Getting a cellular phone in North America

I have the impression that the phone market in North America appears to
be manipulated by the phone companies. Is this true? They seem to have
all of the strings for the prospective subscribers. Is it technically
difficult to switch one phone companies to the others? They seem to
promote the impression that the phone manufacturers (Sony, Nokia,
samsung, etc) build the phones specifically to those phone companies.
Is this actually true? Can I buy a Nokia phones from one carrier and
switch to another if I want to? How difficult it is to get the
electronic hardwire modified from one to the other carrier? Just a
matter of switching a tiny button in the cell phone, or type a code to
activate ?
I hate to see their advertisement or selling gimmick... the phone is
free, as long as you sign 3-5 years contract. I would rather buy a $500
phone , and subscribe and change to any company as I like. Can i do
this? Can I just buy a cellular phone card from different phone
companies?
What happens if I buy a phone via internet from Nokia or Sony? Do I
have to specify what phone carrier I plan to use it with? How to
change from one company to another in this case?

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[email protected] wrote in news:1164594152.297161.194670
@l12g2000cwl.googlegroups.com:

> I have the impression that the phone market in North America appears to
> be manipulated by the phone companies. Is this true? They seem to have
> all of the strings for the prospective subscribers. Is it technically
> difficult to switch one phone companies to the others? They seem to
> promote the impression that the phone manufacturers (Sony, Nokia,
> samsung, etc) build the phones specifically to those phone companies.
> Is this actually true? Can I buy a Nokia phones from one carrier and
> switch to another if I want to? How difficult it is to get the
> electronic hardwire modified from one to the other carrier? Just a
> matter of switching a tiny button in the cell phone, or type a code to
> activate ?
> I hate to see their advertisement or selling gimmick... the phone is
> free, as long as you sign 3-5 years contract. I would rather buy a $500
> phone , and subscribe and change to any company as I like. Can i do
> this? Can I just buy a cellular phone card from different phone
> companies?
> What happens if I buy a phone via internet from Nokia or Sony? Do I
> have to specify what phone carrier I plan to use it with? How to
> change from one company to another in this case?
>
>

Yes
Yes
Yes
No
Impossible. They don't use the same encoding schemes
No
No
No. America doesn't just use one digital system.
Most carriers won't activate a phone they didn't sell.
Carriers use specific firmware generic phones don't have.
To change companies, you trashcan your old phone and buy one from "them".

<[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> I have the impression that the phone market in North America appears to
> be manipulated by the phone companies. Is this true?

For the most part, yes. Not as bad a Japan but much worse than Europe.

> They seem to have
> all of the strings for the prospective subscribers. Is it technically
> difficult to switch one phone companies to the others?

It can be, because unlike Europe there are several different cellular
standards used.

> They seem to
> promote the impression that the phone manufacturers (Sony, Nokia,
> samsung, etc) build the phones specifically to those phone companies.
> Is this actually true?

Almost. The standard models of phones are "customized" for the carriers to
take away features that might reduce the carrier's "income stream". This is
usually called "crippling" a phone. However, I have a couple of ex-Vodafone
handsets and they are "customized" in the same way, so this is not unique to
North America.

> Can I buy a Nokia phones from one carrier and
> switch to another if I want to?

Maybe. They are almost all locked to the carrier that sold them. So, you
would have to get the lock removed. Also, this would only work for the GSM
carriers. The CDMA carriers will probably not activate another carrier's
phone.

>How difficult it is to get the
> electronic hardwire modified from one to the other carrier?

GSM is easy. You really can't convert between GSM, CDMA or iDEN.

> Just a
> matter of switching a tiny button in the cell phone, or type a code to
> activate ?

After you unlock a GSM phone, yes. CDMA and iDEN, no.

> I hate to see their advertisement or selling gimmick... the phone is
> free, as long as you sign 3-5 years contract. I would rather buy a $500
> phone , and subscribe and change to any company as I like. Can i do
> this?

You an I are in the minority. Most people seem happy to bind themselves to a
carrier for eternity to get a "free phone". Most carriers won't even sell
you an unsubsidized, unlocked phone. Most insist that you sign a long-term
contract no matter what but the term is more like 1 or 2 years, not 3-5. You
can get prepaid service and not worry about the contracts.

> Can I just buy a cellular phone card from different phone
> companies?

This is easy with some of the prepaid GSM carriers and MVNOs.

> What happens if I buy a phone via internet from Nokia or Sony? Do I
> have to specify what phone carrier I plan to use it with? How to
> change from one company to another in this case?

What you are asking is a bit of a foreign concept in the US & Canada. 99.99%
of customers take what the carriers offer. In many cases they take the
low-grade "free phone" and move the SIM card to the phone they bring with
them, rather than trying to explain to the carrier what they want to do.
This only works for GSM. For CDMA and iDEN you are stuck with what the
carrier sells.

--
Donald R. Newcomb
DRNewcomb (at) attglobal (dot) net

Donald Newcomb wrote:
> <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
>> I have the impression that the phone market in North America appears to
>> be manipulated by the phone companies. Is this true?
>
> For the most part, yes. Not as bad a Japan but much worse than Europe.
>

I'd argue that point. In Japan its still easy to get postpaid plans on
month-to-month no-commitment status.

"David Van Cleef" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> Donald Newcomb wrote:
> > <[email protected]> wrote in message
> > news:[email protected]...
> >> I have the impression that the phone market in North America appears to
> >> be manipulated by the phone companies. Is this true?
> >
> > For the most part, yes. Not as bad a Japan but much worse than Europe.
> >
>
> I'd argue that point. In Japan its still easy to get postpaid plans on
> month-to-month no-commitment status.

I was refereing to how the phone market is manipulated by the carriers.

--
Donald R. Newcomb
DRNewcomb (at) attglobal (dot) net

On 2006-11-27, Donald Newcomb <[email protected]> wrote:
><[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
>> I have the impression that the phone market in North America appears to
>> be manipulated by the phone companies. Is this true?
>
> For the most part, yes. Not as bad a Japan but much worse than Europe.

It doesn't seem any worse than the UK, the place in Europe I'm most
familiar with (and people in the UK don't think service in other
European countries is much better). The carriers there will sell you
a branded, SIM-locked phone at a low price in return for a contract
(usually 18 months), and will give you a harder time than US carriers about
unlocking it. I've seen a `3' phone with the SIM epoxied into the socket.
The early contract termination penalty in the UK seems to be outrageous,
usually requiring you to pay the basic monthly charge times the number of
months remaining in the contract. It doesn't seem to be possible
to get post-paid phone service without a contract. And I think the
"caller-pays" scheme most European countries have for mobile phone
charging provides a perverse economic incentive; the carriers have
less incentive to compete on the cost of incoming calls since those
charges are not born by the customer they're selling service to, but
rather by other carrier's customers.

There's a small advantage to the fact that all the carriers are GSM,
but other than this I'd rather be buying mobile phone service in the
US or Asia.

Dennis Ferguson