yashsingh1/xdaforums huggingface dataset:
[Galaxy S II General] AllGamer:
because both Wind Mobile and Rogers have not yet fully released the 4G

it's still in testing stage

there is no one in Canada that is offering 4G to the public yet, so you only get 3G until the open up the 4G to the public

there are a lot of news about this in Google News, you can read up on it when you have time
[Galaxy S II General] AllGamer:
yes expensive one too, but nothing as crazy compared to the UPS the brown crap service

FedEx is definitely the most reliable and affordable service of them all

i usually either choose FedEx or Royal Mail (Canada Post) for parcels
[Galaxy S II General] nox156:
4G, according to carriers is both HSPA+ and LTE which are miles apart in terms of technology. HSPA+ is deployed Canada wide expecially in large urban areas, you can see Rogers map at the following link

http://www.rogers.com/web/content/w...nsumer_Wireless_Eng-_-Network_0909-_-coverage

LTE, on the other hand, is set to be released sometime at the end of this year but the GS2 does not support the technology.

In terms of theoretical bandwidth

HSPA: ~7.5mbps

HSPA+: ~21mbps

LTE: ~50mbps when it's deployed in canada (I think)

basically, the GS2 should be able to utilise the HSPA+ capabilites of the Bell and Rogers network and have around 12mbps down in large cities which is not what has been reported thus far in this thread
[Galaxy S II General] Mr.Kakarot:
best I seen was 5 down and 4 up.... they can advertise those speeds as much as they want, but i doubt they can or will deliver them....
[Galaxy S II General] nox156:
it really depends on where you are at and how far from a cell tower you are.

I tried an xperia arc for a week in montreal last week and was getting 7.5 down 2 up or something like that on HSPA.

I am less interested by the speed but rather by a speed increase since this phone is supposed to be HSPA+. 7.5 down is still descent but I was wondering if you could pass the 10 by getting a SGSII :)
[Galaxy S II General] AllGamer:
there is a news update

http://mobilesyrup.com/2011/05/07/rogers-to-officially-become-a-4g-hpsa-network-on-may-9th/

apparently Rogers will officially be turning on 4G
[Galaxy S II General] nox156:
if you read the post though, it's simply a name change to align the name with the International telecommunications union stardard.

The technology is already deployed, LTE is the next step and it's coming Q4 2011
[Galaxy S II General] MaelstromXC:
Brokerage feed is already included in FedEx shipping from UK. You only have to pay tax (eg, HST if you are in BC or ON).
[Galaxy S II General] np231:
How did you manage to pay just $720? Did you have to pay taxes?

I'm guessing that you will be receiving additional tax charges afterwards.
[Galaxy S II General] shabs52:
I got it from clove for about 450 pounds. It was shipped Wednesday and I got it on Friday. Courier was DHL and they charged me about $97 in fees. This is duty and customs I believe, not HST as the couple times I called them regarding charges I was told both times specifically there isn't HST on this.

As for download speeds, yeah ... I'm not getting anywhere near what its supposed to be getting. But I'll blame that on Rogers where when they say upto... you never get that speed. lol.
[Galaxy S II General] ankushkatari:
@AllGamer:

Are you waiting for the GS2 to be released by T-Mob or did u buy the UK version? I was asking as you are on Wind. Just curious cause i want to buy one. Thanks
[Galaxy S II General] AllGamer:
yes, waiting for the Tmob USA version

according to several leaks, if all goes well it might be end of June for Tmobile USA, but i'm skeptical

it might take longer if they yet again releases a "crippled" version of the SGS2 like they did with the SGS1
[Galaxy S II General] ptscon:
I would be surprised if US TMobile picked it up. They are already getting Sensation which will be their flagship Android device.
[Galaxy S II General] K3VL4R:
What data plans are you guys using for your phones?

Can you just get a new sim and use it on your existing data plans or do you have to go month to month ?

MTS/Rogers has the iPhone and unlimited data plan that I wanted on this phone and they are giving me a hassle getting it set up.

I thought that I could just get the second sim card activated for the SG2 and then sell the iPhone.

Well now I am pissed because I have this phone and cannot get an unlimited data plan for it.

First one to help that gets my SG2 activated on the MTS iPhone unlimited plus plan gets 20 CAD via paypal, that is how bad I want this thing working.

PS. I currently have a phone but do not have a data plan with MTS.
[Galaxy S II General] aridoasis:
I got the same scenario, ordered from Clove as well, and paid the same fees.

