“Not supported” doesn’t necessarily mean “doesn’t work.” But they won’t help you troubleshoot it. In the meantime it might be worth exploring the APN settings.
Is there a guide on here for how to mess with APN settings? I looked at the APN settings but it appeared like it was missing a bunch of entries (at least what I remember from Android APN settings).
If the provider won’t allow that IMEI on to their network, it’s game over for that network. But why not just switch to a different provider?
Have you tried activating the SIM card with AT&T in another phone, then switching the SIM to the Librem 5? Some people have reported that worked for them.
Purism’s AweSIM service uses the AT&T backbone, so you might want to talk to Purism support to see if they can give you an APN setting that works.
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The L5 passes T-mobile’s IMEI check, FWIW. (Which also means it will be allowed on any MVNO that uses T-mobile’s network.)
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I am in Alaska, so AT&T and Verizon, and their MVNOs like Straight Talk are the only ones that work up here, TMO doesn’t work up here very well, if at all.
Is there a way to edit more settings for the APN, my LineageOS phone gives me more options to change settings for the APN, whereas there aren’t those options with the Librem5.
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I would get that AweSIM but it is more than twice as expensive as it should be. $100 for not that much data, unlimited means unlimited not (*data speeds throttled after 20GB usage in a month). At least with Straight Talk I get 60GB before they throttle my speeds, and that plan is $50.
I would switch, but there is NO way I can tell if it will work before switching. I’ve also had problems with nongoogled phones, like the Moto G7+ with LineageOS not working on AT&T because they say it doesn’t do VoLTE but it actually does. These big companies whitelist phones and if the phone you want isn’t whitelisted then you are hosed.
I think they’re there, but just stored out of sight in the master list of all carriers’ APN settings located in user/share/mobile-broadband-provider-info in the L5.
You might compare what can be seen there with the settings published by Straight Talk and see if they’re the same. I suppose it’s possible to edit those files in the L5, but they would probably get written over by some future update. (Just guessing here.)
Curious: Is your phone the exact model number/variant on AT&T’s list (XT1965-T)? That’s apparently the only one of the Pluses that had the required testing and certification.
PDF/ATT approved devices: https://www.att.com/idpassets/images/support/pdf/Devices-Working-on-ATT-Network.pdf
Moto G7 Plus variants: https://www.phonemore.com/models/motorola/moto-g7-plus/ and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moto_G7#Variants
Note that I’m not familiar with the device myself.
Yes, the moto G7+ that would not work on AT&T VoLTE is the XT1965-T model.
Ditto, so take with grain of salt but …
So you have the exact model and it doesn’t work and they say it doesn’t work but their own documentation says that it does work? I would ring them up again and give them some more hassle.
Does data work at all? NB: To test that you would need to kill the WiFi using the kill switch (assuming that you have WiFi in range at the time).
Like what exactly? Just APNs that aren’t listed i.e. manual override of the APN? Something else?
Some carriers provide alternate settings to try if the standard ones seem to be problematic, and with more fields than the L5 displays:
BestMVNO collects the major known APN settings for U.S. carriers all in one place:
https://bestmvno.com/apn-settings/
Although the L5 doesn’t provide the fields in the UI, these details are visible at user/share/mobile-broadband-provider-info. I’m curious why the APN UI wasn’t designed to show these, as most all other phones on the market do.
The only thing that worked was SMS messages, making a call, receiving a call or using cellular data with wifi off did not work.
In the past I have spent hours on the phone with Straight Talk tech support and it is very hard to understand what they are saying and it’s like they are working from a script and have no idea how to fix the issue themselves. The issue I had with the Moto G7+ not working on their system was the same thing that I was told about the Librem5 not working, they are NOT able to edit the system to make it work. Basically, if it doesn’t work it won’t work.
I’ve read other forum posts on here about how the Librem5 AweSIM works on AT&T in the US but frankly, I don’t believe it. Unless Purism was able to pull some magic strings to get their device to work under their MVNO (whereas other MVNOs tell me that they don’t have the ability to override AT&Ts allowed devices list) I don’t see how it would. This year has been a nightmare for trying to get non-standard phones connected to the carriers network and I believe it is just going to get worse.
If Purism really can make the phone work on AT&T’s network through their AweSIM I am not sure I would want to buy the service because it is more than double the cost of others. 20 GB data is NOT Unlimited. I really wish companies would quit putting deceptive marketing into play, call it like it is, a highspeed data cap at 20 GB.
Sure, but I meant “a setting other than the APN”.
Yes, the mobile network connection wizard on Ubuntu gives you a pulldown menu of the known APNs (once you have drilled down via country and carrier) but you can tell it that “mine is not listed” and just type the APN in.
Regardless, you can always just edit the .nmconnection file in /etc/NetworkManager/system-connections but you still have to know the correct APN.
Then that needs to be sorted out before you worry about making or receiving calls.
Sure, I understand. Telco tech support customer-facing groups are equally lame here. The only reason that I suggested calling them again is that it is being suggested that their own documentation implies that that model should work.
Maybe you can override the IMEI e.g. borrow from an existing mainstream phone that you already have and which works. It may or may not be legal to do so in your country and if it is not legal in your country to do so then I am explicitly suggesting that you not do so.
I’m prepared to believe that it does work but what I believe and what you believe doesn’t actually influence reality. For $39 you could try it out for 1 month. You can cancel any time before the end of the billing month. It’s a small investment in knowing. If it actually doesn’t work then you could reasonably get a refund from Purism as well, right? So it should only be a cost to you if it does work but you decide not to continue (apart from your time of course).
I just ordered the 1GB plan to see if it works. I’ll update this thread when I get it and try it.
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I’m a little late to the party here, but I’ll throw in info from my experience:
I use PureTalk, also an AT&T MVNO. I bought their SIM, and installed it. SMS worked right away, and I later realized the voice didn’t work - that’s when I learned more than I needed to know about 4G networks and the shutdown of 3G. So I manually turned on the 4G like instructed. Voice DID work for send and receiving calls. At first, data didn’t work (neither did MMS), but then I found a second spot in the settings where the APN info had to also be entered for data. Once I set that, there was a huge string of MMS that showed up and data was a go.
In the settings, I had it set to 4G only (and still do), so I know it is going over that. Roaming was/is set to off. PureTalk’s APN was RESELLER (and they were specific about it being in all caps). That seems pretty generic, so not sure if any of the other MVNOs use that.
I guess in summation, at least one AT&T MVNO works.
N8W