About Our Unlocked Phones
Since we entered the cell phone market in May, we have received a number of inquiries about the "unlocked" cell phones we have for sale. I would like to take a moment to better explain what an "unlocked" phone is and why it is a nice thing to have.
When a phone manufacturer makes a phone model, cellular providers buy them and brand them with their company names. Almost always they will also enter a code into the phone to "lock" it to their service. This means that a phone you buy in a Cingular store is locked to only work with Cingular service. If you put a T-Mobile SIM card in the phone, it will say "invalid SIM" or something similar. If you buy the exact same model phone in a T-Mobile store, it will be locked for T-Mobile and will display an "invalid SIM" message if you put a Cingular SIM card in it. The hardware (the phone itself) is not different. For example, take the V180 cell phone from Motorola. You can buy this phone at a Cingular store or at a T-Mobile store. The phones are identical in all aspects except that each one has had a lock code entered into it by the respective provider.
Cell phone companies do not have to lock their phones, but they choose to do so for business purposes. A phone that is locked cannot be used with a competitor's service (unless it is unlocked). It also decreases the resale value of the phone should you decide to sell it because the market size shopping for that specific carrier is going to be smaller than the market size shopping for all carriers- it's simple mathematics. It is not a legal issue, just a business decision that cell phone companies make.
For consumers, unlocking a cell phone is a pefectly okay thing to do. It is not like hacking a software program to use it without paying for it. Consumers are allowed to unlock their phones, though doing so often voids any phone warranty offered by the provider. If you unlock a phone, this means that you take away the lock code and then the phone will work with any GSM provider, including Cingular, T-Mobile, and AT&T wireless (note: this article is about GSM providers and does not apply to CDMA or TDMA providers like Sprint or Verizon). If you buy a phone from a Cingular store and unlock it, you will no longer get an "invalid SIM" message if you put a T-Mobile SIM card in it. You can use the same phone with multiple providers, which is nice if you ever decide to change providers.
But unlocking a phone is not easy. Most phones cannot be unlocked directly by the end consumer. There are three ways to get an unlocked phone. The first of course is to buy one that is already unlocked, like those that we sell. The second way is to buy a phone that is locked and then pay a company to unlock it for you. A Google search for "unlock GSM" returns all sorts of companies that offer this service. Some of the offerings are straightforward- you pay and then the company sends you a special cable and/or code that you can use to unlock the phone. Some of the offerings are more risky and require that you mail your phone away to be unlocked and then wait to receive it back. While some good things have been said about this type of service, it is important to understand that if you do choose to mail your phone away, you have little recourse if the phone is never returned. So caveat emptor on that one. The third way is to search the Internet to see if there are any codes available for free that you can try yourself. There are some free code generators available for download that sometimes work and sometimes don't. With most GSM phones if you try to enter an unlock code manually, you have five tries and if you fail on all five, no codes can be entered any more, kind of like with an ATM card at a bank machine.
So the easiest and cheapest way to get an unlocked phone might be to just buy one that is already unlocked. This is an especially great option for customers of AT&T Wireless. If you are an AT&T Wireless customer, you may already know that since the merger with Cingular, the only way you can get a new phone through Cingular for your service is if you agree to change your existing plan to a new Cingular plan, extend your contract, and pay for the new phone. If you buy an unlocked phone, all you have to do is put your AT&T Wireless SIM card into the phone and you are all sent to make and receive calls. You keep your same plan, and the same contract. This only applies to AT&T GSM customers of course (if your phone has a SIM card you are an AT&T GSM customer. If it does not, you are a CDMA or TDMA customer in which case none of this applies).
To see our phone offerings, click here. Note that not all phones we sell are unlocked, so be sure to check the individual description to see if we say that the phone is unlocked.
posted at: 12:48 | path: | permanent link to this entry