How's Your Cell Service?

Coldeagle writes "Well for those of us who are fed up with your current leash...Cellular phone providers... Here is an interesting article on various US cell phone providers and how their service adds up."

Interesting article but

[mjmalone]

What about taking into consideration types of services offered? I had Verizon up until about 3 months ago when I decided I wanted to upgrade my phone. I found that Verizon had no GSM network and after talking on the phone with some representitives I found there was no plan to implement one either. The phone I wanted (ericsson t68i) was a tri-band GSM phone, so I decided to switch networks. I now have T-Mobile, and I admit that their coverage is not quite as good as Verizon's, but I have found it is getting better (I was in blacksburg, Va. in June and there was no service, I went back in July and had full coverage all over town.) Also you have to take into consideration the location of the individuals being polled. Some providers have excellent service in various regions, but very poor service elsewhere.

T-Mobile isn't great, but good enough

[geddes]

I use t-Mobile, the second to lowest scoring provider. I havn't had that many service problems, with the exception of coverage. Thier coverage could be a lot better, but I use them over Verizon because of the quality of their customer service. It is really excellent, and customer service, to me, makes all the difference. What I would like to know is how to honestly figure out a cell phone companies coverage (other than taking their 7 day trials or whatever and walking your route, that is annoying). Like, how can I find a map of all the cell phone towers in and around Groton, Massachusetts, and which companies run them. Having such a map at my disposal would be far more useful than the "coverage maps" the companies hand out with the entire nation shaded red. I have heard that some of the mobile shops have these, but that they really aren't allowed to share them. Surely these towers' locations have to be registered somewhere

Different results

[afidel]

Here in NE Ohio between my father and I we have used all of the major cellular companies. Verizon has shit for voice quality (I might blame it on the phone but we've had 4 different sets from 3 manufacturers), AT&T I couldn't be happier with (and their coverage KILLS anyone else, I have used my phone from coast to coast and in some pretty damn remote areas like on Mt. Whitney Calif, The Grand Canyon, etc, finally Nextel is fine so long as you are in a major metro area or never get off the highway but because they have no analog backfill don't expect to get a signal in the boonies (or even the outskirts of the Cleveland/Akron metroplex in my case). Oh yeah the only reason I put up with Virizon? Price, $80/month for unlimited anytime minutes =) My dad and I both use up more minutes then even the jumbo plans that many carriers offer for well over $100 and none of them have reasonable per minute charges if you go over.

Now that we know about coverage

[LogicX]

The next thing I want to know is which provider gives the best wireless internet services, including unlimited connections for a reasonable price -- and services such as AIM with a real client instead of through SMS messages. aim.com/wireless [aim.com] is a start, but I want to hear from those of you who use the services.

I currently have cingular, who does not offer AIM, and I've had numerous problems trying to get the wireless web service to work (apparently it wasn't supported by the towers in my home calling area).

Re:T-Mobile isn't great, but good enough

[ccoder]

if you are a complete sadist, you might be able to compile the information from http://svartifoss2.fcc.gov/reports/index.cfm

I hate the phone

[AssFace]

I absolutely hate the phone and will do nearly anything to avoid talking on one.

That said, I love shiny things. I have had a series of phones over the years and a series of carriers.

I started in '99 with a Nokia - I think it was a 6590 or something like that - it seemed cool at the time. It was with Sprint in Boston/Cambridge.
There were small, but frequent dead zones and when I walked into one while on a call, it would drop out. Frustrating.
I called Sprint about it and they actually said "yeah, we aren't planning on upgrading out networks at all"... so I told them I would be leaving their service, which I did.

I then got a Nokia 8860 - the shiny mirrored girly phone that Christina Aguilara had on one of her MTV interviews. That phone scratched easily and had terrible reception - but I was worshipped like a god whenever I pulled that out of my pocket. It was also excellent for finding nose hair issues.
The reception on that phone was so bad that it is hard to fault AT&T for any of that. That said, AT&T fucked up the billing on my phone and my cable service about 4 times in a row and led to a several month series of events that made me decided to never use them again. They were incredibly annoying to deal with - one person would say the situation was resolved, then I would get a letter from a collection agency - for something that I never needed to pay in the first place according to AT&T.
Finally, the last straw was when the woman (many supervisors up) said to me "I understand that you aren't supposed to have this charge, but you do, and I can't fix it, so how about you just pay $10 of it and then I will write off the rest (of a $100 charge)".
I was so pissed that I had to pay anything at all since I wasn't supposed to - but at that point, I saw the $10 fee as my way of getting out of their fucking phone annoyance hell - and I was sick of getting collection notices for things that weren't my problem.

