XQ-BC72 in the UK/Europe

[guinnsquirrel]

Hello,

I am a UK resident. I will be going to Singapore on business. Whilst there, am planning to buy a SIM free/unlocked Xperia 1iii (XQ-BC72 version). 

Will it work in the UK? What bits will I be missing, comparing the XQ-BC72 to XQ-BC52?

Can I flash the BC52 firmware onto BC72 hardware [suspect not]?

[AndyCalling]

I'd be careful if I were you. This time round, with 5G, frequencies matter. You will need to check the 5G frequencies of the phone you intend to buy, and the 5G frequencies of the UK provider you intend to use. You won't likely find Singapore is a complete match to all UK frequencies so you will have to decide on one provider's subset and hope that increases your odds.

If I were you I'd get a UK version. In fact, I did.

[MarlonUk1]

Hello @guinnsquirrel 

Checking @@https://www.worldtimezone.com/gsm.htm

It looks like UK and Singapore have the same network band coverage, it should work here in the UK. To be more sure. You can ask your network service provider for more specific bands used.

[EMS_MO72]

Yeah, I think you need to check that with support line for Sony there to tell you if it's going to work or not. But I believe you will have no warranty services if you bought the phone from Singapore and use it in the UK.

[makenyo98]

Hi.

I spent several hours researching this and trying various things. If you assemble all the bits, you CAN flash a European firmware to the Asian variant and get it working in the UK. Previously it had rejected my Three SIM - Three couldn't help and said the phone was defective after a lot of troubleshooting. In the end I got it done using NewFlasher (v52), XperiFirm (5.6.5) to download an EU (XQ-BC52) firmware and decrypt it, also to install the flashmode drivers. Then following this video, I now have my Xperia 1 III working fine in the UK. I didn't need to root or unlock the bootloader or any of that malarky. Quite easy in the end.

Good Luck. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KlUigxMkjEU