Moto G2 and Skinny data

Forums › Spark New Zealand (including Skinny and BigPipe) › Moto G2 and Skinny data

Cybergangster

54 posts

Master Geek

#171941 6-May-2015 12:57

I recently picked up a 2nd Gen Motorola Moto G. The primary reason for the change is that I can use 2 SIM cards with the phone. I use 2degrees for work and Skinny for home. All works well, except if I set up the phone to use 2degrees for my mobile data. As soon as I activate this the Skinny network dies. No voice and no SMS. Incoming calls go straight to voicemail.

Now, I can turn off data for both SIMs and Skinny still works fine. But even when mobile data is turned off, I lose all connectivity to Skinny when I select 2degrees for mobile data.

2degrees still works fine regardless of which network handles the data. I've also swapped the SIMs between ports but no joy. Any ideas?

SIM settings

old3eyes

9119 posts

Uber Geek

Subscriber

#1299114 6-May-2015 14:21

Yep that's normal. You can only use 1 SIM at a time for 3G and as Skinny is a 3g only network it will go off line when you set 2D as your preferred 3G network. The only solution is to use Skinny as 3G and 2D as GSM mode for calls and SMS..

Regards,

Old3eyes

eXDee

4032 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

#1299250 6-May-2015 16:25

To explain further, you have a 3G dual sim phone with 2G standby. When you enable mobile data (or possibly make a voice call) on one sim, that sim card is 3G enabled and the second sim slot goes into a standby mode, supporting 2G networks only. Spark's network is 3G and 4G only. So while you enable data with skinny, 2degrees can go into standby as they have a 2G network.

Phones which are 3G or 4G standby aren't that common last i looked, but i can't say i've checked recently. You probably won't see them in the low end like this phone though.

Also to clarify, 2G, 3G and 4G are the network types. Mobile data is internet access over these networks. 3G or 4G doesn't mean mobile data, even though some equate it to this - you can have a 3G or 4G network connection with no active 'data session'.
What can be confusing is when you enable mobile data on a certain sim on this phone, it will also switch that sim card to use the 3G network, because this gives faster data speeds than 2G (which is nearly unusable for internet access due to the slow speed).

Cybergangster

54 posts

Master Geek

#1299369 6-May-2015 19:46

That makes sense. Thanks for clearing this up.