Originally Posted by
sonofzeus
The iPhone has always lacked one great feature found in other U.S. smartphones, and even iPhones outside of the country: the option to buy your hardware outright and operate it on a national network on a prepaid, no-contract basis. Cricket Communications (owned by Leap Wireless) has finally broken through that little restriction with the delivery of a pay-as-you-go iPhone that becomes available through stores starting on June 22.
But not in Chicago or some other big-city markets. Leap’s Chicago-area network uses AWS radio frequencies that aren’t supported by the PCS-only iPhone.
http://www.suntimes.com/technology/i...n-chicago.html
AWS is used by some carriers in some areas, like T Mobile. Until the Iphone supports it, rumored to be the next version according to some reports) it won't work in areas where AWS is the only choice.
This page explains it a bit better than I could
http://www.extremetech.com/electroni...e-coming-maybe