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From: Frank Krygowski <frkrygow@sbcglobal.net>
Newsgroups: rec.bicycles.tech
Subject: Re: Colnago C60
Date: Wed, 8 Jan 2025 23:08:05 -0500
Organization: A noiseless patient Spider
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On 1/8/2025 7:43 PM, Jeff Liebermann wrote:
> On Tue, 7 Jan 2025 23:01:43 -0500, Frank Krygowski
> <frkrygow@sbcglobal.net> wrote:
> 
>> On 1/7/2025 4:46 PM, Jeff Liebermann wrote:
>>> On Thu, 22 Aug 2024 20:02:16 -0400, Frank Krygowski
>>> <frkrygow@sbcglobal.net> wrote:
>>>
>>>> To tell another anti-AT&T tale: The first time we went to continental
>>>> Europe, we (or rather, my wife) had a flip phone through AT&T. I called
>>>> AT&T support to ask whether the phone would function in Europe. The tech
>>>> support guy I got told me it absolutely would, no problem at all.
>>>>
>>>> Of course when we landed, we found the phone was useful only as a
>>>> paperweight. IIRC, the phone wasn't even capable of dealing with the
>>>> frequencies that Europe used. And when I took it into a cell phone store
>>>> of some kind, asking if something could be done to make it work, the
>>>> tech guy there said "We've never even seen a phone like this one!"
>>>>
>>>> Ah well. We got by for six weeks anyway, mostly by using internet cafes.
>>>
>>> Approximately what year was your visit to Europe?  Which countries?
>>> Any clue as to the maker and model number of the flip phone?
> 
>> That visit was 2007. Poland, Czechia, Austria, Italy and Switzerland.
> 
> OK, no maker and model of flip phone.  So, I have to guess.  2007
> would probably be a 3G phone.  LTE was initially introduced in 2009
> with a fairly small number of cell sites.  By about 2009, there were
> sufficient LTE sites available to offer service in metro areas.
> Anyway, with an AT&T phone made before 2007, my best guess(tm) would
> be it was a 3G phone using GSM, GPRS or EDGE.  I'm not sure this will
> help, but it does show some of the possibilities:
> <https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4a/Cellular_network_standards_and_generation_timeline.svg>
> 
>>> Europe switched from 2G and 3G to 4G (and now some 5G) protocols,
>>> which also included some added bands.  Shutting down the 2G and 3G
>>> networks is still work in progress.
>>>
>>> "A Complete Overview of 2G & 3G Sunsets"
>>> <https://1ot.com/resources/blog/a-complete-overview-of-2g-3g-sunsets>
>>>
>>> My guess(tm) is your flip phone was 2G or possibly 3G which is why it
>>> didn't work on a 4G network.  However, since this was AT&T, it's
>>> possible that the SIM chip that AT&T sold you was misprogrammed,
>>> incorrectly activated or just plain defective.
>>
>> If the SIM card were bad in that way, would it work in the U.S.?
> 
> Maybe.  I used "defective", as in electrically broken.  Is that what
> you meant by "bad"?  The SIM could be setup for the correct protocol,
> but the wrong frequency bands, system ID, etc.  It only takes one
> programming error, and it won't work or do something strange.
> Similarly, it also could be a provisioning error at the cellular
> providers end.  Only one way to do it right, but plenty of ways to do
> it wrong.
> 
>> The phone was fine at home.
> 
> I assume that means it was fine using the original USA SIM and not the
> European SIM.

It never got a European SIM. Understand, back in those days I knew 
approximately nothing about cell phones. The phone was my wife's, used 
almost entirely for her job. I may not have known what a SIM card was. 
As I said, AT&T promised the phone would work perfectly as is. The 
European cell phone store staff told me it could never work.

Ah well. It's all electrons over the dam now.

-- 
- Frank Krygowski