Upgrading the to 3G handset may require Upgraded Sim card
 

About 4 months ago our company upgraded 3 phones to 3G.

Had one of the staff members travel away out of regular GSM coverage and the phone did not work.

Spoke to the network provider Telstra and asked them why the phone would not work in a known 3G coverage area. After about 20 minutes on the phone they tell me that we never upgraded the sim card so it would not work on the 3G. :eek:

Without the upgraded sim card the 3G Nokia phone would never work on 3G. Stupid provider Telstra agent isn't getting my business next time. :mad:

I purchased a 3G phone in Hong Kong and made the same discovery upon my return to Oz. Interestingly, before arriving home, I used the phone on UMTS networks in Hong Kong and Korea (yes, Korea) without difficulty on the old Telstra GSM SIM.

There is lots of debate over at Howardsfourm(a BB like Flyertalk devoted to the disscussion of cell phones/PDAs, cell phone technology and the cell providers) about this very topic, are UICC(Universal Integrated Circuit Card) with a USIM(Universal Subscriber Identity Module) application required for accessing the UMTS network.

It seems that the USIM application is definantely required if your provider has branded the phone/pda in way or you account has been provisioned with UMTS access. However, it also appears that if the phone/pda is unbranded and shipped with the OEM software and the users account is provisioned with normal GPRS/EDGE access than the USIM application is not required and UICC with the SIM application is all that is required.

What does this all mean? That nobody(except those engineers who work for the cell providers really know if a USIM is required.

Dan

It must be network determined because that wasnt my experience with Orange UK. I had an unbranded HTC TyTN and could use it roaming with my non-3G TMobile US SIM in the UK. But I could not use it with my Orange GPRS provisioned SIM. I had to get a new 3G SIM from Orange.

I've just bought a new Samsung Z150 and get an "emergency calls only" message when I put my Movistar SIM in it. I actually returned the first one because I thought it was defective. :( When I put in my Cingular SIM, it works fine but I can only connect to GPRS.

I'll have to get a new SIM from Telefonica next time I'm back this way.

Curious. My very old Telstra SIM card works just fine in 3G on the Nokia E61...

Couple of questions:

1. Is it a SIM card issue or an account issue?
2. Are you sure there are areas of 3G (not NextG) in Australia with no GSM coverage?

A quick update - my "very old" SIM card, which died last week, was UMTS 3G enabled. It turns out that 3G won't work on the Telstra network unless you upgrade.

Further - the new 3G cards work on both UMTS/WCDMA (2,100MHz) and NextG (850MHz). Depends on handset capability.

Finally - if you buy a "NextG" handset - which now has the widest coverage of any network in Australia from a standing start of less than 12 months - it will backward roam onto GSM.

Confused? :)

TMobile USA doesn't even have a 3g network, but I had no problem inserting a three and a half year old T-Mobile SIM into a Nokia N70 and making a call in Japan.

It does, just not a consumer accessible one.

The 3G network is currently in testing.