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Comment by alwaysdoit | Hacker News Reader

Is there anything stopping you from using it as a WiFi only device for $10?

I believe I have the same phone (or similar enough model at least), I had gotten it when it was $20 they tend to be rather slow. It's one of those "one app at a time" type of phones.

Can anyone confirm that this thing will work as an Android WiFi device without any kind of activation nonsense?

I like cheap Android devices for testing software (the cheaper and nastier the better, actually...)

How would you get a phone number for it?

If you're just testing apps to see if they'll run acceptably on low-end hardware, you don't need the phone part at all.

Nope, it works perfectly fine as WiFi. Haven't activated the phone at all, but am able to do web browsing, email, google voice, bluetooth remote control, etc.

Probably no, but is it a phone then?

Sure, if you use Skype or Google Hangouts you can call other phones.

While you're right, depending on availability of Wifi is not very portable, which decreases its utility.

Not sure how it is in the US, but in Romania we've got pretty good and cheap 4G-only Internet pre-pay cards. You can't call or receive phone calls, you cannot send SMS, all you can do is to connect to the 3G/4G network. The price is €5 for 1 GB, €7 for 3 GB, €15 for 13 GB of bandwidth. And you recharge whenever you want, as this is not a monthly plan. And I have an Android that I use with such a pre-pay card. It's like my personal 4G modem that I can also use for Skype and stuff. And I was actually thinking of giving up my phone number. If it weren't for my parents which are old-fashioned, I would.

No, it's a $10 iPod Touch equivalent. Which could be a really good thing.

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