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andrewxie

macrumors member
Original poster
Sep 15, 2014
66
0
Hi all, I currently live in China, as you all probably heard China is one of the first countries to release the new iphones. Chinese iphones are "special" in some ways, last year, they blocked the Facetime for some reasons and some phones can not be used overseas.
However, I need to travel to Spain and back to the US this year, but probably not until November, but I want to get the new iphones asap, I mean if the new Chinese iphones are compatible with all the carriers in Spain and the US, then I will just order it and get the phone in China, but I am not sure about that.
I will post some tech spaces for the phones here, any help would be much appreciated! Thanks!

China
Screen Shot 2015-09-10 at 下午3.04.28.png
US
Screen Shot 2015-09-10 at 下午3.04.16.png

HongKong
Screen Shot 2015-09-10 at 下午3.04.00.png
 

jpn

Cancelled
Feb 9, 2003
1,854
1,988
Hi all, I currently live in China, as you all probably heard China is one of the first countries to release the new iphones. Chinese iphones are "special" in some ways, last year, they blocked the Facetime for some reasons and some phones can not be used overseas.
However, I need to travel to Spain and back to the US this year, but probably not until November, but I want to get the new iphones asap, I mean if the new Chinese iphones are compatible with all the carriers in Spain and the US, then I will just order it and get the phone in China, but I am not sure about that.
I will post some tech spaces for the phones here, any help would be much appreciated! Thanks

the important factors are as follows:

1 LTE bands. For China you should try to get the FD-LTE bands and on the 6s these bands are on both models so this is not a consideration

2 New LTE band 30 is about to get a lot of carrier support. This model that has this band is known as the GSM model since it does not have CDMA bands. Band 30 may be important to you in the future. But the CDMA model doesn't have it. Sprint or Verizon in the USA requires the CMDA banded model.

3 place of purchase DOES matter when you go to have it repaired. iPhones bought in China or Hong Kong will not be able to be repaired in the USA even if you have purchased apple care+ in China or Hong Kong along with your phone

4 the phone (unlocked) version will cost more in China.below is pricing.
(all 128GB)
USA unlocked USD 849
HKG unlocked HKD 7188 (@7.75=) USD 927
CHN unlocked RMB 6888 (@6.2=) USD 1,110

5 there are other factors such as apple making special accommodations to the Chinese government to use a special WiFi protocol called WAPI which allows law enforcement to better track devices (if it choses to track them).

i have purchased many apple products in China and have always regretted it in the end. Hong Kong is better, but in the end, USA is still king.
 

AndrewR23

Contributor
Jun 24, 2010
4,545
1,720
the important factors are as follows:

1 LTE bands. For China you should try to get the FD-LTE bands and on the 6s these bands are on both models so this is not a consideration

2 New LTE band 30 is about to get a lot of carrier support. This model that has this band is known as the GSM model since it does not have CDMA bands. Band 30 may be important to you in the future. But the CDMA model doesn't have it. Sprint or Verizon in the USA requires the CMDA banded model.

3 place of purchase DOES matter when you go to have it repaired. iPhones bought in China or Hong Kong will not be able to be repaired in the USA even if you have purchased apple care+ in China or Hong Kong along with your phone

4 the phone (unlocked) version will cost more in China.below is pricing.
(all 128GB)
USA unlocked USD 849
HKG unlocked HKD 7188 (@7.75=) USD 927
CHN unlocked RMB 6888 (@6.2=) USD 1,110

5 there are other factors such as apple making special accommodations to the Chinese government to use a special WiFi protocol called WAPI which allows law enforcement to better track devices (if it choses to track them).

i have purchased many apple products in China and have always regretted it in the end. Hong Kong is better, but in the end, USA is still king.
actually any iPhone 6 works on all carriers but sprint. Get a locked AT&T iPhone 6, unlock it then you can use it with Verizon. This has been confirmed many times and should not change with the 6S
 

andrewxie

macrumors member
Original poster
Sep 15, 2014
66
0
the important factors are as follows:

1 LTE bands. For China you should try to get the FD-LTE bands and on the 6s these bands are on both models so this is not a consideration

2 New LTE band 30 is about to get a lot of carrier support. This model that has this band is known as the GSM model since it does not have CDMA bands. Band 30 may be important to you in the future. But the CDMA model doesn't have it. Sprint or Verizon in the USA requires the CMDA banded model.

3 place of purchase DOES matter when you go to have it repaired. iPhones bought in China or Hong Kong will not be able to be repaired in the USA even if you have purchased apple care+ in China or Hong Kong along with your phone

4 the phone (unlocked) version will cost more in China.below is pricing.
(all 128GB)
USA unlocked USD 849
HKG unlocked HKD 7188 (@7.75=) USD 927
CHN unlocked RMB 6888 (@6.2=) USD 1,110

5 there are other factors such as apple making special accommodations to the Chinese government to use a special WiFi protocol called WAPI which allows law enforcement to better track devices (if it choses to track them).

i have purchased many apple products in China and have always regretted it in the end. Hong Kong is better, but in the end, USA is still king.

Wow! Thanks for the important info niji! I didnt know Apple compromised to the Chinese government! I will definitely get my new iphone somewhere else then! I completely agree with you, USA is probably the best place to buy iphone, since I want to get a new phone asap, I will try HongKong first, they should be able to use on all the US carriers networks but Sprint, right?
 

andrewxie

macrumors member
Original poster
Sep 15, 2014
66
0
actually any iPhone 6 works on all carriers but sprint. Get a locked AT&T iPhone 6, unlock it then you can use it with Verizon. This has been confirmed many times and should not change with the 6S
Yeah man, I agree.
But since I am still in China, HongKong is probably my best bet for now。
 
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