Files in iPhone reveal overseas plans for T-Mobile, Vodafone
By Ryan Block 
posted Jul 4th 2007 3:09PM
posted Jul 4th 2007 3:09PM
That iPhone firmware leaked this week? Well, as found on the iPhone Dev Wiki it's been cracked open, its files laid bare, and deep within the system one can find four very special, very telling files:Default_CARRIER_ATT.png
Default_CARRIER_CINGULAR.png
Default_CARRIER_TMOBILE.png
Default_CARRIER_VODAFONE.png
We know AT&T / Cingular have a 5-year exclusivity agreement on the iPhone in the US, but if this doesn't make clear Apple's plans to launch on Vodafone (presumably for UK and much of Europe) and T-Mobile (presumably for Germany) we don't know what does.
P.S. -Sorry, those iPhone images are encoded all funny (something about flipped R and B pixels?), we couldn't get 'em working. Anyone with some hacking skills want to make 'em readable for us?
P.P.S. -Apple can stop calling the iPhone's browser "Safari" now, we know they differentiated by calling it MobileSafari.app in the iPhone (and it's only 640KB, oddly).
[Via Hackintosh]
noooooo we don't want you vodafone here in England
..I wanted o2 to get it but I think they have no money left after buying the millenium dome
I agree, however, IF vodafone do a AT&T, and do an OK deal, with unlimited data etc... I've not got a problem with them.
The vodafone problem has always been cost (for me)' there network coverage is great, and customer service average
Yer it needs unlimited data...do we have EDGE over here? I know we use GPRS but when I turn my phone on it says it had EDGE
I can see vodafone selling this for £549 With some £30 a month 2 year contract. Uck.
It might be for roaming.
Opening the file with file with TextEdit something about
A
Opening the file with file with TextEdit something about
Information on switching the images to their proper type can be found here at the iPhone Wiki. The images are BGRA and need to be converted to RGBA to be displayed properly.
We have 3G over here which was actually developed by a company owned by Bob Geldof.
You thinking of 3W, as in the third world :P
I'm hoping for T-Mobile in the UK. They are the only network to have unlimited data for about $15 a month.
Outrageous! This is why I hate our marketing department. I work for 3, and we've had a proper unlimited data offer for only £5 ($10) a month for almost a year!
T-Mobile come along and launch their stupid web 'n' walk (unlimited my arse, it's got a 512MB "fair use" limit!) for more money and everyone thinks they got there first.
Stupid marketing fools, why do we pay them?
Not being funny but Three's service is piss poor, both customer service and actual using-your-phone-day-to-day service.
Its true about your marketing though, how are people supposed to work out your data plans from this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ap1-OPM9Qao
Oh, and about 3- segregating your 3G from your GSM network is never a smart idea (why not just call the whole darned thing 3 instead of 3G and 3-Dualband with separate SIMs for each?).
...Oh wait. That's Hong Kong.
Our customer service certainly has a bad reputation. Not convinced about the day-to-day - 3G handsets are still not up there with 2G when it comes to reliability, battery life, stability and so on, but that's not our fault, it's Nokia's (25% return rate on N95s? Oh dear).
Anyway, on topic, iPhone looks like O2 now, which makes sense given that it's the only network in the UK with no 3G!!! What a joke.
And I care about the iPhone going overseas why?
The US isn't the only country that views this site...
Dude, don't be a jerk. That's why the rest of the world doesn't like us. Well, that and we're the richest country, but still.. curtail the jerkness.
Steve, are you asking for flames?
Not all who read Engadget are from the USA, and many of us who've sat through the photos of lines, videos of lines, unboxing and reviews (ad infinitum, but good work guys) can't wait to find out when we get the phone.
Strangely, this site isn't *just* about what you want.
Aye... that is a rather close-minded remark. Most of the posters/readers on Engadget are not just from the US, but from places like Canada, Europe, Australia even and other parts of the world. Even though I'm from the US, comments like that is why our country so hated outside the US. Jerks like you make this country look bad to begin with.
