Orange Phone in the USA

"Simon" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]
> "Colin Forrester" <[email protected]> wrote in
> message news:[email protected]...

[snip]

> > Did you use your Orange SIM or a local one? I thought
> > the OP wanted to place a local SIM in his Orange
> > handset.
>
> Yes Colin, that is what I intend, I was wondering what
> PAYG SIM might work and if so, what network.

T-Mobile or Cingular. Cingular use a lot of 850 MHz cells though which the
6310i doesn't support, so T-Mobile (which is exclusively 1900 IIRC) will
probably be better.

One useful feature of the US system is that you get a normal phone number
in the same range as landlines, people don't pay extra to call you. A
downside is that you pay for incoming calls, but only at normal rate not
ripoff roaming rates. You can also (with T-Mobile at least, not sure of
others) change your number to an area code of your choice. If when you buy
the SIM it has (say) a New York number but you're going to be in San
Francisco, you can change the number to a local one for that area free of
charge. You can do this more than once if you're moving around as well.

Ivor

---

› See More: Orange Phone in the USA

>>>I am going on a holiday in Florida and was thinking of taking my N70,
>>>which
>>>is on an Orange Contract.
>>>
>>> Does anyone know what Network/SIM in the US will work in my phone.
>>
>>1) Pay Orange £20 to unlock your phone - this will take them a week or two
>>so start doing this now. Nobody else can currently unlock these phones,
>>but
>>Orange - to their great credit - does not take advantage of this to gouge
>>its customers.
>>
>>2) When you arrive in the States and have slept off your jetlag, make
>>getting a local prepay SIM card the first thing you do. You can get one
>>from
>>Cingular or T-mobile; Cingular has slightly better coverage and you should
>>be able to persuade the shop to give you the SIM card free if you buy at
>>least a $50 at the same time.
>>
>>3) To call back to the UK, do as the locals do: buy a calling card from
>>any
>>drugstore and use it from your phone. You'll be charged your per minute
>>rate
>>by the mobile company, but it's still pretty cheap.
>>
>
> Or do that from a payphone, local calls are usually free or 25c
> regardless of length, depending on the calling company, beware USA
> local calls are usually very local, across city's can sometimes be
> classed as long distance, depends on the city..

Not normally a good idea. Every US calling card I've used has a 'payphone
surcharge', where dialling the freephone (1-800) number will cost you
between $1 and $2 per call. This is debited from your calling card balance,
and is levied by the payphone owner to cover their costs. Using a calling
card on your mobile is cheaper - unless you're making a long call - because
you're only paying 20-30 cents per minute to call the freephone number.

> As your looking at $50 for a sim card and the £20 unlocking fee (plus
> possibly more) it might be better to just use Orange and keep the
> number of calls down.

Sorry, I wasn't very clear here - the $50 was for a top-up, the SIM card is
cheap or free.

Never, ever roam if you're away for more than a weekend. Even if you think
you're going to make few calls. At £1.10 per minute to use your phone in the
States, you'll have paid for the unlocking fee after 19 minutes. And
remember you'll receive incoming calls free - at the caller's expense -
rather than 70p per minute. This will encourage people to keep calls short
rather than chatting at your expense.

Benedict.

Simon wrote:
> <snip>
>
> Thanks a lot guys, this has been very informative and helpful.
>
> I fly next Tuesday so there is not time to get it unlocked. I will have to
> delve in the cupboard for one of my older phones but as I only want it for
> local calls, thats no bother.
>
> As to Orange, they gave me the ump when I tried to downgrade my Tariff fo my
> wifes phone so will be taking my numbers over to either O2 or T Mobile
> before October passes. I fancy combining my PDA and Phone and both have
> suitable kit.
>
> Now where did I leave that 6310i........................

Good idea about a different phone. As the slightly unseemly squabble
about unlocking has established, later Nokia phones cannot be unlocked
by online code generators. Orange might give you the code for a fee,
but when I asked a couple of years ago, they wanted pre-payment of the
outstanding contract rental as well. It was a 3310 and a friend
unlocked it for me the next day.

Info on US SIMs and network links on
http://www.prepaidgsm.net/en/usa.html

You can see that there are several virtual operators as well, and some
have pretty cheap packages with a phone included, if you can't dig one
out before you go

"andy" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>
> Simon wrote:
>> <snip>
>>
>> Thanks a lot guys, this has been very informative and helpful.
>>
>> I fly next Tuesday so there is not time to get it unlocked. I will have
>> to
>> delve in the cupboard for one of my older phones but as I only want it
>> for
>> local calls, thats no bother.
>>
>> As to Orange, they gave me the ump when I tried to downgrade my Tariff fo
>> my
>> wifes phone so will be taking my numbers over to either O2 or T Mobile
>> before October passes. I fancy combining my PDA and Phone and both have
>> suitable kit.
>>
>> Now where did I leave that 6310i........................
>
> Good idea about a different phone. As the slightly unseemly squabble
> about unlocking has established, later Nokia phones cannot be unlocked
> by online code generators. Orange might give you the code for a fee,
> but when I asked a couple of years ago, they wanted pre-payment of the
> outstanding contract rental as well. It was a 3310 and a friend
> unlocked it for me the next day.
>
> Info on US SIMs and network links on
> http://www.prepaidgsm.net/en/usa.html
>
> You can see that there are several virtual operators as well, and some
> have pretty cheap packages with a phone included, if you can't dig one
> out before you go
>

Its looking more and more like buying a cheap PAYG phone on arrival in US.
Using my own phone looks out of the question and I will have to check that
any phone I take will work in US. I can always pass on the kit to my brother
in law when we come home.

Thanks every one for your help.

This tmobile offer is being discussed the prapaid forums at howard
forums below. Specifically, it mentioned the Nokia 6030.

http://t-mobile.com/shop/phones/prepaid.aspx

http://www.howardforums.com/showthread.php?t=980987




--
mrcamp

> Thanks a lot guys, this has been very informative and helpful.
>
> I fly next Tuesday so there is not time to get it unlocked. I will have to
> delve in the cupboard for one of my older phones but as I only want it for
> local calls, thats no bother.
>
> As to Orange, they gave me the ump when I tried to downgrade my Tariff fo
> my wifes phone so will be taking my numbers over to either O2 or T Mobile
> before October passes. I fancy combining my PDA and Phone and both have
> suitable kit.
>
> Now where did I leave that 6310i........................

Three things:

1) If you *can* find a 6310i, that will work beautifully and it's easy to
unlock.
2) Don't automatically assume that the N70 is locked - try another network's
SIM in it to check.
3) Don't take my word for it that Orange will take at least a week to unlock
your phone. It's worth calling them to ask. Hell, if you state that you need
to use it abroad on Tuesday and they don't get you the code in time, they'll
probably refund the unlocking charge (they did for me!)

Benedict.