Dubai Stu

The folks over at www.bongeso.com have two products which might be more convenient for some people than carrying two phones. The first is a quadband bluetooth enabled fob which will allow a second phoneline to bond with your Android or jailbroken iPhone. The second is a wrap around case for the iPhone which does the same, but which connects to a j.b. iPhone (sorry Android users) through the thirty pin connector.

If you can still maintain a Bluetooth call, I think I would go for the fob. When I travel abroad, I often pack a Mophie battery pack to help my iPhone make it through the trip. I also loan my roaming SIM collection out to relatives to satisfy minimum usage requirements. The fob seems sounds like a better if can still use a Bluetooth headset with the Phone. Also,my iPhone won't fit in a sports band with a battery pack case. I suspect that I can always find a place for the fob.

My only concern is that there are places where I don't want to pull an expensive phone out in public. I currently carry my local SIM in an unlocked Nokia E66 which looks like a very boring phone and flies under the radar of pick pockets and snatch and grab artists.

tentseller

I have a dream. I dream that one day any phone will work anywhere in the world without paying rip-off amount for roaming

Dubai Stu

I hope we don't have to wait as long as Dr. King to see that dream get realized (the part about an African-American President).

dawk

There is a whole bunch of Chinese cheap crap-phones that are dual or even quad sim. Why can't big manufacturers come up with a good product like that? Is the operator lobby really that strong?

Silver Fox

The guy sitting next to me at work has one of those cheapo Chinese dual sim phones right now and it all seems to work well.

Dubai Stu

Samsung makes a decent quality dual SIM phone, but last I looked the second radio was only 900/1800mhz. The problem in the US market is convincing people to give up the phone subsidy for a better phone.

dawk

Dual sim phones from Samsung are very basic... Why can't they release dual-sim Galaxy S? If Chinese can do quad-sim Android phones, OS obviously isn't the limitation.

Most of them unfortunately don't come with 3G, which is a big issue for me. Still carrying two phones seems like a best choice to me.

I looked at OP's link, it mentions Android, but can't find the app anywhere...

BonzoESC

The system for retailing phones in the US and Europe is that strong; mainstream manufacturers would much rather sell millions of $600 phones in stores in two continents (or millions of $200 phones that they get $400 from carriers for) than tens of thousands of $200 phones online.

dawk

Well that's all fine. But have a $800 model in your offer as well. I will pay that much for it. I am sure they can find tens of thousands who will spend that much on dual sim top of the line phone as well... This does not have to be a product for millions.

deniah

motorola makes the Photon 4G... CDMA band for SprintPCS service stateside and a SIM slot for GSM service abroad. (it is locked against using competitor GSM service in the usa [e.g. Tmobile , ATT])

meibao

the gmate from that site looks interesting but it doesn't say whether both sim cards would be dual standby (I imagine so) but what about accessing 3g on the 2nd sim?

dtsm

There is this tiny Korean company, called Samsung that has a dual sim phone out for a couple of years [think it's made in China]....

tentseller

Even a quad sim is not a solution for me. In SE Asia alone I have PAYG SIM for KR JP CN(2 BJ SH) TW HK PH SG TH, Plus a Vodaphone EU.

I just like the idea of one phone and not waking up trying to figure out which country I am in and which SIM to use. not to mention resetting the notification of email, SMS.

nmenaker

I still think a global roaming phone plane from a unified/partnered telco is STILL about 4-5 years off. And AT&T/t-mobile tie up would have probably accelerated that a bit, but even vodaphone/verizon isn't doing anything to help it out. I think it is just too lucrative to bill people a ton of money for calls and DATA when roaming internationally.

At best, we'll probably get a domestic/international plan, with about 15-20$ monthly kicker (on a 24 month program) and say bundled 50-100 minutes of international use and say 100MB of monthly international use. you pay for it year round, but CAN use it while travelling.

weekilter

T-Mobile tried, but it failed. They had/have plans where you bring your own device or pay full price (even paying for the device over time) for a device. In return you pay $10 less per month for the same plan. The plans were called "Even More" and "Even More Plus." I believe it was the Even More plans that give you the $10 per month advantage. People like their "subsidized" phones even though they're actually just paying back the carrier.