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Are T-Mobile version phones of lesser quality than the manufacturer versions?

The featureset may vary from one carrier to another, but the overall quality of the device should absolutely be the same. The major difference between an unlocked, purchased-straight-from-the-manufacturer device and a carrier version is generally that the carriers like to load up value-added software bloatware. You don't really have to worry about that with T-Mobile though. :)
 
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Good point jjfad - I'd forgotten about that (very interesting) report.

Here's the TL;DR:
While we don't know for certain why T-Mobile phones last longer on a charge, there are some strong possibilities. T-Mobile's network could be more efficient at sending and receiving data because of the bands it uses, or maybe there are far fewer customers on its LTE network, easing the strain. Another possibility is that T-Mobile tends to pre-load less bloatware on its flagship devices relative to the other carriers.
 
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Hey all - I just want to be clear about something when shopping for a new phone and I figured I'd just ask here instead of making another topic.

If I am using T-Mobile's no contract $30/month prepaid plan, can I use any unlocked GSM phone? The reason I ask is because while I was looking on Walmart.com, they have 2 different filters - 1 for no contract phones and 1 for unlocked phones.
 
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Any unlocked GSM phone will work for voice/texts, but for data you need to be sure the phone has the proper frequencies enabled. Here they are:

About T-Mobile coverage | T-Mobile Support

Note that T-Mobile's LTE frequency is also sometimes called Band 4. More and more unlocked phones are supporting T-Mobile's bands, for example the excellent Nexus 5.
 
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