[mo-bile]

Will it work? Which carrier?

[finch]

Originally Posted by mo-bile

Will it work? Which carrier?

Don't think so, I think Asian carriers use a different callular technology then those in North America eg. CDMA, TDMA, GSM, GPRS I could be wrong but I would call TMo to be certain.

[Mark Rejhon]

There is indeed GSM in parts of China, but only 900 Mhz.

You will need a -30 or -90 suffixed model BlackBerry to roam voice/SMS on China Unicom 900 Mhz GSM, and China Mobile 900 Mhz GSM.

At the moment, no GPRS roaming is supported. Just voice and SMS. No email.

For China Mobile 900 Mhz GSM coverage (Rogers Roaming):
http://www.coversoft.com/cgi/imap_ro...=cn&net=ct

If you have a 7230 BlackBerry, it should support roaming on China Unicom or China Mobile if TMobile has an agreement with them. But it may be voice-only roaming.

[mspguy]

I just returned from Shanghai, China this week. I'm a new BB user and I only had the BB for a couple days before my trip to China. Therefore, my knowledge of the BB settings/options and lingo is still weak. However, I can tell you the following info based on my trip. Two other colleagues had their BB with them as well. PersonA, who received theirs only a week before I got mine (both 7230) and PersonB who's had his for about a year and a half (model unknown). The three of us were together at all times, except when we went to separate rooms in the same hotel.

My BB worked nearly flawless for both voice and data. The signal was generally strong, except in a couple areas or when I was deep in a building. For the most part, I was received an GRPS (?) signal through China Mobile. Only on a couple of occasions did I see that it had switched to GSM. Also, there were a few times it switched to gprs (lower case - I think this means roaming?).

PersonA, who presumably has the same setup since they're company issued, had difficulty getting to GPRS and was mostly on GSM. Therefore, his data wasn't working all the time.

PersonB had the same experience I did, but his carrier usually said China T-Mobile or something like that.

All-in-all I was quite please with the coverage and my ability to use the device. Particularly because I will have other trips to China in the months ahead. Hope this helps.

[NJBlackBerry]

T-Mobile does have a GSM/GPRS/BlackBerry roaming agreement with China Mobile - http://www.t-mobile.com/internationa...geInternet.asp . I have heard that the GPRS footprint does not match GSM 100%, so there are locations where you will not have BB service. I'd bet that it will work fine in the major cities.