www.CostaRicaTicas.com

how does one get a temporary cell phone in CR for 1 week? and how much do they run for?

Do a search on rental phones, they run about $10 a day. It's cheaper to buy a cheap unlocked phone and get a Simm chip when you get to the airport.

BND

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Dip me in chocolate and throw me to the lesbians

Bring an unlocked Quad-band phone (or a tri-band that is compatible with 1800Mhz band). Buy a prepaid SIM card at the airport for ¢5000 ($10) or ¢10000 ($20). You can buy a new unlocked cell phone online for under $50.

Motorola V180 is a cool basic quad-band phone. V551 is a cool camera phone.

Moto V180: http://cgi.ebay.com/Brand-New-Motorola- ... 35b0b9c747

Moto V551: http://cell-phones.shop.ebay.com/Cell-P ... 86.c0.m282

The rental phone scam is no longer acceptable to waste money on.

and then what? how am I billed when I make calls? or do I get a prepaid phone card or something?

No, you don't get any bills.

The only cost is to buy a prepaid SIM (small chip that is inserted into the phone) and the chip comes with airtime on it (depending how much you buy).

If you buy a 5,000 colones SIM chip (about $10), you would have about 28-30 minutes of talk time to the US (rate is 160-170/min) and more than 2 hours of local talk time, including text messages.

Incoming calls are free, you only use airtime when you make calls.

It works just like a prepaid phone here in States, except you bring your own UNLOCKED GSM phone that works on the 1800Mhz band (like Orange said).

When you arrive at the airport and after you clear Customs, there's an ICE (CR phone company) booth in the baggage claim area. They will sell you a $5, $10 or $20 Kolbi SIM card with a local cell number. They activate the line, hand you a SIM card, you put the SIM card in your phone, and you are ready to start calling your favoritas.

I can't recall the rates but the $5 card is good for a weekend's worth of local calls and texting... you can even use it to dial the US (the rates are comparable to phone card rates). I always buy a $10 card, use it to call the States and get / make plenty of calls and have never had to recharge.

However, in the event you run through your first $5, $10 or even $20's worth of minutes because you are so busy keeping up with all the novias, you can recharge by picking up a ICE prepago card at any ICE store - and you can even recharge over the Internet on the ICE website.

For more info:
http://translate.google.com/translate?h ... Prepago%2F

mh

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mh

You may want to try this:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16875176172&nm_mc=AFC-C8Junction&cm_mmc=AFC-C8Junction-_-na-_-na-_-na&AID=10440897&PID=404255&SID=186627

A couple of things:
You want an unlocked phone, if not you can buy the unlock code on e-bay for about three dollars. I am a mental midget, and have unlocked three phones.

Make sure that the phone you buy will take a sim card. Some of the carriers have proprietary systems that will not take sim cards

I also like the QWERTY system on a phone. I have been known to have a drink every now and then, and it is much easier to screw up having to hit a key three times than one.

Health & happiness...........

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It's not the size of the wand that put the rabbit in the hat, it's the magic in it!!!

HAHAHA...

Thanks guys.. appreciate it as always..

If you can, get a 3G phone, once you are on either side of the central mountains, it can get spotty, 3G much better, learned this the hard way in Feb.

xxx

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"cuz I'm a back-door man" Jim Morrison-1969

i will be going in may and was planning on unlocking one of my old iphone 3g's does anyone know if i could use the iphone on this system?

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You do costa rica your way and I'll do it my way

I've seen I phones there so I say yes, Blackberry's are a problem with texts for some reason.