Sim card manager

July 25, 2016

I have started looking into some sim card managers. I had some issues with phones where the battery gets drained due to some app taking over and not letting the phone sleep, or an old android version just not having any updates. I even lost my phone list a while back and had to redo all of that. In short, I am looking for a small sim manager that can work off the pc and where you can pretty much do any of the editing for name numbers, etc, without the phone. I prefer a stand alone program so that nothing else can affect it so easily. Kind of like synching the old palm hanheld but only when you need to. Now there are pros and cons to doing it this way vs just updating your google account for example. But what this allows anyone to do is not have to log into any system on the web, but just work off your pc and update what you need. So it all depends on how you like to go about it. The other good thing about this is that you can use this and still have all the numbers on an older phone without having to use all those tiny keys to enter each name number for example.

Without a sim manager, entering this information on older style phones will take forever. Yes many people still use them and personally I still like the old flip phones myself. They are simple, small, and your screen doesn't get all scratched up since it's folded. Anyway it's just an option. I am hardly on the phone and I mainly keep it for emergency or to get a hold of family. So I hardly even use my phone. Newer cell phones seem to be getting bogged down with many apps that most want access to everything you have. So this is the reason I like the basic phones. They just work and you don't have to get distracted with all those super bright screens at night. Now they just have to have Bluetooth so that you can be hands free if you ever need that. I know some people cringe at the thought of using an older phone like that, but again, it depends on you. I also know how cool it is to be able to cast your phone to your tv but I hardly watch tv myself anyway. It's nice to just keep things simple.

With all that said, I found a sim editor to show you what something like this would look like. I tried some of the free versions too, but nothing seems to pick up my usb readers. This is where I think the problem is. A usb card reader doesn't seem to be the same as a sim card reader even though the port is there. I can't get any of these programs to pick the cards up. So I will be looking for one that just works for sim cards, but I have yet to see any that look promising or that also come with sim software which would make sense. I have not looked into this before because I wasn't testing anything, now that I have started at least I know what I'm looking for.  Anyway, here are a few screenshots of one that looks like it does what I was looking for. I just saw this so I don't have one and will be looking at what else is at the stores.

Another reason I want to find a sim reader is so that I can make sure that my old sim cards are cleaned. If they have anything they are probably very old numbers, but I like to try to clean all that anyway. Or if you want to donate your old phone and it happens to have a locked sim card, this may be be an option for that.

Please keep in mind that this would only apply to gsm type phones that actually use a sim card. Many of the other new cell phone service providers don't use a sim card so this won't work with those. Also, there are many card readers out there starting from like a dollar and up on ebay. But whether they would work is another question no matter which one you get, so you will have to test yourself which is the down side since it's hard to tell what's will work.

 You can download the software at their site, but it's a 30 day trial and you can't really do anything without an actual sim reader which apparently I don't have.  If you find one that works, you can mention it below in the comments.

 If you close the program and re-open it you get the nagging screen every time.

 And it also kept telling me this. So you do nee to make sure you find a sim card that actually works or you won't be able to do anything. Keep in mind that a sim card reader is not the same as an sd card reader. I only say this because I have tried both sd readers I have and nothing.

And here's what keeps opening up too. In any case, it's nice to see that at least there is hope.

Here is some of the software I tried, but had no luck. I may just be the non sim card readers I have. I can't say for sure until I find one that actually does read the sim cards.

http://agsm.sourceforge.net/index.html

https://sourceforge.net/projects/simcardmanager/

https://sourceforge.net/projects/simreader/?source=directory
This one seems to take forever to load. Some seem to be a bit old too and I found it doesn't read anything. So it doesn't work.

One thing I forgot to mention is the size of the sim card. My current phone now uses a nano sim which is the smallest one there is. This is also a pain to handle since it's just so small and finding a reader that has this port size, well I have yet to find one. The good thing is that my card came attached to all the larger plastic pieces so I could just pop it back into the larger one for the larger port. It's just another thing to figure out.
http://kenstechtips.com/index.php/smartphone-type-standard-sim-micro-sim-or-nano-sim 

 I stopped by fry's earlier to day and found this reader with the sim option so I thought I do a bit of testing on it to see if it would actually read a sim. I got closer but I still had no info showing up.

 Even though this program will expire in 30 days it seems to sort of work. It finally picked up a generic card. Windows 10 did ask if I wanted to install the driver once I plugged it in which you need to say yes in order to see the sim.

 The other program also pick the generic card up, but still had no info showing up on it. Telling me that it's the reader and not the program.

 I could hit the read button and it would read it.

 But still nothing much else showing up.

 Same on this other program I tested just to make sure it was not the program itself.

 I also tried this other program, but this one was even worst as neither option would work. So don't even bother with this one.

 After reading the card I selected contacts, but nothing shows up.

 Then again, nothing shows no matter what I select.

 This is the only place where anything showed up which was not what I wanted to look at.

 The card reader was working fine as you can see here.

 This card reader is re-branded by different vendors from what I noticed and read.

It was still working here before I ejected this.

I found this card at fry's which was the lowest I saw it anywhere. I then went to Walmart and found that they only had this same one, but it was also the only one they had with a sim option. I also found out it was double the price which was terrible since I thought it would actually be lowered and if you look at the reviews on their own website, this reader has the worst reviews too. From actually using it, it worked for me, but the sim part is not great either. If you have a nano sim like me, you will need to tape it to the other adapter, then tape that one to the larger adapter, assuming you still have them. If the card is not taped, it won't work as it's just lose and will end up falling inside the actual reader as I found out. This is the reason I was hoping to find a reader with the smaller slot too so I wouldn't have to look for the adapters in order to read it. So it's become more of a hassle than anything trying to go this route with a nano sim. Either way I just wanted to find something to read sims with.

 Here's what the package looks like.

 I had to tape these two adapters to my nano sim, the yellow one is an old one I was testing, but the nano is smaller than that.

 This sim needed just the larger adapter or cutout.

 This came with a built in cable. I frankly hate these because they are just too short. I rather just see a usb plug for a cable instead.

 I also got lucky with a twisted plug but it still worked. Needless to say this one is going back to the store for a refund.

 Here's the sheet that is included with this reader. Unfortunately the link doesn't work. There is no software of any kind there which is not what you expect from any product that tells you to download their software. I guess they were just using some random program from the net. Who knows.

And the warranty on the back. So it looks like you could eventually read your sim cards, but that's assuming you find a good reader for them and software which you would think there would be plenty around by now. Either way, I like to test things as much as possible to at least find if they will work or not. In this case, not so much unfortunately. I just don't have many readers to test out, not to mention any that could read actual sim cards.

Here is the link for their website which has nothing.
http://www.sunpak.com/sunpak/sunpakdownloads.html