As for HSPA+, I did a speed test and while shwoing H+ and full signal bars and only got 3+ Mbps up and 1+ Mbps down. It's possible that they capped this since on my original plan, the mobile device registered is an N86 which only supports up to 3.6 Mbps UP speed.
[Galaxy S II General] QAM:
Hola

Incorrect with the CAN$9x fees and what this is for. I shipped my SGS2 via FedEx and I went to the local FedEx warehouse at Pearson airport to pickup this baby (yes yes I couldn't wait for the delivery van) and I paid CAN$99.02 as taxes on the device. There was no brokerage/processing fees due to the type of shipping used by Handtec.

BUT the point remains is that the ~CAN$99 extra is due to HST, at least this is for Ontario, not sure about the other provinces...
[Galaxy S II General] umermajeed:
Do you guys know how warranty works for these UK S2 handsets in canada? We can just use receipt and get them repaired in canada or send them to UK?
[Galaxy S II General] Little Dragon:
Good to know...so ont. residents are pretty much paying an extra bill on this cuz of the HST..

Curious, how/where did you pick it up at Pearson? And how were you sure it arrived there that day?
[Galaxy S II General] PearsonDKA:
Same thing I'm looking to find out.

Stalking the forums from my Captivate
[Galaxy S II General] ngo8:
ok so i am assuming you are from winnipeg? MTS is cdma based you cant make the GS2 to work on mts only on rogers/fido ...if you are on rogers just put in youre sim card and it works great didnt even have to put in any apn settings like i had to do on my bell galaxy s .... i got my GS2 on tuesday paid like $964 on ebay had it preordered for 2 weeks and so far its amazing works great on rogers in winnipeg .
[Galaxy S II General] Elythor:
Just to share my experience.....

I got my SG2 yesterday from Clove. Ordered last Friday right before Clove went OOS, arrived Wed. I chose the slightly more expensive Airsure(TM) option instead of DHL. I came home and found the phone in my mail box delivered by Canada Post. I didn't get a bill for tax/duties.

So if you live in high sales tax province then this may be a good alternative to save a bit of money. (assuming Canadian Customs don't come knocking on my door)

Down side with Airsure is that once the package leaves UK...you can't track the it anymore. The Royal Mail website just says the package has been handed over to postal services in Canada. I tried the Canada Post website to track my phone using the tracking number from Clove and it didn't work. So I was definitely anxious for the last few days.
[Galaxy S II General] twigggs:
I got mine shipped from Hantec overnight and I didn't have to pay anything extra. I waited for the delivery guy to bring it and that was it. $719 after everything.
[Galaxy S II General] twigggs:
I don't know but I haven't got anything yet from anyone about any additional fees.

I will let everyone know as soon as I get a bill from Fedex and how much it was.
[Galaxy S II General] Silent8Strike:
I'm looking forward to finding out if there are extra fees as well. I ordered from Handtec tonight and took the FexEx option for shipping, so I hope get their stock soon. For anyone else that ordered from them with FedEx and live in Ontario, how long did it take to arrive once it was shipped?
[Galaxy S II General] Little Dragon:
Im pretty sure fedex will charge you.

Twiggs, are you in ontario as well? The thought of paying an extra $100 on top of everything for this sexy beast saddens me. What shipping option did you choose?

Elythor, good to know at least. I'll keep clove in mind now
[Galaxy S II General] ptscon:
FedEx and DHL mail the bill instead of collecting at delivery time. The least you will have to pay are the taxes.
[Galaxy S II General] ptscon:
Nice, looks like you got lucky. With Canada Post there's always a chance of not getting charged anything.

What was the package marked as on the outside?
[Galaxy S II General] twigggs:
It was sent fedex priority and arrived the day after it was shipped.

Yes I live in Ontario.
[Galaxy S II General] fastmhc:
Just from experience, I had something shipped through DHL and they sent me the fees later in the mail. I was pissed so I didn't pay it (20 dollars worth) and then they called collections. Royal mail im not too sure though. Sometimes it depends on customs. When i get stuff though fedex though i always get charges taxes or duties however, USPS to Canada post only sometimes charges.
[Galaxy S II General] Elythor:
On the customs declaration form it says "Handheld computer" :confused: Weight 0.4 kg, total value 440.

And no, it doesn't say "gift".
[Galaxy S II General] Silent8Strike:
Wow thats some fast shipping, now I'm happy I dont have to wait so long to get this awesome phone :D.
[Galaxy S II General] Elythor:
Speed test

Just wondering if anyone has ran speed test with their new SG2. I'm with Telus and when I got my SIM for the SG2 (I came from cdma HTC Diamond), the Telus rep told me I should be able to experience "4G" speeds.

