Dual SIM Capability

Believe it or not, Samsung is the only major mobile phone manufacturer to deliver a dual SIM-capable phone. However, this technology is not exactly ground-breaking or new to begin with. Certain lesser-known manufacturers have been selling mobile phones with this feature, although they may not be as functional as the SGH-D880.

The SIM card slots are located in the battery compartment, under the battery. Upon removing the battery cover and the battery, you will see the dual SIM slots. As you can see, there's barely enough room for the two SIM slots. Just below the first SIM card slot is a smaller slot for the Micro SD memory card. This is rather unorthodox as most Samsung mobile phones have a hot-swappable memory card slot accessible from the outside.

Just slide your SIM cards in each slot. They will be held in place by a metal bar. As you can see, the SIM card slots are marked by the engraved numbers 1 and 2. However, it doesn't matter which slot you use for each SIM card. This is because the Samsung SGH-D880 allows you to select which SIM card you want to be the primary SIM card. Now, you might be wondering, "Isn’t it a dual SIM phone?"

Well, to be more accurate, the Samsung SGH-D880 is actually a dual SIM standby-capable phone. They are clearly marketing the phone as such but many people would not realize it and merely assume it can just supports two SIM cards. The fact of the matter is the SGH-D880 functions more like two separate mobile phones. According to Samsung, the SGH-D880 actually has two transceivers, one for each SIM slot. This allows it to receive calls and data on both lines at the same time!

It certainly worked as advertised. All incoming calls and SMS messages showed up with an icon that corresponds to their SIM-stored numbers. If you are using contacts stored in the phone memory, it will not show any icon. All calls and messaging settings are customizable according to their respective SIM cards. In other words, the SGH-D880 functions like two phones in one.

With that said, only one line can be active for making calls or sending your SMS messages. When you start up the phone, you will be asked to select the primary line to be used for outgoing calls and messages. Whenever you change the active SIM line, you will need to reboot the phone. This takes up approximately 57 seconds which can get very tiring if you like to change active lines all the time.

This is not a problem if you only need to make calls on one line, for business perhaps with another line just to receive personal calls. However, it does not allow for total freedom and privacy (e.g. calling different people using different accounts), which would only be possible if both lines are active at the same time. Therefore, the next step in the development of dual SIM mobile phones would definitely be the ability to use two lines at once. Let’s see if Samsung releases a ‘higher-end’ dual SIM phone with this capability.

I’d also like future models to come with hot-swappable SIM card slots. Business travellers, in particular, would use more than two lines. Hot-swappable SIM card slots would negate the need to power down and remove the battery just to swap SIM cards.