Cingular 64kb SIM Card

all from the co. website

 

Please allow me to throw in my :twocents: . I went to look at the Nokia 6620 at the cingular Store today. The senior technician is a a friend of mine. As we were chit chatting, he said if I got the 6620 it would come with the 64K but he would set me up with a 32K also because the 64K is only for load balancing, so it might put me on to the ATTWS 1900 if the Cingular 850 was over loaded. Since the ATTWS around here is not as good as the native Cingular, my signal maybe worse than before at times. Having the 32K would ensure that it would always prefer the Cingular signal if it was available. He also said that by the end of this year it was going to be fully integrated and having either SIM would not matter from getting the stronger of the 2 signals. Now he is quite knowledgeable and owns the 6620s predecessor and also the RAZR and intentionally has 32 K SIM in both.

Just thought I would share.

BTW: viewfly, please don't ask me why I am looking at the 6620 when I have the 6230, since I do not have any logical explaination. :O Maybe because the 6230 does everything it is supposed to and with so much ease that there is no challenge left...LOL Fortunately the store was out of the 6620 and so it saved me $300 at least until their shipment comes in next week.

 

That is interesting and very informative! I didn't know that is what the 64K SIM was all about. We never had Cingular here before the merger, so I guess there would be no difference for me here...

 

I won't ask, but I know why. It's the video streaming and screen size. But just wait, the 6230 can do it, but each phone model must be set up by MobiTV. They are workin on that. But wait, didn't you video stream already??

I think by year's end, nokia will have a quad band out.

 

LOL.....Of course you know that's what I really want, I will just have to keep telling myself that . My 6230 will not work on my trip to Egypt where it is 900 only , oh well! may on my next trip.

 

Too bad then. I guess you can always call Cingular directly. Other than that, you are not going to find what you're looking for anywhere else. Even so, whoever you speak with at Cingular will be a person you'll just have to take their word for it. And even so, if you get a website with the information you're looking for, that website is still written by someone who's word you'll have to take for granted. So I am not sure what you're looking for. Maybe your only option is to continue believing that ENS is vaporware. Sorry...

 

I'm sure the CEO/COO won't know the technical details, but it is the closest we can come to "official" information on this issue since inside technicians and engineers are not a trusted option in this thread.

 

Well it was hard for me to decide between a quad or tri band phone too. I really like Nokia, but I really needed a new phone and couldn't wait even a few or 6 months more. In the end, I got a V551 quad and the 6230 tri.

For most of the countries I travel too, the GSMworld web site told me that I will be covered quite well. So I decided to forgo the Quad for now. A good excuse for a new phone later

I will be in Paris in a few weeks, and look forward to trying the phone there.
Thanks Charlyee.

 

Well I agree with you on this. Since you seem to have some inside info on this (or anyone else), can you tell us how to tell if a phone is ENS enable or capable? Can you list the models or model variants that are ENS? It is certainly easily to tell if I have a 64 or 32K sim. But no so for the ENS part...I think this is why some are suspicious.

That is one of the big confusions here. I haven't found anyone that can tell me if a new or old phone of the same model is ENS whatever...

Best,

 

Check this thread for information from Airb on his experience in Paris. Basically, one of the providers works better than the others...

 

Any new phones starting from the V3 and V551 are ENS. So you know everything that came out after those two models are ENS. Older models that came out before the merger (before V551 and V3) but that are still being sold are not ENS. Since this is strictly a firmware addition, manufacturers don't place anything on those phones to distinguish them. If anything, something must be embedded in the codes or the serial number, but that would be hard to identify.

 

What does this mean? Only models since the V3 or older models that have been manufactured since the V3? Every phone that is on the current cingular web page I assume is ENS, whether it was before or after the merger?? I assume a store may have old and new stock?

When I got my 6230 it came with a 64K sim, I didn't ask for it. The 6230s are older than the V3. When I bought the V551 from a former ATT store (after Xmas), they didn't want to give me a 64K. Both are Cingular branded. I had to insist.

 

The 6230 is not ENS as far as I know, but if the 6230 came out near the merger date, it is possible that there is a batch of them non-ENS and the newer ones are ENS. Who knows why they didn't want to give you a 64K SIM. Maybe you already had a 32K?

 

Both phones were upgrades with Cingular, so I had 32K on both. The 6230 was mgfr'd in Dec 2004, and came Locked which means to me it was under the post merger policy on triband phone. The Cing rep said that I didn't need the 64K on the v551. I'm sure that is true, but from what I read, it can save the 6min tower research on both phones.

I agree with the other poster, that the information on this is pretty fishy. But my service is much better than before, so I'm not worrying about the whole ENS thing. The phone seems to be doing what it needs to do and coverage is better than ever.

