Dear Forum,
I recently purchased two MC7354 AirPrime cards to be used with Verizon Wireless. I am using a Gateworks Ventenna board, OpenWRT and libumi for my work. I was able to read the ICCID from the micro sim card I bought from Verizon and then proceeded to called Verizon to activate the device. After speaking with tear 2 technical support and sales, I was informed I purchased the incorrect model sim card, not the wrong type mind you, the wrong physical size. I was told to find the specific type used with AirPrime compatible cards, and additionally, that I might be having trouble setting up the device as a personal user, because. This was, according to them, because the MC7354 only functioned in M2M, machine to machine, mode. I consulted the documentation and see that the only specifications they give are the that you need a GSMA 3.1 compatible card of any size: full, micro or nano. I also see that the cards “can” work in M2M mode. With that in mind, I have two questions:
Can anyone shed light on the type and size cards they use with their MC7354s on Verizon Wireless?
Does anyone know if you need to use the MC7354 with a business account?
If you can read the ICCID of the unit then as far as the MC7354 is concerned it is talking to the SIM card and will work with any network as long as the network accepts its network attach request.
If you can send at commands to the unit then send the below
Obviously the SIM card size is of no relevance to anything. The issue is getting them to allow your device onto their network, which can be challenging to say the least. They told us the same thing when trying to get a Telit card onto their network, which we never succeeded in doing even though the card was Verizon certified.
Verizon does not do well with allowing non-Verizon devices onto their network, even if they are certified. And customer support is basically useless because they typically don’t have any idea that you can take a PCIe card and put it in any type of device you want (tablet, computer, router, etc.). They look up the IMEI number, and it says something like “tablet”, and that’s all they can deal with. We finally gave up and used a different carrier that is more “open” to devices then Verizon. Someday they will change, but who knows when.
If you do get it to work, please share your steps and details.
Thank you both for sharing. I have had difficulty with Verizon before but didn’t think it would be this hard to get the device activated. I will try customer service today and see if I can persuade them to do something. If not, I will just go with another carrier.
EDIT:
I had another conversation with customer support, they were able to classify their device on their “Open Development” program. I am waiting for a call back while Verizon reaches out to Sierra Wireless directly to settle the problem with the sim card discrepancy directly… If any admin for Sierra Wireless are listening, please take the Verizon call and sort this out so your product can work as advertised…