Okay...so I live in Japan and up until recently I had an iPod touch and an NTT DoCoMo handset.  I was using the iPod as my organizer and the handset was just a phone.  I am military and decided that a world phone would be a good idea for me and my research brought me to the E71.  After reading the feature list I was immediately sold and I ordered one.  What I was not aware of though was the differences between 3G frequencies and how it would affect my purchase in the long run.Japan uses 3G 2100 Mhz (NTT DoCoMo)...so that is strike 1 for this version of the E71.  Be aware that there are 3 versions of the E71 available.  The US version will NOT WORK IN ASIA because many places in asia do not use GSM but WCDMA or 3G for the most part.  The US version does not have the bandwidth required to operate here.  Additionally, Japan in particular uses the 3G network for both data AND voice comms.  There IS NO GSM in Japan...they simply don''t use it.  Anyway...now that I have cleared that up... I bought a second E71, the international version, and I use it here and it works marvelously!!  I LOVE this phone.  The 3 variants of this phone are the E71-1 (US), E71-2 (Australia/Asia), and E71-3 (Eur/Asia).  I have a -1 and a -3 and am currently using the -3 here in Japan.  To further explain the networks here...there are other service providers that offer 3g as well, but they are in the 1700Mhz range while others still use an older 2g system known as phs that is also not compatible with this phone.Now...if you''ve read the other reviews about this phone, you already know that it''s great.  I''m not going to bore you by repeating their statements, just know that this phone is definitely worth the money you will shell out for it but be aware that dependent upon where you are going to travel if that be the case, you will need to purchase the applicable version for the region you will be in.  If you''re traveling to Europe it will only be a factor for you when trying to access data services via 3G...voice comms will be unaffected since it''s a quad band phone and nearly all of Europe uses GSM.  I have heard that EDGE/GPRS capabilities may circumvent this but I can''t speak to that effect due to lack of experience/knowledge.Japan and Korea though in particular will require that you have the -2 or -3 version or you will be left with a glorified MP3 player/PDA with a QWERTY keyboard.Additionally, if you will be in Japan long term, the only way you will be able to use this phone here is to contract with Softbank or DoCoMo and buy one of their entry level cheap handsets and pop the sim card out of it and put it into the E71.  There is a catch though...you''ll have to purchase the data package known as "pake hodai double" in order to not get raped on your monthly bill when it comes to your data rates.  Since you are not using a DoCoMo handset the cap on your data bill will be about 60 bucks higher than if you use your DoCoMo phone.  I guess they can recognize that it''s not a "company" handset probably as a result of the IMEI number on the phone that I assume is somehow detectable by the local network.  You will also lose the ability to use a docomo web mail address but all you have to do is open an Ovi account at Nokia''s website and then install Emoze on your phone.  Once you marry the ovi mail account and Emoze you have webmail on your phone again.  You''ll also need to get Mopera from docomo for your data services...and no, they won''t tell you the settings to input...you''ll have to muddle through it yourself.Sorry so lengthy, but I hope that helped someone to buy the "right" version of this phone.