Great way for U.S. customers to roam!
 

As I previously mentioned in another thread, T-Mobile U.S. has come out with a couple combination wifi/GSM phones. For $10/mo. you can get unlimited calling if within range of an accessible wifi. You can use it w.o. getting the $10 option, but usage comes out of your normal bucket of minutes. They call this option "hotspot@home".

We just ran a test. My wifi TMobile phone is in Costa Rica. Calls to and from were virtually as good as over GSM. I went on line and the T-M site DOES show those calls on my account as being UMA (wifi) calls, meaning that phone can receive calls for free and call any U.S. number without cost. (I had been afraid they may charge the $3/min. roaming charge for Costa Rica since, technically, they would know the connection was via Costa Rican ISP.)

I think this T-M service alone might suit some intl. travelers fm. the U.S. This, in combination w. a intl. SIM card of choice would be a good combo.

I think some European carriers have this wifi/GSM service. Can they do the same thing?

...mike

It comes out of your minutes?

Why not use a different VoIP provider instead?

You could get hundreds of minutes a month to USA - free

wifi wow great. So when outside the usa you have a computer that shows you all available wifi access points ?
When you find a point you want to stay within 50 metre of that point so you can be called ?

Wifi is nice but using t-mobile you can only use their access point. Wifi has a limited range.
Wifi is nice when staying at hotels or working in a restaurent or starbuck or mcdonalds.

But wifi is in no way a replacement for cell phone bacause of very limited availablility and range.
Just to call wifi it's to much trouble finding an access point.

I didn't mean to say wifi is a replacement for cell. It is useful if you are, for eg., staying in someone's home for a few days overseas or be in an office for some amount of time etc. When in Costa Rica, at a friend's home, several people made use of the free calling back home.
It's just another tool. There isn't just one tool out there that will work for everyone in every situation.
BTW, there is free wifi at Ft. Lauderdale airport AND as i recall, at the San Jose, CR airport.
Phone worked fine.

...mike

I think TMobile's Hot Spot at home is an interesting solution. I do pretty much the same thing using my E61. I mostly use Truphone on it, but also have Fring.

The thing I was curious about with TMobile's Hotspot at Home was what ports it uses and how similar the UMA protocol was to the industry standard protocols. Whle the program is still relatively small, it occurred to me that some of the problems people have visiting places such as D ubai, might be eliminated

Well, I actually was going to go to T-Mobile today to query about the HotSpot@home, but, I'll ask here.

Of course, I am international half the year, so, this potentially is great, and I had thought about this when I heard about the service.

But, must I carry around the T-mobile Wifi router, or, can I use my Apple airport Express I carry with me, to make my hotel rooms wireless?

Meaning, is the HotSpot@home a software based connection from via any Wifi phone (like my TyTN), or, is it something you can use any Wifi phone, but also exclusive only through using their Wifi router?

HotSpot at Home can connect through almost any router. The TMobile router simply provides QOS, but I'd be interesting in finding out what those settings are.

To the best of my knowledge, TMobile does not use SIP. It is not a software only solution, it is directly tied to the hardware -- that is why there is no HS@H's for Dash or other TMobile smartphones. Their forthcoming WiFi Blackberry is supposed to support this.

I haven't seen anything @ XDA Developers about getting a TyTn to work with HS@H either.

Thanks ... I thought I would just get the T-Mo Blackberry 8310 (after just getting the 8300) ... and hopefully figure a way to use with any router ...

Andy,
I've asked myself the same question. Or, why not just use my Palm for VOIP? One thing about American cellular subscriptions is that the per minuite cost is so low that it is almost free. Some plans give you 3000 minutes for less than US$40/month and you may even get unlimited night and weekend calling too. So, with this sort of plan, I guess you'd be able to sit in CR and chat on your cell phone for hours at night and on weekends with no extra charge whatsoever. And you'd be using your same incoming and outgoing number as if you were still in the US; same address book, etc.

I think it is nice because it is EASY, and SIMPLE. You can use your same trusty GSM device, with the same phone number SIM, and seamlessly hand off. I guess that works for some people. Especially when I am in the Hollywood Hills in LA, it's nice to be able to hand off to a router, and use my cell in an area of no signal.

I agree that easy and simple have a lot to do with this system being attractive. OTOH if the cost were ~25c/min instead of ~2.5c/min I think the easy & simple part would not be so important.

Germany WIFI experience
 

I don't want to downplay the usefulness of @ home/wifi arrangements, but all that glitters is not gold. The WFI coverage was not good at all.

Back from 2 + weeks in Germany, Duesseldorf, Berlin & Frankfurt area. Stayed @ hotels in each place. Here are my WIFI experiences.

In Duesseldorf we stayed @ a small hotel with no WIFI or internet. Spent some time with wife's relatives and none of them had WIFI. First 7 nights. There was an internet cafe close at 2 Euros per hour.

Berlin Crown Plaza WIFI/internet rates: 30 min, 5 Euro; 120 min 10 Euro; 1 day 12.5 Euro.... 4 days 46 Euros. Needless to say I did not sign up. Next 6 nights. There were two internet cafes quite close at 2 Euros per hour.

Frankfurt (actually Gross Gerau). WIFI hotspot by T-Mobile Germany. Well, I did not even bother. Final 3 nights. There were two internet cafes quite close at 1 Euros per hour.

Stan

Well, I prefer WIRED internet, as I carry around an Apple Airport Express, and make my own Wifi network in the hotel room.

As well, I would imagine, many of us, as there is little choice, have to sign up for daily Internet access at the hotels... I just hope the @home works off any router.

clarification
 

Hotel in D-dorf had NO internet of any kind.
Wired internet in Berlin was the same price as WIFI access.
Hotel near Frankfurt had NO wired internet.

No sure how much help the Apple Airport Express is under those circumstances.

My bottom line is that my experiences in Europe (Germany, France, Malta) have been that hotels do not routinely provide any free internet services.

Stan

A travel router is helpful because it lets multiple devices share the same internet connection. Thus, your Nokia E61 could share the connection with your laptop.

By the way, it is my understanding that the TMobile phones work on German TMobile Hotspots at $0.18 a minute.

Yeah, that is true - but, when it's all said and done, doing it that way with a phone, considering the time between being on actual Wifi telephone calls, logging on, etc., the 18c a minute charge for the Wifi usage probably would translate to 50c a minute for the actual call time vs overall Wifi usage. There are options that are that cost, anyway, without Wifi.

And, no, you rarely find free internet in Europe. But, all things remaining the same, I pay around Euro18 a day anyway for internet use around Europe, having @home is just a nice extra.

I didn't think the Starbucks DE option was a necessarily a good option, I just felt compelled to correct the earlier statement.

I had free internet in two hotels in Ireland last year. The hotel I'll be staying at in Instanbul has free internet. It is on the European side of the Bophurus (sp?), but I don't think that is what you meant by "Europe."

In Dubai, intenet is all over the map. When I stayed at the Madinat Jumerah, they wanted $40 a night. Down the street at the Radisson SAS, it was free.