Oversees Data and Phone disable?

[evetro76]

I have a questions that I hope someone can answer. I travel alot overseas and I am always provided a phone for use, but I would still like to be able to use my Droid X for email, internet, Skype. But I really do not want to pay the oveseas fees. There is always regular access to WiFi hotspots.

Is there anyway to disable the phone and data, and use only WiFi?

 

[hookbill]

I have a questions that I hope someone can answer. I travel alot overseas and I am always provided a phone for use, but I would still like to be able to use my Droid X for email, internet, Skype. But I really do not want to pay the oveseas fees. There is always regular access to WiFi hotspots.

Is there anyway to disable the phone and data, and use only WiFi?

Put it in Airplane mode to disable phone and data. You can still use wifi.

 

[lewwill]

I have a questions that I hope someone can answer. I travel alot overseas and I am always provided a phone for use, but I would still like to be able to use my Droid X for email, internet, Skype. But I really do not want to pay the oveseas fees. There is always regular access to WiFi hotspots.

Is there anyway to disable the phone and data, and use only WiFi?

Put it in Airplane mode to disable phone and data. You can still use wifi.

That is interesting Hook. No huge VZ bills? I am going on a cruise thru the Panama Canal and I am sure there will be WiFi hotspots at ports of call. There is no charge for the WiFi data?

 

[BigZig]

no charge for wi-fi. I know some cruise ships have wi-fi on board but I think you have to pay a fee to use it.

 

[abe7333]

Airplane mode

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"I know not with what weapons War World III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with stick and stones."-Albert Einstein.

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[lewwill]

Thank you, didn't know that. Great info.

 

[abe7333]

Thank you, didn't know that. Great info.

No problem. That's why we love the android community. Its pretty helpful


_________________________________________

"I know not with what weapons War World III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with stick and stones."-Albert Einstein.

Send from Droid X

 

[Barryc737]

I'm headed to Vietnam and want to turn off the phone and data, but still have wifi AND GPS. The GPS is disabled in Airplane Mode, right? Any other suggestions? It sure seems like there should be selections to turn off phone and data in the Settings menus. Any ideas?
Thanks!

 

[ChadJ55]

I'm headed to Vietnam and want to turn off the phone and data, but still have wifi AND GPS. The GPS is disabled in Airplane Mode, right? Any other suggestions? It sure seems like there should be selections to turn off phone and data in the Settings menus. Any ideas?
Thanks!

Unfortunately, you will need to turn airplane mode off to get it to receive a GPS signal. Dumb quirk of the phone. It does not need to find a cellular signal to get the GPS to work, so even if you have no reception, you should have GPS. You'll need to download an app that works with offline maps unless you just want to view coordinates. I used Maverick (available in Market) while I was in Ecuador last week and it worked awesome. You do need to download maps of the area you'll be visiting before you go though. Need data to get maps. With Maverick, any map tile that you view automatically gets stored and is available offline. However, there's another app called MapDroyd in the market that lets you download a complete map of the area you will be visiting, rather than either creating maps on your computer with Mobile Atlas Creator (which I struggled with) or literally scrolling all over the area and zooming in/out until you sufficiently cover the area before going offline. mapDroyd is less flexible and less detailed, but gets the job done a little quicker/easier. I'd also suggest downloading GPS Status from the market so you can see for certain that the GPS is locking satellitesd before you try to troubleshoot anything with the apps or phone if it doesn't work.

 

[Barryc737]

Overseas: disabling phone and data

Thanks for your reply. A good reminder of the need for the underlying maps. I'll check it out.

The one issue I'm still concerned with is: So I turn Airplane Mode off (in order to allow the GPS to work) and I might be unknowningly receiving data and maybe even a phone call and rack up big charges. Can I disable roaming data and phone????

Thanks!@

 

[ChadJ55]

Thanks for your reply. A good reminder of the need for the underlying maps. I'll check it out.

The one issue I'm still concerned with is: So I turn Airplane Mode off (in order to allow the GPS to work) and I might be unknowningly receiving data and maybe even a phone call and rack up big charges. Can I disable roaming data and phone????

Thanks!@

To enssure you don't incur any data roaming charges, simply go to Settings > Data manager > Data Delivery and make sure the option for Data Roaming is unchecked. As far as calls, you won't get charged for the calls as long as you don't answer the phone. Just let them go to voicemail. The only unintended charges you can incur would be for incoming text messages. However, at five cents per message, I personally don't worry about it and enjoy the occasional text from home when I'm that far out of the country. Worth the $0.05 per inbound message for me. If you respond to the text while out of country it is $0.50, which I think is a pretty good deal and often use just to say "I'm here safe and sound" to whoever is waiting to hear from me.

 

[Barryc737]

Skype overseas

I just spoke with Verizon Global Support and they told me that the Verizon Skype application on the Droid X only works in the USA. It is a limitation of Verizon. Maybe another Skype app would work???

 

[ChadJ55]

I just spoke with Verizon Global Support and they told me that the Verizon Skype application on the Droid X only works in the USA. It is a limitation of Verizon. Maybe another Skype app would work???

If I'm not mistaken, I believe there are some pretty resourceful folks on here who have found a way to make this work. However, I know this forum is protective of exposing any information that can be viewed as "stealing" from Verizon, rightly so. And I think that, because Verizon charges for this service, if a sneaky way to make it work was posted, it would probably be removed by the moderators. (Don't take that comment as me calling you a would-be thief, by the way. You're just asking a question.) If you are really interested in getting more info specifically about using Skype or another voice over web mobile app, you may have more luck searching the archives and (if you don't find your answer) posting a new topic more specific to this challenge.

 

[tedmeister]

I spent a fair bit of time looking into this, as I am overseas often, and was hoping to use Skype for calling via the WiFi (I do it with my laptop now, but doing on the DX would be better). I have been told the following after doing a fair bit of digging and interrogation of tech reps:

- The Skype Client and driver for DX/Verizon has been deliberately programmed to disable if WiFi is turned on
- The claim from Verizon is that this is due to a Homeland Security and Department of Justice demand (in the US) that cellphone carriers must be able to provide a call record to law enforcement if provided with a warrant for a customer's calls. This is not technically possible with Skype, so they just disabled it

Now I dunno if this is true, or bovine manure. But I am almost motivated to try to scarf up a copy of the source and make the programming changes myself to make this work, at least overseas. It would not be 'stealing voice service from Verizon' as I am most concerned since the areas I visit mostly do not have the signaling technology (CDMA) that is in the Verizon DX. I didn't try the roaming to see if the DX could use tri-band or quad-band overseas and roam to Verizon, as I refuse to take even a slight risk that I might incur huge data charges. I just left the phone in airplane mode my entire trip (so I could still use calendar/reminders, and some apps that I have installed and use a lot; I checked in for my return home flight using the DX browser out to the airline site; it is very cool to be able to do stuff like this).

Anyone have any other ideas or suggestions to get around these issues?

 

[gsbjackson]

Try using Skype from the market (NOT the Verizon version). Turn airplane mode on, then turn on just Wifi. Works like a champ!

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