[Question] PANTECH VEGA IRON IM-A870L

[mvujnovicc]

Hi,
im new to the china phone market and just currently did some research and purchased an inew v3. It is a beautiful phone but i didnt think or expect 3G to be this disgusting slow (cant load up instagram or facebook or even google play). im located in canada, ontario, hamilton to be exact and my service provider is Rogers Wireless. i heard they run on 850/1900/1700/2100/2600 mHz. Anyways im looking to buy a PANTECH VEGA IRON IM-A870L or S or K series. NOW THE QUESTION, the phone claims to have 4G LTE and that its on 850/2100 mHz, so im ASSUMING itll work with me considering that im 10km (tops) away from 2 towers and that my network claims its on 850/1900/1700/2100/2600 mHz.

im trying to see if anyone;
1. has the phone so i can get a better insight about it
2. will it TRULY work on my service provider as LTE
3. any other phone suggestions from people on rogers wireless

Thanks everyone in advance

[lookylooky]

Another fellow Canadian,
Welcome to the forum!
I'm also in Ontario but I'm on Bell. The way Rogers works is they actually have 3 types of network. 4G, 3G (WCDMA), and 2G(GSM). Here is what I think is going on with your situation. You probably need a phone that supports 850 MHz WCDMA. If you phone doesn't support that or if it can't find a compatible frequency it will revert to 2G(GSM). The slow and almost useless speeds you described sound like Rogers GSM network which is really just a fallback network for voice and text.
I've heard some of the newer Inew V3's have been shipping with 900/2100 MHz WCDMA which is no good for Canada. This might be your problem.
My 3G speeds with Bell vary between 3-5MB/s which is plenty fast for doing anything with data. Your Rogers network is probably the same.
As far as I know Rogers are using 850/1900 GSM, 850/1900 WCDMA and 1700/2100/2600 for 4G.

Check this site and you will be able to see what bands are being used in your area.

http://www.ertyu.org/steven_nikkel/cancellsites.html

Let me know what frequencies are being shown for you and I can offer up some suggestions.

[mvujnovicc]

i got a 2100/2600 about 2km from my house and an 850/1900/2100/2600 about 15-18km away.
So i ended up risking it and buying the pan tech vega iron a870L, the specs say this; http://www.devicespecifications.com/en/c...on/712d243

CDMA - 1800MHz
CDMA - 2000MHz
LTE - 850MHz
LTE - 2100MHz

meanwhile rogers wireless runs on:
3G - 850/1900
4G - 1700/2100/2600

i bought this one to be specific off ebay;
PANTECH VEGA IRON IM-A870L White Factory Unlocked 32GB Quad 1.7GHz Smartphone

http://www.ebay.ca/itm/271428594300?ssPa...K:MEWNX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1439.l2649


so im assuming it would be a good match considering that 2100 and 850 match up

[lookylooky]

Looks like a really nice phone. Hopefully the needed frequencies line up for you.
Let us know all about the phone once you get it.

[mvujnovicc]

Okay so I received the phone in only 2 days from Korea!

Really happy about the shipping speed but not happy about the import charges.. i paid $402 CAN for it and they labelled the package as $300 .. i paid 124$ CAN for import.. that puts me at $526 CAN.. ANYWAYS the phone is so far amazing, 4G works, 3G works, everything is amazing.

The phone is a true 5inch screen with the "endless metal" bezel (all one piece no breaks for antennas like iphone 5). It has a good weight to it though, compared to the inew v3 @ 128g the Vega Iron is 154 g. The crystal cut out corner is simply genius, it flashes double and then waits 8 seconds and then flashes double etc etc but if you hit the unlock side button it'll flash again just to remind you if you didn't have your eyes on it in the first place. It takes a single sim card which is perfectly fine by me.

http://www.futuremark.com/hardware/mobil...ron/review

The phone comes in Korean but it has a similar start set up like the Samsung galaxy where it asks you first thing if you want Korean or English. It does come stock with some Korean applications like smart wallet to keep track of your NFC recorded cards like debit and credit, wish it was in English though it would be very useful.

NFC works, GPS is a charm, battery is amazing! BY THE WAY if you've never seen what comes with the Vega Iron it is very convenient and clearly its all about the customer for Pantech. you get the phone, manual, screen protector, surprisingly good headphones, white iPhone like micro usb cable, European wall adapter, 2 x battery with a separate charging dock just like the one Samsung offers for an addition $40! I was pleasantly surprised when i discovered this



If the phone is ever not on 4G network it is on full bars 3G so there is nothing to complain about connection issues. I have a white Pebble smart-watch and it connects beautifully to the phone and doesn't even drain the battery. i have to bus an hr to work and back everyday and from 100% the phone drops to about 96% of music play at full blast.

all in all, i am very pleased about this phone even though it is on the pricey side of the china phones. I haven't heard a lot about the Vega Iron IM-A870L online and doubt many people have either but it looks like Pantech chose Quality over Quantity as a business strategy. Also in recent news (about 3 days ago) Samsung has bought 10% of Pantech's shares for 48 million, clearly they are doing something right

If there are any questions or areas i have not covered and you'd like to know, feel free to ask and id be more than happy to answer them or even test things out if i haven't tried them

[lookylooky]

Sounds like you are very happy with it. I'm glad all the frequencies lined up for you.

[ostres]

all in all, i am very pleased about this phone even though it is on the pricey side of the china phones.

Well it is not China phone
I am glad that you are satisfied. I am also interested in Pantech phone, but problem is that they dont sell internationally so only way of claiming warranty is to send it back via supplier which cost and lasts long. If you pay that kind of money it would be good to have local warranty.
They make phones of same (if not better) quality like Samsung and LG but they are limited on local market.

Where did you order it from? Two day delivery sounds ubeliveable.

Sa srecom i da te dobro posluzi!

[mvujnovicc]

I purchased it off ebay with priority FEDEX from the ebay link i posted on the 2 reply on this thread I was extremely surprised and am in love with the phone, it comes with so many sneaky little features that are just smart for example if you pull down the notification tab and then plug in your headphones it will show in the notification tab a new line with "related apps" like music, mxplayer (if installed), video player etc. everything is customizable like the navigation bar design (4 button on screen, 3 button large, 3 button small, slide navigate, etc) to its look (stainless steel, black, white, black leather,etc) to the os from simple mode( windows sort of look-a-like design) to standard (custom UI on android 4.2.1) storage is great 32GB to added 64GB SD i get a SOLID 6-7 hrs of heavy screen time (half brightness with network and wifi on searching tumblr and instagram) and the phone has a second battery with the charger included.. i never run out of power honestly.

If there are any other questions feel free to ask

jel si srbin? :o i hvala, tebi isto!

[ostres]

Jesam, naslutio sam po potpisu prezime.

Thanks for detailed review! Pantech makes realy great phones, i hope that they
will get more available internationaly.
I only miss dual sim capabilities since i used to it.

[mvujnovicc]

Well clearly Pantech is doing something right for Samsung to buy 10% of their shares for 53 Billion ₩(KRN) which is approx. 48 Million $(USD). Pantech has outsourced its chips and LCD screens to Samsung giving them a unique bound/relationship. You can read more about it in this article. It doesn't really go into depth but its still interesting considering that Samsung is now one of the world's largest manufacturers.

http://www.talkandroid.com/162972-samsun...8-million/

Plus I have just learned that Android 4.4 KitKat OS came to the Pantech Vega Iron first right behind the Nexus while other brands were/are still waiting :o

http://au.ibtimes.com/articles/506538/20...zAxEahdVFs