what data & hotspot plan for 2 to 4 GB/month?

[Kaylee]

Thanks Jim & rvpopeye!
I hit a couple of Walmarts and also had difficulty finding 60-day cards, plus Walmarts are Hellishly noisy, so brain crash for me. :\

Having read a bunch more (including lots of Jim-wisdom at CRVL), it sounds like best practice is to have at least two plans on different networks.
I'm leaning towards getting the $5 Verizon 4G, once it has stabilized (thanks to everyone who has posted in that thread, on this board!).

Until then, I'm considering a cheap T-Mobile plan, to start with.
How is T-Mobile in the West (i.e. cooler higher elevations of the Rockies/etc)?

While trying to research "Straight Talk", I stumbled upon "Mint Mobile" (aka "Mint Sim"), which has a 2 GB plan for $15/month and 5 GB for $20 (sounds like they go up, unless one switches to a year prepaid, but 3 months is enough to give me a feel for it).
They use T-Mobile's network.
Big advantage: no Walmart!
It's prepay only (3, 6, or 12 months), but that's fine for me.

Appears to only work with Android smartphones-as-tether, but it's probably time for me to join this century. =sigh=