Lol America is not the richest country in the world at all! You are actually only 6th in the world. Plus over 50% of America's wealth is held by 10% of the people, making 90% of you no where near as wealthy as you would like to think!
Actually, the US is the richest nation. If you rank by GNP, the US is the largest - if you rank by GNP per capita the US is somewhere between number 4 and 6. Does not make above poster any less of an idiot for assuming the rest of the world hates us for our wealth.
George Bush, LOL.
brendan Sheehan jnr, LOL
i think they choose those 2 networks as they are both offering unlimited web browsing, "something i think the iPhone needs?" im on orange and staying with them my good old N95 will do me till next year! :D
Because your posting a comment...?
Not only the colors a swapped...CgBI: unknown critical chunk =)
Nothing about Rogers or other Canadian providers?
yeah that sucks... what about us Canucks ?
It wouldn't be impossible for T-Mobile to be the primary carrier in the UK as well, or the odd trinity of Vodafone, T-Mobile, and Carphone Warehouse (as secondary seller) could still take the UK.
If O2 did get it, they'd need to introduce flat rate data plan pretty sharpish.
UK phones can usually be easilly unlocked..
o2 iphone for me please.
I thought it was a requirement by law that carriers must unlock phones when requested to do so.
It's a requirement that carriers unlock the phone after the contract has ended in the UK - the contract is taken as a form of Hire-Purchase I believe.
@Brian, Andrew:
I know that's a requirement in Australia at least that the phone be unlocked on request =)
what the eff!!!!!
come on apple, what about Canada already?!?!?
please, just put out an official press release saying Q4 2007 or whenever!
i can stand the wait, but it'd be nice if i knew when i was waiting until!
T Mobile are the obvious uk carrier, they already provide the "web 'n' walk" service plan. What I want to know is this though: can you download mp3s direct to the iphone from podcast websites and listen to them?
Have you lost your mind? Download mp3s?! They dont even let you save images from the browser!
or copy and paste text, or view flash pages, or...
That sucks.
Give me a few mins I'll whip up a converter.
*and it's only 640KB, oddly*
640 KB should be enough for anyone :-)
here they are:
http://img524.imageshack.us/img524/2331/recoverymodeno4.png
http://img503.imageshack.us/img503/7638/applelogoju2.png
http://img114.imageshack.us/img114/5637/serviceneedediz8.png
Thanks DaKine!
and these:
http://img165.imageshack.us/img165/7466/chargedcc1.png
http://img78.imageshack.us/img78/8646/batterylow0nv9.png
http://img78.imageshack.us/img78/2546/batterylow1og2.png
Those are the wrong pictures - where are the t-mobile/vodafone pics? please someone post them! :)
These aren't the images we are interested in, we are interested in the images related to the carrier.
Those images come from the iPhone Dev Wiki.
nice work-- looks like they used your images for the very next story.
I posted this below but I think I lost it...
Anyway, I send the images to a friend with an iPhone and she could open them. Here's what they look like.
http://img453.imageshack.us/img453/3272/img6725qc8.jpg
Impossible! These are "desktop class" applications just like on Mac OS X!
Im from argentina, and I cant wait the iPhone to come here. It looks like it will come around 2008, but as any apple thing, it will cost 50% more and the data and phone plans here stinks, and we are still in 2/2.5g networks, but the wifi feature with al the other thing makes the iPhone a great replacement for my treo 650
I'm not so sure that this means that VF and TM are the EU operators, most GSM phones store details for other networks for roaming purposes. For instance the prefered roaming partner on my T-Mobile UK branded phone in the US is Cingular. For VF phones (don't forget the Vodafone have a big share in Verizon but can't use CDMA networks) its T-Mobile US. Go figure...
Let's see what they do before offering it to Europe. Right now it's rather behind with no 3G, the lame camera, bo built in GPS etc. Fine for the American market but lets hope they improve it - cos we do want it here in impoverished old Europe.
Probably the 640K MobileSafari.app is built on some browser library. So that 640K is just a small shell program, plus some icons and things.
