Verizon Wireless is planning on introducing a brand new $50 monthly prepaid this weak in an effort to edge in on MetroPCS and Sprint-owned Boost and Virgin Mobile. The $50 monthly prepaid is said to include unlimited text, talk, and web according to the Wall Street Journal. The new plan, which fair launched back in April as “Unleashed” in limited markets, will be available to customers in Verizon stores, Walmart, Target, and Best Buy. As of right now, the new plan is much cheaper than Verizon’s current unlimited talk and text prepaid option, which currently costs $94.99 per month.

“This is a very competitive market, and we want to make sure we have a price portfolio to fit a greater number of customers,” Verizon Wireless spokeswoman Brenda Raney said. “In these times there are some people who would prefer living on a prepaid plan.”

As of right now, Verizon’s competitors charge the following: AT&T’s GoPhone service offers the same unlimited option and costs $50 per month. Virgin Mobile’s service costs $55 per month although they are cheaper options for customers who want fewer minutes. MetroPCS offers a nationwide unlimited plan for $45 per month but customers can also opt for a  more expensive 4G prepaid package. Boost Mobile’s service costs $50 per month but can drop as low as $35 per month as part of its “monthly shrinkage” perk for making on-time payments.

Are you or is anyone you know considering this deal from Verizon? If so, leave us a comment below and let us know!

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Apple is usually notorious for their ability to keep a tight seal on future products and keep them a mystery. Even with the next generation iPhone announcement being imminent, no misinformation is being thrown about. This is why when the public gets to see Apple’s prototypes, everyone is excited.

The other day, we got a taste of a prototype when we saw a 15” MacBook Pro (2007 model) with a built in 3G antenna and sim-card slot, which surfaced on eBay. The owner, Carl Frega saw bids reach $70,000 for the machine before Apple successfully had the listing pulled. Frega has claims to have purchased the prototype from a former Apple engineer via Craigslist. The machine was sold via Craigslist despite its unsuccessful eBay fiasco.

The new owner took the laptop to a genius bar where it was denied service (as Apple employees had no idea what to do with the machine). The new owner then turned around and sued Frega for selling him a fake MacBook and Frega was forced to pay back the $740 that he gained from the sale, finding himself as the owner of the device once again. We aren’t really sure how the Judge made the decision, considering the MacBook was in fact a real piece of Apple hardware. The trouble Apple went through to retrieve the unit should be enough to prove that as well.

As of right now, it is unclear how or if Apple will compensate Frega for the prototype. It doesn’t seem likely that Frega stole the device. The whole event does give us some insight as to what to look forward to in the upcoming future.

As usual, stay tuned for more info on the topic by following us on Facebook, Twitter, and/or subscribing to our RSS feed.

The wireless service provider, AT&T has recently hired Bank of America’s Merril Lynch to help advise the company on the sale of as much as $8 billion in assets in an effort to gain the government’s approval of its planned T-Mobile acquisition. The Wall Street Journal is saying that AT&T is trying to sell off its network assets in an attempt to  water down its market power, but most of the assets could actually be T-Mobile’s holdings.”As we said on the day we announced the marger with T-Mobile USA, we anticipate there will be some divestitures, as we had in past mergers, but any speculation about the amount of divestitures is premature,” an AT&T spokesperson told The Journal.

Earlier in the week, the Federal Communications Commission pumped the brakes on the merger when it announced that it will roll in AT&T’s planned acquisition of Qualcomm’s FLOTV spectrum into its overall decision on the T-Mobile purchase. AT&T has mentioned that the acquisition is on schedule for approval in March of next year.

As usual, stay tuned by following us on our new Facebook, Twitter, and/or subscribing to our RSS feed.

Verizon’s Chief Financial Officer, Fran Shammo revealed that there were plans to discontinue the unlimited data plan for iPhone users as early as mid-summer, back in March. Word is out about Verizon moving to tiered data plans as early as July 7th for their new customers.

