Database Users

T-Mobile G1 in Europe?

I live in the US and I have a trip planned to London, Paris and Rome in May. I own a T-mobile G1 and was wondering what my best option was for using my G1 in those cities. I know there are a lot of European users here on XDA so I was hoping somebody could give me some advise from experience. I do realize that the 3G won't work over there no matter what I do.
Thanks for any and all help!

NickPDX said:
I live in the US and I have a trip planned to London, Paris and Rome in May. I own a T-mobile G1 and was wondering what my best option was for using my G1 in those cities. I know there are a lot of European users here on XDA so I was hoping somebody could give me some advise from experience. I do realize that the 3G won't work over there no matter what I do.
Thanks for any and all help!
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3G should work fine. When you get there, buy a local prepaid simcard.

You need to unlock it first, call T-Mo and tell them what you just posted and they will give you the unlock code.

Your best bet for London (once you've got the phone unlocked) is a "pay as you go" sim from three. Just put £10 credit on it and you'll get a 150mb, 90day internet allowance. If you need to top it up again you get that allowance renewed every time.

Unless I am mistaking, the phone is rooted and is running a non stock rom, thus it is unlocked. I will look into the prepaid sim cards. Will I have to get a different one for each of the countries/cities?
@lbcoder: are you sure about the 3G? since this is a t-mobile phone I was under the impression that the bands it uses for 3G are only the N. American Bands and would only work over here.

Not unlocked for other networks, you need to get it unlocked to use other networks.

NickPDX said:
Unless I am mistaking, the phone is rooted and is running a non stock rom, thus it is unlocked.
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Sim unlock isn't the same thing as root.. You need a code from t-mobile for that. They'll give you one if you tell them what you've told us.
NickPDX said:
I will look into the prepaid sim cards. Will I have to get a different one for each of the countries/cities?
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That's going to be the cheapest way to do it.. You'll get brutally raped for roaming charges otherwise. In the UK the cards are usually free, you just have to buy the calling credit.

TMO will give you your SIM unlock code for free if your account has been paid up for 90 days or longer. They take up to 7 days. I had to get this from TMO via my American friend when I bought my G1 off him. There are places online where you can pay $25 or so and get an unlock code within hours. SIM unlock is not the same thing as root.
I'm also just about to go to Europe! Vodafone turned on global roaming for free (I just pay for calls) and they sells packs of roaming data, I got 25Mb for $50, which is way cheaper than their usual rate of $10 per 1Mb! For me this is easier than stuffing round with pre-paid SIM cards, changing number and whatever, I also don't know if a pre-paid SIM gives mobile data access? Give TMO a call and see what they offer.
I will turn off Sync and use DroidWall to make sure stuff doesn't update in the background and use all my allowance. It's really only to update Facebook to let people know I am still alive

Your G1 will most definitely work and use 3G in London. You can grab a T-Mo prepaid SIM from the multiple vending machines in the airport when you arrive in London, and swap it in and start using it immediately. I did exactly this at both Gatwick and Heathrow. Do like the other posters said and call T-Mobile in the US and get the unlock code before you fly. It's free that way. I did that too, and they are cool about it. It took about 24 hours after my request and it was emailed to me. The one thing that confused me at first was my G1 kept asking for a "SIM unlock code" or something like that after I had unlocked it using the T-Mobile code. Turns out it was a security setting that I could disable, to prevent someone from using the phone if they stole it. Two totally different "SIM unlocks". Now I know.

western europe for 5 weeks...international sim cards?

so after doing exhaustive research on the subject I was not able to find a definitive thread or answer on the subject of using international sim cards on an unlocked g2. I'm hoping someone here at xda has experience with this and is able to give me advice.
I'm going to be backpacking europe for 5 weeks and want to bring my g2 to use as a computer (while connected to wifi) and making rare calls (just to check in with people at home), htc's website says this phone is quad band and umts http://www.htc.com/us/products/t-mobile-g2#tech-specs but I've never traveled so I'm not sure what to make of it.
any help would be very appreciated!!
edit: called tmobile and they were no help at all, the rep was reading off a script that didnt have much info. looking for personal experience please!

Hi,
G2/Desire Z as you rightly point out will be able to deal with mobile networks in Europe.
The problem you face is that a Sim from county 1 will work Ok in that country but will attract data roaming charges in all other european countries.
That's unless you negotiate something with the operator prior to your purchase regarding both mobile data and call roaming charges.
Chances are you will get a better deal from maybe Germany or perhaps france. Check them both on the web and also check the uk operators and see where you get..
Des. . .