As I suggested to the first poster in this thread, if his mother is doing fine, don' t concern yourself; Cingular will give you one if your really need it or can make use of it.

 

That's right, you don't need 64k SIMs. I still have my old 32K SIM and I don't intend on changing it. Why? My area doesn't have two Cingular networks. We only have the blue network and the other one that's going back to T-Mobile, so there's no benefit from ENS in my area. In other areas, ENS can improve your service, but it is not really needed.

By the way, I don't know what you mean by "...it can save the 6min tower research on both phones..."?

 

Again, don't know if it's true, but from Kilo's post at 64K + ENS

I meant by 'research' , 'scanning' for the home network

Excerpt:

So what does the combo of 64K SIM and ENS give me?
As a consumer you may not notice a difference, or even care to get new equipment. About the only improvement you would see might be in battery life because your phone stops scanning for a differnet network ever 6 minutes.

Scan for a different network every 6 minutes?
That's right. There are these things called "MNC" that is like a "network identifier". This isn't nothing you need worry about. But right now ATTWS has an MNC of 310380, and Cingular has 3 MNC's spread out over the US (310410 and two others but I can't remember). Eventually Cingular will move all the towers/networks to 310410 but until then there needs to be a way for Cingular to "home" different subscribers on the different networks and move them back and forth, without the user having to do anything, or even being aware of what's going on.


What happens if I have JUST an ENS enabled phone and a 32K SIM?
Your phone will act like it did if you were using a non-ENS enabled phone. Use whatever network is in your area, and then scan for a new network every 6 minutes.

What happens if I have JUST a 64K SIM but not an ENS enabled phone?
Your phone will act like it did if you put a 32K SIM in it. Use whatever network is in your area, and then scan for a new network every 6 minutes.

However for Cingulars purposes, the customers that Cingular will want to sell this new equipment primarily to will be former AT&T Wireless customers ESPECIALLY if they are in an area where there are only former AT&T Wireless towers and no Cingular towers.

So, Bobo, if there are no Cing towers in your area, maybe this means you too.??

I know my phone almost never scans anymore, and I use blue and orange

 

Funny. I bought a 6230 last week and it was unlocked. Saved me a whole 5 minutes of unlocking it myself!

 

Funny, I thought you posted that you returned or swapped your 6230 for a V551 back in November?

Well, whatever, either you got an old one, or cingular changed their official corp policy again. But 5 minutes saved is 5 minutes earned. Do you know the date of mfgr?

 

I did do that exchange. What an idiot I was to do that too. Yeah, I still think the phone is a bit too small, but it works a whole lot better than the stupid Moto.

As for the mfg. date, I have no idea. Is it "hidden" in the IMEI #?

 

Welcome back to the 6230, glad you finally saw the light.....LOL. You can check the mfg. date by doing*#92702689#.It shows Date of phone manufacture, Serial and IMEI numbers, Purchasing date, Last Repair Date. Mine is 092004 and it was unlocked..

HTH

 

Wirelessly posted (A phone: Nokia6230/2.0 (04.43) Profile/MIDP-2.0 Configuration/CLDC-1.1)

Thanks. My manufacture date is also 92004.

 

My date is 122004 and came direct from Cingular warehouse with 64K SIM to replace my 32K. If you talk alot with the phone, the over the ear Nokia headset works great. I don't mind the phone size, since it fits in my pockets well. It's a great phone, audio and RF wise.

With you mfgr date, I understand now why it was unlocked.

On a HoFo forum, some guy finally got deep into tech support, and they never heard of ENS, nor did anyone (in tech support) know how to ID one. Hmmmm. The mystery deepens.

 

Off topic, but does Nokia only make phones on the 20th of every month?

 

I am pretty sure that the 092004, 122004 means September of 2004, December of 2004 etc.

 

Wirelessly posted (A phone: Nokia6230/2.0 (04.43) Profile/MIDP-2.0 Configuration/CLDC-1.1)

I suppose that makes sense. i was wondering why the dates seemed to be written in American rather than European style, lol.

 

AnthroMatt,

Curious. What didn't you like about the Moto? I have the V551, but never use it...belongs to my daugther.

 

I had some browser issues (couldn't load pages "Error 413: Entity too large" that my backup Samsung WAP 1.1 phone had no problem with. Also, every now and then the microphone seemed to stop working...people on the other end of the conversation could not hear me.

 

Charlyee, AnthroMatt

When you guys first looked at this information, did it have a date of purchase? My didn't and allowed me to insert a date. Now that is fixed and cannot be change anymore. Makes sense, but I thought it asked me for a day too. Now it only says 122004. Am I having a 'senior moment'?

 

No, my date of purchase field just says "MMYYYY" I entered 012005.

 

phew! Thanks I bought mine on Dec 20, 2004!