News Forum Phone database

> New Topic
> Reply
< Esato Forum Index > Sony Ericsson / Sony > Software, Firmware and Drivers > Little rant about not being able to unlock phones any more! Bookmark topic

I'm probably being a tad unfair here, but I am starting to get a bit frustrated with manufacturers making it harder to unlock their phones to all networks. It started with Nokia's BB5 phones, now SE has jumped on the bandwagon with the current crop of DB2020 phones. These could be unlocked via places like Davinci but after reading a reply to a thread I started on SE-NSE about SE locking out all it's Emma cards for unlocking so people cannot unlock their phones currently (apart from service providers), it's made me wonder why manufacturers are suddenly treating unlocking like something evil.

Is it the service providers putting pressure on the manufacturers? Or an attempt to cut down on the practice of 'box-breaking' where cheap subsidised pay as you go handsets are bought in bulk in the UK, the sims taken out then the phones sold on at a profit to another country?

I'm starting to think that service providers are getting greedy and realised that charging £15-odd for an unlocking code that costs them very little is a nice little earner on the side, and forcing people to go through them to unlock a phone rather than doing it themselves for free or nearly free adds to their profits.

Maybe someone in the mobile industry could tell me what the rationale for this or why this is happening. I find it quite frustrating when buying secondhand phones to fix that increasingly they're not unlocked. For example, I'm shortly getting a W850i that's locked to Orange, and would love to use it with my main contract O2 sim, but will have to mess about asking Orange to unlock it (I have an Orange PAYG sim I've had for a while), which I'm guessing may not be immediate, and will cost me £15 whereas before I could do it myself for free. Anyone else a tad annoyed at this, or is it just me?
--
Posted: 2007-03-26 15:39:02
Edit : Quote


i get quite annoyed as i have had a few faulty phones (that i have fixed) that have been locked (to another network) and have good cases on them. phones with good casing i tend to use myself.



--
Posted: 2007-03-26 17:04:50
Edit : Quote


Frustrating isn't it! I've just been charged £20 by Orange for unlocking the phone, and it'll apparently take 10-15 days for the unlocking code to arrive! They must be making a few quid out of this, the manufacturers must be getting something too or they wouldn't make locking a phone to a network so hard to undo!
--
Posted: 2007-03-27 12:58:37
Edit : Quote


I've been told, the networks want phones, which are more difficult to unlock, man reason being this "box-breaking".
Five or six years ago, the phones in prepaid packages were very low-end, not worth the effort, but now there are some very attractive PAYG phones available. So unlocking them and selling them in other countries seems to be very profitable.

Where I live in the Netherlands, near the German border, everyone who works in a phone shop can tell you stories about people (mostly from Eastern Europe), coming to their shop and buying all prepaid packages with a certain phone, they have in stock.
This seems to be easy here in my country, as you don't have to show your legitimation, when you buy a PAYG phone, as you have to in some other european countries.

Still, you're lucky, in my country, you can get the unlock-code for your phone for free, when it's more then one year old, but when it's younger, the code costs a lot more, then in UK.
--
Posted: 2007-03-27 14:43:01
Edit : Quote




i know vodafone do the same thing here. once the phone is a year old, if you requset an unlock code they will give it to you for free
--
Posted: 2007-03-27 16:51:32
Edit : Quote



What's an Emma card?
--
Posted: 2007-03-27 17:36:59
Edit : Quote


I think it's some sort of card/box used for unlocking, don't know much about it myself, perhaps someone more knowledgable could explain a bit better than me?

I think in the UK you can request unlock codes whenever you want, though it will cost you regardless of the age of the phone.
--
Posted: 2007-03-27 18:18:54
Edit : Quote


Vodafone charged £20 to unlock phones.

My mum had a Vodafone locked V3 and she wanted to switch to Mobile World. It asked for a subsidy password, we weren't sure what it was as the phone had no physical customisation so we didn't think it was network locked. I tried a few codes that didn't work. In the end we took it to Vodafone to ask what was wrong and they said they'll harge £20 to unlock it. The guy serving us tried the code on his screen and it didn't work. So he said that he doubted that it will be able to be unlocked so he printed out a copy of code and gave it for free. Got home and it worked, unlocked for free!
--
Posted: 2007-03-27 19:40:26
Edit : Quote

---

New Topic   Reply

Forum Index