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ID Essentials - Virgin Mobile

lewedswiver — Thu, 24 Jan 2013 08:30:11 -0800

What is on the ID pack Essentials that my Virgin Mobile phone, a Galaxy S2, is bugging me to install? This seems to imply that it is mandatory that I choose to install it.

1) What *is* exactly an ID pack?

2) How will my phone change if I do install it?

3) Is there any way for me not to install it?

4) Is there any reason why I should install it?

Mired in a sea of cell phone choices, 2013 edition

aecorwin — Mon, 21 Jan 2013 15:09:54 -0800

I need a new phone! However, in looking at the available options, I am finding myself mired in analysis paralysis (not to mention a lot of "junk" websites full of keyword matches but zero useful content). Help narrowing down my selection, or even just finding a reliable source of sincere, information-dense reviews would be greatly appreciated. My current cell phone (an LG Optimus V, via Virgin Mobile) has been flaking out on me in various annoying ways for a while now, and I would like to identify and procure its successor before it actually becomes a paperweight.

I switched my carrier from Verizon to Virgin Mobile about two years ago, and have overall been very happy with VM's "Beyond Talk" plan. That said, I am open to switching plans/carriers but for now would be happy just to get a sense of whether there is something currently available from VM that would suit my needs.

Here, in no particular order, are my primary Wanted Features and Attributes for whatever my future phone ends up being:

- Decent-sized, highly responsive touchscreen. The Optimus V's screen is a mite smaller than I'd prefer and overall its responsiveness is mediocre compared to, say, that of my iPod Touch.

- Reasonable battery life (the Optimus V actually does reasonably well in that department; with my use patterns I need to charge it once every 1-2 days). Considering I use my phone more in "screen on" mode than "screen off", something like 5-8 continuous hours of screen-on time would be nice.

- Internal storage of 4 GB or greater and/or an SD card slot that permits cards of 2 GB or greater. SD card options should be able to support easy/seamless storage of things like photos, archived texts, and apps without complaining. One of the biggest annoyances about the Optimus V for me is its paltry internal storage and finicky, non-user-friendly behavior as far as letting me move stuff to the SD card. I have been running out of space unacceptably often lately.

- Durability / longevity: I hate buying new phones and want my next purchase to last as long as possible, both from a hardware standpoint and a relevance/obsolescence standpoint.

Operating system is really not a major consideration...I would probably be happy enough with an iphone, but I am comfortable using Android as well, so recommendations don't need to be restricted along OS lines.

Price is a minor consideration...I am a notorious cheapskate when it comes to most things, but I would be ok paying up to $500ish if I knew I was getting a phone that I'd still be using 3-4 years from now.

For obvious reasons I'd prefer to look beyond the reviews posted on the Virgin Mobile site, but thus far my Web searches seem to be mainly leading to utterly useless results. So in addition to specific phone recommendations, if anyone knows of unbiased/third-party tech blogs wherein people who actually know what they are talking about post detailed reviews of new phones, I'd greatly appreciate links! Thanks in advance, folks.

Phone for a Dandy Man

Greg Nog — Fri, 23 Nov 2012 18:31:58 -0800

I have a Fancy Cousin who uses Virgin Mobile pre-paid, and my Fancy Cousin would like to get a new Android phone during this weekend's sales. A few questions: - Is there a reason my Fancy Cousin should buy direct from Virgin Mobile, or will any phone he buys work? Is there something specific the phone would need to work on Virgin Mobile?

- What is a good mid-range model? My Fancy Cousin would like something that's around $200. An older model is fine (he says, foppishly), but something with good battery life and responsiveness is key. He says he would like one of Google's own models, if possible.

- Which online retailer is likely to have the best deal?

How to root Android Optimus V

lewedswiver — Sun, 15 Jul 2012 10:10:03 -0800

LG Optimus V on Virgin Mobile -- this phone sucks. Or maybe it's the operating system? Anyways, tell me about rooting it. A lot of apps are forced to go on the phone and not the SD card, making the phone's memory fill up VERY quickly. The phone freezes all the time -- it takes a while to send one text message, and if I try to send two text messages in a row, it will freeze for a minute or two. All sorts of apps freeze and crash all the time (granted, this could be on the apps and not the phone, and some of the apps I'm talking about are big hulking beasts that are known to be buggy, but who knows...).

