Buying a captivate in the states to use in ireland?

[Irish#AC]

hey guys new to the forum, new to smartphones really, new to android been listening to the podcast for a a few months and am ready to buy

i am spending my summer in the us and have 3 weeks left and ahve a bit of money so am thinking of buying the captivate before i leave to unlock and use at home but i have some questions, im sure they have been answered in a series of threads but im at work right now so cant search until later or tomorrow so sorry if they are repeats

1. is it tri band so it will work all over the world?
2. the guy in best buy said you can buy it off contract for 550 or thereabouts but its still locked to at+t so is there an unlock for the captivate so i can use the sim cards from my networks at home in ireland?
3. does it use regular size sim cards?
4. what is the latest on the gps problem? do you think there will be a fix form samsung?
5. does it run 2.2? if not will it get it? if so will i be able to get the update automatically in ireland?
6. can it be rooted yet? can it be rooted easily?
7. is there any other non cdma(it needs to be gsm to work in ireland) android phone i should consider instead?
8. is there any of the important features that i wont be able to use because i wont be using it in the states on at+t?
9. can i access the market from ireland?


thats all i can think of for now, thanks in advance

irish

 

[dmnall]

Hello Irish,
1. is it tri band so it will work all over the world?

It is Quad Band and is a world phone meaning it will work on any GSM, however, do you know the 3G Bands in Ireland? Because UMTS is Tri-Band *3G Speeds* GSM Quad-band phone capable of global roaming (850/900/1800/1900 MHz)
UMTS tri-band global 3G (850/1900/2100 MHz)

2. the guy in best buy said you can buy it off contract for 550 or thereabouts but its still locked to at+t so is there an unlock for the captivate so i can use the sim cards from my networks at home in ireland?

I have not heard of any unlock codes yet but I have heard that TurboSim works in these until the unlock codes are available.

3. does it use regular size sim cards?

Yes the phone runs regular size sim cards unlike the iPhone 4 which has the Mini or Micro Sim..

4. what is the latest on the gps problem? do you think there will be a fix form samsung?

The GPS problem is it can take a while to lock on to the gps satellites, and there are some instances it is not actually 100% accurate. I have heard there will be a fix next month from Samsung which we just have to wait it out. Not a big deal for me because my gps locks under Google Maps with no problems.

5. does it run 2.2? if not will it get it? if so will i be able to get the update automatically in ireland?

The Captivate is running 2.1 right at the moment and we are supposed to be getting 2.2 by the end of next month. You should be able to get the update but since I am in US, I have att here, but I dont see why you would not be able to get it.

6. can it be rooted yet? can it be rooted easily?

There was files that popped up on xda-developers.com that had the whole rooting process before the Vibrant and Captivates were even released here in the us.. I bought my captivate on launch day *07-18-2010* and had mine rooted in less then 2 minuets. There are different methods now but when I did mine, copy the root file after renaming it to update.zip, put the phone into Recovery Mode and run the update on it. Rooted..

7. is there any other non cdma(it needs to be gsm to work in ireland) android phone i should consider instead?

Well depending on whether the unlock codes are released soon or not, there is the Unlocked Galaxy S phones, htc desire, nexus one but I love my captivate... Unlocked phones are always going to be more expensive but for $ 500 on the Captivate is still worth it in my opinion..

8. is there any of the important features that i wont be able to use because i wont be using it in the states on at+t?

I dont think there are any att only specific features of the phone, that you cannot use for free from google, just the Bloatware att crap you wont be able to use *I am running att and I removed them because I dont want to use them.

9. can i access the market from ireland?

You should be able to access the market from Ireland with no issues. The best thing is root your phone and get Market Enabler, and enable another Market because att censors their market and blocks certain programs.. I use the T-Mobile USA for mine.

HTH,
Charlie

 

[Irish#AC]

It is Quad Band and is a world phone meaning it will work on any GSM, however, do you know the 3G Bands in Ireland? Because UMTS is Tri-Band *3G Speeds* GSM Quad-band phone capable of global roaming (850/900/1800/1900 MHz)
UMTS tri-band global 3G (850/1900/2100 MHz)

these arethefrequencies in ireland so i hink it should be good

Just be careful that it supports European GSM and UMTS bands!
Nothing worse than buying a fancy phone and discovering it won't support 3G at home!
GSM 900/1800mhz
UMTS 2100mhz and ideally 900mhz too (due to launch in next 12-18mth and will drastically improve indoor 3G reception)

 

[dmnall]

Well it looks like after delving more into this on gsmworld.com Hutchinson uses 2100, Meteor has 900/1800 for GSM *edge*, O2 and Vodaphone both use 900/1800 for GSM and 3G 2100. So you should be fine with the Captivate! I think you will love the phone, I love mine!

Cheers,
Charlie