Question about cellular network supports

[Guest jacobgong]

My Omnia II is from Bell Canada, and as far as I know Bell uses CDMA network here. But the phone is like quad-band whatever that has all the frequencies so it should in theory usable anywhere in the world as long as you have signal and a SIM card right?

When I first came here I noticed there are two separate discussion boards for GSM and CDMA ROMs, so I was thinking maybe if I bring my phone to a GSM network it will not work unless I flash my system into a "GSM ROM?"

last year when I brought it to England it didn't work with the Bell SIM card, I didn't try to make any calls but it never had any signal bars, though you could see the list of networks available in settings, it won't connect to any of them.

I am planning to bring it to Japan in a few months, and if it will work, I'll go ahead and try to get it unlocked.

[Guest dgmorland]

My Omnia II is from Bell Canada, and as far as I know Bell uses CDMA network here. But the phone is like quad-band whatever that has all the frequencies so it should in theory usable anywhere in the world as long as you have signal and a SIM card right?

When I first came here I noticed there are two separate discussion boards for GSM and CDMA ROMs, so I was thinking maybe if I bring my phone to a GSM network it will not work unless I flash my system into a "GSM ROM?"

last year when I brought it to England it didn't work with the Bell SIM card, I didn't try to make any calls but it never had any signal bars, though you could see the list of networks available in settings, it won't connect to any of them.

I am planning to bring it to Japan in a few months, and if it will work, I'll go ahead and try to get it unlocked.

Quad-band on Omnia II means GSM on 4 different frequencies. Japan does not have any GSM networks.

[Guest jacobgong]

Quad-band on Omnia II means GSM on 4 different frequencies. Japan does not have any GSM networks.

but Bell uses CDMA right? I mean I think that is what it said on Wikipedia when I checked.

[Guest dgmorland]

but Bell uses CDMA right? I mean I think that is what it said on Wikipedia when I checked.

According to Bell Canada website your Omnia II is Dual-band: 850/1900 MHz HSPA/UMTS and Quad-band: 850/900/1800/1900 MHz GSM/GPRS/EDGE.

The quad-band GSM feature is no use in Japan because there are no GSM networks there. You have W-CDMA at 850 and 1900MHz (W-CMDA is a 3G technology - GSM is 2G technology). Note that W-CDMA is something completely different to CDMA. There are some W-CDMA networks in Japan but I dont know what frequency they are. Assuming there is a W-CMDA (3G) network on one of these 2 frequencies your phone should roam there as long as Bell Canada has an in interconnect agreement with the other provider.

[Guest jacobgong]

According to Bell Canada website your Omnia II is Dual-band: 850/1900 MHz HSPA/UMTS and Quad-band: 850/900/1800/1900 MHz GSM/GPRS/EDGE.

The quad-band GSM feature is no use in Japan because there are no GSM networks there. You have W-CDMA at 850 and 1900MHz (W-CMDA is a 3G technology - GSM is 2G technology). Note that W-CDMA is something completely different to CDMA. There are some W-CDMA networks in Japan but I dont know what frequency they are. Assuming there is a W-CMDA (3G) network on one of these 2 frequencies your phone should roam there as long as Bell Canada has an in interconnect agreement with the other provider.

why would the bell Omnia 2 have 1 less frequency for UMTS WCDMA than the original version. I found that Japan uses 800 and 2100.

so from the numbers, and information from bell's website, it will not work in Japan. great......

Do they have like absolutely no 2G networks in Japan?

Edited February 22, 2010 by jacobgong