Nexus 4 price slash

Wow! If you are a Verizon user who wants to try going to the prepaid setup that I've been using, the deal just got a lot sweeter! The price of the Nexus 4 is now $100 less than it was before. There are rumors of a Nexus 5 coming soon, but this Nexus 4 is such an incredible deal that it would still be the way to go, in my humble opinion. Here's a link in case you don't know how to find Google Play on your own. :)
https://play.google.com/store/devices/details?id=nexus_4_8gb

The Nexus 4 pairs really well with the prepaid T-Mobile plan that I've mentioned in this blog. Even without LTE, I feel like I get pretty good speed on the data connection. I'll probably want LTE some time in the future, but it's not a burning desire.

Also, my roommate has an old iPhone 4 (or maybe a 4S) and he just switched to this plan. He says he likes it and he definitely loves the price. He plans to also get Skype to supplement his 100 minutes. Getting AT&T to unlock the phone only took a day or two.

Bye Bye Bionic

Well the Bionic is no more. Or I should say the Bionic is mine no more. I sold it on eBay as a bundle with the Lapdock, Otterbox case, and an extended battery. I listed a starting price of $50, and a "Buy It Now" price of $150 for the bundle. Some dude in Kansas bought it right away, as in less than 3 minutes after I posted it. So last night I took it down to UPS and shipped it off to him. Since it sold so quickly, there are those little tinges of "I should have asked for more," but overall I'm still glad to have cashed out and prevented it from becoming more clutter.
I think I need to go through my other stuff and start selling more of it. Tonight I plan to list my old nForce2 motherboard. It's from my first computer build, but it's actually the second motherboard I bought. I'm going to sell it with the CPU, RAM, and a Radeon 9600 video card. I plan to hook it all up again first, just to make sure everything still works. It's only about 10 years old!
I get clingy with my stuff. It's sad to see it go, but if it's just sitting in the closet taking up space, then it's really good riddance. Especially if I can make some money from it.

Nepotism alert!

Here is a video that Ford Motors made, but it features a product made by my employer, Graco:
http://youtu.be/punLeCP72ZI

Our stuff has also been featured on This Old House and other TV shows. But it's always exciting to see another one!

Referral confusion

Last night my renter/roommate returned from Ecuador. He had cancelled his AT&T service before he left since he was gone all summer. I was excited to tell him about the T-Mobile prepaid plan I've been using. And I said, hey, if you are going to sign up for it, then use my referral link.
He was cool with that, but then when he gets the link it says to go sign up first, and then come back and register on the referral program page. So now I'm wondering if this thing even works. I told him not to worry about it because I'm more interested in him saving money than I am in getting my referral bonus, but it's still pretty annoying that this all is so confusing. Why would anyone click my referral link if they make it so hard to use? I guess we'll see what happens after he receives his SIM card and activates the service. Maybe after I go through it all once, then I'll have a better understanding of the right way to do things.
I think he also needs to contact AT&T because his iPhone 4 is probably still locked.

Motivation

I built my first computer in 2002. At the time I was working at a place that sold computers. We were given some training on computers and it got me all excited. I also was living with a friend who had built his own computer in the past. So I ordered a bunch of components and built my first PC. Athlon XP processor, Windows XP, etc. Very exciting.

Now I am about to take an accounting class. We have some reading due the first day, so I'm getting an early start on it. As I read about balance sheets and income statements, I noticed a growing desire to reduce my expenses. Then I remembered that I already had that desire. My whole experiment with my cell phone, or lack there of, has been motivated by the desire to reduce my expenses.

Since then I've also reduced the bill for my DSL connection at home. I would cut it completely but I promised my renters, in writing, that I would provide high speed WiFi for them.

Now if I could just bring myself to sell my new car, and get something old and cheap, then I'd really be making a difference!

Skype is working better than expected.

This weekend I used Skype while I was out driving around. I drove from the outer northern suburbs in to Minneapolis, about 20 miles, and my call stayed connected the entire time. I had assumed that the call would drop when I switched towers, but it never dropped. There were a couple of times that it got a little bit choppy. I am assuming I had a weaker data connection at those times. I also used it when driving on the south end of town and it worked well there too. I was not covering the same 20 mile distance as the previous time, but it was still nice to be able to rely on it. I'm so happy with it that I am considering a Skype number. So far I have just been letting incoming calls go to voicemail and then calling back right away. It might just be worth it to have that Skype number so I can skip the extra step. But for now I plan to sign up for multiple months of Skype phone service so I can save a few more dollars off the already bargain price of $3/month.

It's going to take me about 10 months to make up for the $400 I spent on the Nexus 4. I'm going to be keeping an eye on T-Mo's LTE rollout and I'll probably be shopping for an LTE phone in the future. Maybe an S4 or HTC One after the prices come down some more. Especially if I can find a good deal on a used one.

FreedomPop LTE

Well there is no press release on their website, but FreedomPop's homepage is now showing an LTE hotspot called the "Mifi 5580 LTE." I won't be testing this because I am content with my T-Mobile setup. This is still on the Sprint network. I've heard the Sprint network is not able to maximize the bandwidth of LTE because their infrastructure is too weak. So until the infrastructure is beefed up, all they can promise is potential. Just having LTE does not do anything for you if you can't handle the data. Also the price of the device is $150. All that being said, it still give each owner a free 500 Gb of data each month. And as Sprint improves its network, it will keep getting better performance. So this might be the perfect travel companion for some folks. I know I enjoy the option of taking my Overdrive Pro and plugging it into my laptop. Also I just read a post on FreedomPop's blog which states that they lifted the 99 cent maintenance fee for unused accounts back in June. So you can now keep one of these in your travel bag and you don't have to worry about turning it on once a month.

Apparently the phone service they plan to roll out is going to be available for Android phones that works on Sprint. So if you have an old Sprint, Virgin, Boost, or other phone set up for Sprint, you should be able to bring it to FreedomPop. I'm not sure if there is going to be a requirement for it to be CDMA or LTE, so be careful to check on that if you plan to use their service.

Looks like I'm out of luck with my Nexus 4, but I still like the deal I currently have with T-Mobile and Skype.

T-Mobile referral program

If reading about my experiences makes you want to switch to T-Mobile too, you can help me out by going through this referral link:
https://mbsy.co/gwsT
I get some sort of promo credit of $25 if you sign up. It's worth a shot, right?

Skype works great

Last night a friend called me on my cell phone. I'm down to only 9 minutes remaining of the 100 monthly minutes. So I told him I would call him right back. I have Skype set up as my default phone call app, so I just open my call history, and his number was right on top. I clicked on it and my phone immediately called him from Skype. We talked for about 10 or 15 minutes and everything was just as clear as it was when he called me. So the bottom line is that when I'm at home, it works great on my Nexus 4. I still have my Bionic so I think I will give it a try from there too. And I also need to test it while I'm out and about. I assume if I am driving and change towers, it's going to drop the call. But I need to experiment a little bit with that. All in all, for $3/month, I'm excited about how well this works. Totally worth the money!