16 September, 2015
AT&T GoPhone MMS Settings on Nokia 220
**Note AT&T has turned off their 2G GSM network as of 03 January, 2017. The Nokia 220 (RM-971) will no longer work on the AT&T network.
Longing for turn of the century T9 on a candy bar phone? Need an MMS capable unlocked handset but only have $40 to spend? The Nokia 220 might fit the bill. This dual-band (the RM-971 model is the 850/1900 MHz version appropriate for North America) 2.5G handset (GSM + EDGE/GPRS) might fit your desires.
Slipping your GoPhone SIM card into the Nokia 220 will correctly set the service numbers for voicemail and SMS messaging, but it does not automatically generate the access point required by the multimedia messaging service for fetching the media over an EDGE/GPRS data connection.
Begin the configuration by unlocking the phone (that's a double touch of the end/power key followed by a touch of the left soft key) and select "Menu" with the left soft key.
From the menu select the "Settings" icon with the directional pad and select "Choose" with the center soft key.
From the "Settings" menu, select the first choice "Connectivity"
From the "connectivity" menu, select "mobile data".
From the "mobile data" menu, select "mobile data" again.
From the "mobile data" menu, select "access points".
From the "access points" menu, select "Add".
Alright, after that navigation fun we are ready to enter some configuration. Name the access point "AT&T MMS" and set the access point name to "wap.cingular" leaving the username and password fields blank.
Leave the Authentication type set at "Normal" and select "advanced settings" where the URIs for data access will be entered (the next illustration is the second portion of the access point definition screen).
In the advanced settings, set the Homepage to "http://mmsc.cingular.com", the Connection type to HTTP and turn the Proxy On.
In the second portion of that dialog, set the Proxy address to "wireless.cingular.com", and the Proxy port to "80". Leave the Proxy username and Proxy password blank and save the settings.
All that is left to do is to tell the messaging application to use the newly defined access point. Return to the main menu and select Messaging.
Using the left soft key, select "Options" and choose "Message settings" from the list.
In the message settings, select MMS.
Select "Access point" and set that to your newly created "AT&T MMS" access point.
You should now be set to send and receive MMS messages on the AT&T GoPhone network. Enjoy your multimedia messaging!
Notes
MMS works fairly well on this handset with a few caveats.
Just below the Access Point setting on the MMS settings menu is the option to direct MMS reception to the memory card. It will be in your best interest to install a memory card (MicroSD memory cards are supported up to 32 GB) if you have any interest in multimedia messaging. The Nokia 220 boast an underwhelming 8 MB (yes, megabytes) of storage, 4.6 MB of which is available to the user. Considering that the MMS size limit on the AT&T network is 1 MB, you can see that a just a few MMS messages will fill the phone memory. Direct the messaging app to use the "Memory card" as the "Default mem." for multimedia messages on the MMS settings dialog.
It would be nice if you could do the same for SMS, directing messages to the memory card, but you can't. The SMS inbox can reside only on phone memory. While SMS messages are much smaller (160 bytes), you will find yourself deleting SMS messages frequently due to memory limitations on this handset.
The Nokia 220 supports a wide variety of common image, audio and video formats, and as a result, does very well in sending, receiving and playing most multimedia messages. Not too bad for a $40 handset.
Settings Details
If you'd like just the facts, or are setting a different handset for MMS reception on the AT&T GoPhone network, here are just the configuration settings.
name: AT&T MMS
access point name: wap.cingular
username: leave blank
password: leave blank
homepage: http://mmsc.cingular.com
connection type: http
proxy: on
proxy address: wireless.cingular.com
port: 80
This might be wireless.cingular.com:80 if you only have one line for the proxy address.
proxy username: leave blank
proxy password: leave blank
The Nokia 220 also has a web browser (Nokia Xpress by default, you will be prompted to upgrade to Opera Mini), and you can configure your device for mobile web use. The method for defining the access point is identical, and the settings for the WAP access point are below.
name: ATT WAP
access point name: wap.cingular
username: leave blank
password: leave blank
homepage: http://device.home
connection type: http
proxy: on
proxy address: wireless.cingular.com
port: 80
This might be wireless.cingular.com:80 if you only have one line for the proxy address.
proxy username: leave blank
proxy password: leave blank
Conclusions
The Nokia 220 has a modest (2.0 MP, 1600x1200 resolution) camera and supports the sending and receiving of MMS messages. The handset requires a non-trivial configuration for multimedia messaging service, but works well once those settings are entered. The true key to enjoying multimedia messaging on this handset is the use of a microSD memory card—MMS isn't going to work well (at all) without a memory card.