Can a Sprint phone be used with U.S. Cellular?

[c073186]

They both appear to use CDMA networks, so could a Sprint cell phone be used with U.S. Cellular service? If yes, is this something that the U.S. Cellular store would support it?

 

[MacNut]

No, they use different frequencies and they don't have a card you can replace it with.

 

[yg17]

Actually, it should be technically possible since US Cellular uses CDMA on 800 and 1900MHz for their network. Sprint uses CDMA on 1900MHz, but almost all their phones are dual band and will do 800 MHz. Now, whether or not US Cellular will actually activate a Sprint phone, I'm not sure. IIRC, the other CDMA carriers won't activate another carrier's phone. I don't know is US Cellular has the same policy.

GSM FTW

 

[MacNut]

Isn't the phone tuned to the carrier.

 

[yg17]

Isn't the phone tuned to the carrier.

No. 800 and 1900 are actually ranges of 824-829 MHz and 1930-1990 MHz, and a phone that does 800 and 1900 will be able to use anything in that range. A carrier, depending on frequencies available and what licenses they have, may use any specific frequencies within that range in any given location in the country. And roaming partners might use a different subset of that range, or the other range (Sprint and T-Mobile are both 1900MHz, albeit CDMA and GSM, but they both use 800/850 (GSM) carriers for roaming), so the phones are able to use anything in there.

So it will technically be possible, it's just a matter of US Cellular's policy.