GoPhone

AT&T's Z221 GoPhone

The AT&T Z221 is the latest prepaid flip phone to enter AT&T's GoPhone portfolio. A quad-band world phone, the ZTE-made Z221 has a 2-inch internal screen with a QVGA display (320x240 pixels) and a basic camera. The Z221 is a petite thing, just 3.8 inches tall, 2 inches wide, and .7-inch thick. It weighs 3.2 ounces.

There's a little more than meets the eye, with support for AT&T Mobile Music, mobile e-mail, and a Web browser. The Z221's battery life is rated at 3 hours talk time and around … Read more

Quick Take: AT&T U2800A

The U2800A, made by Huawei, is a low-end phone for AT&T's GoPhone prepaid service. Basic inside and out, the U2800A has a standard candy bar design that measures 4.37 inches long by 1.84 inches wide by 0.56 inch deep and weighs 2.68 ounces. The 1.8-inch display shows 262,000 colors (160x128 pixels).

Features include messaging, a personal organizer, a WAP browser, polyphonic ringtones, USB syncing, M3/T3 hearing aid compatibility, and a speakerphone. The U2800A is just $19.99, but you can get it for free if you purchase it online.

AT&T to add new $25 GoPhone prepaid plan

In addition to unveiling three new Windows Phone Mango devices today, AT&T announced that it will offer a new $25-per-month GoPhone prepaid plan.

The plan includes 250 nationwide voice minutes and unlimited nationwide messaging every 30 days, and launches on September 18. On that day, the carrier will also offer GoPhone customers a new international long-distance calling feature that gives 250 minutes of international calls to more than 50 countries for an additional $10 per month.

Ask Maggie: Net neutrality, Verizon iPhones on Sprint, and more

The Federal Communications Commission adopted this week new rules intended to protect consumers from nefarious broadband providers who in the future may monkey with rivals' network traffic to boost usage of their own services.

But what do these so-called Net neutrality rules mean for consumers? In this week's Ask Maggie column, I try to answer a reader's question about what protections the new rules provide for certain applications, such as Skype and Netflix.

I also break the bad news to another reader that he will not be able to use a Verizon iPhone, when it's eventually released, … Read more

Snap up the AT&T R225 for $20, contract-free

It's not every day we see a prepaid phone at the AT&T R225's rock-bottom $20 price.

Even the simplest phone tends to cost more off-contract since they're not receiving any subsidies the carriers hand out in exchange for your two-year service agreement. So if you're in the market for an inexpensive phone just for making calls, feast your eyes on the AT&T R225 Go Phone.

This is a typically tall, slim candy bar handset colored in black and silver. It's a dual-band GSM phone (850/1900) with a 1.8-inch screen … Read more

Samsung offers two prepaid phones for AT&T

AT&T's Go prepaid service may not get the flashiest cell phones, but it is an ideal first stop if you're searching for a functional handset with a simple design and an affordable price tag. Samsung is a frequent source of such models, and it recently gave us two more with the SGH-A187 and SGH-A197. Both are now available on AT&T's Web site and in some carriers' stores.

The SGH-A187 has a full QWERTY keyboard for easy testing and messaging. Inside its blue candy bar design you'll find a 1.3-megapixel camera, a … Read more

AT&T slashes prepaid GoPhone rates October 3

AT&T announced new payment plans for GoPhone today that drastically cut costs to the wireless carrier's prepaid phone service. The revised plans go into effect on October 3, and lower the price of using the Unlimited Daily Talk and Text and Simple Rate plans.

Unlimited Daily Talk and Text users will now pay $2 per day for days they use their phones, as opposed to $3, and the plan includes 200 MB of data. Simple Rate users will see prices drop from 25 cents per minute to 10 cents per minute. Charges apply for making or receiving … Read more

AT&T starts $60 unlimited GoPhone plan

AT&T will begin providing unlimited voice and text for $60 a month as part of its GoPhone prepaid service, the company announced Friday. Other prepaid plans from Boost Mobile and MetroPCS, for example, are around $50 a month or less, but the $60 a month plan still sounds pretty good.

The plan also includes unlimited texting to Canada, Mexico, and a hundred other countries. AT&T will start offering the service on October 12.

(Via PhoneScoop)

AT&T's GoPhone now has unlimited calling for $3 a day

Most prepaid phone services deal in minute allotments so that you're paying X number of dollars for X number of minutes. AT&T, however, is breaking that convention with a new prepaid calling option that offers unlimited nationwide calls for $3 a day. It'll be part of a new AT&T GoPhone plan without any roaming or long-distance fees and is yet another option for the "Pay as you go" model.

It's called GoPhone Unlimited, and customers will still have to use text messaging and data service at the same old pay-per-use rates--so … Read more