Previously you said "unlocked", which usually means it was locked but
was then unlocked. And you said they were cryptic and mysterious about
it. So I assumed you were talking about phones that were unlocked. Hence
my comment that the shop guys (not the phones!) have no reason to look
cryptic and mysterious as if as being afraid of Softbank, because no
Nokia handsets sold by Softbank/Vodafone are unlockable by the black
market yet.
However it seems that what you mean is "SIM free" handsets. That's what
Nokia directly sells in Japan, through their websites and in Narita
airport.
And as Nik pointed out, these Nokia official SIM free phones are not
meant for Vodafone Live/SMS/MMS. For those services, Nokia tells you to
buy the 702NK/702NKII etc.
Pada Tue, 19 Sep 2006 15:51:27 +0900
si Gerhard Fasol <fasol@eurotechnology.com> bilang:
>
> On 2006/09/19, at 15:05, Arnold P. Siboro wrote:
> >
> > No Nokia handsets sold by operators in Japan are unlockable*).
> > So the ones you saw on the store must be the Nokias from abroad. That
> > makes me wonder why they looked mysterious to you.
>
> No: NOKIA sells mobile phones direct in Japan, without any
> carrier branding or carrier lock. These are in official NOKIA shops
> in Japan - sure they are made in Brazil or China or somewhere,
> but they are approved in Japan and officially sold by NOKIA in
> Japan.
>
> No. I have been working with Japan's phone industry since 1984 -
> so there are not many phones which look mysterious to me (warau =
> joking)
>
>
> > *)Completely changing the firmware to foreign ones (like writing 6630
> > firmware to 702NK) will of course remove the sim lock, but it's not
> > easy
> > and expensive.
> >
> > As far as I know unlocking is cheaper in the market than with the
> > operator, so I guess they won't be out of business just because of
> > better announcement..
>
> But some people feel more comfortable paying 20 pounds to the
> operator to have the phone officially unlocked, than paying 10 pounds
> to some guy on the street market, who might run away with the phone
> if you don't watch carefully. I guess these are two different market
> segments.
>
> Gerhard
Arnold P. Siboro (asiboro@maltech.jp)
"There are lots of examples where not the best product wins,
Windows would be one of those, but there are examples where
the best product wins. And the iPod is a great example of that."
-- Steve Jobs
Received on Tue Sep 19 10:39:36 2006