From what I've been able to gather about phone service and local carriers for blackberry units in OZ and NZ, the one company which covers both countries is Vodafone. Are there any others? For a blackberry, Optus and Telstra seem to cover OZ but not NZ. Am I correct on this? Any help on this is greatly appreciated. Thanks again. Kathy

Hi Kathleen
We've used our Blackberry in Australia and Europe - you need to check with the carrier you use at home for mobile connections. They'll be able to tell you who they link with overseas. Make sure you check for all areas you'll be in - we got caught out in Belgium east coast because we hadn't pre-organised to be connected in that particular area.
Happy travels, Di

That sounds right to me, Kathy, although Telstra and Optus would both have roaming agreements with a NZ carrier. As of a few years ago Telstra's agreement was with Vodafone NZ - don't know about Optus. Whether Vodafone offers any particular advantage because it has operations in both countries I don't know - you'd have to check their roaming rates against Telstra and Optus.

With Telstra, you only have to activate the international roaming facility once, and you have multi-country service from that time - there's no need to make special arrangements for particular countries.

I have to admit that I know next to nothing about issues surrounding Blackberry devices, though.

Di and Neil, Thanks for your input. Since we don’t own a cell phone or blackberry—we haven’t needed or wanted one—I know very little about all this stuff. I’ve been gathering information for months, I’m tired of thinking about it, and I’m ready to finish up. Just a little more research on roaming is needed (probably go with Vodafone). I’d rather be thinking about the exciting part of trip planning, where to go, what to see and do. But since this trip is so extensive in time and scope, and since we will be using the web, email and phone a lot, we thought we’d try a blackberry, instead of using internet cafes. Not sure what we’ll do with it when we return home. Kathy

Kathy, there are lots of threads on the subject, although I don't know how many deal with those Blackberry thingeys. You'll find most of them on the Europe forum, bearing in mind that the issues are the same there for visiting North Americans - i.e. most of the world's cellphones use the GSM standard, whereas most North American networks use an incompatible standard called CDMA. Even where US networks use GSM, the frequencies are different. If you buy an unlocked tri-band or quad-band phone (eg on eBay) you'd be able to use it almost everywhere you travel, at home and abroad.

You can choose to use your phone company's international roaming service, which is convenient because you keep the same number, but the call charges are expensive. Or, in each country you visit, you can buy a SIM (Sunscriber Interface Module) card loaded with prepaid call credits - and a local phone number.

Now I'd better go and educate myself on Blackberries.

One other thing that I forgot to mention in the previous post, Kathy, is that in our experience the Blackberry doesn't work for web access unless you are linked to a business account that uses a network connection for the business premises (which we don't have). So while it's excellent for phone, SMS and sending & receiving email, you still need to visit internet cafes etc for web access. We actually run our small home business from the Blackberry while we travel, and just pop into internet cafes when we know that we need to access the web (eg to check on info for sending an email reply etc).
Hope this helps you, Di

The Telstra website wasn't as helpful a I'd have liked, or maybe I was impatient, but it seems that when used in mobile phone mode Blackberry devices will operate on either GSM or CDMA mobile networks.

[Telstra was pressured to install a duplicate CDMA network to mollify rural users - it has better reach than GSM, and also more data bandwidth.]

My guess is that, as with standard mobile phones (cellphones), a single Blackberry device will be either GSM or CDMA, but not both. I noticed that device and call charges are high.

Do you have a laptop, Kathy? If so, you might be better relying on Wi-Fi for email and web access, and a cheap GSM phone for telephony.

Di and Neil, Thanks again, I think. Just when I believe I'm getting close to understanding all this at a basic level, you present more puzzles.

Di, I do think we're connected to a business account since I know some colleagues at our university use a blackberry. I'll check to see if they do this through the campus account. I know the email system is set up that way. But, I didn't know about blackberry use being linked this way, and I'm glad to find it out now, before we leave for the trip.