Essential: WHEN will you be going? Because TMO Germany is about to bring up an Europe-wide (or at least Western Europe) roaming-charges-free card. I'll look it up and answer asap. Hold on.
EDIT: TMO Travel & Surf does not include (or not even feature? Not clear from the Article I read) calls. Sorry. PLUS the Prices seem not really good to me. I haven't found anything you're looking for in Germany yet. Could do with it as well. Greez, mwrsa

I will be travelling march-april. I guess what my question is, once they send me my unlock code and I unlock my phone to use the international sim, I will not be tied at all to tmobile or their roaming charges unless I put my original sim card back in the phone is that correct?
does anyone have any recommendations what carriers are the best? I'll be going to UK, France, Netherlands, Germany, Czech, and Spain

well I can't speak for europe I'm currently out of my home country with my DZ, I unlocked it with gfree, which I would reccomend. also its definetly cheaper to use a local simcard from where every you are travelling, there's no getting around roaming charges and insane rates if your going international. I personally picked up a free ATT card here where I am and paid 20 bucks for 100mb of data, since calling and texting is still expensive I communicate through "whatsapp" with my wife and family . it worrks on data or wifi, let's u send and receive pics and videos and uses a surprisingly tiny amount of data to do so. id honestly reccomend this route so long as your family has a whatsapp compatible device, currently its available for blackberry,droid,and iphone.
sorry I can't be more help but with "real life" experience I found this to be the best route. if u need voice, its still cheaper to pickup a 20dollar long distance calling card and use the hotel phones. or skype app when your on wifi.
hope it helps a bit! and have a safe trip!
ptesmoke
Sent from my HTC Vision using XDA App

Problem is, that at least with German SIM-Cards, you need an adress here in germany ti register the card to your name. Austria and GB have "3" as a network operator. AFAIK they have a sim-card with no roaming fees where "3" is available as a network.

Hi,
I'll be going through europe this summer. The suggestion of getting a local PAYG sim is good, on the face of it. Unless you are going to be in that country for just a few days (as I will be) then, perhaps, it is more aggravation to get the sims than pay roaming.
A sim from Germany - if it was to include some country roaming - from either O2 or T-Mobile or even Voda - may be an answer.
Very much depends on how long you will be in each country I guess.
A week+ stay in each country, and a sim from each country when you get there could week prove to be your way forward.
Des. . .

HI,
This is worth a read. Gives you some idea as to prices and amounts:
Roaming Data Charges - UK Accounts...
Des. . .

As far as band compatibility, the important thing is that your phone is compatible with the bands used in Europe. Looks like Europe uses the 900 and 1800 MHz GSM bands just about everywhere for voice, and UMTS 2100 for 3G. The G2 has GSM 850, 900, 1800, 1900; and UMTS 1700/2100, 2100. So you're good to go as far as the hardware compatibility.

International sim card
Hello!
Have you ever heard about international sim cards? In my opinion is the best solution to save on roaming charges!
Personally I use WorldSIm, they have both a UK and US number in the same sim card and have free incoming calls in over 90 countries.
There are more like this in the market but I can only speak about what I already now and I'm very happy with.
Hope it helps!

[Q] Venue Pro In Canada, Ideas?

Ok so now that Dell has the DVP for AT&T, will anyone here be working to change their T-Mobile device to work on AT&T? From what I understand it's just a firmware difference that allows the radio to work on the other frequencies. Consequently the same frequencies of UMTS that Bell and Telus run in Canada. It's great that Dell has decided to move to AT&T as well but unfortunately we can't get the unlocked versions shipped up here directly from Dell.
If someone wants to make some coin, buy a bunch of unlocked AT&T compatible DVP's and sell them to Canadians to work on Bell and Telus. Unfortunately I'm one of those suckers that didn't realize that UMTS 3G ran on 5 different frequencies and bought a T-Mobile one before the AT&T version was available.
I'm basically looking to try and get this one I already have to work, but if it's not possible, I'm willing to trade and/or buy an AT&T one.
Anyone have ideas? Do you think that the May 18th (tentative) firmware release will be able to be hacked to unlock all the frequencies on the radio? I hate to make such a long post but basically I'm grasping at life-lines here. My iPhone is a POS and I'm desperate for an awesome, non-android phone.

You my friend and I are in the same boat. I lucked out and Mobilicity shows up just before I ordered the phone. I like you have the t-mobile phone.
So far however the phone only works on rogers (and subsidiaries) and mobilicy. But as mobilicity is brand new i'm having a hard time staying connected and after paying almost 600 for the phone i'm kinda getting annoyed at the fact it barely stays connected to the 3G, though I have no issues with wifi.
Otherwise the phone is fantastic (with the no "explorer" exception) and with unlimited data through mobilicity, when it's good it's really good.

Lucky for you. Unfortunately I live in Alberta and the only carriers we have here are Bell, Telus, and Rogers. And the only coverage worth mentioning is worth Bell and Telus. So I'm a little SOL. If someone from the states is willing to trade an unlock AT&T version for a brand new (used for a couple hours) T-Mobile version, I'll pay shipping. I don't care. I just want a working phone.

Need solutions for international travel. Use Sprint currently.

