Mobile phone language in HK

If I go to buy a phone in Mongkok I always see one price displayed and get told another. The seller always says that the cheaper price is for a Chinese language phone. Is this true or is it the same phone but I get charged another $100 or so for him to change the phone language to English. Can someone advise. Thanks.

Not entirely sure about this one but here goes.


I guess it depends on the brand, but I think most phones here support at least English, Traditional Chinese and Simplified Chinese. Certainly Nokia phones do. I think you are being ripped off.

Agreed with axptguy. Nokia phones in particular have product codes in the memory. These determine languages / locale. Local would be English, Trad Chinese, Simp Chinese. But connect it to my pc, run my little product code changing software and 5 minutes later you could have a North American, North European phone with the languages from that region. Most others are the same and don't for a minute fall for the Chinese language only iPhone.......


However there are a few smartphones that are Chinese only, especially those running Windows Mobile. These would be different to Eng language versions. Similarly phones from over the border will be Chinese only. Remember that Mongkok sells mostly grey import stuff so some of what they have has been flashed to local languages.

Mongkok mostly sells "parallel import" or grey market phones, specially in Sincere Podium. These are usually cheaper since there's no local warranty for the phone. But selling English version phones shouldn't matter in price since most phones come with at least 3-4 languages built in, English included. Unless as evildeeds noted about PDA phones.


Advice: if you feel you're getting ripped off, you probably are so move on to another store!