question

[..Gsus..]

i ahve heard in japan they dont have sims, rather sum kind of laser sim or sumthing. my friend came bak thi a jap fone... wen i went to put my sim in there there was no place to put it.. he sed sumthing like they had sum sorta laser technology or sumthing... is this true? how does it work if so

[timmy]

I haven't heard of this, but that's some pretty good tech.

[gracar]

i am no expert and correct me if i am wrong but in japan they have 3G netweorks which are also known as W-CDMA so they are not exactly GSM networks.... these networks have a virtual SIM and dont require a physical sim as in any other CDMA network....

[Jose_R.A.M]

sounds interesting. Hopefully they will eradicate sims because my stupid phone keeps saying "sim registration failed" and i got to turn it off and adjust the sim.

If they have no sim, how would they change their number if they decide to change it? (they wudnt beable to take it on hols right cos the bands are japan only no?)

They prob buy a new phone to get a new number! lol. must be amazin to live in japan,,,all that technology!

[3gpeasy]

sounds interesting. Hopefully they will eradicate sims because my stupid phone keeps saying "sim registration failed" and i got to turn it off and adjust the sim.

Maybe, but wouldn't you miss the flexibility? Either i'm missing the point here, or "virtual sim" means only one subscriber identity per handset, ever. That'd be terrible!

[carcomptoy]

i am no expert and correct me if i am wrong but in japan they have 3G netweorks which are also known as W-CDMA so they are not exactly GSM networks.... these networks have a virtual SIM and dont require a physical sim as in any other CDMA network....
LOL I love how you guys would freak out if you couldn't change SIMs on the fly, because that's how CDMA networks run anyways (which many people have here in the US). But yes, Japan does run on W-CDMA but that's based on GSM technology, so they do use SIM cards, except they're called USIM cards...not much difference except for the 3G. They also use FOMA, which if you research on the other threads, is a different technology that also uses W-CDMA but a different variant. And as for that, I'm not sure whether or not they do use some sort of SIM card or not...

[Jose_R.A.M]

Maybe, but wouldn't you miss the flexibility? Either i'm missing the point here, or "virtual sim" means only one subscriber identity per handset, ever. That'd be terrible!

yeah, i thought about that, hence the 2nd bit of the thing u quoted! lol. :p

They should have a virtual sim, which is unique to the phone like the imei (or whatever) number but also a sim card slot, and somehow the phone can accept both numbers ....

[carcomptoy]

Why doesn't someone just ask someone who lives in Japan directly to verify this "laser SIM" "virtual SIM" busines! Like maybe someone on eBay:p...especially the ones selling the Vodafone 702NK (the Nokia 6630 by sane standards...I hate it when telcos rename phones to make it sound like it's theirs)

[Jose_R.A.M]

Why doesn't someone just ask someone who lives in Japan directly to verify this "laser SIM" "virtual SIM" busines! Like maybe someone on eBay:p...especially the ones selling the Vodafone 702NK (the Nokia 6630 by sane standards...I hate it when telcos rename phones to make it sound like it's theirs)

I dont know that many japanese people...the only japanese people I know are over here and know nothing about what's happening tech wise back in japan :D

[fabarati]

well, i know that vodafone japanese UMTS phones have sim-cards.

[carcomptoy]

We know that much, but what about NTT DoCoMo? I'm so intrigued by them...they just lightyears ahead of everyone else, most especially the US :mad: I think though that they do use some sort of SIM card...in South Korea, even though they're on CDMA, they use RUIM cards which act like SIM cards except for their CDMA networks.

[fabarati]

they might for their foma phones, i don't remember... just checked my sources:p, they say they use simcards.

[Jose_R.A.M]

[QUOTE=carcomptoythey just lightyears ahead of everyone else,.[/QUOTE]

i was watchin old episodes of "the osbournes" when they went to japan..god did u see all them phones? ooof! all flippy super high tech! The public didnt use cameras, just their phones!!! only the photographers had them proper black big zoom lens ones.

Ive never seen a japanese person who own a "candy bar" phone.

omg!