Japanese Phones

Ever since DoCoMo released its 905i series, I’ve noticed there has been a huge demand for these phones and its predecessors. This was because these phones are able to be used outside of Japan, something not many Japanese phones was able to do before. Being a phone lover, I’m glad a lot more people are beginning to understand the appeal of a Japanese phone.

Before going to Japan, I had a Nokia N70 which was a pretty good phone. It made and received calls/messages, played music, took pictures etc, basically, it had everything I needed and I thought it couldn’t get better than that. That is till I went to Japan..

When I arrived in Japan, rather than feeling shocked, I was sad because kids and grandmas were sporting better looking and more sophisticated phones than my good `ol N70. Not all of them of course but I still took quite a blow. I knew Japanese phones were pretty advanced but didn’t expect there’d be such a big difference… I fell in love ♡

I can hear the obaasan mocking me already

Japanese phones, or keitai as they’re called in Japan are kind of a pain to get if you’re a foreigner. The reason for this is because of the Fraudulent Usage of Mobile Phones Prevention Act (携帯電話不正利用防止法) that was enacted in April 2006 (I actually have no idea what it’s called in English so I loosely translated it to that). Anyway, the act states that when you apply for a mobile phone service, you need to provide them with valid documents that prove your identity. So you must be thinking, “So what? Sounds reasonable” and it is…. unless you’re a foreigner.

When I first arrived in Japan, the only form of identification I had was my passport but that can’t be used when applying for a contract. So I waited. After finishing my entrance exams, I get my student card and and also received my health insurance certificate, but the shop still refused my application for some reason. They needed proof that I will be living in Japan for more than 90 days and I thought my student card did that. Apparently not. I had to wait for my alien registration card to arrive till they finally allowed me to sign-up with them. So for a whole month I had to rely on pay phones. Wasn’t very fun.

I wasn’t the only one too. A few of the other foreign students encountered the same problem and we all went to different service providers. I went to DoCoMo while they went to Softbank and AU. Two of my friends had it even worse as they were minors (below 20 in Japan). They had to get a letter of consent from their parents in order to apply. One even waited till his 20th birthday passed before he got a phone. So for those of you who intend to sign up for a phone in Japan while on holiday and without proper identification, don’t do it! Unless of course, you can get a Japanese person to apply for you.

All in all, it wasn’t all that bad actually. I just wasn’t informed about the law and didn’t do enough research. I didn’t think they’d be that strict. But it was good in a way because I had a whole month to decide on which phone I wanted to get. After hours of thorough research online and checking out the phones in shops, I finally decided on Panasonic’s P905i, from DoCoMo’s 905 series line (latest at the time). Went to Yodobashi Camera in Umeda and signed up for a 2-year contract with DoCoMo. Take that obaasan!

My phone ♡

There were many reason why I chose this phone, large 3-inch+ display with stunning VIERA image processing, beautiful exterior design, 5.1 megapixel camera, 1-Seg TV, GPS etc etc. But the main and most important reason was because it supported GSM. Relatively unheard of at that time.

Yes, I wanted to continue using the phone even after leaving Japan. Before I got the phone, there were already a couple of bypass sims available for purchase online. These however weren’t really stable and were pretty expensive. I figured by the time I left Japan there would be better alternatives available and I was right.

A bypass sim is a sim which you place together with your network provider’s SIM card into your phone. This tricks the phone into thinking that you have a DoCoMo/Softbank SIM card. Older version required you to cut your SIM card so that they both fit into the SIM card slot but there are newer and thinner versions now that don’t involve disfiguring your SIM card.

After some more research, I narrowed down my choices to two bypass SIMs. The INEX SIM and i-Smartphone Hypersim. The INEX Sim is one of the first bypass sims to be released and is constantly improving with every new update. I decided to buy the i-Smartphone hypersim however, as the INEX Sim was a bit on the pricey side (about US$85). The hypersim cost me about US$35 and so far I’ve had no problems whatsoever.

One of the biggest drawbacks to using a Japanese phone outside of Japan is the need to perform CPR on your phone. As the name implies, your phone may sometimes experience a loss of reception which can only be resuscitated by performing CPR. To do this, you have to place your sim card into your CPR phone to regain reception. For this, you have to constantly carry along with you two phones, your keitai and your CPR phone because you’ll never know when it’ll happen.