And indeed..when I plugged in the SIM I do see the data indicator switching between 3G / H+. I ran Speedtest and my DL/UL speeds range from 0.30Mbps/0.78Mbps to as high as 5.70/2.90. The high range is only achievable at my workplace which is right beside the telus cell tower.

Anyone want to share their data speeds?
[Galaxy S II General] ngo8:
when the fed ex guy showed up at my door on tuesdsay i payed $20.31 which was fine .
[Galaxy S II General] K3VL4R:
Thanks for the reply. I am in rural Manitoba. As for the HSPA+, it is running mostly on the MTS towers, just that Rogers merged funds with MTS for the CDMA to HSPA+ upgrade so Rogers gets to use the MTS towers Manitoba wide now.

I did go on a non blackberry data plan and everything works fine (without needing APN settings, like you say). My main concern was trying to get the GS2 working on the iPhone unlimited plan since it is unlimited, and the plan I am on now is (soft) capped at 10GB.

Being new(er) to the phone modding community, I was wondering if it were possible to get the iPhone and unlimited plan and then switch the plan over to the GS2 somehow. Not sure if it is legal, or even possible, to clone the iPhone Sim to the GS2 Sim to make that work. Or maybe sweet talk the phone rep or any other ideas, or is it not going to work at all ? It is not a big deal to have it, I would just like the unlimited data for laptop tethering that's all.
[Galaxy S II General] ngo8:
You dont have to call anybody just put you're. simcard in the GS2 and use you're plan the way it is the only problem is that the icrap 4 uses those stupid smaller sim cards and need a micro sim card converter and you are good to go all the apn settings set up automatically hope it helps.
[Galaxy S II General] K3VL4R:
Thanks for the good news, it would be good if I could do as you say. Part of my reasoning for buying this SG2 was that the iCraps are selling for lots on fleabay and that was supposed to cut costs of the SG2 by selling the iPhone.

Now I want to believe you but I would hate to get locked into a 3 year plan if it did not work, so could I check if it would work by taking a friends iPhone sim (phone is on the plan that I am looking at) and putting it in my SG2 ? It would already be set up with the same APN as my phone is. The micro sim has the same pin locations, I would just have to align it manually to match up the 3 channels with the pins on my phone (to simulate having the adapter).

I have heard of dropping a sim in a new phone and have it working, but was kind of hesitant in case the carrier had some way of marrying a sim to the phone (like they do with satellite dish receivers) to prevent swapping phones.

I am kind of new in this area of tech, so I apologize for all the questions and do appreciate the help.
[Galaxy S II General] HTCinToronto:
The carriers only know your device if you're using one of their phones. That's because they've the IMEI on record for support, warranty and theft.

They're blind to an outside phone. I put my old N1 on an iPhone plan. Support once noted I no longer had the iP. I told I lost it and had to get another from Apple.
[Galaxy S II General] K3VL4R:
Thanks for the info.

Did your iPhone come locked to Rogers ? I know someone who works at the store and may be able to get the phone without taking it out of the box. Just wondering if it would be worth more locked to a carrier but in a sealed box, or unlocked in an opened box. Unlocked in an sealed box would be the best though I suppose. I guess it depends on the carrier, so I can check a friends iPhone from the same carrier to see if it is carrier branded.
[Galaxy S II General] LunarStrain:
:D Bought my SGS2 Yesterday at Handtec , they are still OOS but , i'm still hoping ill have mine soon :)
[Galaxy S II General] Beast11:
I saw a guy with the SGS2 a couple days back in Mississauga, so I went up to him and asked him where he got it and stuff.

He said he works at bell and is doing testing on the device and they are looking at a June-July release. Thats basically all... and let me check it out breifly. It made my day :D
[Galaxy S II General] peachpuff:
Nice......
[Galaxy S II General] ankushkatari:
Sweet news :)
[Galaxy S II General] Bakedbread:
cool news on the S2 possibly going to Bell

I'm curious if it's a variant like what they did with the Galaxy S1s..

that said, my order with handtec is still open from last week..I heard they're getting stock tomorrow though. Wondering if I should cancel...so much talk of a new model with NFC chip next month or the carrier picking it up..HMMM

But the price was steeper than i thought - my credit card got charged already and after conversion it looks like im paying 716$ CAD and most likely the extra $99 in taxes (I live in Ontario) when it comes :eek:

if only HST tax rates werent so high here :(
[Galaxy S II General] virtuatony:
Does anybody on Telus have problems with the Data staying connected?