Anyways, I'm sick of it. I want to root Android 2.2 and get the latest version of Android. There are some questions on askmefi about androids that are rooted, or specific other phones... but I can't see anything as straightforwardly obvious as "How do I root this phone?" [My one other option I would consider would to buy an unlocked iPhone off craigslist, but I'm not sure if it's possible to get that to work on your Virgin Mobile number. I don't really want to buy the new iPhone Virgin is offering, for price reasons.]

Via Google, it seems that this is a good reference to start with. Unfortunately, this is NOT very clear for non-techy people. (For example, there's an early warning that you need to find out if you have Android 2.2.1 or 2.2.2, but then the link that is a guide to finding that out immediately jumps into things that would only make sense AFTER you've rooted.) The more links I click on the more that site seems to be taking me into a rabbit hole of techy-speak I can't understand. Has anyone here rooted this phone? How? Is there an easy step-by-step guide?

TL;DR: I want to update my Android 2.2 Optimus V on Virgin Mobile to the latest operating system, presumably Android 4.0, so that it will work better and more smoothly and crash less often. How can I do this?

Smart Phones at Virgin Mobile

maxwelton — Fri, 13 Jul 2012 15:47:23 -0800

My wife and I are going to swap our elderly "regular" cell phones on Sprint for smart phones on Virgin Mobile. My wife is going to go with the Optimus Elite. My question is this: Can it possibly be worth it for me to go with the less expensive iPhone ($550) over the highest-spec Android phone (the Evo V 4G at $300)? I have no Apple devices and use Windows on my regular machines. I'm 95% convinced about the Evo but would listen to arguments about why spending twice as much will give me twice as much usefulness/pleasure. (I do inherently dislike the Apple business model.) Also would be interested in learning that no-matter-what, the Evo is a bad idea.

I use my phone only when I'm out and about, I definitely don't live on it. I'm looking forward to being able to use data-based stuff like maps and the web, if I take a photo with the on-board camera I'd be using it online so the difference between 5 or 8MP doesn't matter at all. That said, if the camera in the evo is just total junk, that's not cool.

My phone would need to have a service life of a couple of years, at least. The idea of running down to the phone store because a new model comes out is laughable to me, so I try to get something decent to start with.

I'm a programmer, so rooting a phone doesn't sound intimidating, but am not sure it's a requirement to be able to do so.

Google Voice phone calls over wi-fi using android 2.2 cell phone.

dancestoblue — Mon, 02 Jul 2012 01:19:49 -0800

Seriously considering buying Virgin Mobile LG Optimus V (android 2.2) phone tomorrow, would/will be my first foray into any phone even beginning to resemble smart. My main question: how difficult is this phone to set up to use Google Voice telephone number over wi-fi, calls in-bound and out. I'm assuming that this can be done and likely it's easy-peasy but I've not done it, maybe you have.

The plan I want to use on this Virgin Mobile phone has unlimited text, email, data and web but only 300 minutes of talk time, and no off-prime minutes -- 300 minutes talk, total, period.

I've been with Sprint since the dawn of time, I'm been used to having 500 minutes, plus free nights/weekends after seven PM. Mostly I don't use all the minutes but it's been nice to know they're there.

Virgin is closing these out for $60 and no contract (having been married to sprint these long years, no contract looks mighty fine.) I've nosed around these past months, seems people have had good luck with this phone, and for my purposes I suspect it'll be fine, only question is making calls in/out using GVoice. I'm all the time in reach of wi-fi, up to and including a fast clear.com hot-spot that's got good coverage most everywhere I go

Other than this issue, this calls over wifi thing? I don't know -- anything which you might know about this switch I'm contemplating, sprint to virgin, dumb-phone to sortof smart phone, I'd love to hear it.

Thx!