So I will never go with them again. I later got some mail telling me that I was part of a class action suit against them and would in the end get like $1 off of my cable service if I upgraded - right.

Then I switched to VoiceStream, and they then renamed to T-Mobile. I have the Nokia 8890 with them. GSM - works in other countries and many cities.
Great service, great customer service - no billing errors - great phone.
Was very happy with them - they would upgrade my service for free as things came along - great stuff.

Then I moved to Bermuda and had to cancel that.
I can still use the same phone here, and the service is decent enough, considering I didn't want to get it in the first place (work made me get it, but then refused to pay for it, so as a result, I don't answer it much).
The customer service here is non-existant - but so far haven't had to deal with that yet. Have had a rude person and a nice person when signing up. That is pretty normal here - usually more rude.

In the end, the only way I would change phones is if I get one of the new Treo phones from Handspring/Palm, or if Nokia's upgrade to the 8890 comes here (I think it is the 8910 and 8910i - nice looking phones).

Re:T-Mobile isn't great, but good enough

[WhiteDragon]

check usenet. alt.cellular [google.com] and children have lots of info. I bet some people have made some nice detailed cell site maps. I actually have a friend who's hobby is finding cell towers, he has a big book with photos of just about every tower in the city he lives in, and he draws up maps of all the different providers. It is pretty cool, he looks at the pattern of existing towers, and says, "ok, I predict that Cingular will have a tower here", then goes to that spot, and sure enough, a tower! I had never previously heard of such a hobby, but he can't be the only one.

Re:I don't have a cell phone.

[dnoyeb]

I bought a phone and had it for 3 years back in '92. contract was 2 years. Then I decided to upgrade, so I got a new 2 year contract with a new phone. 2 days later phone was stolen. They made me pay out the rest of the contract even without the phone, and would not give me a deal on a new phone. They wanted like $500 for a cheap ass motorola botom of the line phone.

From then on I quit Ameritech. Screw them. I just tought me I could live without a phone, and I have for 8 years running now...

I got one for my wife though. Married folks know how it is. Nice to to have your wife tethered, but not quite as nice to be tethered yourself.

Re:to cell or not to cell

[Palos]

The main reason I ended up with a cell phone was price vs a landline. For $40 a month I get unlimited nights/weekends, no charge for long distance, and a decent amount of anytime minutes. Compared to the phone in my house which used to cost about $30 after caller id/etc and included no minutes, this was very nice.
As far as the article itself goes, as has been mentioned before its 100% location based. If you're getting a cell phone talk to people who have one there, and find out what is best.

Bad experience with ATT

[vladid]

When I first applied for a cellphone, ATT seemed to have the best deal. But being a foreign student with no credit history at all, they wanted a $600 dollar deposit that I would have gotten back after 6 or 9 months with little interest. A real shame if you ask me.

Sprint however, cleared me within 5 minutes and I am a satisfied customer ever since.

Prepaid

[Patik]

Prepaid phones are a great resource for those who wish they had a phone for occasional usage (emergencies, quick short calls, etc.) but won't talk enough to justify $30/month. I've found Virgin Mobile [virginmobile.com] to offer the best rates. You have to add $20 every 90 days, which works out to $7/month if you never use it (or use up to about a half hour a month). You can add money on their website, through the phone itself, or by buying a card at a store. The balance also carries over until you cancel the service. I've never had to add any more than the minimum, and I feel like I've adequate usage out of it. It's .25/min, which seems costly but if I had a $30/month plan I'd still only use it 30-60 minutes, and I'd be pay three times per minute when you average it out. Free text messages (10 cents to send) are very convenient.

For the 7 months I've had it the service has been great, phone has worked fine, and everything has run smoothly.

Since then I've convinced three people close to me to get their own. They, too, disregarded cell phones because of the daunting costs, but have found the occasional usage quite convenient.

Verizon / Nextel / Sprint

[weave]

I've driven all over the southwest with a friend of mine. I have Verizon, my work phone is Nextel, and he has Sprint PCS. Coverage wise, it was Verizon by far, then Nextel, then that POS Sprint. Even in dense areas like - ah, er, Phoenix -- he often had trouble getting a decent signal.

Then there's the entire southeast quadrant of New Mexico. All around Carlsbad, Roswell, and basically anywhere east of I-25 was a complete dead zone for Nextel and Sprint. Verizon was great except for a few isolated areas between some mountains.