This can be stopped however with anti-CPR hypersims that was released not too long ago. All you have to do to regain reception is to restart your phone. To make sure it’s the real deal, always remember to buy from a trustworthy seller (good record, recommended by many etc).

There are also some Japanese phones that do not require CPR at all, eg. the ever popular 902 and 903SH by Sharp. To unlock it, the phone’s firmware is flashed to an unlocked or hacked version, so there’s no need for a hypersim at all. There aren’t many phones which allow you to do this however, most of the newer models (DoCoMo/Softbank) require a hypersim.

I’ve tested my phone in three countries so far, Singapore(StarHub), Malaysia(Maxis, Celcom) and Australia(Vodafone, 3, Telstra). Was able to make and receive phone calls and SMS on all the networks mentioned. There were a few times where I had to CPR the phone but that’s expected.

Thinking of getting a keitai? I’ll go ahead and list a couple of pros and cons. (Applies mainly to DoCoMo phones)

Pros

Beautiful Design
I’m a sucker for flip phones and there just aren’t any good looking flip phones outside of Japan. The screen is either too small and/or the design is too bland.

Rarity
Not many people would go through the hassle of importing a Japanese phone which makes it kind of a rarity. I get asked all the time about my phone when I’m out, it’s starting to get a bit out of hand though. -_-;

LCD Display
Superior quality of the LCD display especially on the AQUOS and VIERA phones.

Japanese Input
This is handy for me because I send SMSes to Japan from time to time. Also, a lot of Japanese phones come with Japanese dictionaries. I guess you could use that for your Japanese studies and also to cheat in your Japanese exams……. I’m just kidding, don’t cheat~ If you do, it wasn’t my idea okay?

Cons

Reception Loss
The CPR issue. Loss of reception occurs when you’re moving from place to place and when the phone connects to other signal towers. It all depends on your location and network provider. So far I’ve gone for about more than a month without having to perform CPR on my phone. But with anti-CPR hypersims out now, I assume this wouldn’t be much of a problem anymore. Adding this here because a lot of hypersims out there still require CPR.

MP3 Support
Most Japanese phones do not offer MP3 support. If you want custom ringtones you will have to convert them to MMF or MLD format. Also, I was really disappointed when all the games, apps and ringtones I downloaded when I was in Japan wouldn’t work with my current SIM card. It seems DoCoMo locks the content to a specific SIM card.

T9 Dictionary
Japanese phones do not generally have T9 support. It took a while to get used to but now I’m so used to it that it felt weird when I tried to send an SMS using a friend’s phone. This may not actually be a con but I know how a lot of you rely on it so I thought I’d give you guys a heads up.

GPRS/3G Functions
Anything that requires sending/receiving packet data is unusable. Basically i-mode functions (mailing, GPS, web browsing etc.). There is also no MMS function on Japanese phones as they use mail to send pictures and messages. Additionally, 1-Seg TV does not work outside of Japan.

I’m sure there’s more but that’s all I could come up with at the moment.

I relied on my phone a lot in Japan, I used it to record TV shows, check the train schedule, buy drinks at the vending machine etc. So I am quite saddened now that it has lost more than half its functions. Its still a cool phone though.

Read through all the cons and still not deterred?

Decided to get a keitai? Well, the first thing you need to do is research. You do not want to buy a phone only to realize it doesn’t work in your country. The Japanese phone section on HowardForums is a good place to start.

Once you’ve set your eyes on a phone, it’s time to look for an importer. I personally haven’t seen any shops selling Japanese phones but there might be some out in your country. Because it largely depends on your location, I can’t give you a specific shop or person to go to. You’ll have to do a search at your local tech/phone sites or forums. If you can’t find any, your next best bet is purchasing it online through sites like eBay. Although I would only do this as a last resort since I find most of them are slightly overpriced.

Browsing the DoCoMo site is tempting me to get the newer models, but that would mean subsisting on bread and instant noodles for a few months. Look like I’ll just have to wait….

In the mean time I have this~

Panasonic 905i

Illuminated keypad

Previous wallpaper

Current wallpaper. My crappy picture quality doesn’t do it justice

Music player

TV mode

Those of you who already own a keitai, how do you like it? Any plans on switching soon?

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