Sprint Nextel agrees to start unlocking phones
By Nilay Patel 
posted Oct 26th 2007 5:31PM
posted Oct 26th 2007 5:31PM
An under-the-radar class action lawsuit against Sprint Nextel is winding its way towards a settlement this week, and it contains a pretty huge concession by Sprint: the company will unlock phones for both current and former customers, and will begin training its customer service reps on how to connect non-Sprint phones to its network. The settlement was tentatively approved by a California judge on October 2, but hasn't had a final approval hearing yet, according to Sprint -- but it's still a huge win for US consumers, who haven't been able to buy mainstream unlocked phones from any of the major carriers. Of course, since Sprint's network is CDMA, unlocked phones will only work on other CDMA carriers like Verizon -- and there's no guarantees those companies will be happy about it -- but at this point we'll take whatever we can get.
So will any new phone work with sprint, as long as it is cdma? When is this going to go into effect?
the story says it is working toward a settlement; this is NOT a done deal
finally the world is starting to make sense.
*America
The world consists of more than your shithole country, you know.
Man, really? "Shithole country"? Was that necessary? Especially 'cause from where I'm sitting, America is pretty top notch. We have the best movies, the best athletes, the best economy, the best military, the biggest corporations, the most foreign aid contributions, the only space program to go to the moon, and in general do everything biggest, best and first. Only in America do the poor eat too much. Only in America do people hike across deserts and swim across seas to sneak in with the hope of a better life. Where are you from, anyway?
CT:
you know, you got AWFULLY defensive about that.
we also have the largest NATIONAL DEBT, and the fattest freaking people.
we're not the BEST country, we're just one of the many countries that make up the world. EVERY country has it's ups and downs, has it's good and bad; why not appreciate what we offer, as well as what other countries offer.
we have our freedoms, but at the price of our privacy, as well as other freedoms. seriously. if you're going to just use this forum to talk about how you live in the GREATEST COUNTRY EVAR LOLZ AND EVERYONE ELSE SUXORZ then you seriously need to find a new forum. oorrr, fall in a hole, and die.
Well, to be fair, we DO have a larger/better economy (per capita) than the European Union, so I would assume that makes us the biggest/best out of everyone.
And I'm not sure, but I don't think we have the fattest people. I think there are one or two countries with a higher obese population, but again, I'm not sure.
wow.. will the other carries adopted this motion?
Cingular/AT&T will unlock any of their phones after three months (except the iPhone). They have done this for a long time now.
for fuller story see here http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20071026-sprint-unlocking-settlement-may-pressure-others-to-follow.html
the deal is: 1. this ONLY applies in CALIFORNIA
2. the full story does not say sprint will accept unlocked phones, only that they will unlock sprint phones (for whatever good that may do)
3. this is only AFTER the 2 year contract is up
4. this deal is NOT yet finalized and may change before it is done
I realize there is a race to be first with the story but lets not have more misinformation than information please
AWESOME!!! so wait, does that mean that i say, i buy verizon's voyager when it comes out next month, i can take the phone and hook it up to sprint? what about a helio ocean?
The phone will have to be unlocked by the "owning carrier". So if Helio will unlock the phone for you, then you may be able to take it to Sprint but seeing how tightly Helio is tied to the (sprint) network, features available on Original Helio most likely will not work once ported to Sprint (just my wild guess)...similar to GPRS settings from say at&t not working on T-Mobile and vice versa.
Maciek
www.symbiosis60.com
WRONG!
Sprint can't unlock a Verizon or Helio phone. They can only unlock their branded phones, which you can take to Verizon or Helio and ask them to hook up. But of course they will tell you that they can't.
Remember, this case is currently only applicable to Sprint since they've settled. You will have to bring a separate lawsuit against Verizon and Helio and win to set a precedent. But that should be easy now that Sprint has lost.
Verizon and Helio phones aren't locked...
As others have said, THE NETWORK WAS LOCKED.
