OVMS AT&T GoPhone SIM card installation guide

[NigelM]

I suspect that *kgb* has the streaming feature enabled. I ran it for a while to show off to some friends...it's very cool to be driving and to see the car moving across the map....but I turned it off when I saw data usage going up. It's great for tracking someone else driving the car (or if it gets stolen :scared but makes no sense for me to keep it enabled. BTW, the location indicator is incredibly accurate.

 

[kgb]

I suspect that *kgb* has the streaming feature enabled.

nope. I have been checking in with Pay As You Go Online, but my account has not been updated with charges since April 18 at 7:30pm. I need to call them, but I am very busy.

 

[NigelM]

Did you take a look at "Cellular Usage" on the control page? I checked mine after 3 days of showing off the app and I've used 0.17MB so even if I continue at this rate (unlikely) I'll average out to 1.7MB a month.

BTW, an iPhone question: How do you get that screenshot? (I'm an iPhone noob)

 

[tomsax]

BTW, an iPhone question: How do you get that screenshot? (I'm an iPhone noob)

Press the sleep button (on the top) and the home button (below the screen) simultaneously and it will make a camera shutter sound and put the screenshot in your photo library.

 

[markwj]

Did you take a look at "Cellular Usage" on the control page? I checked mine after 3 days of showing off the app and I've used 0.17MB

Nigel,

That screen is based on how much data the server sends and receives to the car. It is an estimate of what the car sent/received only. The cellular providers tend to round up, and may charge more, 0.17MB in 3 days is close to 60KB a day, and what I'd expect.

Alo, regarding streaming mode, remember that is only active when an app is connected, so doesn't actually affect the usage that much nomally,

 

[kgb]

UPDATE:

It's now April 22 00:38
Just checked for additional charges. After $15 of charges the first day, mostly in $0.01 increments, there has been little activity.

I set it up April 18, and between 17:53 and 19:31 there were approx 3 $0.01 charges/minute and a couple $0.20 charges for SMS.
Even though I continue to use the OVMS, no charges the rest of April 18.
No charges April 19
Charges resume April 20 9:42 and end April 20 23:52
No charges April 21

AT&T says "History information may be delayed by up to 2 minutes"

So between April 19, 20, & 21, I only incurred $0.14 more in data charges.

Keep you posted (still no time to call AT&T - very busy with family stuff)

 

[kgb]

UPDATE:

I waited a while to see what would happen. Not sure what happened that first day, but after that the data charges slowed down significantly.

I looked at the data charges for April 20-27, and it came out to $0.71
Some days the data is $0, some days over $0.19.
What seems to take a relatively large chunk of change are the SMS which are $0.20 each.
Those occur when someone sends and SMS to the number. AT&T sent me 2. Then I get an interrupted charge SMS... but usually I'm the one to interrupt.
The data usage is not bad now, and at this rate $100 will last just shy of 3 years.

Hope this helps.

 

[markwj]

KGB: Good to hear it has stabilised.

The SMS notifications can be disabled in OVMS if you don't want them (change notification from "IP SMS" to just "IP"). Nothing can be done if someone sends you an SMS, but outgoing is controllable.

Out of interest, do they give you data volume? Does it come out anywhere close to the estimate 30-60KB/day?

 

[NigelM]

Out of interest, do they give you data volume? Does it come out anywhere close to the estimate 30-60KB/day?

In the first 9 days (where I was showing off the app many times at earth day events etc) my unit used 453kb's...simple average = 50kb's per day.

It's worth noting for other users that if you put $100 on your account and enable auto refill on the data/sms packages then the unused messages and data width don't expire for a year. I used up a lot of text messages with a problematic sim card at the beginning but in my second month I now have a balance of >350 messages available and >19.5mb data width available.

 

[kgb]

Out of interest, do they give you data volume? Does it come out anywhere close to the estimate 30-60KB/day?