On mine it says 3G then switches to H and close to a tower it will switch to H+, when browsing a few pages will load then after awhile and when going to another page it will say a page is unavailable, then it takes awhile like it has to reconnect.

Also after having WIFI on and connected for a few hours if I turn it off it will not connect to 3G data, and then the phone appears to lose signal and say no service and forget it's APN settings that it got automatically.

But it even forgets the APN I entered manually.

After a minute or so it reconnects and has the automatic APN settings along with the APN I entered manually.

It's done this out of the box when using with my Telus microsim.

Updating from firmware KDD to KE2 hasn't changed anything in regards to this issue, so I'm just hoping someone might know what's going on.

Thanks
[Galaxy S II General] Techvir:
THis issue has been reported by others. If i recall correctly some users with ATT have this issue as well.
[Galaxy S II General] ngo8:
K3vlar 2 years ago when i got my nexus one which was my first android device i took out my sim card from myu iphone 3g and put it in and everything worked fine with my current plan, the only thing i did was i called rogers and asked them to switch my iphone pack to a smartphone pack cause i wasnt using the some of the features from the iphone anymore , now the rep asked me what device i switched to and told i have a nexus one which i got form the google site and she said thats fine its no problem everything else stays the same kept my 6 gig of data plan and my $30 plan all stays the same so dont worry to much .. :D;)
[Galaxy S II General] elena11:
I ordered from Expansys USA, but it will take 5-10 days because they are out of stock. It is the same situation with the UK retailers. I do not wish to wait till August for the Bell version, but if anybody knows if it would be worth waiting for please share the info. Thank you.
[Galaxy S II General] Beast11:
Nope, the phone was exactly the same as the Europe version hardware wise. (i didnt ask abt NFC but i'd assume it doesn't have it.) He said the software is still buggy which means bells is adding some of their own stuff. I hope they don't mess it up like they did with the SGS1...
[Galaxy S II General] elena11:
As much as I would like to buy it from Bell so I can have Canadian Warranty, I cannot wait.....till July or August. I spoke to a Bell CS and they toldm me August. SGS1 was released in August last year.
[Galaxy S II General] Little Dragon:
i don't think NFC is a big issue for us Canadians. i doubt we'd be using that technology in our daily lives as its not really implemented in our society as of yet
[Galaxy S II General] elena11:
Warranty is an issue. I had to send my I9000M three times for repair.
[Galaxy S II General] Beast11:
Thats true but with ICS we should be seeing new APIs for NFC and the ability for phone to phone communication. Payment in Canada is definitely very far off though.
[Galaxy S II General] Digital1325:
Just put my order in at Handtec.

Can't wait! Will update my post with any further charges they snag me with (expecting a huge HST bill).
[Galaxy S II General] phonex1:
Lots of people here in Toronto don't even know what paypass on their MCs means when that technology is now years old. NFC? Will take a long time for Canadians to get used to lol.

I am waiting for a Canadian/NA variant for warranty reasons. Don't want to deal with no warranty/having to wait long times etc. because of an international phone.
[Galaxy S II General] Beast11:
Any updates on people getting it in Canada?
[Galaxy S II General] Little Dragon:
there's another thread here:

http://forums.redflagdeals.com/sams...-added-rooted-overclocked-custom-rom-1035232/
[Galaxy S II General] QAM:
Hola

@Beast11

Lots of us have this lovely phone already... you'll have to search the Q&A or General sub-forums for other threads. I bought mine from Handtec and it was delivered pretty fast (I was lucky to have been part of the first batch of phones to be dispatched out). Total came up to about CAN$820 or somewhere around there, I had to pay a CAN$99.02 HST fee on top of the cost because I live in ON.

I would advice that you use FedEx, no real issues with them and you do NOT pay any brokerage fee due to the type of delivery Handtec uses.

I am with Rogers, I get 3G speeds but I use mostly wifi for my online access and very little mobile data.. I only have one of those 300MB/month plans so I need to watch it when I am on the road. I limit my mobile data to use 2G.

Hardware wise, it is the phone of the year indeed! But as with any such devices a few minor issues to deal with.. my biggest complaint would be battery life but then again I am a heavy to moderate user.

Oh one other suggestion... ensure you order a case of some sort. The entire body is plastic and can be dropped very easily.