You can now use ANY CDMA phone on Sprint, as long as it supports Sprint's frequencies.
short answer - NO
long answer - this is not yet a done deal and there are NO details on if, when, what is involved but, pay attention, ... it ONLY APPLIES TO CALIFORNIA and ONLY AFTER YOUR 2 YEAR CONTRACT IS FINISHED! That part will NOT change as this deal is finalized
OMG?! Unlocked phones? In North America? From a CARRIER?
*faints*......
Oh, someone just revived me, Sprint are CDMA. Here's to hoping for you yanks that the GSM operators follow suit.. :)
T-Mobile will unlock any phone every three months (meaning you can request unlock code every three months)
Maciek
About a year ago, Cingular (now AT&T) gave me the code to unlock my phone, a Treo 650 (GSM).
I've been a customer for a very long time though, since 2000, when it was called CellularOne, which became AT&T, then Cingular, then AT&T again (but not the same AT&T).
CellularOne is now Unicell
Or maybe they just ran commercials in my area advertising that... as a joke?
"OMG?! Unlocked phones? In North America? From a CARRIER?
*faints*......"
Doesn't seem their going to be selling phones unlocked. Just allowing non-Sprint'd phones on their network and allowing people to unlock theirs when they leave Sprint for someone else. The few GSM carriers here already do this.
facepalm.jpg
Actually, I retract that "facepalm.jpg" comment. Sprint does have world phones which had locked GSM, so now those GSM phones will be unlocked.
This is the only thing about Sprint I hated, and now it is remedied.
Makes me happy to use them finally. =] (Even if it did take a lawsuit or two)
Just try explaining the unlocking concept / process to the cretins Sprint hires to be their customer support agents. Remember that they're rated the worst customer support EVER.
WOW.. This is one of those looks great on paper, but whats the point Verizon Wireless wont activate a sprint phone on its network to many fail safes in place, and since that whole e911 push all ESN / MEID's have to be loaded into a special system in order for them to be activate. The next thing is that some if not all the CDMA providers will start using some type of internal software to randomly generate lock codes that why the phones cant be used on another CDMA service providers network..
If the US where anything like Europe where they all use GSM and the phones are compatible because most providers offer all the same features I'd say have at it, but that's not the cause VZW uses, BREW and Sprint uses JAVA. You know that some phone tart will call Spint when the Verizon Wireless phone they bought doesn't work. Like I said this looks good on paper but so do alot of things that never work out..
Doesn't Sprint use 1900Mhz spectrum while Verizon uses 800Mhz? In other words, unlocked or not, they won't work on each other's networks. (that's the way it used to be at least...)
Most Sprint phones can roam onto the Verizon network, as well as US Cellular (from experience as a Sprint customer).
Mike, I'm pretty sure Sprint and Verizon use the same spectrum. They don't just use one frequency. At least, their phones usually support 2+.
And isn't BREW, Java?
Thank you sprint. This is the least you could do for me. I wanted you to turn to Gsm but this is still ...AWESOME!!!!!!
Wow, this is huge news. Of course having the ability to use unlocked phones on the Sprint network (of which I'm a proud member) and to get Sprint to unlock their own phones is amazing. But what makes this even better is that it's PRECEDENT. We might soon find ourselves joining the rest of the modernized world (well, Europe) with all our phones unlockable and portable BY LAW (I'm looking at you VZW). I can't wait. 8^D
Yes, this does set an awesome precedent, but if you thought CDMA phones were locked, I'm just going to laugh.
huh? they are/were. Or didn't you read the article?
Also, I saw your comments about carrier lock vs. phone lock. YAWN. The point is that Sprint's policy is now to actively allow phones that aren't Sprint-branded to work on the Sprint network. And to allow users to/notify users that they can use Sprint phones to be used on other networks (if other carriers allow it).
How is the end result any different for the consumer than GSM-unlocking? Oh that's right, it isn't. Welcome to the real world where the large majority of people DON'T GIVE A SHIT about the nuts and bolts.
