[anon(636465)]

Hey everyone, I had a few questions.

I'm traveling to Germany next month, and was wondering about the best option for my cell. I have the 9530 storm with Verizon, and it's unlocked. I've tested the sim port with other carriers and it works great.

So thus far, after a few hours research I've come up with a few options.

#1. Get a German pre-paid sim card to use in my phone. The price is 29 usd for the card itself, then the rate is .39 cents per minuet to call back to the US. The card comes with 10.00 euros on it already to use towards calls.

#2. Get the international roaming plan with Verizon. It would cost about 2.50 for the "value plan" (which isn't very much of a value at all) of which the rate to the US from Germany would be 1 usd a minuet.



So, it's kind of a toss up because while option #1 seems to be the cheaper choice, I wouldn't be able to use email or any other data services aside from texting which is also crazy expensive. #2 seems more expensive, but at the same time I could email for free (according to Verizon rep)

Also, does anyone know if BBM would work with intl roaming through my verizon sim over in Europe? and if so, would it charge me?

Thanks for your input everyone! Let me know what you think!

[elydoug]

Go with Verizon. Simple and not a lot of $ for the convenience. Data IMHO is the most important feature and you wont get it with a prepaid sim. GMaps made finding hotels, food etc. a breeze. IM instead of text is no big deal. I don't know if BBM works because I didn't use it but I did use AIM and it worked flawlessly. If you need voice/text a lot, you may see an advantage but for temporary travel I don't think it is worth it.

[anon(636465)]

Awesome, thank you elydoug. I will most likely go with verizon, and just use data mostly instead of voice.

[snork]

If you're planning to talk for more than 10-15 minutes while over there, I would get a prepaid sim card while you're over there, they can offer more competitively priced rates.

the international data plan is amazing though. its $65/month, but they will pro-rate it for the time you are there. i went to germany and israel and the data plan cost me $20 extra for 11 days.

the only downside is that in germany it uses GSM, so if you get a pre-paid sim for calls, you'll have to swap that out with the one you'll use for data.

[anon(636465)]

Ahh also good info. Thank you. I think I will rely more on the data, so I'll stick with VZ.

Thanks again everyone

[pkcable]

Yea get the data and then just don't make any voice calls. If need be get a regular calling card and use pay phones, or your hotel phone. Who wants to make many calls anyways while on vacation?

[jags316]

If you do use Verizon, make absolutely certain they sign you up for the right plan. I went overseas last year (UK and Ireland) and somehow ended up with over $600 in data "roaming" charges!! This was after I spoke with Verizon and thought I had converted to the proper int'l data plan. They ultimately rescinded the charges, but it was a huge hassle and took 4 phone calls to customer services and 3 billing cycles.

[Eich]

If you do use Verizon, make absolutely certain they sign you up for the right plan. I went overseas last year (UK and Ireland) and somehow ended up with over $600 in data "roaming" charges!! This was after I spoke with Verizon and thought I had converted to the proper int'l data plan. They ultimately rescinded the charges, but it was a huge hassle and took 4 phone calls to customer services and 3 billing cycles.

Same thing happened to me. If you're not covered under the proper international data plan, you'll get charged through the nose. Using something like Google maps chews up a lot of data VERY quickly.

[DUKDIKz]

oh,,i never knew thatt,,,i thought if u unlock it,,u can use it anywhere - -*

[anon(636465)]

Well, if you unlock it, you're just enabling the phone to use a different carrier's sim card.

I'm in germany now, and my phone works fine. It took it a few minuets even after connecting up to Vodafone GSM network, but now its fully functional.

It does keep saying "blackberry message memory full. please delete some SMS messages"

Any idea about this? I KNOW my memory isn't full, and i've deleted some just in case. Also I've done the batt pull thing