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US iphone 4 in UK

J

jringeno

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jul 25, 2009
5
0
South Korea
I have tried to get a straight answer on this, but nobody seems to know and the guy at the apple store didnt have any clue either.

The wife and I are moving to the UK in february, and her sprint contract is about to run out, so we are really wanting to get iphones. Im not really worried about contracts, since i will be moving on military orders, and are not required to pay all the disconect fees when we leave. My main question is, if we buy iphone 4's now, will we be able to use them in the UK if i jailbreak and unlock them?

If anyone can give me info, i would very much appreciate it. thanks!
 
If the cell phone provider in the UK operates on these frequencies:

-UMTS/HSDPA/HSUPA (850, 900, 1900, 2100 MHz)
-GSM/EDGE (850, 900, 1800, 1900 MHz)

and require a SIM Card, I think you should be fine, but don't take my word as 100% truth.
 
jringeno said:
I have tried to get a straight answer on this, but nobody seems to know and the guy at the apple store didnt have any clue either.

The wife and I are moving to the UK in february, and her sprint contract is about to run out, so we are really wanting to get iphones. Im not really worried about contracts, since i will be moving on military orders, and are not required to pay all the disconect fees when we leave. My main question is, if we buy iphone 4's now, will we be able to use them in the UK if i jailbreak and unlock them?

If anyone can give me info, i would very much appreciate it. thanks!
Click to expand...

problem is there's no unlock for 4.1 right now, which is pretty much what you'll get unless that shop has old stock lying around (highly unlikely)
 
How long will you be in the UK for?

If you buy a US phone, it will be locked to a US network. Sim Free, the phones are £499 and £599.

On the plus side, you get to use the phones anywhere in the world on a GSM network.
 
When the iPhone 3G came out, it was sold in the UK and the US. Both were the same model and carried the same baseband chip. O2 and AT&T used the same frequencies for 3G networking, so, the iPhone worked well there regardless where you bought it.

Furthermore, the current iPhone 4 supports two more types of frequencies giving it much more International support. And since the iPhone 4 has the same and two additional frequencies it is *very* likely a US purchased iPhone will work in the UK if and only if the US iPhone has been previously unlocked.
 
Willis said:
How long will you be in the UK for?

If you buy a US phone, it will be locked to a US network. Sim Free, the phones are £499 and £599.

On the plus side, you get to use the phones anywhere in the world on a GSM network.
Click to expand...

Were going to be in the UK for 3 years and then somewhere else in europe after that, hopefully.

I am thinking i will just have my wife buy the 2 iphones now on a family plan, and send me the other one to mess around with, since it wont work here in korea.
 
saving107 said:
If the cell phone provider in the UK operates on these frequencies:

-UMTS/HSDPA/HSUPA (850, 900, 1900, 2100 MHz)
-GSM (850, 900, 1800, 1900 MHz)
Click to expand...

The UK providers only use one (or more) of the three frequencies I've put in bold, so it'll be fine (as others have pointed out, assuming it isn't SIM locked).
 
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