Australian customers

Hi there,

I live in Australia and have the opportunity to buy a Fairphone 2 from the online store (in the next two days!).

Will the Australian electicity voltage (230V 50Hz) effect the charging of the phone?

Should I use an Australian charger or a European charger with an Australian adapter?

Thanks for your thoughts!

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In Europa we also have electicity voltage (230V 50Hz). So there should be no problem with charging.
A charger for the Fairphone 2 needs to have the following specifications:
5 volts (5V)
1 ampere (1A, 1000mA) or more
micro USB Type B connector

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Is Australia using the same 2G/3G/4G frequencies as in Europe? I don’t have it at hand but maybe somebody else knows?

Have a look here.

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Are you going to get it through a European friend? You know Fairphone doesn’t ship to Australia?

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Maybe buying at one of the #resellers?

@nicolag
Should that be the case, it might be really helpful for other customers, if you share your experience here on the forum.
Especially: Where did you buy and how was customer support.
Thx in advance.

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There is no charger included with the FP2, you have to use your own micro-USB charger - so you can get one from your own country. Phone chargers tend to support a wide range of systems though, they’re commonly labeled ‘100-240V 50-60Hz’, so it doesn’t matter that much.

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Thanks for the advice all.
Update: my fairphone 2 arrived last week and everything is working fine except the SIM card. I can’t seem to get my Vodafone sim working. I also tried a Telstra sim and that didn’t work either. Does anyone have any ideas why the SIM cards aren’t working? I live in Sydney and both sims are prepaid. I bought the FP2 unlocked from The Phone Coop in the UK.

At which stage is it ‘not working’? There should be an icon in the top drawer showing: either your operator’s name, or a message such as “emergency calls only” or another error.

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This is strange. Were there any changes in mobile networks in the last 2 years? I was in Australia in 2016 and my prepaid Vodafone data SIM card worked perfectly in NSW, South Australia, Northern Territory and Queensland. Even 4G worked.

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They switched off 2G recently.

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It appears many networks in Australia operate on the 700MHz and 850MHz frequency bands which the FP2 does not support, but according to Wikipedia, this page and this page, the 3G networks of Vodafone and Optus operate on compatible bands.

For 4G the lower frequencies (usually used in rural areas) do not work with the FP2, but the 1800MHz and 2600MHz usually used in cities should work. I expect no problems given you live in the biggest city of your country!

(See https://shop.fairphone.com/en/ for the frequency bands supported by the phone, where ‘WCDMA’ is 3G).

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I have been using FP2 in Australia since September, with Optus. It is fine mostly, I get reasonable 3G signal at home (as good as it gets with a fairly patchy coverage in rural area around the ACT) and good 4G in bigger centres. In an area close to us, Optus apparently has recently discontinued one of the frequencies (not sure which yet) which means I don’t have much reception there but still rural is mostly OK. The problem is finding out which frequencies are used in which areas; the Optus coverage maps will only tell you where your device will work and they don’t have FP on the list - you can put in an IMEI as well I believe but of course that means you already have the phone…not much point.

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