4 ms·

This is why I've imported all my phones for the past 7+ years... Nokia 6820 Sony Ericsson M600i (white) Nokia N95 8gb Nokia N900 Galaxy S2 It's a tad more

by kirse 15y ago

This is why I've imported all my phones for the past 7+ years... Nokia 6820 Sony Ericsson M600i (white) Nokia N95 8gb Nokia N900 Galaxy S2 It's a tad more expensive than a locked-in contract plan but you get your phone many months before the US Market (if they get it at all) and none of the Marketing / Carrier BS. Having a smartphone years ago was almost like owning a really nice car, everyone used to ask me about the 6820/M600i especially. Now the only advantage is getting something a few months earlier, so the markets are at least improving in that most great phones are making it to the US markets. The US mobile market was complete garbage years ago compared to what it is now...

pedrocr 15y ago
Do you still get 3G? AT&T and T-Mobile both use different 3G frequencies than the rest of the world. You can easily just plug in a SIM to a foreign phone but you may not get 3G.
- kirse 15y ago
  That used to be an issue with phones 5 years ago (like the M600i, which I bought purely because it looked cool), but these days with most phones being Quad-band 2G / Tri-band 3G (or better) it's pretty easy to get a phone that will work on most freq. here in the US. Howardforums is full of people that do this all the time. Obviously you're stuck if Verizon is your choice of network... I mostly just hop around on T-Mobile / AT&T depending on who has the towers that support the phone I want. I think the Galaxy S2 may be the last phone I import early though, like I said the only real disadvantage to the US markets these days is launch lag time... We're getting all the best hardware now. Sometimes it's even good to wait, because there's always bugs that are worked out with any first release.
  - pedrocr 15y ago
    That's not my experience with T-Mobile. It uses the pretty non-standard 1700Mhz. I bought a HTC Wildfire a while ago and only got 2G. AT&T may be a different experience.

by kirse 15y ago

pedrocr 15y ago

Do you still get 3G? AT&T and T-Mobile both use different 3G frequencies than the rest of the world. You can easily just plug in a SIM to a foreign phone but you may not get 3G.

kirse 15y ago
That used to be an issue with phones 5 years ago (like the M600i, which I bought purely because it looked cool), but these days with most phones being Quad-band 2G / Tri-band 3G (or better) it's pretty easy to get a phone that will work on most freq. here in the US. Howardforums is full of people that do this all the time. Obviously you're stuck if Verizon is your choice of network... I mostly just hop around on T-Mobile / AT&T depending on who has the towers that support the phone I want. I think the Galaxy S2 may be the last phone I import early though, like I said the only real disadvantage to the US markets these days is launch lag time... We're getting all the best hardware now. Sometimes it's even good to wait, because there's always bugs that are worked out with any first release.
- pedrocr 15y ago
  That's not my experience with T-Mobile. It uses the pretty non-standard 1700Mhz. I bought a HTC Wildfire a while ago and only got 2G. AT&T may be a different experience.