Sorry, but a *settlement* has no legal precedential value.
Furthermore, nothing in the article says that Sprint has to allow unlocked phones on to its network, but only that it will unlock phones.
If Sprint will indeed start to let non-branded phones onto its network, then this is HUGE. This could end the CDMA lockdown in the US once and for all - if this is taken far enough and VZW and Alltell are also sued.
nonow someone just needs to bring the same suit
against metropcs ... then maybe you'll be able to
use decent phones with their flat rate services.
and due to this case, the consumer will have precedent on their side.
w someone just needs to bring the same suit against metropcs ... then maybe you'll be able to use decent phones with their flat rate services.
Get the Sprint SERO plan from www.sprint.com/sero using the email savings@sprintemi.com . Cheapest out there.
These wireless network operators have too much power when come to deciding which phones customers can use on their networks. It's time to take that power away. Let the customers who must sign a ridiculous two-year contract decide.
does this mean that I can connect some of those beautiful korean phones with my sprint service?
in a perfect world..
(but, oh god, i understand how much you want to...)
Doesn't the Nextel side of Sprint still work with the iDEN network and not CDMA? And aren't they the only carrier that uses iDEN? This doesn't seem all that Earth-shattering to me.
they have many spin-offs that pay to use the i-den network (i.e. Air-tel)
This is a step in the right direction. But, this alone gets us nothing until another CDMA carrier follows suit.
ex 1. I try to use a Verizon phone on Sprint.
This won't work, because Verizon won't unlock my phone.
ex 2. I try to use my unlocked Sprint phone on Verizon.
This won't work because Verizon only accepts Verizon-branded phones.
Rinse and repeat with other CDMA carriers.
facepalm.jpg
Depending on where you live, there are certain experts that can put your phone onto the Verizon network. It's been done for Korean phones on Verizon for ages, and they can probably do the same for Sprint phones.
Let us keep one thing in mind though. YES, they said they'll do this. Yes it is a good thing.
But trying to find a Sprint CSR that even knows how to spell "unlock" will prove to be quite the challenge.
This is great new for us that use a CDMA provider. Now we need the other carriers to follow suit. Don't think that Sprint and Verizon haven't spoke to each other about this and how this will affect the business. The thing is recurring revenue, the cost to acquire a new customer, and the cost to reduce the churn of existing customers, is whats inportant to the providers. Unlocking phones will do all those things. Expect Alltel and Verizon to follow suit quickly.
anyone want to go sue Verizon now?
And MetroPCS. Don't leave out MetroPCS.
Think of what Sprint and Verizon would have to do to keep their customers if anyone could just move over to MetroPCS's lower/flat rates.
Exactly.
This is useless until Verizon unlocks their phones.
When that happens... bye-bye timed exclusives!
Hallelujah!
Well, I wouldn't say bye bye exclusives because the GSM companies still have exclusives. But its still a big step forward.
most importantly:
maybe sprint, verizon, and altell need to just get OFF OF CDMA and get with the technology that's obviously superior?
less importantly, but still on my mind:
is anyone here thinking CRICKET in this whole mess? at least here in cincinnati, cricket has great rates, but their phones BLOW. they use horrible kyocera technology, that i won't touch, even for 45/month unlimited text/unlimited minutes.
allaina,
Same thing with MetroPCS. Rates a little lower than cricket, all unlimited plans (ie. flat rates). But the phone selection is awful.
allaina:
def dont turn this into another GSM vs CDMA debate, becuase we all know how it will end up, REGARDLESS of which is better (and superior? wrong choice of words, maybe more world-friendly but not superior. if it was superior, WCDMA wouldnt of been an option to combine CDMA aspects with GSM)
antonio:
SIM cards alone make current GSM superior.
i'm stuck on verizon, and i absolutely hate it. i hate my phone selection (i don't WANT to pay more for a music phone, because i have a great DAP, but i don't want a phone that SUCKS like most of the others offered by vzw.), and i'm good at breaking phones. having a SIM phone would make my life wonderfully easy, instead of having to get onto myspace/email/AIM and getting everyone's number a second time.
trust me, the current carriers that use GSM/SIM cards are superior simply for the latter.
allaina, you're an idiot. Ever hear of R-UIM? CDMA is superior in every single way to GSM. GSM is just used by more countries.