It was previously known that July 7th would be the date that marked something new for Verizon after the company had just extended the free 4G hotspot promotion one more time to the 6th. Employees were also receieving training over the last few weeks on a new point-of-sale system, along with new account management tools that hinted at family plan changes. What wasn’t known was that the big change was the tiered data plans, which are now being expected to be released the day after the promotion ends (July 7th) for new customers.

One thing to note is that this tiered data plan is applicable to both 3G and 4G smartphones, confirming that they are not separate plans depending on device. If you are under contract currently, you should be fine and you don’t need to run out and buy a 4G phone just to lock in as we have seen other sites recommending doing that. Verizon is set to offer the following data plans:

• 2 GB for $30/month
• 5 GB for $50/month
• 10 GB for $80/month

Verizon offers the official mobile hotspot feature as well, which is set to cost an extra $20 a month. The hotspot comes with its own 2GB monthly data pool, one separate from the iPhone’s data plan.This is compared to AT&T’s hotspot feature which offers 200 MB for 15/month or 2GB for $25 a month. AT&T also charges $10 per GB if you go over the limit. The mobile hotspot feature on AT&T is only available to customers who opt for the DataPro plan and users get an additional 2 GB of monthly data usage.

Existing Verizon customers should have the option to keep their unlimited data plans through the tenure of their contract, however, it needs to be seen if Verizon will allow them to grandfather the unlimited data plans when they want to upgrade to the next generation iPhone. The unlimited data plans are currently seen as a unique selling point to Verizon’s iPhone as AT&T stopped offering iPhone customers unlimited data plans just before the iPhone 4 was launched.

What do you think of the rumored tiered data plans from Verizon? Would the lack of an unlimited data plan be a deal breaker for you? Let us know what you think in the comments section below!

As usual, stay tuned for more news and info on the topic Facebook, Twitter, and/or subscribing to our RSS feed.

Read More

You may also like to read:

• Verizon iPhone Usage Much Higher Than That of AT&T
• AT&T Personal Hotspot For iPhone 4 iOS 4.3 Limited To 3 Devices
• AT&T Prepares Network For iPhone 4 Personal Hotspot Feature
• AT&T Customizes Smartphone Tethering Plan To Take On Verizon
• AT&T To Offer Unlimited Data Plans To Counter Verizon’s Strategy
• AT&T Announces Its 4G Plans; 4G On iPhone in 2012
• AT&T Improves NYC Metro Area Coverage – Will It Help?
• AT&T Announces Tethering Support For iPhone 4G / HD; Updates Data Plans

According to the folks over at 9to5Mac, Apple is reportedly recalling Verizon iPad 2 shipments and asking Apple Retail employees to locate certain iPad 2s and send them back to Apple. Apple’s discussion boards recently lit up with the complaints from customers who had their iPad shipments mysteriously sent back to Apple. Sources are now offering a little more information on the situation:

Apple has given all the stores a list of serial numbers to scan, if it’s a match we were told to set aside and ship back to Apple, these are only for Verizon ipads. This was to be done on Monday and continue to scan all shipments thru June 11. I had over one hundred to send back.

Another source said the recall has to do with accessing cellular account information on the device:

Verizon iPad 2s aren’t being sent back due to engraving. If someone activates a cellular connection on the device, then wants to view or edit account information, they can’t. They receive a message that it is activated, and that’s it. I saw someone open at least 6 looking for one that didn’t do it. It’s device specific, not software.

Stay tuned for more news and info on this topic by following us on Facebook, Twitter, and/or subscribing to our RSS feed.

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AT&T in a surprise announcement has totally changed the mobile world Sunday by announcing a definitive agreement to acquire T-Mobile USA Deutsche Telekom for $39 billion in cash and stock combo. With this transaction, the wireless giant says in a formal statement heralding the buy, “AT&T commits to a significant expansion of robust 4G LTE deployment to 95 percent of the U.S population to reach an additional 46.5 million Americans beyond current plans – including rural communities and small towns.”

If given the green light via regulatory approval, AT&T will effectively become the largest wireless provider in the U.S. This moves comes in as a major blow to Verizon as the carriers (both of which boast an iPhone) end up duking it out to an entirely new degree of mobile supremacy. By bringing T-Mobile customers into the fold at AT&T, the carrier is poised to end up potentially regaining some of the mobile mojo it lost to Verizon earlier this year due to the release of the Verizon iPhone.

