Unlocked French iphone

I think the problems occur when you try and use a sim card that is not from the country that you purchased the iPhone.

The reason for this is pretty simple. I could jump on the eurostar or ferry sometime today, do a bit a booze cruise for Christmas and while I'm there pick up a bunch of unlocked iPhones. Then bring them back into the UK.

Apple makes money on it's contracts being sold. Although for example when in the UK you have a contract with O2, thats not really an O2 contract, since Apple has had a say in what the contract is and that contract is only good for the iPhone. O2 are just the carrier apple has chosen to make the phone work in the UK.

So basically if I was to do what you do, Id basically be able to get a non-iPhone O2 contract or a contract with another provider and thereby Apple would lose some revenue stream. The only reason unlocked iPhones are available in the first place is in that particular country it is against the law.

As for your dilemma, I'd keep the iPhone, but get another phone for putting your sim card in. You can still use your iPhone for things, but have a sim for that country in another phone for keeping costs down and still having phone functionality.

What you are trying to do is avoid paying International Roaming charges to a carrier.

An officially unlocked iPhone will work on any GSM/EDGE network in the country the iPhone has been officially released in. (In this case France). iPhone has not to the best of my knowledge been launched in Spain and so will not recognise a SIM card from a Spanish Network Operator.

An officially unlocked iPhone is not the same as a SIM FREE mobile, except in the country of release (France in this case). For example, I could travel to France and buy an officially unlocked iPhone. I could travel back to the U.K, where iPhone has been officially released, however upon activation, I could only choose O2 and one of their price plans, as they are the only supported network for iPhone in the U.K. I could not choose any network operator SIM the U.K has to offer, as iPhone has been exclusively launched on O2 in the U.K. Likewise I could not activate iPhone in France, then travel to the U.K and install any U.K network operator SIM card and expect iPhone to work. It won't. It will work fine with the French Operator SIM card installed, using International Roaming.

Therefor, there is no point in me traveling to France to buy an officially unlocked iPhone for use in the U.K, as I would pay more for the iPhone (being unlocked) and would still have to sign up to an 18 month O2 contract

If you install your French Network SIM and travel to Spain or the U.K, iPhone will function as expected using International Roaming.

You said " In buying a UNLOCKED BY APPLE AND ORANGE iphone I expect it to be unlocked giving me the above ability".

Your expectation is what is disappointing you. The officially unlocked iPhone is available as a matter of French law. French law does not cover Spain, the U.K or any other country. I have raised this point in other posts, an unlocked phone does not necessarily mean the same as a SIM FREE phone.

When you buy a SIM FREE mobile phone, it is exactly that. SIM FREE (and you pay a premium for SIM FREE mobile phones). It will work with any SIM card from any supported Network Operator, however you may not get full functionality from the device on an unsupported network. especially if the device in question has not been launched in the country you are trying to use it in (Networks may not support all device functions).

An unlocked device, it could be argued, refers to a device sold contract free, thus not being locked into a contract with a specific carrier in the country of release. The unlocked device will work with any network operator SIM in the country of release. This appears to the be the case with iPhone.

Tim in Spain wrote:

Also when I bought the phone France Telecom did not inform me it was only open to French networks her words were UNLOCKED ANY SIM ANY COUNTRY.

Of course they say that; they're trying to sell you the phone! Buyer Beware!

I have a French unlocked phone and it works fine with a Vodafone Germany SIM. None of the problems you describe. SMS works fine. Etc.

I am going to test various SIM's next week ( I work for a Mobile Operator) with the officially unlocked French iPhone - going to try and reproduce any of these problems.

Kevin,

I read your report on the testing before it disappeared. My parents bought an unlocked French iPhone for my daughter as a Xmas present without asking me first. That iPhone cost a third of their monthly pension income. Now they are quite devastated, because Orange won't take the iPhone back. Can you tell me how to fix the software issue?

Contact me. Look on the net for kevinbr. You will find me.

Message was edited by: Kevin Brown2

as we probably all know by now, official unlocked phones only work ik country's where iPhone is available.

this has something to do with the international settings.
to be more specific the telephone number 'layout'

when you start sms or start dailing a number our iPhone checks the country code on your sim card and gets the data from that country out of his database.
since there is no information for unsupported country's the app crashes.

this is exactly the same problems people with "helped" iPhones has been facing.
For which some guys created a solution I'd prefer not to discuss on here.

As i've seen in a thread similar to this one about GERMAN unlocked phones (before it got closed due to a argue), this is a bug in firmware 1.1.2 and apple's working on a solution in 1.1.3 that will come soon if we may believe rhumours on the net.

I have the same problem but with an official! German unlocked phone using it in The Netherlands.

I know all the arguments about you have to buy it in Germany and use it there and you have to buy it in France and use it there yeah yeah! but Both T-Mobile and APPLE!!!!!! self told that it would work in The Netherlands with my Dutch Vodafone Sim because it will be unlocked! Else i would of course not have bought it for a thousand Euro!

Now whats up!?

Apple fix the problem you have a couple of thousand unlocked iphones on the market and you dont have enough money to screw so many clients! Help us and make that simple update!

We bought this iphone because it is legal in the EU!!! We don't wanna have a stupid hacked phone.

You sold us this product under false conditions pleas be honest with us or fix it or give our money back!