Sailfish in the USA

General
#262

No. It’s not available to buy in the US and it’s not worth the effort. That’s the TLDR short answer.

Remember that the XA2 was only sold in EMEA i.e. not for the North American market. As a result, 4g frequency band support was only added for bands used outside of North America. There is some overlap but tbh it’s borderline non-existent.

The XA2 supports 4g bands

  • 1, 2, 3, 4, 5
  • 7 & 8
  • 20
  • 38

AT&T & T-Mobile only supports bands 2, 4 and 5 of those supported by the XA2. I’m not bothering with Verizon though their 4G LTE bands are in theory GSM and not the CDMA that Verizon previously used for 2g & 3g.

The following is my edit of Wikipedia articles for T-Mobile US and AT&T Mobility:
For T-Mobile, Band 2 is only used in rural locations for 2g to 4g conversion, and even then is actively being refarmed for 5G. Band 5 is only relevant if you’re in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. Band 4 is the main LTE band but if full you’ve got no alternative.

AT&T - bands 2&4 are for additional capacity, band 5 is being refarmed to 5g is is unavailable in many locations. AT&T mainly uses bands 12 & 17, neither of which are supported by the XA2.

As an aside, there’s zero 3g on any US network. Only T-Mobile has 2g support and in theory that was to shut down on 2nd April. It still exists in places but I interpret their PR to basically say that they can end service without warning going forward.

I live in the US, and have an XA2 that I setup in early 2019 in the UK. I can’t test my XA2 with a local sim as the only one I have is now esim. But it took 30mins to actually connect to a 4G network on my UK sim card and even then it didn’t receive or make a call and had no data (I assume due to a lack of VoLTE support). That’s something that still works on my old Lumia 950, which is still on the AT&T VoLTE whitelist 3 years after I previously replied to this topic).

I’m not inclined to troubleshoot it at this point, especially since it’s had a battery replacement, and the new battery isn’t very good (but at least it isn’t swollen).

That’s before you have to find a workaround for tricking the Jolla shop into selling a licence to you without a European credit card. I don’t think it’s worth the effort and would at the very least suggest waiting for a phone that supports VoLTE (e.g. the 10 V).

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#263

Has something changed lately? I never had any issues buying a license using a US-issued credit card. The only thing they ever checked was the IP address, which could easily be circumvented by using Opera browser’s built-in free VPN.

#264

The VPN is all you need, no one is checking location of your creditcard.

4 Likes
#265

It doesn’t appear that the bands that the 10 V supports on US networks are any better than the XA2. I have a 10 II (the version supported by SFOS with the limited USA bands) and it’s not really usable here if you need to be reachable at arbitrary and unpredictable times. Dead zones are everywhere (like my entire basement) and when band 4 is full, callers get immediately dumped to voice mail without me even knowing they called. With frail elderly relatives and others who can only reach me by voice, it’s a poor fit. :frowning: Someone under 40 who couldn’t imagine talking on a phone might have a somewhat more positive experience than mine. Since I won’t Android or iPhone, I’ve been reduced to a freakin’ flip phone running Kaios. :cry:

#266

offtopic: the title always reminds me of this song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tRx212PUa4g born in the usa by bruce springsteen

#267

I have to admit I was a bit shocked to learn how many people seem to still care about talking on the phone outside of a business setting.
I can’t even remember the last time someone dared to call me on my private phone who wasn’t a scammer :rofl:

1 Like
#268

Wow! Thank you for the technical background on wireless bands and the phone situation here. I love to know the reasons behind the symptoms I observe.

I will say that I have occasionally experienced the 2.5G coverage issues, but for the most part 4G works nicely on my 10iii.

I live in a Chicago suburb, so I know helps. But I travel a modest amount. During commutes, I make many voice telephone calls. I’ll have a conversation for an hour or more. Once on a drive Chicago to Detroit, I talked to someone for four hours. TMO dropped the call exactly at three hours. Redialed and continued for another hour.

But that is along highways.

Yesterday drove to North Carolina. Streamed a recording of live prog rock concert and other than in the mountain passes in NC, the music played uninterrupted. Yes buffering helps conceal the tower-to-tower handoffs.

I have occasionally (1 per 6 weeks maybe) instances where I get a voicemail indication whereas my phone didn’t ring. Now I understand that is probably band 4 being full. Makes sense! Ty!

In Austin, TX, if I’m down in a valley and then go into a building, I lose the 4G.

In rural parts of OR, once away from town or major roadway, yeah, lost signal there where my wife’s Android 5G still had signal.

In big convention centers if I have a lot of structure between me and towers, I’ve lost signal. i question the cell repeaters in those buildings, do they do 5G only now?

Overall, I suppose my travel habits keep me along major roads and near cities where I get 4G. Enough that 10iii is and has been daily driver. I’ll definitely jump on whatever new 10? that’s supported and encourage anyone thinking about it to do so as well. If someone is on the fence, I still have a couple 10ii’s still sealed and am willing to ship one for someone to use to test for their usage patterns.

But I sure wish that Sony would once again develop a US-targetted variant to work upon the freqs here.

3 Likes
#269

It’s great to hear of the practical experiences on SFOS in the US. Now with the OS release 4.6 Sauna announced with 5G support, what kind of improvement should a user of an European 10 III (xqbt52) expect in practice - are there similar frequency issues on 5G as well?

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#270

I’m not an expert, but if the device is available in your country, it should work fine. If not, it’s a bit of a gamble.

#271

This site is particularly useful to check phones vs countries and networks for compatibility or lack thereof.

#272

For those who have upgraded to Sauna and are connecting to T-Mobile in the USA, how is it going? I upgraded and even when my 10iii says I’m on 4G, I can’t make or receive calls. I inputted that I prefer 5G but have yet to see the 5G connection illuminate…

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#273

(ah wait, now it’s registering 4G LTE and I can make although not receive calls. Still no 5G though…)

1 Like
#274

Are you on a 5G-enabled package? I’m discovering at my EU service provider that I might need to be upgrading my service package to get 5G (whatever it means, but probably a new SIM, too), doubles the monthly base charge :thinking:

#275

5G support will not work on 10III for T-Mobile.
10III 5g bands: n1, n3, n7, n8, n28, n77, n78
T-Mobile USA 5g bands: n41, n258, n260, n261, n71

however, 10 V adds the band n41, so we will EVENTUALLY get SOME 5G coverage

5 Likes
#276

we’ll just have to pay subscription for it… ok. thanks!

#277

I have selected Prefer 5G, but get no indication of 5G service, and I’m in a Chicago suburb - so not like there isn’t 5G available here! I’m on a family package with all phones being 5G-capable/enabled in T-Mobile. Well, maybe mine isn’t yet. I’ll call and ask.

#278

And now I read the next message and find the answer to the question, thus saving me a call to T-Mobile for this. I’ll set back to Prefer 4G and maybe my MMS settings will work again. Thank you!

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#279

MMS send/receive of photos not working. I called TMO tech support and they are submitting a ticket to tier 2 again. I’ll keep everyone updated.

How is MMS send/receive working for other T-Mobile U.S.-based users who have upgraded?

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#280

:frowning: that is alarming, thank you for the update.

#281

US Mobile on white SIM (GSM-T / TMobile) seems to be able to be configured and make calls via VoLTE with the 10ii and 10iii for me. SMS working normally. As usual, MMS is problematic and sometimes requires jumping off WIFI and VPN to successfully download messages.

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