AT&T chairman and CEO, Randall Stephenson mentioned “This transition represents a major commitment to strengthen and expand critical infrastructure for our nation’s future. It will improve network quality and it will bring advanced LTE capabilities to more than 294 million people. Mobile broadband networks drive economic opportunity everywhere, and they enable the expanding high-tech ecosystem that includes device makers., cloud and content providers, app developers, customers, and more. During the past few years, America’s high-tech industry has delivered innovation at unprecedented speed, and this combination will accelerate its continued growth.”

If you are interested in reading the official statement from AT&T, you can do so by clicking here.

What do you guys think of the possibility of such a large merger? Do you think it’ll help improve the complaints many AT&T and T-Mobile users currently have? Let us know your thoughts and opinions in the comments section below!

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Source: AT&T

Verizon recently released data plan pricing for its version of the iPad 2 and many of you are probably wondering how it compares to AT&T’s plan. AT&T recently released their plan which gives users the option of being billed for their service rather than having to pre-pay. The two plans are roughly equivalent, though Verizon offers a discount for the heaviest data users. A recent study showing AT&T still with a dominant lead on download speeds, however, may give data hogs pause: Verizon users might get the bandwidth for less money but it will be slower.

AT&T is still planning to offer the two plans they rolled out with the original iPad: the Data Plus with 250 MB for $14.99/mo or Data Pro with 2GB for $25. Concurrent with the iPad 2 launch, AT&T is adding a post-paid option where users pay the same amount for the two data plans, but Data Pro users get billed at $10 per gigabyte for overages. Previously, the only option was just to pay for another month of service at the same price; Data Plus users pretty much still have to do that, but they will just get a bill rather than having to pay as they go. As for the Verizon iPad 2, it’s a little more straightforward. Data plans go from $20 per month for 1 GB on a slidign scale up to $80 per month for 10 GB, with overages at $10 for every gigabyte. AllThingsD has a good comparison chart which can be found here. If you are a bandwidth beast who uses 14 GB a month, you are going to pay $175 to AT&T, but just $120 to Verizon.

It sounds like a good deal, but you don’t get something for nothing. The latest comparison of AT&T and Verizon for bandwidth shows that the iPhone 4s on AT&T were able to download twice as fast in five major cities as their Verizon counterparts. This backs up an earlier study by Speedtest.net that showed AT&T’s HSDPA network performing, as expected, twice as well as the Verizon EV-DO Rev. A system. As we all know though, Verizon does have better coverage: if you can’t get AT&T where you are, it doesn’t matter how fast it is. If you are weighing an AT&T versus a Verizon iPad, where you are and how much data you expect to use should help you determine the answer to your decision.

What do you think? If you were one of the many who plan to get an iPad 2, have you decided which carrier you are going with? If so, let us know in the comments below! As usual, stay tuned for more tech news and info by following us on Twitter and/or subscribing to our RSS feed.

[Source: AllThingsD, GigaOm, MacWorld]

Citrix Online has just released a new remote desktop productivity application in the Apple App Store.  The GoToMyPC app will give iPad users access to their Mac or PC desktop’s files, programs, and network resources via their tablet. Citrix has focused strongly on the security of the connection, with 128-bit AES encryption, dual passwords and end-to-end user authentication. GoToMyPC will also automatically disconnect after extended periods of inactivity.

GoToMyPC only requires that a user’s iPad be connected to either a Wi-Fi or 3G network and that the app be downloaded on both the iPad and targeted desktop for full remote capabilities. Check out the demo below.

The interface for the app has been optimized to translate the iPad’s touch capabilities into commands that would generally be used on a Mac or PC. Additionally, the app includes full keyboard functionality with special keys, 300% zooming and panning and a text preview mode with spelling and grammar check.

GoToMyPC is the fast, easy and secure way to instantly connect to your Mac or PC, with access to all of your files, programs and network. And now you can take it to go with GoToMyPC for iPad.

