Cheapest iPhone discussion

jicms

or the £20 one of course!

iPhone 4 16GB Black

12 month contract

• Handset price: £349.00
• £20 Tariff 12 Month iPhone Contract (250 minutes, unlimited texts , 1 GB mobile data and unlimited BT Openzone Wifi)

Darloal_2

I've worked the telecoms industry since 1995 and I have always took an interest in tariffs, minutes, cost and recently contract length. I currently have a iPhone 3GS and have been looking at the new iPhone. However looking at this thread I've noticed some pretty big holes in the research.

1. The iPhone 4 is unlocked for any network as standard.
2. The iPhone 4 has the new micro sim standard, this means that you can't pop in any old sim into the iPhone 4 as it will not fit.

When searching for deals you may as well discount any of the deals displayed on the page listing the deals. You will need to check all the networks for iPhone micros sim deals. The networks are clever and are not giving consumers the same deals they are for normal or 'large' sim only deals.

From what I can see then only operators to do these deals are Orange, Three, O2 and Vodafone.

T-mobile, virgin and telco are not doing microsims (correct at time of writing)

If you want an iPhone 4 you have 3 options.
Buy the phone from where ever and buy a pay microsim
Buy the phone from where ever and buy a monthly/yearly sim tariff
Buy the phone with a contract

Darloal_2

Telco = Tesco

d123

Darloal wrote: »

2. The iPhone 4 has the new micro sim standard, this means that you can't pop in any old sim into the iPhone 4 as it will not fit.

When searching for deals you may as well discount any of the deals displayed on the page listing the deals. You will need to check all the networks for iPhone micros sim deals. The networks are clever and are not giving consumers the same deals they are for normal or 'large' sim only deals.

It's actually pretty easy to turn a normal old sim into a micro sim, there are plenty of "how to" pages around, downloadable templates and even a little machine now available to "punch" the mini sim out of a normal sim.

"how to" example:
http://www.techradar.com/news/computing/apple/how-to-make-your-own-ipad-micro-sim-681020

Oscar_The_Grouch

Darloal wrote: »

T-mobile, virgin and tesco are not doing microsims (correct at time of writing)

Tesco and T-Mobile are selling the iPhone 4 so will provide a micro sim. Virgin don't but as mentioned by D123, you can cut a normal sim down quite easily.

shell1000

wow that tesco deal looks really good, it might actually tempt me across from my sim only deal on 02.

typically i fall between the two, i need about 400/500 minutes, texts and data. so i'd prob have to go for the 35 deal.

jicms

Oscar_The_Grouch wrote: »

Tesco and T-Mobile are selling the iPhone 4 so will provide a micro sim. Virgin don't but as mentioned by D123, you can cut a normal sim down quite easily.

Unless I've missed something T-Mobile aren't doing the iphone4 yet, the reason I'm leaving them to go to Tesco Mobile.

Can someone clarify, when I get to the end of my Tesco 12 mth contract, I can go straight to O2 for a SIM only deal or will my phone be locked to Tesco? Not sure how their relationship works.

d123

jicms wrote: »

Can someone clarify, when I get to the end of my Tesco 12 mth contract, I can go straight to O2 for a SIM only deal or will my phone be locked to Tesco? Not sure how their relationship works.

should be fine, as Tesco use o2 (and use the same MCC+MNC which governs the lock status) so the sim should be interchangeable, even if not, Tesco have said they will unlock their iPhones after 12 months on Tesco, so you would be able to apply for an unlock and use whoever seems the most reasonable in 12 months time.

bobtail_5

Yeah I will do. I was going to leave Orange at the end of my last contract and they ended up giving me a deal I could not pass down. If you call up at the end of your contract they will do mostly anything to keep you on their contract as a customer :-)

kalifire

I will be looking to get an iPhone from Apple directly, so it's unlocked. I don't wany any kind of contract, but often the only alternative seems to be 'SIM only' - which is still a contract, even if it only lasts a month. All I want is a PAYG sim, with no contract or credit check of any kind whatsoever. Surely this must be possible?!