Are all Verizon LTE capable phones unlocked?

[TurtleCrusher]

Hello everyone,

I just bought a Verizon branded Galaxy Note Edge from ebay that didn't say it's unlocked. I thought all Verizon LTE phones were unlocked. Is this the case? I have metroPCS (T-Mobile).The ESN should be clean for this phone. It's a seller that's sold thousands of the same refurbished phone.

Thanks in advance.

 

[Mike64]

The only potential carrier-lock-related issue I can think of involves exactly when Verizon stopped locking their devices entirely, and I don't remember when that was. The Edge was released in September 2014, so if they started after that, you might have to get an unlock code or something, but I don't that should be a problem even if it means a minor hoop to jump through... The only other question is whether TMobile/MetroPCS uses frequencies the VZW-branded model of the Edge can handle, and I have no idea about that. GSMArena can probably help there, both as to the phone's bands and the ones T-Mobile operates on...

 

[Kazukian]

ALL Verizon LTE capable phones have been unlocked.

 

[Oyeve]

You just need to put in the right tmobile APN settings.

 

[TurtleCrusher]

Thank you everyone for your responses. I will assume the phone is unlocked as it seems all reports (forum posters) I'm seeing of the Note Edge was able to change carrier pre Q1 2015 with just popping in the sim card. It's just the eBay page is contradictory to that fact.

https://www.frequencycheck.com/carr...-galaxy-note-edge-xlte/t-mobile-united-states

The link above shows exactly which bands it has and there are a few bands missing (one 3G, two of the LTE) but should work. I get great reception with TMobile where I live, so hopefully it is those bands. I was in need of a phone that has more than a 1.3Ghz A53 core performance. The Blu Life One X just wasn't cutting it for many things, despite being an octocore. For $190 I hope it's a big step up.

 

[TurtleCrusher]

The only potential carrier-lock-related issue I can think of involves exactly when Verizon stopped locking their devices entirely, and I don't remember when that was. The Edge was released in September 2014, so if they started after that, you might have to get an unlock code or something, but I don't that should be a problem even if it means a minor hoop to jump through... The only other question is whether TMobile/MetroPCS uses frequencies the VZW-branded model of the Edge can handle, and I have no idea about that. GSMArena can probably help there, both as to the phone's bands and the ones T-Mobile operates on...

http://www.cellmapper.net/map?MCC=3...&showUnverifiedOnly=false&showLTECAOnly=false

I'm seeing my city having exclusive Band-4 T-Mobile LTE, so the missing band I don't think will have much effect.

 

[TurtleCrusher]

The phone ended up being unlocked, but I did have to fiddle with the APN settings a bunch to get MMS and LTE to work. Here they are for future reference to those who may have been in the same boat.

Name: MetroPCS
APN: fast.t-mobile.com
MMSC: http://mms.msg.eng.t-mobile.com/mms/wapenc
Multimedia Message Port: 80
MCC: 310
MNC 260
APN Type: default,mms,supl,hipri

All other values are default
My default for APN protocols were both ipv4

This is essentially T-Mobile APN settings and not MetroPCS as their values didn't work at all. I do believe, however, that these come with unrestricted speed. I only got 20mbit down and 8mbit up with my iPhone using MetroPCS (non-configurable settings), but now I'm getting speed tests of 55mbit down and 40mbit up despite having fewer LTE bands.

 

[Kazukian]

Good work, you're a 1%er of cell phone users.