Locked vs unlocked... please help

[tpapictures]

Very straight-forward question... I hope.

I want a Lumia 925 for my account on T-Mobile in the States. (Well, my dad does, but just stay with me so I don't have to speak about him/his etc...)
I want to pay it all upfront. Therefore, I wanna get my phone wherever I get the best deal online.
I'm thinking why not buy it unlocked somewhere, that way I can use it with pay-as-you-go SIM cards because I travel to Europe a lot and its a quad band phone.
1. Can I do this? i.e. Will the phone work fine on my network and others internationally?
2. Will I NOT be able to get 4G in the US with an unlocked phone as the T-Mobile guy I just spoke to suggested in the store I just went to?

PLEASE help me figure this out. I think it's fine but I wanted to double check with experts.

 

[jdandison]

Very straight-forward question... I hope.

2. Will I NOT be able to get 4G in the US with an unlocked phone as the T-Mobile guy I just spoke to suggested in the store I just went to?

That's BS - if you buy an unlocked phone & it has the proper bands for the network you want to use, you should be fine.

The US T-Mobile/ATT 925 (RM-893) is pentaband 3G (which T-Mobile/ATT also call 4G) and quad-band LTE. As long as the international carriers work on those frequencies, you should be fine. You can use the Nokia Access Point app for setting up data/MMS APNs depending on your network.

If you want LTE in the US, be sure to pick up the RM-893. The US uses different LTE frequencies from ROW, but you should still get HSPA+ internationally.

Here's a chart of the model variants from Nokia Lumia 925 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:

[TABLE="class: grid"]
[TR]
[TD]Model[/TD]
[TD]RM-892[/TD]
[TD]RM-893[/TD]
[TD]RM-910[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]Countries[/TD]
[TD]International[/TD]
[TD]United States[/TD]
[TD]Asia[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]Carriers[/TD]
[TD]International[/TD]
[TD]T-Mobile USA and AT&T Mobility[/TD]
[TD]China Mobile and China Unicom[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]2G[/TD]
[TD]Quad-band GSM/EDGE (850/900/1800/1900 MHz)[/TD]
[TD]Quad-band GSM/EDGE (850/900/1800/1900 MHz)[/TD]
[TD]Quad-band GSM/EDGE (850/900/1800/1900 MHz)[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]3G[/TD]
[TD]Quad-band HSPA+ 1, 2, 5/6, 8 (850/900/1900/2100 MHz)[/TD]
[TD]Penta-band HSPA+ 1, 2, 4, 5/6, 8 (850/900/AWS/1900/2100 MHz)[/TD]
[TD]Penta-band HSPA+ 1, 2, 4, 5/6, 8 (850/900/AWS/1900/2100 MHz)[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]4G[/TD]
[TD]Penta-band LTE 1, 3, 7, 8, 20 (2100/1800/2600/900/800 MHz)[/TD]
[TD]Quad-band LTE 2, 4, 5, 17 (700/850/1700/1900 MHz)[/TD]
[TD]None[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]Max network speed[/TD]
[TD]LTE: 100 Mbit/s[/TD]
[TD]LTE: 100 Mbit/s[/TD]
[TD]HSPA+: 21 Mbit/s[/TD]
[/TR]
[/TABLE]

 

[tpapictures]

Well this is the phone and he basically went ahead and bought it already because the customer service rep said it was definitely capable of 4G. If it's not, it'll be a misprint on their site and they'll definitely do a return. This is the ad...
Newegg.com - NOKIA LUMIA 925 BLACK - UNLOCKED