I was in Italy last week and tried to get an Italian SIM at a TIM store for my Motorola V-190, which is quad band. The people at the store popped in a SIM and I tried to enter the unlock code three times, and each time the message (in Italian) said something to the effect that the unlock code wasn't valid.

When I received the code over the phone from Cingular (now AT&T), I wrote it on a piece of paper and read it back to the Cingular rep to verify that I'd written the unlock code down correctly. So I'm positive that I was using the 8-digit string that Cingular gave me.

The only thing I could think of is that I got the code from Cingular (now AT&T) last October (2006) when I thought I was going to Italy. That trip got cancelled, so more than a year passed since I received the unlock code. It never crossed my mind that an unlock code would expire, but maybe it does.

I was wondering if anyone else had had a similar problem with a more-than-a-year-old unlock code.

Anyway, if I get to take another foreign trip, I'll call AT&T again and try to get another unlock code closer to the trip date.

Thanks!