I've got a Sprint Samsung Epic 4G but I plan on doing some international travel next year (2012, and I don't know where yet). I've never had to figure out the phone situation before.
I have a business to run so I'll need voice, text, and data for checking email.
Is it easier just to buy an unlocked GSM Android-based phone and do the SIM swapping thing from country to country? How do I go about unlocking a phone? Will I be able to keep my old number? Or do I just go for an international phone that can do both GSM and CDMA?
Any recommendations?
*sigh*
If the GSM providers in the US weren't so crappy I wouldn't be having such a hard time, heh.

,
Thread moved to Q&A due to it being a question. Would advise you to read forum rules and post in correct section.
Failure to comply with forum rules will result in an infraction and/or ban depending on severity of rule break.

The only way you can keep your same phone number when traveling abroad is to keep using Sprint and then do international roaming. Unfortunately, that can be incredibly expensive, especially for data. For instance in many countries, Verizon charges up to $20.48 per megabyte!
If you buy an unlocked phone and get a prepaid sim in the country you are traveling, the local rates will be far cheaper than roaming with your carrier, but you will get another phone number with that new sim card. You may be able to activate call forwarding so the calls go from your Sprint number to your international sim card. I'm not sure of all the details on that, if there are extra costs, etc.
Sprint has a recent phone, the Motorola Photon that comes with a GSM radio so you could use Sprint's CDMA service here and then use a local sim when you travel abroad. That phone is unlocked for international sims, but locked to domestic sims such as from ATT and T-Mobile.
You can find most phones sold in Europe and elsewhere are unlocked from the start, but keep in mind you'd pay the off-contract price which can be $500+. If you want, maybe you will be eligible to upgrade to the Photon or a newer GSM+CDMA model next year for a contract price.
Also, Europe is strictly GSM. So even if you brought your CDMA-only Epic there, it would not work at all, not even for roaming.

I am not sure if operators allow call forwarding to international numbers .... It can be done only to local numbers no matter GSM or CDMA.
I suggest you purchase a pre paid GSM number and activate your call forwarding onto it and use the GSM number for international roaming. But as we all know DATA will cost you a BOM!
I remember losing some 10+ euros in Paris just by consuming some 300 KB data on a LOCAL SIM !
At the end what best i suggest is set up a voice mail on your sprint number and purchase a Uni Connect or Tricon card (both GSM) which works through Europe. You can then inform every one via your voice message about your new number for the duration of time you are roaming.

Taking my Verizon HTC 10 to Asia

Hi everyone, I have a bone stock Verizon HTC 10 on a grandfathered unlimited data plan.
This is going to be my first trip outside of the US, I'm going to Southeast Asia and I was, originally, looking at the Verizon TravelPass plan, but it is only for newer plans, not for the grandfathered plans. So now I am looking into swapping out to a local SIM, but I'm not sure I understand everything. Does it matter which carrier I use? GSM or CDMA? Since it's a World Phone, I'm assuming that it has all the bands covered. Besides having a different phone number, are there any other drawbacks?
What do you guys think about using the Wi-Fi in that part of the world. I get leery about even using the Hotels Wi-Fi. LOL
Any info would be greatly appreciated, thanks.

ditto - i'll be going to London for about 6 months. I have the verizon htc 10 (sunshined - don't think that matters for this?). i'm assuming i can take out that verizon sim and put in a vodafone (unless someone has some suggestions of other carriers) sim and it will work seamlessly.
any help for me and my new OP friend going to Asia would be cool ... tia !

Dragbike Racer said:
Hi everyone, I have a bone stock Verizon HTC 10 on a grandfathered unlimited data plan.
This is going to be my first trip outside of the US, I'm going to Southeast Asia and I was, originally, looking at the Verizon TravelPass plan, but it is only for newer plans, not for the grandfathered plans. So now I am looking into swapping out to a local SIM, but I'm not sure I understand everything. Does it matter which carrier I use? GSM or CDMA? Since it's a World Phone, I'm assuming that it has all the bands covered. Besides having a different phone number, are there any other drawbacks?
What do you guys think about using the Wi-Fi in that part of the world. I get leery about even using the Hotels Wi-Fi. LOL
Any info would be greatly appreciated, thanks.
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I used my Verizon 10 in Japan mostly without issues with a local data sim card. Look at possible sim providers where you're going and see what bands they use, and see if your phone supports those. The VZW 10 has a couple of bands disabled compared to the unlocked 10. Just make sure you change your network settings from CDMA to Global.
No drawbacks in using your phone abroad. Depending on if you get a data only sim card and which provider you use there, you might experience some additional battery drain. I experienced this mostly in Japan, but it Singapore and Thailand as well with my M7.
Safety wise I would say using public wifi in SEA has the same risk as using public wifi in the states.

Thanks for the info, I really appreciate it.

Dragbike Racer said:
Thanks for the info, I really appreciate it.
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No probs, hope it all works out.