[samuraijak]

Hello people of CrackBerry. I just recently got interested in the new BlackBerry Storm for obvious reasons, and am really interested in upgrading. The only problem is that I am 17, on an AT&T Family Plan with 4 other members of my family, and don't have an option to switch to Verizon. I am eligible for an upgrade since my phone is old, and was planning on upgrading to the iPhone 3g but after seeing the Storm I am officially obsessed with it! I just started looking into the whole unlocking process and possibilities, but a lot of it sounds like straight jibberish to me because I'm not very intelligent when it comes to the deeper specs of phones and cracking them and all that. I have a few questions about my options:



-Can the BlackBerry Storm (North American) be unlocked for an AT&T family Plan?

-Are there any extra fees or problems that might occur if I did this (i.e. phone locking such as the bricking of iPhones)?

-Is it really as easy as calling the number and saying you want to unlock it because you are going to be traveling?

-Assuming it just involves unlocking and putting my SIM card in, does that mean that my family plan will just cost the same as it does now + a data plan that I would be adding (AT&T has a $35 data plan for BlackBerries)?

-Does AT&T's Data plan fully support all the mechanisms and applications on the BB Storm?

-Is there anything I should be worried about? Any reason why I shouldn't do this?




Thank you for any help, as I am again very new to this subject of phones.

[Kaylajoy21]

The storm is exclusive to Verizon and Verizon uses CDMA technology. At&t uses GSM, so any storm you may uncover also will not take your SIM card.

[Duvi]

- Yes it can be unlocked for AT&T, but no 3g. You will be limited to EDGE only.

- No extra fees or real problems that I know of due to unlocking.

- It sounds that easy. Not sure how easy it really is though.

- Same amount and if you are on a family plan, the data portion should be $30, not $35 (unless you are referring to the $5 messaging plan for 200)

- Everything except visual voicemail (I am assuming)

- Only reason you shouldn't is because at&t will be getting their version next year. This will have the at&t 3g bands.

[keswan]

The storm is exclusive to Verizon and Verizon uses CDMA technology. At&t uses GSM, so any storm you may uncover also will not take your SIM card.

The Storm is both GSM/CMDA capable (would have know this if you had read all the info about it) so yes it can be unlocked for use on at&t's network. I have not heard or seen anybody doing this yet but I am sure that someone out there has done it already.

Double check with at&t before you do anything such as adding the data package because that could change your plan (primary number has to do the requesting for the upgrade, and unless your number is specifically used for the data you could end up paying for data for all the phones)

[samuraijak]

- Yes it can be unlocked for AT&T, but no 3g. You will be limited to EDGE only.

- No extra fees or real problems that I know of due to unlocking.

- It sounds that easy. Not sure how easy it really is though.

- Same amount and if you are on a family plan, the data portion should be $30, not $35 (unless you are referring to the $5 messaging plan for 200)

- Everything except visual voicemail (I am assuming)

- Only reason you shouldn't is because at&t will be getting their version next year. This will have the at&t 3g bands.

TY to you and Keswan who obviously know what you are talking about. You helped a lot. One questions though is do you think the storm will be out in early 2009 or later 2009 because I really need a new phone now and Christmas seems like a really good opportunity. I don't want to settle for the iPhone 3g just because I need a new phone since I really like the Blackberry Storm. With your answers comes 2 more questions if you don't mind:

-If I unlocked a Blackberry Storm now, would that mean that when the AT&T version comes out next year, I wouldn't be able to just switch to it the legit way? Or would it still be via unlocking and SIM?

-Is the EDGE network bad? Like how is it in comparison to 3g (I'm guessing significantly slower).

Thanks for all the help so far =)

[jjgoo]

storm is only for verizon. Im sure that apple would not let at&t add storm to the lineup of phones.

[sophikittykat]

Is it possible to synchronise an unlocked blackberry curve to orange.blackberry.com and still receive emails?

many thanks!!!!