Best iPhone Unlock

After many years of frustration, trying to deal with AT&T's appalling customer service and a series of technical issue, the time had come to get my phone unlocked so I could switch carriers. Unlocking an iPhone simply means breaking the technological tie between the hardware and the carrier. Once done, you can use your iPhone on any carrier’s network. In the case of the iPhone, this is achieved via a permanent iPhone iTunes unlock.

The main issue preventing you from unlocking your iPhone is the network themselves. In pretty much every case, they will insist your phone is out of contract and there are no fees owing on your account before they will even consider unlocking it. If you decide to upgrade to the latest model of iPhone when it's released, be aware that in doing so you are undoubtedly going to have to wait a further two years before you can unlock it.

But a friend of mine that is very knowledgeable on the subject of cell phone's and technology, advises me that there are options to your carrier providing an unlock. He has been using a third party iPhone unlocking service he found on-line, with the main advantage of doing so being, they impose no restriction on the age of the handset that they will unlock.

Coincidentally, at the same time I decided to unlock my iPhone, my partners employer dropped the long standing benefit of providing a phone, so we were suddenly in the market for a second smart phone for the very first time. In the process of due diligence, I looked into the cost of adding a second phone to my AT&T account even though I loathed the idea. We then went through the exercise of comparing all the major carriers individual and shared plans, and ever combination of each. By far the best deal was being offered by T-Mobile, much cheaper than AT&T, so a win for us. My AT&T plan included unlimited domestic data and voice, but charged me for texts. T-Mobile offered unlimited everything and the ability to share the plan between two handsets. How cool is that? We were able to get a free second smart phone, get a better plan, AND lower our monthly bills. But adding a second phone to my current AT&T plan stacked up to costing close to an extra thousand bucks a year!

With my iPhone now unlocked, how easy was it to change cellular service providers? The answer, pretty damn simple! Within 30 minutes of walking in, we were walking out with a fully operational, unlocked iPhone, and a brand new Samsung Galaxy, both of a single, shared plan costing less then my single handset plan on AT&T. An iPhone and a Samsung Galaxy, sharing the same T-Mobile plan, and saving us a decent amount of money as well - simply superb!

Typically, buying these individual SIM cards by country when you travel is the cheapest way to use your phone internationally. But the downside is that you have to do it every time, you get a new number every time, the directions might be dodgy, and you might not use the money you spend on pre-paid cards, especially if you are carrying the phone mainly for emergencies. There are many alternatives, including global and semi-global SIM cards that work almost everywhere or in the slate of countries you are likely to visit. The beauty with this option is you keep a single number while travelling.

Configuring data roaming while on the move can be a little tricky and may require the changing of settings on your phone with each SIM card change, but it's all very simple stuff. If you plan on travelling extensively overseas, I recommend setting up a international data plan in advance through someone like Telestial that can sell you the right product for your particular phone and walk you through the process. Alternatively you can go into a cell phone store abroad for assistance, but I wouldn’t recommend buying a card off the rack at a news stand and expecting your data to work seamlessly. You could also stick to WiFi for data and use a SIM card for only voice calling while abroad.

Say you love to vacation in one particular country. I chose England as random destination and took a look at the domestic offerings. For around $17 I could buy a local SIM card which comes with $11 of air-time and is rechargeable. Once you buy it you can use it forever. You get a local number, all incoming calls are free, including international, you pay the same rate for domestic calls as you would if you lived there, and international calls are dirt cheap - to the US you pay just 12¢ a minute. All these cards have no contract and no repeat charges.

Unlock iPhone

My decision to unlock my phone has paid serious dividends. In 5 months I've already saved $70 over my old monthly cellphone spend! I used a UK based website to unlock my iPhone, a company called iUnlox, that provided a very efficient service. As the unlocking process they provided was remote (and also permanent by the way), they were able to unlock my handset without it leaving my possession.