Robespierre,
You bought that phone at the airport? Is it safe to assume I can find a similar deal (under $50 for phone + SIM card) at the Shannon airport?

Kwren,
Not really related – I ask the questions, he has the answers (and the patience to explain this over and over again) :)

Mine came from the Virgin Megastore at Piccadilly.

I don't think they have a presence in Ireland. I'm pretty sure O2 and Vodaphone do.

and I'm glad you asked 99! I needed the answers too :)

Haven't priced a phone in Ireland recently, but a co-worker just returned from Amsterdam about two weeks ago and she got a Dutch Vodaphone 'package' with a nifty, LITTLE Sony Erickson for 29 Euro 95, with 10 Euro worth of call credit. She bought it in city center, in an area she described as 'mostly touristy'.

Incidently, we tried putting my IRISH Vodaphone SIM into her phone (to see if it was locked into a 'country-specific' SIM, or just locked to Vodaphone), but it DID NOT recognize the SIM.

Ireland's "Big Three" are Vodaphone, O2 and Meteor. Last I knew, Meteor's coverage wasn't as good as O2 and Vodaphone's, but they may have caught up by now.

I don't think that there is still a phone shop in Shannon Airport, but I'm sure you can find SEVERAL in Galway, Ennis and/or Limmerick.

Bob

I'm leaving for Dublin in 3 weeks and after reading all this on cell phones, I'm still somewhat confused. I'm assuming O2 and Vodaphone are regular cell phone companies with stores all over Dublin, is that correct? Would I be able to just stop in one once I leave the airport and get a pay as you use phone? Am I correct in my understanding that I would be able to use the phone I purchase there in other countries by buying a new sim card when I would travel there (like France)?

I plan to use the phone to make reservations, call for directions etc. and to use it to call the US (with a calling card).

Too much technology...I want my rotary phone back!! ;-P

There is a vodafone IE store right in Dublin airport after exiting customs and immigration; probably the easiest place to get a phone and a prepaid sim package.

Chances are, however, the phone you purchase from them will be locked (as the poster noted about the Dutch phone his or her colleage purchased)....that means you will not be able to place the sim card of another cmpany in the phone and have it register...you'll get an immediate message the sim card is not authorized.

Solutions...

1. buy an unlocked dual band (900/1800) gsm phone on ebay...you may have to go to ebay.co.uk rather than ebay.com to find such phones and shipping prices have to be taken into consideration. Under no circumstances should you buy a udal band phone with 850/1900....this is important.

You can buy a tri band phone for use in Europe but make sure it is 900/1800/1900...read the specs carefully. Can run $60 to $100

Can buy a quad band phone and not worry about any of this. Should run $70 to $120.

Don't need a fancy phone with all the whistles unless you want a camera phone or a video phone or an mp3 phone; for those you pay through the nose.

or

2. You can find somebody to unlock the phone you get from the Irish company....I know that in London, if you wander down Oxford Street you will see store front after store front willing to unlock mobile phones for prices from 5 to 8 quid...don't know about other locations...one of the regular contributors to this forum from Germany tells us Germans, being law abiding citizens, do not unlock gsm phones....although it is questionable whether or not it is legal to even lock phones in the first place or prevent you from unlocking them.

And so again, once you have an unlocked gsm phone with the proper frequencies, you are all set to put any sim card into it from any European gsm carrier (most of them are) and you'll be all set.

I got so irritated by obnoxiously intrusive Vodaphone internet ads, usually designed with obnoxious cleverness to get around many popup blockers, that I've vowed never, ever to buy any Vodophone goods or services and to urge everyone I know to do the same.

"Too much technology...I want my rotary phone back!! ;-P"

I long for the days of two tin cans connected by a string ...

xyz123,
If/When buying from ebay, you recommend a dual band phone 900/1800 – is a dual band 850/1900 ok? What other characteristics should I look for?

Thanks

xyz99.
you ask "is a dual band 850/1900 ok?"

The answer is YES, if you want to use it in the US.

The answer is NO, NO, NO, if you want to use it in Europe. Europe uses 900 or 1800 MHz, so a dual or tri-band phone with both of those frequencies is what you want, or any unlocked quadband phone.

The reason I suggested buying a quadband phone in an earlier post is that it's easy to make a mistake if you buy a triband on ebay. Most tribands sold on ebay in the US are 850/1800/1900, and many sellers (I speak from experience) don't know the difference between European and American style tribands.

quadband is far more secure than triband.

