Hello everyone,
I just purchased a Motorola Photon (my first android and smartphone) and was wondering if someone can help me answer my question.
I would like to use the Photon with a SIM card during my overseas travel and wanted to know if unlocking the bootloader will allow this? I know I can't use Sprint's Worldphones while overseas with SIM cards from other countries - I had my friend confirm it from his BB-Bold. According to him, even if he switches to GSM, the phone automatically goes back to CDMA and uses Sprint's international Voice/Data.
I, however, wanted to know if unlocking will avoid this behavior on Photon? I really love this phone and would like to use it even when I am overseas.
Please advise.
Thank you in advance!
Photon 4G Sim Card
I bought a Photon 4G on Sunday, I just went to Mexico on Monday and tested a sim card from a local carrier and it worked. Just had to switch Network Mode to Any GSM/UMTS mode.
ive just unlocked and rooted my Motorola Photon Q 4G LTE. now im about to mod it with CyanogenMod
The phone was previously on sprints network which is CDMA. I plan on flashing the phone to a different network.
Which phone network is easier to flash to. And should I go with GSM or CDMA. thanx in advance.
sinkai said:
ive just unlocked and rooted my Motorola Photon Q 4G LTE. now im about to mod it with CyanogenMod
The phone was previously on sprints network which is CDMA. I plan on flashing the phone to a different network.
Which phone network is easier to flash to. And should I go with GSM or CDMA. thanx in advance.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What is your provider which you are flashing the phone to?
Also, just FYI - hacking CDMA devices is one of those borderline illegal things - mainly because it involves ESN swaps.
Hacking this phone for GSM is perfectly legal, however, because you are not changing the serial number of the device - merely swapping the SIM cards. Just be warned, you will have to do some hardware modification in order to swap SIM's.
After several long calls with Verizon and help from Motorola insiders, I have been given to understand that:
1. Droid Maxx if not activated on Verizon, before leaving US, cannot be used on other carriers (say in Europe or Asia).
The reason is the SIM unlock cannot be done by the customer support since they won't see the device in their network if it is not activated first.
2. The activation cannot happen outside US, since Verizon does not have a network.
So bottom line is get the device activated before you import it from US.
Now, my Droid Maxx is locked to Verizon. I know the boot loader can be unlocked. Will this help me in flashing something that can get rid of the SIM lock that Verizon has in place.
My device is an employee edition so perhaps there was some extra protection added there by Verizon.
Please help.
I do not have a Maxx, but I'm replying because you PM'd me asking to take a look at this thread..
It has been my experience that Verizon's 4GLte phones are sim unlocked (on the GSM side) out of the box. I thought that was a condition of VZW's 700Mhz spectrum auction win? One potential issue is does the phone support the needed bands out of the box (think Bionic where a hack was needed to enable bands needed for T-mobile).
That being said, if your Maxx is truly SIM LOCKED, then unlocking the bootloader wont help you SIM unlock, nor will flashing a 3rd party Rom after unlocking the bootloader.
where are you located, and who is your carrier? Do they use CDMA for voice, or GSM? What happens when you put a non-VZW sim in the phone?
KidJoe said:
I do not have a Maxx, but I'm replying because you PM'd me asking to take a look at this thread..
It has been my experience that Verizon's 4GLte phones are sim unlocked (on the GSM side) out of the box. I thought that was a condition of VZW's 700Mhz spectrum auction win? One potential issue is does the phone support the needed bands out of the box (think Bionic where a hack was needed to enable bands needed for T-mobile).
That being said, if your Maxx is truly SIM LOCKED, then unlocking the bootloader wont help you SIM unlock, nor will flashing a 3rd party Rom after unlocking the bootloader.
where are you located, and who is your carrier? Do they use CDMA for voice, or GSM? What happens when you put a non-VZW sim in the phone?
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Click to collapse
Thanks Mark.
The phone Droid Maxx does support these bands since there are others who are using the same phone on GSM networks in the country.
The networks in India are:
2G capabilities GSM 900, GSM 1800
3G capabilities UMTS 2100
4G capabilities LTE 2300 (this one won't work with the phone, plus my carrier does not have it either)
The CDMA is CDMA 2000 - but I have not been able to try with a CDMA SIM, but that one has a higher probability of working.
When I put a non-VZ SIM, and set to Global mode, it does not detect any signal and the search network does pretty much nothing. The automatic mode tries to connect but then throws an error saying "can't connect to this network at this time"
I am using a brand new nano SIM card (which now is back in my Moto Defy with an adapter.)
Earlier I had a normal SIM converted to a nano SIM and that one did not work, but after I put in APN manually, I was able to access data.
I tried another user's cut-nano SIM and that one worked for data out of the box (another GSM provider).
Ditto for me, but I am using DroidMini... I also have DroidMAXX which is working great (even unlocked its BL and rooted it)...