Neil, I have been to the Europe board, and you're correct. They talk about all this stuff on a regular basis. Still, some of these questions haven't been bought up, web access limitations and GSM vs CDMA, for example.

We do have laptops. but didn't want to bring them (or one). I'll be bringing a digital SLR and hyperdrive for downloading in the field, so we wanted only one more small devise to have to watch out for, and carry around all the time.

I appreciate all the information and will check with people here. We just might use internet cafes and a cheap cell phone and keep it simple. Kathy

on a side note, the internet cafes we used in Oz in 2004 were very nice, clean and pretty cost effective. There were a lot of cafes in Cairns and it seemed that a computer was readily available anywhere, even in Kakadu in the camping/cabin place where we stayed.
Sally in Seattle, Oz dreaming

Have found out a few more things. I think we'll be using internet cafes and a cell phone which we'll purchase once we arrive. The account which I was hoping to use (school account) has a limited number of licenses, all of which are taken. I didn't find out (or they didn't know) if the two service providers for our accounts worked within the Australia system. So that is that.

Fot traveling, we've always used internet cafes, we're used to them, and they work just fine. And, they are literally everywhere. That's the way we'll go on this trip. I'm putting the blackberry topic to rest. Thanks everyone for your time. Kathy

No problem, Kathy. As mentioned, any GSM phone you buy in Aust/NZ will work almost everywhere else in the world - Europe, most of Asia, etc., and if you want to spring for a tri/quadband phone you could even use it with GSM-providing phone companies in US/Canada. There, GSM frequencies are 850 & 1900 Megahertz, rest of world 900 & 1800 MHz.

One point to be aware of though is that any phone with prepaid credits you buy will be "locked" to the phone company that has subsidised the handset price. I believe that in the US it may well be locked even if you buy it on a monthly plan. It's possible to have it unlocked for use with other carriers, though - this is dealt with in some of those older threads on the Europe forum.

We were planning a 6 week trip...3 in Oz and 3 in NZ and wanted a cell phone in case our families at home needed us in an emergency. Also because we were driving alone in NZ thought it would be wise to have one.

Did't need anything fancy with all the bells & whistles...just a GSM tri-mode. Got a good deal on an UNLOCKED..(this is very important) Motorola phone on Overstock.com for only $55.oo US. On arrival in Oz went to a Telstra phone store and bought a SIM card for $25 AUD that came with $20 worth of calls. This was all we needed...the time ran out on our last day. BTW...all incoming calls are at no charge...not like in the US. When we arrived in NZ, did the same thing but used Vodaphone...couldn't find a Telstra store...maybe they don't have them in NZ. Paid $35.00 NZD for Sim card with only $5.00 in calls but received another $10.00 by answering a survey on their free customer service #. Have now used it for 2 weeks and am almost out of time but can by a top-up card in any convenience store. It has been a big help to have had the phone...reconfirm hotel reservations, book tours, make dinner reservations, etc. We have another 10 days here in NZ before returning home. Wouldn't have felt as comfortable without a phone...and we will be able to use in most places we travel. We both use digital cameras and have taken over 7000 pix between us. We opted to bring our own notebook...we download our memory cards each night and back up the photos to CD just in case. Has worked well for us and we have easily found free or relatively inexpensive internet access to keep in touch with home...pay bills, etc.

Itchyfeet, Thanks for the information. I just went to overstock and saw a tri-band, unlocked for about $85. It's a Motorola V180. Is that the model you have? It sound perfect. We've given up on a blackberry and now we're just wanting a cell phone. We'll buy here or there, doesn't matter. Previously, I had been looking up the differences in the tri vs quad bands, and checking if the areas in US we'd be calling would be covered by the 1900 band (mostly PA, WI, and SC). And, in the specific areas in each of those states, it looks like it will work.

It's asking a lot, but if you can, please respond with the model number you have, so that we can get the same one.

We're looking forward to our trip, which is coming up fast--less than three weeks! I am definitely NOT ready. Hope you're having a wonderful, fun filled and safe trip. Kathy