Sprint's "all digital" shtick is supposed to be a selling point, but it's actually a disadvantage. If there's no digital signal, I'd much rather fall back to analog (plus not have to pay roaming charges) than have no service at all.

One more thing, modern cell phones pretty much suck. I've had a startac 7868W for years now, works like a champ, great sound quality, and goes ages on a charge. It's basically a very good telephone. OK, so it doesn't have solitaire or allow me to snap photos inside of locker rooms. I'd rather just have a good phone and reliable dependable phone service.

Re:Interesting article but

[TopShelf]

Another aspect that's left out, of course, is actual customer service (as opposed to merely cellular network coverage). I'm sure the majority of people with cell phones have at least one horror story - like my wife who had to cancel her AT&T Wireless phone service on 4 separate occasions before they finally stopped sending us bills...

Re:T-Mobile isn't great, but good enough

[wolf-]

I was doing contract work for a cell provider in atlanta about 6 years ago. We had to have a serious background check done in order to even view the database with tower information in it. The cell companies claim that the hush hush is for security and anti-terrorism reasons. Personally I thought it was so we couldnt share just how lousy their coverage really was.

maybe

[Datasage]

Verizon may be best for the entire country, but not best for every area. When i was choosing a cellular provider i did a bit of shopping around. sometimes by overhearing other customers talking to the guy at the counter about thier problems. Most of them were compaining about the quality of verizon's service. In the end i choose t-mobile.

Quality of service is not the only reason why i would choose a provider.

GSM vs CDMA: Because we in the US always have to be incompatible with the rest of the world we create the cdma standard. Generally i have found that the cdma based networks cant send sms outside of thier network or to very few others. while t-mobile to many of the networks around the world. T-mobile also can be used on many of the networks around the work, but you pay a premium price to do so (anywhere from $1-5 per minute). But if you were in those countries, it would be rather easy to just get a sim card for a local network. The last reason i like gsm over cdma, i can upgrade my handset by just moving the sim card to another phone, no programing needed.

Re:Interesting article but

[Misch]

I had Sprint back when I lived in Rochester. It was great, always had good reception (living near 2 major colleges really helps that). Now that Ive moved into a bassackwards town, I find that my apartment is in a no-sprint service zone. Even when it's plugged in, my phone shuts itself off at night because it can't find a signal anywhere, and I am constantly bombarded with the "Bloop-bleep!" of moving in and out of digital-analog ranges.

I'm dropping Sprint when my contract ends in 15 days. Verizon has a store just down the street from me. I think they'll have better service there :-)

Re:Etiquette

[selderrr]

umpf... i seriously doubt that you're right on this. Social norms are last in the priority line. as soon as personal interest is involved (i.e. cash) people will do as they please.

And then there's the issue of 79.14% of all people being either babies or total morons with no manners. You can't imagine how popular farting on the bus still is. Just when I reach the age where I can control my own flatulence, I put a son on the world who seems to have the same bowels as me. He looks like an angel but farts like a rocket, full bus or empty bus. Social skillz ? Suuuuuure dude...

Tmobile had a computer coverage map

[acomj]

I remember in a TMobile store the sales guy pulled up a map of my home area coverage on the sales computer. The coverage wasn't good. He sugested I try some other provider (I respect that alot). Ask if you can see a coverage map when you go to buy, if your nice they might show it to you..

Re:You get what you pay for

[lucifuge31337]

Verizon is significantly more expensive than most other US-based providers.

Yeah...everyone other than Nextel. Who I've been using for years, as do most of my business associates and friends, and, more importantly, my fire department. LNP or not, Nextel has their customers who actually use direct connect by the balls, and thay know it.

They could double the price, and I'd still pay it. Any more than that and I'd carry a phone for calls and a Nextel for just durect connect. I suspect others feel the same.

I hate that.

The ongoing saga...

[badasscat]

Cellular service in this country is a mess, and urban areas can be just as bad off as rural. Case in point: New York City. I've been with Sprint now for about 6 or 7 years, not because their service is so great but because everybody else is even worse. I live in Queens (though not in the boonies of Queens) and commute to Manhattan - I get 1 bar of signal strength in either place, occasionally going up to 2. A good 50% of my calls are either dropped or just go through to voicemail. This is not just on one model of phone, either - as I said, I've been with Sprint for a while and have used a good 4-5 phones over the duration, all with external antennas, and all have been equally bad. It's the service, not the phones.