I am also from India... Using it in GSM networks... I may get one Nano CDMA SIM to test later and will report here for sure...
Thanks...
kanagadeepan said:
Ditto for me, but I am using DroidMini... I also have DroidMAXX which is working great (even unlocked its BL and rooted it)...
I am also from India... Using it in GSM networks... I may get one Nano CDMA SIM to test later and will report here for sure...
Thanks...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well, we have interacted on Rimweb recently.
The radio on the Droid series is the same. The difference between the mini and the maxx in your case is that the mini has never been activated on VZ network and hence it is SIM locked. Whereas, the Maxx would have been purchased as a used item (perhaps just activated and then sold off?). So that takes care of the SIM unlock part.
Yesterday I spend around 60 minutes with global support, VZ.
I escalated the issue to the supervisor.
He checked and said that the IMEI is clean and not in any sort of negative list. So there is nothing else that they can do.
He also said, the phones are unlocked by default for global use.
Obviously they don't want to dig deeper into why three phones are not working on GSM in India.
I am now running out of avenues. Does anyone have some debugging tool which can log what is happening when the phone tries to log on to the network?
s_u_n said:
Thanks Mark.
The phone Droid Maxx does support these bands since there are others who are using the same phone on GSM networks in the country.
The networks in India are:
2G capabilities GSM 900, GSM 1800
3G capabilities UMTS 2100
4G capabilities LTE 2300 (this one won't work with the phone, plus my carrier does not have it either)
The CDMA is CDMA 2000 - but I have not been able to try with a CDMA SIM, but that one has a higher probability of working.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The current Droid Maxx that Verizon sells supports the following..
LTE Band 13/4 700/1700
EDGE/GSM: 850/900/1800/1900,
HSPA/UMTS: 850/900/1900/2100 (download speeds to 42.2 Mbps, upload speeds to 5.76 Mbps
From what you listed, the Maxx should get GSM/Edge/HSPA/UMTS coverage there. And of course, no LTE.
The CDMA side of the Verizon phones is still "locked" so I also would not expect CDMA to work. In other words, if your carrier NEEDS CDMA, stop trying.
s_u_n said:
When I put a non-VZ SIM, and set to Global mode, it does not detect any signal and the search network does pretty much nothing. The automatic mode tries to connect but then throws an error saying "can't connect to this network at this time"
I am using a brand new nano SIM card (which now is back in my Moto Defy with an adapter.)
Earlier I had a normal SIM converted to a nano SIM and that one did not work, but after I put in APN manually, I was able to access data.
I tried another user's cut-nano SIM and that one worked for data out of the box (another GSM provider).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've been through this with some trying the Moto X in India, and I've been through it while trying my T-Mobile and ATT sim's in my Verizon Moto X.
From what you are describing, it sounds like your APN settings for your carrier on the phone are not set right.
Example... When I put my T-Mobile SIM into my Verizon Samsung Galaxy S4, I get "unknown sim" and bars, but no network connectivity. Nothing works. By going into the mobile network settings on the phone and adding an APN with the T-Mobile settings, features like calling, SMS, data, etc. start working. I have had occasions where I thought I had the APN right, as calls and data worked, but MMS only partially worked (would send but not receive). When I do have the settings right, everything works. Similar thing happens on my Moto X with T-Mobile SIM.
---------- Post added at 07:12 AM ---------- Previous post was at 07:06 AM ----------
s_u_n said:
Yesterday I spend around 60 minutes with global support, VZ.
I escalated the issue to the supervisor.
He checked and said that the IMEI is clean and not in any sort of negative list. So there is nothing else that they can do.
He also said, the phones are unlocked by default for global use.
Obviously they don't want to dig deeper into why three phones are not working on GSM in India.
I am now running out of avenues. Does anyone have some debugging tool which can log what is happening when the phone tries to log on to the network?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Unless you have an active account with Verizon, and are trying to use their service when traveling, Verizon wont help you. In other words, unless you are trying to get your Verizon phone, working on Verizon's Global Roaming service, on your currently active Verizon account, they wont help you.
Even if you are a Verizon customer who is just traveling and popped out your VZW SIM in favor of using a local prepay sim to save data/voice costs, once you pop that VZW SIM out, they wont assist.
But you have received confirmation of what I said.. the GSM side is unlocked.
The SIM you are trying to use is from a GSM India carrier? As long as they only use GSM (no CDMA required), your only hope will be working with them. Telling them your phone is SIM Unlocked and going from there. Or finding a local message board for the carrier, and hope people are discussing use of "3rd party" phones, and you might get some help there.
I really think it will come down to the APN settings for the GSM carrier not being correct on the Maxx.
I can't offer any more than that. Sorry.
KidJoe said:
The current Droid Maxx that Verizon sells supports the following..