No more filling up flash drives, worrying about forgotten files or late nights in the office. With GoToMyPC, everything you need is always just a few taps away.

Simple
• Instantly access your Mac or PC desktop.
• Work on any application or file on your computer.

Convenient
• Leave the laptop behind and lighten your load. With GoToMyPC you can use all of your computer’s contacts, files and programs from your iPad.
• Finish up your workday without staying in the office after hours. With GoToMyPC you always have access to everything on your work computer.

Reliable
• GoToMyPC comes with free 24/7 Global Customer Support. You’re never left hanging.
• GoToMyPC is backed by Citrix, so you can count on this app working when you need it.

Features
• Instant access to your files, programs and network
• Intuitive touch and gesture controls
• 300% zoom to see details and operate with precision
• Full keyboard functionality, including special keys like Alt, Ctrl and Tab
• Preview text mode for fast typing
• Keyboard Locking and Screen Blanking on host computer (PC only)
• Works seamlessly with existing firewalls – no need for special configuration
• 128-bit AES encryption, dual passwords and end-to-end user authentication
• Inactivity timeout that you can configure (PC only)
• Connects over 3G and Wi-Fi
• Free 24/7 support

GoToMyPC For iPad [Video Demo]:

NOTE:

To use this free application, you must first have a GoToMyPC subscription on the computer(s) you want to access. If you’re not a subscriber, try it now free for 30 days at www.gotomypc.com.

Download GoToMyPC For iPad:

You can download GoToMyPC (Remote Desktop) from the App Store for free.

With the release of iOS 4.3 comes the end of support for the iPhone 3G and iPod touch 2G but it also brings a host of new features to other iDevices. The iPhone 4, 3GS, iPad, iPod touch 3G/4G and Apple TV will all be receiving the benefits of the updated iOS. The list below is just some of the new features that will be coming in the release.

Features of iOS 4.3 for iPhone, iPad, iPod touch

• Personal Hotspot will allow the user to turn the iDevice into a wireless router that others can use to pick up a Wi-Fi connection.
• AirPlay will now support 3rd party apps allowing the use of other media sources besides iTunes.
• New FaceTime icon comes to us for the iPod Touch.
• iAd Full Screen Banners may not be that exciting to consumers but anyone looking for revenue via advertising will be looking forward to this.
• 4 and 5 finger gestures for iPad is similar to a report we did earlier about the rumor that Apple may be removing the Home button and be replacing it with this.

• Apple has listened to the masses by adding the option of choosing between rotation lock and mute switch for “Side Switch” for the iPad.
• New alert settings for messages coming into the iDevice
• The iPad will be receiving a new font “Noteworthy”

It’s nice to see Apple actually listening to its customers by implementing options and features that people have been calling for. Is there any features that you were looking for but didn’t make it into iOS 4.3?

Stay tuned for more news and updates, also don’t forget to follow us on Twitter and/or subscribe to our RSS Feed.

Hackers have finally managed to port Android 2.3 Gingerbread on a jailbroken iPhone 3G.

The OS seems a bit sluggish, which isn’t surprising since the iPhone 3G has a much slower processor than most recent Android (or iOS) devices — and since the operating system wasn’t really designed for the hardware, everything else seems to be working fine as can be seen in the video embedded below:

http://twitvid.com/6SWN3 – For those of you in doubt, this is Android Gingerbread on iPhone 3G, apologies for the crap video

Also, since it is based on the iDroid project, you will be able to keep both iOS and Android in a dual-boot configuration on your iPhone.

No word on the release date yet, in the mean time you can follow the step-by-step guide listed below to install Android 2.2 Froyo OS on your iPhone. And, as usual stay tuned for more news and info by following us on Twitter and/or by subscribing to our RSS Feed.

How to install Android OS on iPhone:

• [How To] Auto-Install Android On iPhone 2G / 3G With iPhodroid
• [How To] Install Android 2.2.1 Froyo On iPhone 3G / 2G With Bootlace
• [How To] Install Android 2.2 Froyo on iPhone 3G
• [How To] Install Android On An iPhone 2G

[Source: Twitter]