I didn't know quantity was more important than quality.
allaina:
eh, yes SIM cards are great but that is a decision that was made by CDMA carriers to not do SIM cards. You can have one with CDMA they just don't unless its a world phone. Don't get me wrong, I agree with ya 100% that having the SIM card is awesome, but using the versatility of the SIM card as an example of GSM "superiority" is like saying Ford is the number one car maker in the world because they have the Mustang. Doesnt make them better, they just have something a lot of people want and like (it was an example people, don't start going off on this). The SIM card has become synonymous with GSM, but it's not what makes the technology if you look at tech spec by tech spec is all I'm saying. :)
R-UIM? Only China, HK, Thailand, and possibly India use it right now. I live in China and can say that this is the best thing to happen to CDMA since the introduction of the network itself. It's a pity that most coutnries won't pick up on it.
Jesse: if by quantity, you mean how many networks i can use my phone on, or how many different phones i can unlock, then, i'm right. CDMA is inferior, because in the USA, the only networks that work with it are vzw/altell/sprint anyway.
it's more important to me to have a choice of any phone on any/almost any network. and if you want to tell me i'm wrong, tell all the iphone hackers that as well; your dollar is what votes for you...
Allaina:
Umm, actually GSM predates CDMA by about 3 or 4 years. GSM is more widely used because it's cheaper to build up the infrastructure and it's simply been around longer. It's kinda like VHS vs. Beta. One is superior, but the other one's cheaper. The cheaper one has prevailed, but 35 years down the road the Beta format is still being used in production studios for their preliminary edits, while you can't even give away a VHS player.
In addition, CDMA networks, by rule of measurement that the providers use (customers connected to the network), are larger than GSM networks in the US. So, larger network, more customers, superior tech. Yeah, you might have a SIM card, but that also makes it easier for somebody to run up your minutes without you knowing (on CDMA they'd have to steal your phone, which I'm sure you'd notice immediately). It'd be pretty cool if CDMA had SIM cards, but in my years of using it, I simply don't see it as a necessity.
Hmm if sprint unlocks your phone who exactly are you going to take it too? Verizon still wont let you activate it.
And if you an activate unlocked phones on sprint? who are they coming from if verizon wont unlock them thats also pointless.
I dont know if CDMA over seas is the same frequency or not. But over all this seems pretty damn pointless.
you know, i think the most important part of this move is more than the move itself: it's just precedent, you know? if sprint does it, to compete, altell and verizon most likely will.
verizon just recently made it where you can change your contract without extending it. they know that as of right now, a good 60% of their users will jump ship AS SOON as their contracts are up, unless they do something drastic, and fast.
your money is what speaks; it's not what you say that they care about, it's what you're buying.
this could just be a great catalyst for a big change that's needed to happen forever now.
CDMA lock/unlock isn't really the same as GSM lock/unlocked, IIRC. Back around 1999-2000 sprint's network wasn't tightly controlled and in store computers could activate a verizon phone no problem. Just enter the ESN and you were golden. Not everything worked though - quite a bit of software is custom for CDMA phones. No internet, no voicemail, etc
Yep, Alltel used to do that too. I don't know if Verizon ever did, though.
Mike: Verizon uses both 1900 and 800 and so does Sprint
**** THIS IS STUPID ****
Anyone who knows CDMA knows that CDMA phones ARE NOT LOCKED. The only "locking" happens for the .05% of CDMA phones that also have GSM, and sprint unlocks the GSM anyway. THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS UNLOCKING A CDMA PHONE!!!!!!!!!! This is a rare mis characterization by Engadget. The only "lock" as such is that Spring/Verizon won't allow you to connect to its network unless you have a phone they are comfortable with. There is nothing stopping you from using every VZW phone on Sprint, except sprint's decision not to allow you to (would create price war/increase competition between the two).
