The Beanster Blog

No this post is not about musical bands here nor there… It is actually a guide to understanding single dual tri quad band monicker that devices get. Here’s what you need to know: A mobile phone operates using a radio communicating with a cell tower (hence cellular or cell phone) Most of Asia (including the Philippines) and Europe uses GSM and our frequencies are as follows GSM/GPRS/EDGE: 900/1800 UMTS: 900/2100 **China, Japan and Korea uses both GSM and CDMA The Americas uses GSM and CDMA their GSM frequencies are: GSM: 850/1900 UMTS: 1700 (T-Mobile) 850/1900 (AT&T) Chances are if you are buying a phone locally, from Hong Kong or from Europe you’ll be fine. However if you buy a device from the Americas you have to be extra cautious. Their CDMA devices essentially don’t have SIM card slots and will not work with Globe, SMART or Sun. Their GSM devices may work provided they include the same bands we have locally. However keep in mind usually manufacturer...

I always make fun of people getting up sold in HKG or SG by those rascals that sell electronics. Well Karma is probably ROFL’ing about this… Here is the timeline: 9/3/09 – Arrive in MNL from PVG, Sun line disconnected, exceeded credit limit because of roaming 9/4/09 – Visited Sun Shop Greenhills Shopping Center paid 3,283.99 = re-connection fee Signed up for unlimited DATA on phone & received a Sunbroadband SIM paid 799 x 2 = 1598.00 = 2 months advanced deposit to waive lockout and get unlimited data on both my phone / broadband SIM (or so I thought). I even asked when unlimited would go live on my phone because I knew I would be using the phone more vs the data SIM. 9/5/09 – Broadband SIM goes live I start using both but more the phone vs the broadband SIM in my netbook. 9/9/09 - received system message that my line was nearing credit limit again. called SUN CS was informed everything was ok I was on unlimited DATA & CTU. 9/10/09 – phone get’s disconnected, ...

Last 04-Sep I was lead to believe that adding 799PhP to my 350 CTU (Call and Text Unlimited) would give me unlimited data on both my phone & the broadband SIM. Well apparently I was mistaken. So in 5 days (my phone got re-connected on the 5th) I have already gone over my monthly credit limit which is 1500PhP (default for CTU 350). I thought I was on unlimited but was actually being charged the normal rate which is 10PHP per 30mins. Fraking hell. Right now my Sun is blocked for out going SMS & calls, waiting to get re-connected again and have requested an increase in credit limit. I would really piss me off that I was upsold to an non existent plan. I am not sure if the service rep at the business center I visited upsold me or misunderstood me. Or if I misunderstood him and was too eager to sign up when hearing unlimited and bundle in the same sentence. What’s clear is this I now have 2 SIM cards 1 with unlimited broadband but no SMS or calls; the other is my line which can do S...