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Do International phones work the same way as a US phone? Can I expect the same clarity and coverage?
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Of course... big international phone manufacturers like Ericsson, Nokia, Sony etc are not American!

In 2008 I went to Greece with a CallinEurope.com phone/SIM. At the time it was a good deal... still a handy option but no longer price competitive today. I phoned my wife and daughter back in Canada from atop the Acropolis in Athens. The call was clear as a bell... in fact, my wife thought my flight had been cancelled and that I was still in the airport 100 miles from home, not a few thousand miles away.

Yes... other countries do have technology as good as and better to what you are used to. ;^)

rayjames, renting a phone in this day and age is not the best thing to do. As others have said, the cheapest option would have been to get a cheap unlocked phone and get a local sim when you get to your destination. The only time any of those international sim is worthwhile is if you are visiting multiple countries briefly. Then it makes sense to maintain one number by going the international sim route.

mrcamp....never say never. E-kit has a very interesting international card for $15 with $10 credit so a total of $5 which gives you almost all of Western, Central and Eastern Europe (except a couple of countries such as Russia) in what it considers zone 1....the card gives you two numbers...a UK (+44) number and a USA (+1) number...you receive for free when called on the +44 number, you pay 19¢/minute to receive on the +1 mi,bet snd you have the numbers in advance....this might be a better solution in some cases than a local sims....in most cases (not the UK for example) it is expensive to call the USA on the local sim somewhat more than on e-kit which is not dirt cheap but reasonably cheap.

It is an alternative.

mr camp and xyz123

I checked out looked at ekit, and their rates were more expensive, than ezroam. I will be traveling to France and maybe even Italy and the rental will work in each of those countries. I looked into the local SIM, but it was expensive just for the SIM and since I will be traveling to a couple other countries it made more sense forme

Correction I will be in Italy and have a couple day trip to France and may even go to Spain.

As an infrequent traveler to Europe, I like the ezroam site that the OP found. Anyone else have any experience with them?

The best tariff is with the 3 network - tre.it They have the lowest rates including data which lets you connect to Skype and Skype Out

Mobal works well, but is VERY expensive - about $1.50 per minute in and out. There are a ton of other companies that work better.

If you do the eBay thing you can get either an UNLOCKED, dual-band European phone or an UNLOCKED tri-band or quad-band. If you get a tri-band, make certain that 2 of the bands are for Europe and not for North America. The reason for having two frequencies is to help reduce connection problems. If you get a quad then it works anywhere.

The reason for the capitalized UNLOCK is so you can use any SIM card.

dave

Wanted to update this to relate my experience with EZROAM. At first I was delighted, but when I ran out of minutes, even though I had signed up for auto-reload, I could NEVER get customer service to answer my calls. I returned the phone when I got home and they sent me a customer satisfaction survey; I related my complaint and asked them to get in touch with me. They still haven't! (six weeks later)