This is  the first time I've ever tried to use a mobile phone for web
access etc so hopefully the problems are just due to my total lack of
understanding how to configure cell phones,but.....

Our carrier is Cingular Blue. The phone is an unbranded, unlocked, Moto
v635 purchased as a full retail package. The phone works great for
sending and receiving calls, text messaging, etc with my SIM card. We
bought the quad-band phone (850-900-1800-1900) for temporary use in
India with a region-specific SIM card and then permanent home-use here.
As with all new phones, it has these wonderful internet capabilites so
I thought we'd give them a try in case we decide down the road to take
advanatge of them.

Configuring the phone for internet use has been a nightmare. No matter
what we do the error message is always the same: GPRS Network Not
Available. The multi-language manual is of little help. The
instructions are no where near detailed enough. The closest
instructions that Cingular has on their site for internet configuration
is for the v551. I talked to the kid at the Cingular store and he said
that locked phones are specially built for Cingular and that unlocking
them or buying non-carrier specific phones won't work nowadays for
internet use because the phones are basically custom built with special
chip-sets that can't be modified. There is also carrier-specific
software that will only work with their network (maybe that's what he
meant by special chip-sets). So I contacted Motorola and they basically
confirmed what he had said. Branded phones have custom-built hardware
that can't be modified so that all of the internet features are
avaiable. In my case, absolutely none of the internet features are
available unless you consider text messaging an internet feature. So,
following that statement, even if we had of purchased a
never-before-locked v551, we still wouldn't be able to connect even
with the detailed instruction set that is on Cingular's website.

All of this is pretty much opposite of what I've read about the
locking-unlocking debate. I know that in some cases all of the features
are not available or work quite right but I've never heard of none of
them working. Is this a sign of the future? As mobile phone internet
useage becomes more and more sophisticated and popular, are the various
carriers going to increase their efforts to make it more difficult to
use their networks with only the phones that *they* say you can use? Or
does locked vs unlocked only apply to voice and not data and I just
totally misunderstood the whole concept?

I will be calling  Cingular next just to see what they say and of
course, if anyone wants to take this on and help me, I'd really
appreciate it. Otherwise, I've got a really nice voice-only phone (with
a built-in camera whoo hooo!) that will be used once in India and then
here for phone calls only. Thanks.