Go suck it EGDE, 3G here we come!! ;)
Hmm so is it o2 or vodafone?
the times seems pretty sure its o2!
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/telecoms/article2028678.ece
Very Interesting.
Maybe O2 had a press release embargoed until midnight, I'm still trying to find other sources for this news, but if it's true, I'm a happy man! I'm currently on Virgin, but I'd rather switch to O2 instead of Vodafone, I always found them a bit expensive.
LOL, from the bottom of the article: "O2 and Vodafone both declined to comment."
Well where the heck did they get the info from then?
Just an idea.
Apple will launch iPhone in Europe somewhere around the end of December. This makes me think that you U.S. Apple fans are testing Steve's toy on your own money. This guy is really a genius. He got over 500K testers within a weekend, he is getting feedback more than he needs in order to update the software 5-6 times and guess what? You are paying him! Finally, in 6 months it will be a mature product with mature software. This time I'm really glad that they've launched the thing in US first. Advantages and disadvantages...
RE: 5 year exclusive-- Can someone explain to me why we can't just call Cingular/ATT up & ask that our phone be unlocked?
I thought the Library of Congress ruled last year that locking phones wasn't legal (or at least we could ask that they be unlocked).
T-Mobile allows this out of the kindness of their heart, but shouldn't all companies be allowing this now?
> Outrageous! This is why I hate our marketing department. I
> work for 3, and we've had a proper unlimited data offer for
> only £5 ($10) a month for almost a year!
> T-Mobile come along and launch their stupid web 'n' walk
> (unlimited my arse, it's got a 512MB "fair use" limit!) for
> more money and everyone thinks they got there first.
@James - the basic T-Mobile Web'n'Walk £7.50/month data tarrif is capped at 1GB fair use, while their Web'n'Walk Plus data tarrif (which allows laptop/modem use) is capped at 3GB (£12.50/month).
The £5/month "unlimited" internet tarrif on 3 is also capped at 1GB a month (a good deal for phone-only usage) however the only tarrifs that allow laptop/modem usage are the £15/month tarrif (capped at 56MB/month - how I laughed at that!) and the "unlimited" laptop access at £45/month which is capped at a measely 512MB, 1/6th the allowance for almost 4 times the cost compared to T-Mobile!
On the whole, the 3 data tarrifs don't match those of T-Mobile. Who got their first makes no difference to the consumer, but it's obvious that T-Mobile wipe the @rse of 3 when it comes to data.
Fair dos mate, they've changed the FUP to 1GB recently. I should mention that ours is actually 2GB although it's advertised at 1GB, no idea why. You can also use the £5 add-on for modem use - we just don't tell anyone! (cf: previous comments re: marketing).
The other tariffs you mention are hopelessly out of date.
So to sum up - we charge £2.50 less than T-Mobile, who have about a tenth of our 3G coverage. And what's this? HSDPA, full UK Coverage by early '08? Sorry, T-Mobile has no HSDPA at all? Yes you're right, T-Mobile are only good enough to wipe our arses.
Just remember that if it were not for 3, you still wouldn't have open internet browsing on a mobile phone at a flat rate.
Sorry James, but you can't blame anyone for not knowing about Three's internet data deals if the Three web site provides inaccurate and misleading information...
not to mention.. safarimobile crashes a lot
Well if T-mobile in Germany gets the Iphone I will see if I can use my T-mobile US sim in the phone which would be sweet. It would be better than AT&T. But I probably would need a German Itunes account.
Oops, forgot to mention...
Does T-Mobile offer Skype? Free MSN Messaging, unlimited for life? A viable consumer Push Mail solution for your existing handset? All included within the £5 add-on - which ALSO allows (let me re-iterate) modem use, 2GB fair use, and is part of the easily the most competitive Voice 'n' Text tariffs available in the UK.
No, our customer service is not good enough.
No, 3G handsets are not good enough yet.
who cares??? you are all f*cking losers!!!!!! the iphone wont make your lives better and it wont make you cooler or liked more. IT'S JUST A PHONE!!!!