Good luck on your purchase.
[Galaxy S II General] hansonator:
Ahh, but that is why we come here right. After flashing my first custom ROM I could never go back to stock.

I think I might be able to buy the sgs 2 when it hits bell and the wife won't be able to tell the difference from my sgs 1. :D
[Galaxy S II General] mindracer:
I got mine from ebay for 700$, paid no duties/taxes (was very lucky). It was a risk cause the seller only had a 7 rating but I couldnt pass it up, LOVE THIS PHONE!

But i have a huge problem with data usage and Telus, I posted a new thread about it 5 mins ago. Telus reports I use 30mb data and 3G Watchdog Pro said 11mb for the same time period. Ive had to turn my 3G off most of the time so I dont go over my data plan. :(
[Galaxy S II General] KableKiB:
Maybe that data was used before you were able to get 3G Watchdog Pro installed? See if there is still a 19MB difference after you use more data.
[Galaxy S II General] ptscon:
Ordered mine from Clove yesterday, my 2-year old Magic is too slow to be usable these days.

Don't feel like waiting 3-4 months for Rogers to release it. When/if Rogers gets it I'll get that on HUP and sell it to cover most of the cost.
[Galaxy S II General] Beast11:
Haha yea, but I went through two Bell SGS's b/c I guess they put in bad internal flashes. Each time the internal memory would go corrupt. I told my self I would never buy samsung again, then i saw the sgs2 :P Hopefully one of the carriers will release it soon.
[Galaxy S II General] blue265:
yeah the Bell i9000M was a failure. Sammy used cheap internal SD cards on those are they were notorious for dying and rather quickly (whether you installed custom roms or not). Other versions such as the international i9000 or the AT&T/Rogers Captivate did not generally have this problem.

I think Samsung learned from using a cheaper SD card though and we should be fine with SGS2.

I gotta say, I love my SGS2...amazing. It doesn't feel cheap quality to me, but maybe its just because I am used to sammy products. I actually like the feel of the battery cover too. I got mine from Expansys and if you check their website, you shouldn't be charged for any duties or brokerage as you are paying the 13percent up front. I didn't get charged any extras when I got mine. So even though Expansys looks to be more expensive than Handtec, you shouldn't be paying anything on top. With Handtec, expect to pay the taxes upon getting your package.

I don't want the carrier variants of this device this time. I'd much rather have the constant updated firmwares. I think my Captivate had one official firmware update through Rogers/AT&T wheres as the i9000 had a dozen or more over the past year. Sure, I was running GB on my Captivate but there are way too many issues running ported firmwares. Screw the variants! haha
[Galaxy S II General] Beast11:
But its $800 :| I can't spend that much lol... my limit is about 600.
[Galaxy S II General] Durvann:
Ordered it from Clove UK couple of days before release.

Took 5 days to get to Ottawa. Shipper was DHL (expensive) but only option.

Products

1 x Samsung Galaxy S II i9100 (16GB) (SAM-GALS2-T7, £440)

Paid around 950$ with taxes shipping and customs.

Im with Telus and according to Speedtest I get around 300-600kB/s download and 30-120kB/s upload.
[Galaxy S II General] yesh:
I ordered mine from Expansys-USA. Got it shipped there (in transit). Waiting for a friend to bring it to Canada.

Cost $ 725 US (750 + LSMAY25 Coupon) = $ 704 Canadian based on the rate I got when I converted cash to US for it.
[Galaxy S II General] Little Dragon:
just to reiterate: the SGSII SHOULD be cheaper once its announced for all carriers, correct? and i think that announcement is coming up in the next couple weeks..

..?
[Galaxy S II General] Beast11:
Yea it should. Bell released the SGS1 for $600 off contract, but you needed to be a bell customer, or know a bell customer. As for a couple weeks... no one knows... From the guy I met who was testing it for bell (see a couple pages back) I'd say end of July or early August...
[Galaxy S II General] ptscon:
I'm guessing $699 off contract. This is not a cheap device. Then you have to wait 3-4 months for them to actually get here.
[Galaxy S II General] Beast11:
Noooo wayyy... No phone has hit that high (other than the iPhone...) And all phones off contract in the US are 500. That being said, we live in Canada where the carriers rob us...
[Galaxy S II General] Techvir:
Canada

Pros - Get most of the handset with compatible network( big network have common compatiblity) . In US handsets gets divided between tmob / att / sprint and verizon and none of them are intercompatible for 3g

Con - handsets are often released late and higher priced

P.S : And canada has two cities among top 10 best cities to live and We have none. ;-(