Thread: Frequency bands and OS version

Sorry if this has been answered before. I recently ended up with a Vodafone UK 9900 that doesn't work outside of urban areas in New Zealand due to the "wrong" frequencies (Telecom NZ's XT network uses 850 in rural areas). Voda UK used to supply handsets that basically matched the AT+T frequencies and therefore worked on 850. They now seem to buy the T-Mobile frequency-set unit which does 900 instead. Anyways,... just keen to triple check that there is nothing in the software bundles that affects this. Ie, I don't want to download the latest Voda UK OS version on my new (ex-Rogers) 9900 and discover these prevent 850 from working for example. I'm sure this is down to the chipset and not the OS, but I'm asking anyway because the About shows the supported frequency bands for the handheld, so the OS knows about this at least at some level. Thanks

I'm not 100% certain, but you could always try it out and then revert back if you have any issues.

The frequencies are not affected by the OS you install that's in the hardware I believe

But what I do know is that some OSes have a Radio file that offers a better signal in some area

For example, I get a better and stronger Radio signal if I stick to the OSes that come from carriers in my region (in this case the Middle East) but it is all a matter of trial and error really

I loaded the 503 subversion because of the warnings/complaints about the latest Voda UK one. Looks like the 503 version is from A1 Telecom (which is the one in Austria right?) and they seem to use UMTS 2100 plus GSM 900 and GSM 1800. That means they don't use the same 850 band that Telecom New Zealand's "XT" network uses in rural areas. The ex-Rogers 9900 that I have covers 850, and even with the 503 OS version installed it still shows 3G/H+ bands 1,2,5,6 (1 and 5 are the ones I care about). I'd say that answers the question then. The OS version (and the vendor network that the version is associated with) don't affect what frequencies the phone can handle. The About page seems to report the hardware capability of the handset, not just what the OS version might be expecting to work with. This must all be down to the chipset then, as expected.

Keen to hear more about looking at (and potentially adjusting/replacing) the Radios file if this is possible to do. How best to learn about that? Currently this ex-Rogers device shows H+ 5 bars in city centres which is a good start.

The bands are included with the device radio hardware... there are a few bands that a device will support.. mostly there will be 2 versions.. and each carrier is using some bands to transfer the data.. some can use 1700 to provide 3G while others use the same band for 2G.