Hello, regarding iPhone models that are manuf in Japan or Korea cannot have camera shutter sound disabled, my D has an iPhone 8 model A1863 from Japan yet she can mute the shutter sound. Why not on iPhone X or XS? Seems inconsistent, and it's frustrating when trying to buy a second hand phone. I bought her a new second hand iPhone X and the shutter cannot be disabled; now she's looking to sell it and buy one that can be disabled...but how do you know?!?!?
iPhone X
The iPhone A1863 was made for sale in a number of countries including the USA. The model number is immaterial to this whole discussion.
What matters is when Foxconn is manufacturing iphones, what is the intended country of original retail sale for that lot of iPhones. If Japan or S. Korea is the intended market for initial shipment to Apple stores and Apple authorized sellers, then those devices will have the ability to mute the shutter permanently disabled (as the laws of Japan and S. Korea require that for all digital camera sales). So A1863 models shipping direct from the factory to legitimate sellers in those countries will have the shutter sound permenantly enabled, while A1863 iPhones shipping to other countries will have the ability to mute it.
So unless you can know where the device was originally purchased at retail from Apple itself, or an Apple authorized seller, there is no way to know from just the model number.
You can determine the region the iPhone was designed to be sold for in the regular model number. Go where you see the A#### number, tap again, and it will change to a longer mix, like my iPhone 11 Pro is MW9D2LL/A. The LL is North American, the Japanese iPhone has a J before the slash. If you Google that long number, you should receive at least one response that would identify the region.
Interesting. So essentially, she has to physically try each phone she is looking to purchase, or have the seller try it. From what I'm seeing, for these second hand phones, there's no way to tell where it was originally sold/purchased. Thanks for the quick reply.
Yes, and it is the same for just about any used smart phone or digital camera since most are also sold in other countries. Even for companies in Japan, their native sales production must meet that same law, but the production they make for export does not.
The CDMA (and GSM) designation for USA carriers really doesn’t matter. Verizon (and the others) are LTE carriers and those old labels are sort of meaningless with today’s networks (and even more so as 5G gets rolled out). So that’s not a worry really as an iPhone XS Max will have no problems with Verizon’s network.
The model A1921 was the Verizon dual-modem model available as SIM-free and unlocked as well from Apple. It was sold in the USA, Canada, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands. Not sure what the “non-domestic” labeling means as I have never seen that on a used product.
Thank you for taking the time to educate me!
Ahh, this is very helpful. I checked mine and it says LL/. I checked the second hand one I bought her and it says J/. So this will be the trick for future shopping. Thank you!!!!!
You're welcome.
Ok, it actually makes sense that they would make a different product for export. For the second hand sellers, it is likely cheaper to buy one from "native sales" inventory and resell it for profit in US. The phone she's looking at concerns me on two fronts. One, it says "non-domestic", (Phone XS Max - 256GB - Gold (Unlocked) Apple smartphone with Non-Domestic Product) and the other says CDMA/GSM (Model Number- A1921 (CDMA + Gsm), Network Technology- CDMA / Evdo REV Ritter), but our carrier Verizon is discontinuing support of CDMA this year. Any opinion on potential risks on these two things? Thanks so much.
Disable or Mute Shutter Sounds
