Is there such thing as a "World Phone" anymore?

A

Ashelyn P

New member
I travel at least once a year and want to get a phone that is unlocked that I can carry with me to use for texting, talking etc.

About 4 years ago, if you had a quad band GSM phone you were good in most places in the world. Is there a 3G equavlent now?

There is a Sony Ericsson W760 in the B/S/T Forum for $100 CAD which is in my budget for this travel phone, is this a good buy? And other choices in in this price range (or lower) that you might suggest? Since I'll only be using it maybe twice a year I don't want to spend the bank on it (besides the fact that I need a new every day phone, but thats a different thread).
 
If you can wait until the Nokia N8, it'll have penta-band 3G; it'll even work on T-Mobile US! But then again, you'd be stuck with Symbian.

The iPhone 4 unlocked is actually penta-band too, although its fifth band is different and isn't listed; it's the 800MHz band that NTT DoCoMo sometimes uses in Japan. But it'll get you around virtually the entire world.

You may want to seriously consider the iPhone. It'll be sold in Canada as an unlocked device, so if you're willing to pay in full, you can get one you can take to almost every carrier in the world with 3G intact. The only tricky bit is that you need a micro SIM, but you can actually cut a full-size SIM down to size yourself if it's yours to keep.
 
uh he is looking for a budget travel phone, and something basic that will only be used twice a year (as seen in his post), so why bother recomending an iphone ? 100 vs 500+ dollars is quite a lot on the op budget,especially for something very basic calling and texting usage requirement
 
The advantage here would be that this could be both his phone for home and for roaming abroad, but you're right. You probably wouldn't want to take your main device on a vacation if you think there's a realistic chance it could be stolen.
 
aw is right, I'm not looking to drop a lont on it. And cutting a sim is sort of opposite of what I asked as well. I'm not really intersted in the iPhone either, Apple is just not my thing.

Any other suggestions? Is there an answer to the world phone question?
 
I'm not sure if I would worry too much about the 3g coverage. As long as you have the 4 bands of GSM covered, you should be OK. The only benefit of 3g would be slightly clearer calls as you won't be using data.
 
If you are not worried about data, then any basic quadband phone is still a world phone. Except that it will not work in some countries such as Japan. The Nokia E63 is a nice basic smartphone that can be had for around $150 or less.
 
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