Fed up, I tried Verizon for 2 weeks about a year ago, based on their reputation (a reputation confirmed at the linked article). Every single call I made reverted to analog mode despite showing 4 bars of digital strength prior to placing the call. Accessing any data services was useless for this reason, and call quality was atrocious. Dropped Verizon within my 15 day trial period (which I believe is mandated by law around here).

During all this time, Sprint's rates have shot up dramatically, and for my family plan I am now paying a minimum of $95 per month including taxes (taxes are much higher here than anywhere else - YMMV). That's the cheapest plan available with 2 lines.

Just this weekend my wife and I signed up with Cingular, mostly due to their lower rates ($50 plus 17.1% total tax for 2 lines and a reasonable amount of minutes). Was instantly complaining that I was going to cancel the service again after I couldn't even complete a call to my wife's phone in our own apartment. Now that I've had a bit more time to play with the phones I'm starting to think the service is not particularly worse than Sprint (1 bar of strength at home, 1 bar at work, 2-3 bars everywhere in between, some calls dropped, some go through), so at the reduced rates I may as well stick with them. But I'm still not particularly happy.

If any other product on the market (and cellular service is a product like any other) only worked 50% of the time it would be considered defective. Imagine picking up your home phone and wondering whether or not your call will go through. This is the beginning of the 21st century, not the 20th. The top priority of all of these companies needs to be to fix their service. And I mean fix, not "improve". The service as it is is broken.

I have not tried cellular service in Europe but I can't imagine it is this bad. I have, on the other hand, tried it in Japan and was absolutely astonished. Now, granted, I only tried one company's service (DoCoMo) and only in one area (Tokyo metro) but it was full signal strength at all times, even in rural areas (yes, there are rural areas around Tokyo), with absolutely crystal clear call quality. I cannot understand how cellular service in the US could be so much worse.

Re:You are violating Sprint's TOS

[Anonymous Coward]

uh, but you won't get caught unless you d/l gigs a month...something most people don't do.

Has anyone actually ever take five different phones around and used them to compare?

I did this late last year with:

Sprint
AT&T
Verizon
T-Mobile
Nextel

I really wanted to know what worked best.
I used common model phones, so as to eliminate that as an issue.

Sprint - good overall coverage, some missing spots. Rarely got the network busy.

AT&T - good coverage, but over-saturated
network...lots of "network busy" messages.

Verizon - poor coverage, even at major airports

T-Mobile - Very spotty coverage, unless in metro area.

Nextel - Good in metro areas, spotty in outlying areas.

Overall, Sprint was the best of the lot in terms of coverage. Also, they have the best plans pricewise.

More importantly, voice quality is excellent on Sprint, at least in my testing.

I think Sprint has issue because their cust. svc. isn't the best. But that's because they have a certain SLA for cust. svc. and stick to it.

Again, your mileage may vary, but I was curious and thought this was the way to test it. I expected Verizon to be a lot better, and it wasn't. I expected AT&T to be poor (based on using it 3 years ago), and it (still) was.
Nextel was actually better than expected, but voice quaility was iffy. T-Mobile is.....well, only good for Starbucks wi-fi hotspots. I expected Sprint to be decent, but was surprised how much better it was compared to the others.

Decide.com

[_ph1ux_]

I used to work for a co named Decide.com - we were an online retailer of cell packages and phones. We gave you the ability to rate cell phone features side-by-side and determine which carrier had the best package for your needs.

In order to give you the full gammut of info - we had vans that were equipped with cell phones from almost every carrier, and it would drive around and the banks of phones would make automated calls from the van, play a pre-recorded message and then rate the quality of service.

You could then put in a commute path - or an address and see which carriers had the best service for that area - based on actual call data. all nicely overlayed over a neat little map.

The company obviously went under - but since I left before the final sinking - I am not sure what happened to the technology for doing these ratings...

it was cool though.

Re:The ongoing saga...

[hackstraw]

If any other product on the market (and cellular service is a product like any other) only worked 50% of the time it would be considered defective.

But you keep buying them and tell them that 50% is OK!

I had a cell phone for about 6 months, hated it, got a $400 bill one month, dropped calls left and right (Verizon), and once my jobhunting was over, I enthusiastically paid to get out of my 1 year contract and then threw the phone in the trash.

Once cell phones are as affordable (*cough*) and reliable as a land line, I may consider getting one and replacing my land line with a cell, maybe not, I like holding my phone with my shoulder.