Expert: DebiN - 1/19/2010

Question
QUESTION: hi,
i have a wonderful but dinosaur-type motorola 6000e select flip phone (not the clamshell).  i don't want to change for many reasons.  my sim card was fine until an assistant at the at&t store 'accidentally' cancelled my sim card and turned my phone into a paperweight.  at&t, after pressure, has agreed to pay for the repair/etc., if we can figure out how to bring it back online.  

i can't find a new appropriate sim card anywhere (and, i've tried!).  we can't find unlock codes for it, either.  right now, it's at the authorized repair shop and they're having trouble, too.  any help with unlock info or a place to buy a 32k orange cingular sim card with 20 registration numbers (not 19) would be appreciated.  

price is not the object.  i do NOT want to use a 'new' phone. at&t actually gave me a new phone to use while the problem is being resolved.  my old dinosaur motorola is the one i want. aas i said, any help would be most appreciated.

thx for your time,


ANSWER: So here is the problem - only AT&T can replace your SIM card. You can't buy a third party SIM card and make it work with AT&T. Not possible and wouldn't work even if you found one. If the phone you have is actually an old Star Tac, this phone didn't use a SIM card, it's a TDMA phone. AT&T can't make that phone work with any SIM card. Who at AT&T told you that the phone used a SIM card and that it had one with less numbers? I'm even shocked that they told you that they were going to fix it and that they could get it to work. Let me know. THanks.

---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: hi and thanks for getting us a step closer to an answer.

the phone is actually a microtac 6000e select flip phone, not a startac clamshell.  it uses the full-sized sim card and the one that was working in it was a cingular wireless one.  there are two types that i'm aware of... one has 20 reg numbers and the other, which is available online from both amazon and ebay, has 19.  the phone itself was originally with 'ariel' phone service and would go through screens reading 'pacific bell', 'wordstream' and 'us40', 'us41' when it was turned on.  at&T told me they could bring the phone back online with an old cingular sim card that had not been used before and had 20 numbers.

 
i hope this gives you more pertinent info.  thoughts?

thanks for dredging through old data to try to figure this one out.
tom, over at motorola tech support, told me the phone had to be "reflashed", his word. i asked if he meant, 'refreshed', but he said, 'no.'  i am unaware of any unlock codes but perhaps someone else knows about them.  

let me know if you have any ideas...
thanks!
jerry

Answer
In all honesty, all older phones will work with new SIM cards because SIM cards are always backwards compatible. I have no idea why someone at AT&T would tell you that if you got some old SIM card that has 19 digits that it could work. I really don't think they know what they are talking about. Their provisioning systems wouldn't even allow them to activate an old SIM card, so even if you got one, they couldn't activate it. There's also nothing to reflash and I know you don't want to do this, but I am strongly urging you to just get a new phone. I know you love your phone, but your experience on the network will dramatically improve and you will be very happy that you did this. If there is any way that you will consider this, I really recommend that you do it. Please don't waste your time and energy trying to find an old SIM card that AT&T very likely cannot activate for you regardless of what you are being told. If a salesperson at AT&T were to try to activate an old SIM card that was not purchased through AT&T, they could actually get in serious trouble. They are not allowed to do this even if they could. I am very sorry to hear that anyone messed with your phone in the first place and you might want to consider seeing what the store manager would be willing to do in the way of giving you a new phone. That is my recommendation and I hope that it helps. Thanks. DebiN