LTE Band 13/4 700/1700
EDGE/GSM: 850/900/1800/1900,
HSPA/UMTS: 850/900/1900/2100 (download speeds to 42.2 Mbps, upload speeds to 5.76 Mbps
From what you listed, the Maxx should get GSM/Edge/HSPA/UMTS coverage there. And of course, no LTE.
The CDMA side of the Verizon phones is still "locked" so I also would not expect CDMA to work. In other words, if your carrier NEEDS CDMA, stop trying.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have now put in a CDMA SIM card, but run into another problem with that. I will activate that SIM on another phone and then pop it in the Maxx again and check. But CDMA should work fine as reported by other users.
But the problem is the GSM part, because that is what we need to get working.
Unless you have an active account with Verizon, and are trying to use their service when traveling, Verizon wont help you. In other words, unless you are trying to get your Verizon phone, working on Verizon's Global Roaming service, on your currently active Verizon account, they wont help you.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That is bad on the part of Verizon. I have purchased a Verizon device off-contract and that device is a global one. So I am entitled to some support from them even if I am without a service plan.
The SIM you are trying to use is from a GSM India carrier? As long as they only use GSM (no CDMA required), your only hope will be working with them. Telling them your phone is SIM Unlocked and going from there. Or finding a local message board for the carrier, and hope people are discussing use of "3rd party" phones, and you might get some help there.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes. Local carrier. And for now, there are three such XDA members who have been facing the same issue. In one case, a member was able to make calls and receive calls and also use data. Then after a few minutes, the SIM invalid message popped up.
I really think it will come down to the APN settings for the GSM carrier not being correct on the Maxx.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
APN settings are pretty easy. I did that with my earlier SIM and I got data working. There was no voice, so I gave that SIM back to the carrier and got a brand new nano SIM. Now, nothing works. The old and new SIM are for the same number and same service provider.
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Click to collapse
s_u_n said:
APN settings are pretty easy. I did that with my earlier SIM and I got data working. There was no voice, so I gave that SIM back to the carrier and got a brand new nano SIM. Now, nothing works. The old and new SIM are for the same number and same service provider.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Right, you got just DATA working with the APN settings, but the correct APN settings are also needed for SMS, MMS, Phone calls, etc.
I've had an issue where I had voice but no data, and it was related to APN. I've had an issue where I had voice, SMS, data but no MMS, again, it was related to APN settings for the carrier you are using.
So good luck!
the problem we sorted out to get gsm working in india first the phone must be activated on usa to get it work on india so can anyone help us > @s_u_n
So, after using the phone for a week on GSM with all application updates installed, I can safely state that
1. Verizon activation is not needed for non-VZ networks to work (at least outside US).
2. A full FXZ was installed and it probably solved the modem configuration mess that the phone might have been. Perhaps it unlocked something?
3. Four corner activation bypass method was used (as described in earlier Motorola phones).
Either 2 or 3 solved the problem
There was nothing to do with APN. Data works even without any APN settings out here, just like on my Motorola Defy.
Im about to unlock my phone for use with Verizon, and I wanted to double check something since I'll have to wait until later to do it.
I was informed that my ATT LG G2 wouldn't be compatible with a Verizon SIM since it's CDMA, but I searched around and it appears as though this phone supports the CDMA network.
Would it work?
pootio said:
Im about to unlock my phone for use with Verizon, and I wanted to double check something since I'll have to wait until later to do it.
I was informed that my ATT LG G2 wouldn't be compatible with a Verizon SIM since it's CDMA, but I searched around and it appears as though this phone supports the CDMA network.
Would it work?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
+1
I would like to know
SIM and CDMA are not the same thing. Verizon uses SIM cards with 4G LTE part of their service. If have a phone that's only 3G then that's CDMA and don't have a SIM card. Also Verizon only "allows" Verizon branded phones on their network. Which is not to hard to get around for the 3G CDMA no SIM needed service BUT I am not sure "IF" its "POSSIBLE" or "HOW TO" if you want to use it on Verizons 4G LTE like I do!
I'm going to ask here and in a another forum that has a lot of LG G2 activity.
The D800 model will not work on Verizon's network, as the D800 does not support CDMA. It doesn't matter if it is unlocked, it will only work GSM networks.
Sent from my LG-D800
For photon Q, I want use voice and text from sprint and data from redpocket(AT&T or T-mobile mvno) at the same time, is it possible?
Thanks!
Well, you'd have to do the SIM card mod in order to get AT&T or tmo (or a mvno which is GSM) tow work on the device... and I'm pretty sure that would break Sprint's LTE.
However, I believe Sprint's basic services would still work. Have I done this to test? Nope! So I'm just speculating.
@Skrilax_CZ - how does your Q function stateside?
You had to unlock it for AT&T and use QPST to disable auto switch to CDMA. I wasn't Sprint customer (Sprint = extremely sucky carrier), I suppose it will be no LTE for you, but you'll be able to switch between GSM and CDMA freely.