Any port in a cell phone storm?

bluefly — Mon, 07 May 2012 11:32:19 -0800

Currently, I have a Virgin Mobile PAYG smartphone. I'd like to get a phone on my family's Sprint plan instead (for the same monthly price as Virgin, I can get unlimited whatever). However, Sprint says they can't port my phone number because Virgin is a reseller of theirs. I've heard that you can port your number to Google Voice for a small fee, and then have Sprint port the number to a Sprint phone, but this advice was found on a forum somewhere and no one backed up the claim that it actually worked. Would it work? Have you done this? I'd really like to keep my phone number, and before I risk losing it, I'd like to know. Thanks.

two cell #'s, one person

diode — Sat, 24 Mar 2012 08:19:29 -0800

I have a new smart phone on Virgin Mobile. I could have ported to Google Voice initially, using a number on GV I already had, but chose not to. I'm now getting calls from the cell's # and my GV #. Should I port over to GV completely and have just one number? When I got my Optimus on Virgin Mobile, I thought it would be useful to segregate business calls on the VM # and personal calls on the Google Voice number I have had for some time now. In practice I'm not seeing much advantage to doing this and wondering if I could now switch to Google Voice totally, have one number, and not lose the cell # and the calls that are coming to it.
I get calls often for a small business I run. I thought it would be convenient to know that a caller was calling on a particular number so I could be prepared to deal with the caller based on personal or business calls. The phone doesn't tell me what service they are calling on, so that's not much use.
Google Voice has a lot of functionality, like better voice quality on recordings and calls, transcriptions and and Android app compared to Virgin's voicemail capability. Plus when I call out, the phone is asking me if I want to use GV service or VM to make the call, which adds another step to making a call.
So, I have two numbers, one Virgin Mobile for business calls, and one GV for personal calls. The functionality of this arrangement is not optimal as the VM voicemail is poor compared to GV, plus there's added complications to doing outbound calls,, plus I don't know on what service people are calling on.
What options might I have to improve this, given I don't want to lose the VM # with it's business related history, meaning people have this # and I don't want to lose it.
Thanks for any tips or information.

DTMF, eh?

jepler — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 14:25:47 -0800

What can I do to make things go smoothly when I quit Sprint for another mobile provider in a few months? In June 2010 I switched from Virgin Mobile USA to Sprint. When my contract is up later this year, I want to switch back to Virgin to save money (yeah, I'll be buying another new phone—but even at two hundred bucks it won't take long to make that back in savings on service).

I'd really like to keep my current number (something I wasn't able to do when I switched to Sprint). Also, my wife (we're on the "family everything data" plan and got our phones at the same time) doesn't want to switch service at this time.

Is there anything I can do in advance to make things go more smoothly when I quit Sprint? Will porting my sprint number to google voice make things easier or harder? How is having a "family" plan going to complicate this?

Bonus question: As someone who has hated his Samsung Moment from day 1 for being slow (e.g., to change among apps) and flaky (GPS and wifi, I'm looking at you), should I pick up the LG Optimus Slider or the Samsung Intercept? Or, more to the point, any reason not to go with the LG?

Not a Virgin Mobile Virgin

spamguy — Wed, 24 Nov 2010 12:56:15 -0800

What's a cell phone plan comparable in scope and price to Virgin Mobile's $25/month? I loathe phones in general, so my cell phone is my only phone, and even then I tend to use mine minimally: talk and occasional text. I have been using Virgin Mobile and one of their LG phones since 2007 without much complaint. The phone was totally obsolete even then, but it works. More importantly, the plan is perfect for me, $25/month.

It figures, of course, that the one place my phone doesn't work is at my new job. Every attempt to make a phone call is met with a man yelling at me that I am inside a Sprint private network. (Psst, dude: Sprint owns VM.) I've decided to consider other providers, but I've been repulsed by prices that are occasionally 100% higher for equivalent service.

What options do I have if I want to stay as close to Virgin's low price as possible? The important variables:

Don't need many minutes, don't text much. Pay-as-you-go used to work, but it started biting me in the ass every time I made a half-hour phone call, so I gave that up.

I work for a faceless megacorp that gives me 10%-20% off plans for Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile, and a couple other carriers.

