Using a mobile phone in the USA

[allanb]

I'm going to be in the USA for a few weeks and I'd like to know whether I will be able to use a European mobile phone, assuming that I buy a suitable SIM card when I get there.

There are two phones I could take: a Samsung C520 and a Motorola Blue Razr V3.  They're both fairly old, but they work well enough in France.

Any advice will be appreciated.

[suein56]

[quote user="allanb"]I'm going to be in the USA for a few weeks and I'd like to know whether I will be able to use a European mobile phone, assuming that I buy a suitable SIM card when I get there. [/quote]

The problem seems to be that the US uses 2 different frequency bands to the 2 we use in Europe. Many recent phones are tri-band or quadri-band so can be used. If one of your phones is quadriband then that should work OK. The Motorola is only dual band but I don't know about the Razr.

Best I can do. Good luck.

Sue

[YCCMB]

Thanks to having watched the complete boxed set of "The Wire", I remembered that you could always do this:

[url]http://www.buzzle.com/articles/disposable-cell-phone.html[/url]

It would appear that you can get something quite cheap which may solve your problem, if neither of your old phones is suitable (and I don't think they are)

[JeanS]

I've got a Samsung C3030 using Vodafone pay as you go.  It's worked ok the three times I've been to the USA over the past 3 years. Twice to Florida and once to New York. As a note - you'll need a good adapter for the charger. The first time I used a car charger but the second time tried a normal adapter and it wouldn't charge.  I was fortunate because the hotel had a draw full of chargers and we managed to find one which worked, so they let me have it for a dollar - bargain.