CDMA phones ARE NOT LOCKED. The NETWORK WAS LOCKED FROM NEW PHONES.
If Verizon does this, I am going to start buying those awesome Korean CDMA phones.
This is 10 degrees of awesome.
Also, the Verizon network is still locked.
The lack of technical knowledge that some Engadget writers exhibit, and the fact that they use Fischer Price OS's over real ones, really shows that this site is going down the drain.
Anyone know of a good tech blog that knows what they're talking about that isn't made up of Apple fanboys and anti-MS/Sony mentality? I just want a smart, fair and balanced tech news site. Is that so much to ask for?
I just realized this may lead to R-UIM in the states.
That would be fucking awesome.
If it does, then it'd be much easier to bring over a phone from China and stick in the card than to fool around with trying to activate the phone.
can the iPhone work on the sprint network?
thats a GSM phone. so the answer would be, no
No you can't. The iPhone uses a different technology. And everyone yelling about CDMA phone not being locked, we get it really stop it. If we are reading this article it would stand to reason we all know a little about cell technology. With that being said "locked" is the best term to be used in this case. Yes, Sprints phone are "locked" to Sprint. Not the same "locked" as GSM phones, but locked never the less. Get over it already. We know how smart you are, but you don't have to keep telling us.
Feech, no they aren't. I can go take my Verizon phone to a Korean or Chinese carrier, and have it activated, and use it right away. I could do the same with my friend's Sprint phone.
What's locked is the carrier. The CDMA carriers want to keep you locked into their phones and they don't want to deal with the e911 lists (where they have to enter in the ESN of every phone on their network, so it's much easier for them to do it in batches with new phones they get in than on a case by case basis), so they locked their networks.
The phones have no locks on them themselves.
The problem as was stated by several users was locked NETWORK ie a verizon phone will work on sprint but sprint would REFUSE to let it.
THIS might cause manufacturers to start MAKING sprint compatible phones !!! Holy crap am I hopeful !!!!
Jesse, there's 3 kinds of locking.
1) Network level locking (whether or not the network will allow that ESN on their network)
2) Phone to network locking (GSM type locking that is the flip-side of #1: will the phone allow itself to be put on a different network)
3) Feature locking (you need a code to get to the a menu on the phone which does things like limit data rates, allow or disallow Bluetooth DUN, etc.).
For example, even though several MetroPCS phones are capable of Bluetooth DUN, MetroPCS doesn't allow it. And they _lock_ your phone so that you can't turn it on. And they're a CDMA carrier.
You can get around it by acquiring the MSL code for your phone, unlocking the feature menu, and then turning things on. But their CDMA phones are definitely "locked". Just not in the GSM sense.
I was actually thinking of that, but that's just limited firmware. The phones aren't locked to the carrier, which is much more important.
Anyway, Verizon and the like only lock down their lower-end phones. For the most part, anyway. They do try to limit tethering on their pdaphones, but they fail at it.
Well, the phones Sprint sells are locked because they have a MSL code that isn't 000000. But yeah, the end conclusion of this is 'so what', and now it's too late to opt out of the class-action, Sprint will NEVER have to open their network, since none of the current customers can sue them over it. Great. We get a worthless class-action with no payment and Sprint gets immunity from ever having to unlock the network and take non-Sprint phones. A+ to whoever came up with that.
(Note: Nowhere in the settlement does it say that Sprint will accept foreign ESNs onto their network. This is a ridiculous misreporting by Engadget, and I don't know where the idea came from that Sprint would do that.)
Would make sense then why when I was talking to a Nextel Rep about the i425 which is a Boost phone she just told me to get one and have a service center unlock it and then I could use it on nextel LOL.