The service has to be good enough to pierce the mystery outage bubble cursing my north Austin office building.

We all want iPhones or Droids naturally, but until the US catches up with Asia's data plans, I'm always still content with even the crappiest of phones.

How do I reset my VirginMobile device?

geoff. — Wed, 13 Oct 2010 13:10:59 -0800

Does anyone use Virgin Mobile? I have a data card with them (a MiFi device), and I'm trying to replenish minutes with them but don't remember my PIN, also I can't get any of the security recovery questions right. Calling up was not helpful at all. Short of getting a new device, is there anyway to reset this? Ideally I'd like to just reset this device and setup a new account on it, but I can't figure out how. This is incredibly frustrating as I have the PIN and security question written down, but apparently must have mistyped something. Their help line wasn't helpful at all.

Surely there must be a way to reset the device to factory default and just setup a new account? As it stands now it looks like I have to pay for another device to get going.

What are your experiences using Virgin Mobile in Oakland, CA?

jenmakes — Sun, 03 Oct 2010 12:40:15 -0800

What are your experiences using Virgin Mobile in Oakland, CA? I'm feeling lured away from T-Mobile by the siren song of VM's $25 plan in conjunction with the upcoming Android. Specifically, I live on the south side of Lake Merritt, work in Rockridge, and I often visit downtown SF and the Mission. I will be canceling my home internet & using the phone for (not very much) talk, text, and some internet like gmail, maps, and finding random info like the hours at the library. I'm a little gun-shy because I've had zero problems with TM in 10 years, but saving some change would really help out these days.

Did you make the switch to VM in Oakland? What made you regret it or wish you'd done it sooner?

Can't afford smartphone. What will do instead?

dhartung — Tue, 17 Aug 2010 22:27:09 -0800

A Rumor Touch looks like my best bet to stay with this carrier. I might like the LG Prime, though. Do I have any other good options? Can I find an affordable no-contract smartphone? OK, my old Samsung slider has bitten the dust. The internet was so abysmal I rarely used it.

As a Virginmobile customer, I can upgrade to a Loft, a Rumor2, a Rumor Touch ($130), and a Blackberry Curve. The Touch looks like my price point. It's a "messaging phone" and comes with a number of built-in apps. It sounds like I could do some real mobile web stuff, even YouTube, and use a Facebook app, so that would satisfy a lot. I know it isn't a smartphone, but is this going to just whet my appetite more or will these additional capabilities really be useful? If not I could just stick with a cheapo option like the Loft.

I'm intrigued a bit by the LG Prime offered by AT&T GoPhone. How would it compare with the Rumor Touch, or any other phone in this class? Am I right that this is around the best I can expect without going to the next level up? (I must be missing other options, but so much of what you can read about is contract-only tech.)

Ultimately, is there a no-contract smartphone option out there? I don't need the latest and greatest device, but I recognize there are risks to old tech in this space. I could go either way between iPhone or Droid, but I'm open to other choices like Palm.

Finally, I am sort of bound to VM by having this sweet legacy plan (from 2001!) that I think saves me about 10-20% on talk minutes. But I have a number out of my local area code and need to change that. A new account would be on a new plan (e.g.), and I'd need a data plan for any real internet use, so I bet I would soon not notice the difference. Concur? I live and work at home so I mainly use my PC, so it's not something I'll use necessarily daily, but I expect it to add up anyway.

Help me receive text messages from people on all cell networks.

needs more cowbell — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 13:39:50 -0800

After porting a number from Virgin Mobile to Page Plus, I don't receive text messages from people on the AT&T network. Page Plus is a small MVNO cell phone provider that "rents" space on the Verizon network. This is all in the US.

I ported my number to them from Virgin Mobile about two months ago. Everything seemed to have gone OK until I figured out that texts from people who have AT&T were not coming through. (I have tested this several times with several people. They get no indication that the text has not gone through, and I get no indication that a text has been sent.) Texts from Verizon and US Cellular are fine; I don't seem to know anyone on Sprint or T-Mobile, so I'm not sure about those. People on any network seem to *receive* my texts just fine.

