Not unlocked after all?

[Guest JCPren]

Hi everyone, I hope someone can help me with this problem.

I have a T-Mobile Vivacity running the CyanogenMod 7 ROM. I unlocked it ages ago, and have been using it successfully in the UK with a Three SIM.

Sometimes on starting up, the phone would still ask me for the SIM unlock code - but there was a "dismiss" button, and if I pressed it, everything worked. I believe some other posters here have mentioned this kind of phone behaviour too. (See http://www.modaco.com/topic/353378-gb-cm7-237-cyanogenmod-7-for-the-zte-crescent-rom-last-updated-2806/page__st__20#entry1935771)

However, I'm currently in Greece, and I just bought a Wind F2G pay as you go SIM card. After entering the SIM PIN (and dismissing the unlock request as usual), the SIM error icon reappears in the status bar, and on the lock screen it says "No SIM card". I can try searching for a network, but after choosing "Wind", an error message says that registration was unsuccessful. The staff in the Wind store tried putting the new SIM into their phone, and it worked, so they believe the problem lies in my phone still somehow being locked, rather than the SIM itself being faulty.

Any ideas? Is there any chance a different ROM would solve this problem, if no easier solution can be found?

Many thanks!

John

Edited August 19, 2013 by JCPren

[Guest JCPren]

PS. According to this article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SIM_lock

there are such things as country codes. Could this be the source of my problem?

[Guest JCPren]

Update: I've upgraded to CM9, and with this ROM, after entering the SIM PIN, I briefly get a signal, but the signal disappears, and I then get the error message: "SIM card removed - The mobile network will be unavailable until you restart with a valid SIM card inserted."

[Guest JCPren]

Any ideas? I'm on the verge of buying a second handset from the Wind shop, but would rather not, if there's another solution...

[Guest dodgetimmy]

Not sure how you unlocked but I don't think you should be greeted with anything when you start the phone.

Try running through the unlock process again. Make sure you use qpst to restore the backup you made when first unlocking afterwards.

If you didn't use qpst before then you probably unlocked incorrectly, but you will still be able to go through the steps to unlock again.

[Guest JCPren]

Thanks for the suggestion.

I did use QPST at the time, and all seemed to go well apart from that weird prompt. After all, I was able to use my Three SIM.

I was going to try unlocking again, but I only have my Win XP netbook here on this trip, and driver problems stopped me in my tracks.

It's academic now, since I bought a cheap Huawei Y210 handset from the Wind store today. I was assured it was unlocked, and it does seem to work flawlessly with both SIMs.

Searching the internet for such things as "android foreign sim not recognised" does throw up a number of similar reports, none resolved. In most cases not even an unlock code is prompted (as was the case with me on CM9 - though I'm now back on CM7 due to system partition being too small). There does seem to be an obscure type of country lock that's less well known about than the standard network lock. Hopefully somebody will solve it one day!

[Guest JCPren]

Now that I'm back in the UK with my Win 7 laptop, and found the time, I've gone through the entire unlocking process again, QPST and all, as described here:-

http://www.getandroidfree.com/advanced/sim-unlock/updated-unlock-your-t-mobile-vivacity-for-free/

 

The end result is no change. The 3 SIM still works after dismissing the unlock prompt which sometimes appears at startup. With the Wind Greece SIM, the phone still says there's no SIM card. Both SIMs still work in the Greek-bought phone which came unlocked.

 

Any more thoughts?

Edited November 2, 2013 by JCPren