What Is A Quad-band Cell Phone?

[FruitRocks 0]

I saw on a Chinese sight that they were offering quad-band phones. What is that? I've heard about dual-band phones, but never this. Does this mean that I can receive both CDMA and GSM signals? Thanks!

[kobra500 1]

The bands are the frequencies they can use. So triband has 3 frequencys, quadband has 4. and each band usually is assigned to a country or selection of countries. Its useful to enable roaming if you plan on visiting other Countries, quad band I think adds a few new Countries that wern't in the tri-band but this is just my understanding.

[Watermonkey 0]

That's actually a tough one and I'm not sure I'll get it right, but here goes: CDMA and GSM aren't mutually compatible. Your phone will either be able to operate on one or the other, not both. TDMA and GSM are compatible. I believe quad band would be 850Mhz, 900Mhz, 1850Mhz, and 1900Mhz and, if memory serves, the two lower frequencies are the unsecured analog TDMA bands that have been completely decommissioned here in N. America. General Moters' "On Star" used to operate on the 850 analog band because it travels far and wide in rural areas but a few years ago, when the FCC announced that that band would be pulled from carriers and given to military and paramilitary, they've had to upgrade their systems to the 1900 GPS band.