Strange thing: after porting, I was still able to log in to my Virgin Mobile account online. And whaddya know, I could see a record of texts received from those AT&T numbers there. (Incidentally, Page Plus has no such online account management feature where you can see that someone with a particular cell number has sent you a text.)

I called Page Plus about my problem and mentioned what I'd noticed about seeing the record of the texts in my VM account online. They told me that I needed to speak to Virgin Mobile to have them fully close and delete the account, and that would solve the problem. I have since called Virgin Mobile several times. They swear to me that they have closed and deleted the account, and I can no longer log in to account management online, but the texts from people with AT&T still do not come through.

I've called Page Plus customer support again numerous times. They have "reset my account" and "reprogrammed my phone" a bunch of times, neither of which helped. Then they told me there was nothing else they could do because I use an unlocked CDMA phone/handset rather than a phone I purchased from them, and insisted that the issue must be my phone's software, which they cannot troubleshoot. That seems pretty ridiculous to me - it seems pretty apparent that it's a network issue.

ANYWAY - after pushing and threatening to contact the Better Business Bureau, I finally got tech support there to acknowledge that it might not be an issue with the phone/handset I use, and agree to troubleshoot what they can on their end, but without guarantees since "it could still be your phone." They're doing that now, but I suspect I still may need to make some suggestions for how they proceed in order to get this resolved. I'm supposed to call them back tonight.

SO - what could be causing this issue? Are there any concrete suggestions I can make to them (either Page Plus or Virgin Mobile's customer service) for how to resolve it? Do you think there is a snowball's chance in hell that this is an issue with my phone (Samsung SCH-i760)? If all else fails is there some intermediary inter-carrier text-directing entity I can speak to directly to try to get this fixed? I've googled and read and posted a bunch on HowardForums, and seen some people with similar issues, but that hasn't gotten me anywhere.

How reliable are Virgin Mobile and their term plans?

Joseppi — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 10:30:31 -0800

Is Virgin Mobile worthwhile for their non-pay-as-you-go phone plans? They've got very competitive prices but I've heard they're terrible for their pay-as-you-go plans. Does anyone have any experience with their term plans? Are they just as bad? The main thing I've heard is their customer service being the worst and that the coverage isn't great. Any thoughts?

Virgin Mobile Arc wtf?

Anonymous — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 15:29:31 -0800

Does anyone know how to turn off the shutter sound on the Virgin Mobile Arc?

Virgin Mobile US to T-Mobile UK. Can we connect?

electriccynic — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 04:28:59 -0800

Virgin Mobile US to T-Mobile UK. Can we connect? My friend is on a Virgin Mobile US phone. I'm on a T-Mobile UK phone. I can SMS her, but she can't text or call me ... can you suggest reasons why this could be?

Virgin Mobile customer service claim that I need to be on a certain network, one of which given is ... the network I'm on!

Do you use Virgin Mobile (in the U.S.)? Even better, do you use their Slice phone?

lorimer — Thu, 26 Jul 2007 05:49:22 -0800

Do you use Virgin Mobile (in the U.S.)? Even better, do you use their Slice phone? All its specs are fine for me; I'm hoping to hear how you like it (especially the sound quality of calls, since the reviews of that are mixed) and/or how you like using Virgin Mobile.

Virgin Mobile custom ringtones

zixyer — Sat, 16 Jun 2007 13:13:10 -0800

Is it in any way possible to add a custom ringtone to a Virgin Mobile phone? I've got a ringtone in mind that I would like to have on my phone, but it's unlikely to ever be offered for purchase. My provider is Virgin Mobile, which seems to make every attempt to lock down their phones to prevent people from doing what I want to do. Unfortunately, changing providers isn't really an option as I don't use a lot of minutes and vmobile is the cheapest in my situation.

The ringtone that I want is monophonic, but it would be okay if I needed to make it polyphonic. Is there any phone available in Virgin Mobile's selection that would allow me to use it? Is it possible to obtain a different phone that would allow a custom ringtone and also work with Virgin Mobile?

Google is failing me. Just try to google for anything involving ringtones and see how far you get...