The exciting news for T-Mobile users is that they will be able to use the iPhone 5 around mid October; the unfortunate news is it will come at a price. This week after the new iPhone was announced there was major buzz on Twitter, coming from members of the T-Mobile network asking “Will T-Mobile be releasing iPhone 5 compatible nano-sim cards?”. The answer from the cell carrier was yes, which made everyone happy.
This promise does give the carrier’s customers the ability to use the new iPhone, but at what cost and capability? As reported during the event, the major official carriers of the phone are Verizon, Sprint, and AT&T. The truth of the matter is this just acts as a band-aid to patch up the issue for T-Mobile, and is not a solid fix.
It isn’t clear when Apple will be releasing unlocked versions of the phone for sale in the U.S., although the price point for an unlocked phone will hurt your wallet. Pricing will probably be similar to past iterations 16GB $649, 32GB $749, 64GB $849. Verizon is claiming to be selling off contract iPhone 5’s in store on launch day, but that is yet to be seen.
When you activate the your shiny new iPhone 5 on the current T-Mobile network, you will be moving at 2G EDGE network turtle speeds. The carrier is working slowly on a 4G HSPA+ service currently only available in Seattle, New York, and Las Vegas.
When you take all of these things into consideration, is the headache of going through all these hoops and money just to use the iPhone 5 worth it?
