Community

turesuh · ‎01-31-2017

Hello,

I am planning on buying a China phone, but would like to read about personal experiences any of you have had with a China phone under this network. It would be great if you could also write down the model number so that I may possibly buy one for myself in the future.

gipsyblues · ‎03-29-2018

The info re available bands is dead on

I have noticed that most Chinese phones at best will have only band 7 availbel which could be used in Canada

The minimum one needs for LTE is band: 2, 4, 5, 7

Look for the term international version - even then make sure it is a North American international version

domenicocortez · ‎02-07-2017

Archos, blackberry, apple, it's always the same thing : designed in France, in California, in Toronto, but all phones are made in China, even Samsung (South Korea) and Asus (Taiwan).

ckl · ‎02-07-2017

@WearySkyI guess that's true for most of their phones, but for the blu life one x2, if you open the back cover and read the fine print, it says "Made in China" but also says "Designed by BLU in Miami / Assembled in China"

So this may be their first phone which they designed themselves? I don't know.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O4d1HmxjK-Y

1:36 in the video you should see the fine print.

WearySky · ‎02-06-2017

@ckl wrote:
Many of the BLU products are "China" phones and it is reflected in the pricing. You can get them on Amazon. They are an American based company and their phones are designed to work with US networks, so the phones that support LTE should also work here.

I have a BLU Life One X2 and it works on PM LTE. It also works in China with a China Mobile SIM in the second slot, but that is 3G only as the LTE frequencies over there are different.

I'm not 100% certain, but I'm 99% sure that BLU doesn't actually manufacture any of their own phones. I believe they're all just rebadged Chinese phones (mostly, if not all, Gionee phones) with North American frequency support enabled.

ckl · ‎02-06-2017

Many of the BLU products are "China" phones and it is reflected in the pricing. You can get them on Amazon. They are an American based company and their phones are designed to work with US networks, so the phones that support LTE should also work here.

I have a BLU Life One X2 and it works on PM LTE. It also works in China with a China Mobile SIM in the second slot, but that is 3G only as the LTE frequencies over there are different.

BobbyBoucher · ‎02-03-2017

Lenovo Zuk Z2 - Amazing specs for the price (~$220 CAD). Easily best phone I've used.

Bought at Banggood.com, and it took about a month to show up. Link: http://www.banggood.com/Lenovo-ZUK-Z2-5_0-inch-4GB-RAM-64GB-ROM-Snapdragon-820-2_15GHz-Quad-core-4G-...

Edit: It is possibly the most slippery phone I've ever held, so get a case if you order the phone

I ran a couple of speedtests this morning on Public's network:

-16.18 Mbps download, 14.79 Mbps upload.

-17.13Mbps download, 13.18 Mbps upload.

There is a very active online forum for owners, with lots of articles on how to flash various ROM on the phone. There are quite a few people on there that have ordered from the same location: http://zukfans.eu/community/forums/zuk-z2.5/

thudoan63 · ‎02-01-2017

Depends what kind of phone specifically.

I use an "Asian market" phone (though not explicitly Chinese), the Lenovo K4 Note. Although it supports LTE in Vietnam where I got it, it does not support LTE in Canada. However HSPA+ (3G) works fine.

WearySky · ‎01-31-2017

@CalvinW wrote:
Most of the newer Chinese phones should support LTE,

This isn't really true. Unless you're only talking about high end flagship Chinese phones (and even then, not necessarily true). Unless a phone is specifically released in the North American market (OnePlus, some Huawei models, some Xiaomi "international" models, BLU, etc), chances are pretty good that it's only going to have spotty LTE support at best. Most common is for a ChinaPhone to only have band 7 (2600) LTE support. We're starting to see more band 4 support in some phones, which is definitely a plus for folks on Telus towers, but it's still not exceedingly common.

Tup · ‎01-31-2017

Might help if you told us which China phone you were considering. There are several China based phones that are pushing high end specs. They are trying to offer flagship level phones for lower prices (think One+ or Xiaomi). These would have decent product support and should work without problem. Some of the super inexpensive ones might have some issues such as reliability or functionality but that is the risk you take when buying super cheap anything.

CalvinW · ‎01-31-2017

Most of the newer Chinese phones should support LTE, but you should always double check to be sure they have the right bands. I tried my Huawei Mate 8 and it works great!

arkw · ‎01-31-2017

I would make sure from various sources that the exact phone model has the correct bands. There is a lot of copy pasted product info, especially for China phones that have multiple sub model variants for different areas, etc.

As much as I understand the allure of Chinese smartphones meant for the China/Asia market, I got burned before buying a China phone for less money but only bands for 3G. I should of done more research for sure. However, for a lot of people, 3G is totally fine.

Also something I've noticed is that the cameras for many of the phones are really really bad. Not all, the performance on some of these are terrible.

Websites to check, but there are definitely more out there.

http://willmyphonework.net/

https://www.frequencycheck.com/

http://www.gsmnation.com/operator/compatibility/calculator/