calls, and will try to use wifi for data when available, but will want some data when wifi isn't available.

Can anyone recommend the best way to go? We arrive in Ljubljana, will be traveling around smaller towns for a few days, then heading south into Croatia for a couple of weeks. Will it be easy to find a sim for both countries in Ljubljana, or should I skip Slovenia and just look for one in Croatia when we get there?

Thanks for any other tips!

JakiChan

Any experience with getting data on something like an iPad?

Jake Gittes

Not in France, but I imagine the experience is pretty similar to the UK where it's the same process of waltzing into a phone shop and getting hooked up.

I didn't even bother with figuring out an iPad sim in Paris as there is Free muncipal run WiFi in a bajillion spots; generally it's available for free in most parks and landmarks. (List of sites here.) I was never really more than 5 minutes away from either a Free WiFi spot or a cafe/restaurant/bar/museum with an unlocked WiFi network I could hop on; so I didn't try to mess with a data-SIM.

Can't speak for the rest of France, though! In the past if I've in a pinch in some far-flung town in France, I use WiFi tether on my rooted Android phone for iPad access; however I've never been too far away from a WiFi network or wasn't able to take care of what I needed on my phone by itself.

fredsxb

Bouygues Telecom sells prepaid iPad sims in their stores. They ask for an ID when purchasing the sim. Not sure if it works with foreign passports. Not sure if you can top up with a foreign credit card either...

Jake Gittes

I think that's the general rule for SIMs in France. I've always had to present my passport, and have gotten SIMs without a problem. Also I can top up either with cash or credit card by picking up a card in any Tabac. (But yes, assuming they take my non-EMV credit card; however that's an entirely separate argument/problem! )

ryandelmundo

You can buy a micro-sim cutter on Amazon for about $4. I'd get one, as they tend to charge a lot for microSIM's because they know the only folks buying them are swanky iPhone/iPad users.

The airport is always a great place to try and score a card (tho not necessarily the cheapest).

boerne

Just got back from Peru, specifically Iquitos and Nauta. There is edge and GSM at both those towns but not 3G and for sure not HPSA+ (that was available in Lima). Confirmed on a verizon iphone 4s and ATT Skyrocket. I don't know about sims because I didn't try to buy one, but Claro seemed dominant and Movistar was less obvious. Both had stores in Iquitos.