Ok, I got it – 900/1800 means I need those exact frequencies (that is not a range). I don’t need a new cell phone for US, I need one for Ireland – and if I can use it again next time in a different country, even better :)

Mobal rates for Ireland,
Incoming calls $1.25/min, National calls$1.25/min, Calls to USA & Canada $1.50/min, Calls to other countries $2.95/min, SMS text messages .80/message

The $49 phone
Works in over 140 countries (but not the US). The $99 phone works in the the US and other countries.

Mobal, alias O2, does not charge for incoming in the UK.

If you have questions about international cellphone service try
http://www.gsmworld.com or
http://www.telestial.com

Sorry to jump in on someone's thread with a question but it seemed it may be helpful.
I bought my son, who is going to London tomorrow a phone that I paid to have unlocked. I wanted him to buy a card in London. If he did, what would be the advantage? Would local calls still be local on a north american phone or would they charge a roaming fee? If I use my cell phone in another Canadian city I am not charged unless someone phones me.
Also if he buys a card to put in the phone when he calls his friends, who will not have unlocked phones, will he pay long distance? When are roaming charges applied.

Even trying to formulate my question is baffling me!

Sorry.

A locked phone lives a monogamic relation with his/her SIM.
An unlocked phone lives a poligamic relation with whatever SIM he/she founds during his/her lifetime.

I think that is just for phones in Utah.

Serial monogamy, actually. Like in California.

Monogamy on my serial is OK, but I prefer peaches or strawberries.

I bought my phone and my SIM card on line before I left at Telestial.com.
As long as I make a call once a year- the sim card does not expire. I have used it for 3 European trips and it has worked fine.

Bookmarking -- thanks! :-)

Oops, meant to ask -- whenzuc, could you tell me how much you paid for the telestial deal? Thanks.

In the U.S., you can also buy an unlocked tri band GSM phone and foreign SIM card from Cellular Abroad <http://www.cellularabroad.com/>.

I used them 2 1/2 years ago when we went to Australia. Everything was completely as advertised and their service was very quick. I still use the phone today at home with a prepaid minutes plan through T-Mobile.

I have a triband phone from LG. I called Cingular to add the international roaming to my phone before I left for Germany, but when I got over there, it didn't work.
Next year I am making sure I have the 4 band before I leave, because the customer service guy from Cingular obviously didn't know what he was talking about.

As posted here so many times, 900/1800 is used in europe. May be your phone only has the 1800 band, which if you were roaming should have still worked. But may be somewhat in a limited way. Now, if you bought a prepaid sim, you have to make sure you bought one from a carrier that uses only the 1800 band. Also, may be your phone does not swithc bands automatically, and you need to manually switch it to the 900/1800 bands.

I'm sure the OP has been and returned. But one thing to consider when buying a cell phone for use abroad is the coverage. We bought a Nokia phone and a TMobile SIM card in Glasgow; seemed the best deal. But there was very little TMobile coverage in the Highlands and on Skye.

This is worse than the IRS tax codes. I've bought an unlocked quadband phone on ebay. I only need to make calls within Slovenina, Italy, and Croatia. I can email the u.s. Sooo, is it best to buy a multi country in our first arrival point which is Slovenia for use in all 3 countries. Sorry, I'm really trying to get this.

Most sims will work outside the country you buy them in - calls just cost more. Others may disagree, but what I would do is buy a sim in the first country you are in along with ample talk time, then use the sim until your minutes run out. Then, if you have to, buy a new sim.

The alternative is to buy a new sim in each country and throw away the unused minutes on the old sim.

I decided not to buy a local sim for a trip to Rome my wife and I took in May. I didn't want to spend time hunting down a place to buy the sim, I didn't want to worry about the Italian security requirements for buying a sim, I didn't want to worry about getting an English language sim, I didn't want to leave Italy with lots of unused calling time, and I wanted a phone number before we left the US. I ordered international sims for myself and my wife based on the recommendations at
http://www.prepaidgsm.net/en/international.html,
and everything worked fine.

Everything is in a state of flux what with the new eu regs coming into effect...up until this past April, our recommendation was united mobile coupled with an account with callbackworld....but rates to Liechtenstein mobiles have shot through the roof and that is no longer a good alternative; not that they don't have low rates and lots of countries where you can receive calls for free. The problem is that if you give out your UM number with a Liechtenstein country code (+423), most long distance companies now charge ungodly amounts to call them. The way around used to be using pin2dest on callbackworld but even that's close to 60¢/minute US...there are international cards available with icelandic (O9) and Estonian (many) numbers which have the same problem on incoming but rates with both callbackworld and enlinea (a very smilar service to cbw) are very modest indeed but both cards have problems and understand both cards also have high termination fees if you make calls directly with them. There are also many international sim cards with a +44 country code which is the UK but it is not located in the UK but in the Isle of Man...termination fees aren't as high as Liechtenstein, Estonia and Iceland but some ld carriers cannot complete to the numbers, even though they are UK numbers in theory.

