DiGi Prepaid DIY nano sim

Since getting an iPhone, I was forced to look for nano SIMs but I'm a prepaid user and majority of local telcos are hesitant to provide a nano SIM unless you sign up for a postpaid package (money sucking tactics). There were two ways to get around it - first is to get a nano SIM cutter or at least someone who has it to cut the standard mini SIM . Buying a cutter is useless because I only need one card (I'm not opening a phone store) so wasting RM17 (cheapest I could find) for a single use item was out of the question. There were some shop/stalls offering the cutting service at a few ringgit but I never had my phone with me at those times.

So, I had to resort to cutting my own. After reading many horror stories about failed cuts online and other advice, I was initially hesitant ... but eventually, I took a leap of faith and cut my own since I basically had no choice. Here's what I did ...


Get a template - there are various templates you can print out to get cutting guidelines. Find one that you feel comfortable with and works with your printer and paper size. I used this one here. [UPDATE Sept 2014 - link is dead, search google for "nano sim template"]

Before doing the actual cut, I tried out on several expired SIM cards I had on hand for practice - I tested a Celcom xPax mini SIM, TMobile micro SIM, Optus mini SIM and Starhub mini SIM. It is easiest if you have a micro SIM (image top right) but it works just as well with mini SIMs (image top left) - with micro you don't cut across the gold contact points but you have to with a mini. Ask around for unused SIMs or mobile phone vendors if you wish to get some practice before hand.

The final cut was made on the DiGi prepaid mini SIM. All five attempts worked out fine anyways with a 100% hand-cut success rate.

My advice for those wanting to try manual SIM cutting - make sure your cutting tool is sharp and strong. Flimsy school paper scissors will NOT work. Large heavy duty cutters may work but are unwieldy and may block your sight from cutting on the correct line. To test your scissors, try sticking a piece of tape onto both sides of an expired credit card (or any SIMilar thickness plastic card) and test on that. The scissors should cut through the tape layers and the card between neatly with pulling or stretching the tape. If at any point this fails, you may want to look for a different tool.

The SIM standard specs are pretty forgiving and you can actually overcut (or undercut) quite a lot and the SIM will continue to work. The problem with overcutting is that the SIM will be smaller than the official nano SIM size and will not fit in the tray properly (this will make removal and insertion very difficult). So you could always UNDERcut and then sand the edges to size if you're worried. I overcut the Starhub card I tested with in the picture above and ended up with a nano SIM too small for the iPhone tray ... the SIM card still works on other phones if I tape it to the contacts though.

The thickness is the relatively same for most of the cards I tested so no sanding was necessary except for one which was ever so slightly thicker. YMMV

Disclaimer: Any attempts at cutting your SIM card are at your own risk. Cutting your SIM card may destroy it, damage your handset and void your handset's warranty and I will not be held responsible.
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Setup ... and wait

Yay! .... setting up it really taking so long - shouldn't have synced with my cloud. Oh well

OMG .... itchy fingers made me do it

In the last moments of the very first Asian Apple Store Lunar New Year sale ... I made a purchase. I feel a hole burning in my wallet liao

Unifi/Streamyx is IPV6 ready

As the world slowly begins its transition to IPv6, its funny that Telekom Malaysia has actually rolled out IPv6 features but not enabled them .... but then its not like there is any advantage of doing it yet.

If you're running on TM Unifi or Streamyx you can actually start using IPv6 on the network already. For example, if you're using Unifi on the defautl DIR-615 Gx router, the steps are as follows

Login to your router at the default address of 192.168.0.1 using a web browser (if you changed this, use the correct IP accordingly). You can use either the admin or management or operator accounts - all will work the same for this. Locate the first tab at the top for SETUP and then the left-hand side menu for IPV6 option. Then choose the option for "Enable IPv6 WAN connection"

Once enabled, choose PPPoE from the drop down menu (since SLAAC does not seem to be enabled at Telekom's end for now) and you'll see the options expand for account settings.

Choose to create a new session and then enter your Unifi account settings (the same as the ones found in the Internet setup page). Choose to "Obtain IPv6 DNS Servers automatically" for now else you can search for OpenDNS IPv6 options on Google.

Once that is done, click on the [Save Settings] button and then reboot the router. Upon completion of reboot, you can then proceed to the STATUS tab and view the IPv6 connection information if you logged on successfully.

You can then proceed to use any of the available tests online to check IPv6 connectivity. You'll see that you have dual-stack connectivity which means you are runnng both IPv4 and IPv6 simultaneously on the same network infrastructure without the need for any tunnelling.

So, why implement IPv6? There aren't many advantages or benefits to using IPv6 now unfortunately since majority of networks are running IPv4 but with IPv4 exhaustion already here more networks are expected to migrate soon. If you're an online gamer, there are reports that IPv6 will improve latency and routing times....so maybe you can try it out there and see if there is any change.

A 2014 resolution ... I hope

Its a new year ... and I decided I probably should be more actively writing my nonsense here. So I hope to be able to add a post each week or month at least (fingers crossed)