Let me know if this helps. The AT&T webpage isn't too helpful

 

[NigelM]

@kgb: I thought the usage on mine is so small that it gets rounded down to zero's, but now I wonder if it's because the package(s) I bought includes 200 "free" texts and 10mb "free" data....In any case it's very surprising to see your numbers, here's mine for comparison:

 

[NigelM]

So AT&T cancelled my data package option today. Good news is that I'm now on the 10c/minute plan where data costs 1c/5kb and that should reduce my monthly spend on data to about $2.50 or less. :biggrin:

@MarkWJ - is it possible to turn off text notifications altogether and get all notifications through the app? That would enable those of us with AT&T to switch to the $2/day plan (which we would never have to pay apart from the set-up day) and therefore ditch the text package.

 

[dsm363]

I may do the same. Yeah, I like how they cancel the data plan but don't send out an e-mail letting you know about it. Once it's set up, we really don't need the text message capability, right? That would cut down on text spam I get sometimes I think. The most annoying thing is the money you refill expires after a short period of time depending on how much you add.

 

[NigelM]

The most annoying thing is the money you refill expires after a short period of time depending on how much you add.

I'd forgotten about that as I originally set up the account with $100 and figured it would last me ~10 months. AT&T obviously didn't realize how their change to the plans would affect us, but my $100 would now likely last more than a year. The $100 expires after 12 months so I'm still slightly better off; but doing without text messages at all would mean the cost could reduce to a couple of bucks a month on the $2/day plan.....until AT&T makes the next change!

 

[smorgasbord]

is it possible to turn off text notifications altogether and get all notifications through the app?

Yes you can turn off Text Notifications.

In the iPhone App, you'll want to get to the Control" screen, then choose the "Parameters" button. Item #3 is labeled Notifications. To turn off SMS notifications and just get them through the App (GPRS data), set the value to: IP .

I'm sure there's something similar for the Android App, but I don't know what it is. You can still send text messages to the OVMS Module, and the OVMS Module will still respond - this will just have the OVMS Module tell you via the App when events like charging stopped occurred.

 

[markwj]

@MarkWJ - is it possible to turn off text notifications altogether and get all notifications through the app

Set the notification parameter to IP (was SMSIP).

As an aside, you can also turn off the forwarding of SMS messages with the carbits.

Details are in the features and parameters appendixes in the manual,

 

[driver_EV]

So I activated my att GoPhone SIM for monthly service SMS and minimum data at around $5 each in March, and attempted to renew prior to the month service interval ending, and had difficulty (confusing, with no advance notification of the removal of data option) doing so. The site did allow me to add funds. I added $25, in theory, that should get me two months of the same service I just got in March. The site did show account was now active through late June, which is what I expected, and made sense.

My car began having difficulty with Data becoming intermittent, followed by SMS also failing. I would unplug and replug the the OVMS module, get restored service for a time, then these would fail again, and the recovery/failure mode again would repeat. Finally neither data nor SMS would function, and I spent some time without. Finally with assistance from markwj I found it was probably entirely due to AT&T. They began charging me $.20/SMS ?!, and there were many individual charges for GPRS data. My account was down to a balance of $.17 in early May.

I may have resolved this, though only time will tell, and I have turned off SMS in the application (IP).
Currently I have just over $100 balance with annual renewal on $.10/min $.20/SMS plan that includes $.01/5kb data (If what I see on the site is correct).

It would be nice to also block SMS at the device.

After activating this morning, I have been charged $.11 -so far today just for data.
Moving forward, it looks like it may be economical, as long as no SMS service is used.

 

[markwj]

Can I ask what is the _current_ monthly rate people are paying AT&T for OVMS data? $5, $10 or something else? How much hassle I it.

I'm looking at perhaps using a MVNO to bypass this hassle.

 

[dsm363]

Mine still appears to be $5 for each feature (data and SMS). The problem is they all seem to have your monthly amount that you can add be more than than and the money expires before you can use it. I can't find a true 'pay as you go' plan.

 

[NigelM]

$5 for SMS and 1c/5kb for data.