In the past week, United Mobile, probably in response to what has been going on with the absurd termination fees has come out with a new international sim card with a +44 country code, again the UK but this time in Jersey....it is having some start up problems you can read about on prepaidgsm.net....

Vodafone passport, where it is available, is also possibly a good deal. With vodafone passport, you buy a card from a vodafone supplier in one of the European countries, sign up for free with vodafone passport and as long as you are roaming on a vodafone network, incoming calls are free with a one time charge of 0,99€ (or 75p if using Vodafone UK)....if you receive long calls, it can be very good using one of the call forwarding options (voicestick, kall8)...

This past two weeks, a good friend of mine was travelling through Croatia, Italy and Greece using my o9 account...his total bill for the two weeks and he made and receiveds lots of calls was $16....

A lot, of course, has to do with just how you intend to use the mobile phone, where you're going etc.

Also you have to be aware that as with so much technology, things change quickly due to competition and regulation. For example, in the UK, if that's your only destinations, they are literally givin sim cards away and all you have to pay for is calls...for example you can get (through a British friend or perhaps if you make arrangements with your hotel to hold mail for you) a free sim card from T Mobile UK and there is a service (again you can read about it on www.prepaidgsm.net) which enabless you t dial from any T Mobile UK phone the number 07755 220 220 and calls to the USA, Canada, Australia are 3p/minute coming directly out of your T Mobile UK PAYG account (calls to Australian mobiles are 15p/minute...USA and Canadian mobiles do not operate on the caller pays model which is used throughout the world...calls to US and Canadian mobiles are charged the same as landlines)...can't do much better than that......

Like I said, everything changes almost hourly so what I tell you today may not be true tomorrow.

But the one thing I wouldn't do, at least if I was going to use the phone for anything other than just emergencies, is pay for USA roaming on T Mobile USA and AT&T..

And the other thing I wouldn't do is buy a sim card from firms such as telestial...several have reported they have bought sim card from them at their absurdly inflated prices and discovered the cards needed registration and were no good when arriving at their destinations (this is particularly true now of Italian sim cards).

Oh My, now I am more confused than ever. I am from U.S., going to Slovenia, Croatia and Italy. I only need the phone to call and confirm reservations or notify of a late arrival within those countries. That being said, I bought an unlocked phone in U.S. (quadband). I will not be calling the U.S. or receiving calls. Am I safe just purchasing a SIM card when I get there? This is all brand new for me so please forgive my ignorance. Most of my travel will be in Croatia.

bookmarking

mark. One of these days I am going to buy a cell phone, maybe.

Reece...

In that case I'll make it quite simple for you..there are 3 easy alternatives.

1. If your US cell provider is either T Mobile USA or Cinglular (the new AT&T), simply make sure you have a phone capable of working in Europe (a tri band or quad band) and activate international roaming. The few calls you will make won't cost that much and of course as you noted, you don't intend to make any calls home anyway so the rip off level of their pricing won't bother you.

2. If you have a non gsm carrier such as Verizon, check out the offer of Mobal at www.mobal.com...buy their cheapest phone for $49 and you'll be able, in emergencies, to make calls but again you'll paya ridiculously high rates but at least you'll have a phone and if you only make a couple of calls, it really doesn't matter.

3. Don't bother with a cell phone and use calling cards in each of the countries and use public phones...but do remember that just like in the USA every 10 year old kid in this day and age in Europe is walking around with his or her own mobile phone and public phones really are starting in many instances to disappear and may not be easy to find when you most need them.

hopscotch..

One of these days I'm going to purchase a new horseless carriage.

maybe

xyz, you solved it for me. Let me know where I can send my contribution for your new horseless carriage. I do have Verizon, so I'll check Mobal and get one from them. Thanks again.

Reecee,

You already have an unlocked GSM phone. Option 2 posted by xyz123 assumes you do not. I would either get one of the international sims and use it in all the countries you are visiting, or get a sim in the first country you visit and use (roam) it in the other countries. The latter will be quite expensive though.