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The new Galaxy Note 3 is region-locked

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141–150 of 233 posts

Re: The new Galaxy Note 3 is region-locked

#141
post #14

My HP printer is region-locked. When I moved from Europe to the US it refused to accept ink cartridges bought in the US.

I honestly thought this was a troll comment intended to show how ridiculous this sort of thing would be if region locking applied to printers. I was not pleased to find out that this is, actually, a thing.

And circumventing the "technological protection measure" is illegal under §1201 of the DMCA.

Re: The new Galaxy Note 3 is region-locked

#142
post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a difference between default apps and apps for which the manufacturer was paid to put on the phone in order to advertise to the purchaser. Apple does not get paid by another company to load its default apps onto the phone.

What do you call newsstand? It's a purely magazine advertising service. Would PizzaHut app be acceptable if it was called PizzaStand and allowed you to select from multiple pizza vendors?

It's a default app. It doesn't come with any content, nor any branding on it's icon. You're analogy does not hold.

Re: The new Galaxy Note 3 is region-locked

#143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have a contract? That maybe why price you pay is cheaper. Seems like parent was only in US for a short period of time, so he probably didn't wanted to sign a, say 12 months, contract.

It's a prepaid plan with T-Mobile. No contract. Every Nexus 4 owner loves to talk about it. Go look at the Nexus 4 subreddit, it's a circle jerk of people who are "beating the system" by using a low-end phone on a sub-par carrier and getting "unlimited data".

Nice troll. You can get the same plan with any GSM phone.

T-Mobile is about the same as Sprint and AT&T, and all are sub-par to Verizon. But what's nice about T-Mobile is that you get unlimited data, whereas with Verizon, you'd better cash in your fleet of 777s to afford your bill.

Re: The new Galaxy Note 3 is region-locked

#144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have a contract? That maybe why price you pay is cheaper. Seems like parent was only in US for a short period of time, so he probably didn't wanted to sign a, say 12 months, contract.

It's a prepaid plan with T-Mobile. No contract. Every Nexus 4 owner loves to talk about it. Go look at the Nexus 4 subreddit, it's a circle jerk of people who are "beating the system" by using a low-end phone on a sub-par carrier and getting "unlimited data".

Meanwhile everyone else are "losers" using overpowered phones on extortionate carriers and forced into paying for stuff they don't need.

Sheesh.

Re: The new Galaxy Note 3 is region-locked

#145
post #22

I own a Samsung Galaxy S4 - and had a similar message on my box - "This product is only compatible with a SIM-card issue from a mobile operator within the Americas (The North, South and Central Americas and the Caribbean)". However it works perfectly well with European SIM Cards (tested with both Spanish and UK SIMs).

I bought mine from Google Play and this message was not included.

Re: The new Galaxy Note 3 is region-locked

#146
post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also, you can't put Newsstand into a folder

Actually you can as of iOS 7.

I'm on a 5S - was trying to do it via iTunes, but I may not have the newest version. Of course, that bug mentioned might be a problem. That aside, I can do it via phone. Thanks for the heads up.

Re: The new Galaxy Note 3 is region-locked

#147
post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A sim can have contacts, but bookmarks? Are you sure?

I just put in Italian Vodafone SIM into unlocked iPhone 4S with iOS 7 and got Vodafone bookmark in Safari, which is indeed deletable. Haven't noticed new contacts so far.

It's not the SIM, it's the carrier bundle. Each iPhone ships (and updates) some XML files for each operator that contain all specific operator settings. These vary from radio configurations to features lock/unlock; eg: you can tell the iPhone how to remote-check whether tethering is activated on the data plan, and change the UI accordingly; it can also contain a custom action box to show to the user when they try to activate the feature, and/or activate the feature itself directly, communicating to the operator network so that they can bill the user.

Carrier bundles also allow carriers to specify bookmarks to add to Safari, the idea being that users "might find useful" to have direct links to check their invoices or so. Such bookmarks are of course deletable.

Re: The new Galaxy Note 3 is region-locked

#148
post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a difference between default apps and apps for which the manufacturer was paid to put on the phone in order to advertise to the purchaser. Apple does not get paid by another company to load its default apps onto the phone.

What do you call newsstand? It's a purely magazine advertising service. Would PizzaHut app be acceptable if it was called PizzaStand and allowed you to select from multiple pizza vendors?

A proper analogy on the Apple side would be "ShittyHut" where you can buy only magazines from Shitty Magazine Inc and nothing else.

E.g, a "Cosmopolitan App" that you can't delete and can use to only buy Cosmopolitan.

That is the proper analogy here.

Re: The new Galaxy Note 3 is region-locked

#149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is with bundling. Carriers should be forbidden to bundle phones and plans long time ago. It's antitrust issue and a big one. Microsoft faced trouble for bundling their browser with operating system which you could easily replace with any other one while carriers are forcing phone manufacturers to accept ridiculous terms (unless they are Apple or recently Google) and customers have no way uninstall all the…

you're getting your terms wrong. The antitrust concept is called "tying" and what it means is using a lawfully-acquired monopoly (or dominant) position in one market to increase market share in another. Because no carrier has anything like a monopoly position in any market, and no phone manufacturer does either, is very far from an antitrust issue. It may be scummy and short-sighted, but it doesn't implicate antitrus…

Digressing, I wonder if antitrust would say that Google is "tying" their Google+ social network to the lawfully-acquired dominant market position of YouTube.

There is a thin line between trying to integrate and optimize services and applications between them, and forcing unwanted applications down the throat of users.

Re: The new Galaxy Note 3 is region-locked

#150
post #30

I recently went to the US for a few weeks. My Nexus 4 worked just fine with a US SIM from T-Mobile. $70 for a month for voice and data was worth it, and everything worked quite nicely. Big +1 for unlocked products!

And +1 for non-contract-friendly carriers like T-Mobile. Anytime someone bitches about their phone contract (here in US), I ask if they're willing to switch to TMO like I did.

Some have good reasons why (mainly coverage, tho TMO is getting better), others are forced to question their contract policy.

Right now I'm paying monthly at TMO what I paid on Verizon+AT&T for me and my wife - except I now get 3 other smartphones on the plan for the same price, all with their own 500M data pool.

Once the new phones are paid off (i.e. equipment loan), I'll be paying just a bit over what I did for just one of my lines for all five lines I'm paying today. And no other carrier in the US has HD Voice.

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