Verizon is best carrier for third year. In SF Bay Area, it's 1-Verizon, 2-T-Mobile, 3-Sprint, 4-Cingular

Coverage is very subjective, it all depends upon your location. Verizon
coverage in unusable at my home in Laguna Niguel California, however, Sprint
has full signal strength at my home. One mile down the street, Verizon
coverage is better than Sprint. Do you get my drift? In some areas, Cingular
provides the best signal.

That is all that there is to it and it is not possible to draw any other
conclusions. On the other hand, Sprint and Cingular customer service suck
when compare to Verizon. Verizon is very customer oriented while Sprint and
Cingular could care-less about the customer as long as it does not eat too
much into the bottom line.

The horrible Sprint and Cingular customer service will cause Verizon to win
every year on all counts. It is really that simple.

-mij

These is no one carrier that provides the best coverage. "SMS"
<[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> Justin wrote:
>> Mike T. wrote on [Tue, 6 Dec 2005 12:12:08 -0500]:
>>> I know a lot of people dump Cingular for Verizon as they think Verizon
>>> has better coverage. That just shows the power of advertising.
>>
>> Verizon DOES have better coverage.
>>
>> I have a friend who can't use his cingular phone from his house, my
>> verizon phone works just fine. I also have friends who had the same
>> problem with Sprint, and my verizon phone had 5 bars.
>
> The relative coverage quality does vary by geographic area, but
> technically Verizon will have better coverage, if you have a tri-mode
> phone, versus a digital-only Cingular phone. There is simply no way around
> this, AMPS coverage is still very good, and even after the FCC permits it
> to be turned off in 2008, it will still remain in service in areas where
> digital service is not available.
>
> There are areas of the country, where Verizon was not the A or B side
> cellular carrier (and hence is 1900 Mhz only), where the Cingular digital
> coverage should be better, i.e. South Florida.
>
>> I have had my verizon phone go out of coverage in one place, a middle of
>> nowhere paintball field. Everyone else's phones also had no service.
>
> This is often the case in my area, the San Francisco Bay area (not on a
> paintball field, but in the outlying areas in mountains and valleys that
> are not close to a city or town). Now some people will claim that they
> like to not be available when relaxing on a hike or whatever, but this is
> really a cop-out because for many people, the very time they most want
> their phone to work is when they are out in the boondocks.
>
> Sprint is also very bad in my area, because of the lack of towers, and the
> shorter range of the 1900 Mhz sites.

---

› See More: Verizon is best carrier for third year. In SF Bay Area, it's 1-Verizon, 2-T-Mobile, 3-Sprint, 4-Cingular

Mij Adyaw wrote:
> Coverage is very subjective, it all depends upon your location. Verizon
> coverage in unusable at my home in Laguna Niguel California, however, Sprint
> has full signal strength at my home. One mile down the street, Verizon
> coverage is better than Sprint. Do you get my drift? In some areas, Cingular
> provides the best signal.
>
> That is all that there is to it and it is not possible to draw any other
> conclusions. On the other hand, Sprint and Cingular customer service suck
> when compare to Verizon. Verizon is very customer oriented while Sprint and
> Cingular could care-less about the customer as long as it does not eat too
> much into the bottom line.
>
> The horrible Sprint and Cingular customer service will cause Verizon to win
> every year on all counts. It is really that simple.
>
> -mij
>
> These is no one carrier that provides the best coverage. "SMS"
> <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
>
>>Justin wrote:
>>
>>>Mike T. wrote on [Tue, 6 Dec 2005 12:12:08 -0500]:
>>>
>>>>I know a lot of people dump Cingular for Verizon as they think Verizon
>>>>has better coverage. That just shows the power of advertising.
>>>
>>>Verizon DOES have better coverage.
>>>
>>>I have a friend who can't use his cingular phone from his house, my
>>>verizon phone works just fine. I also have friends who had the same
>>>problem with Sprint, and my verizon phone had 5 bars.
>>
>>The relative coverage quality does vary by geographic area, but
>>technically Verizon will have better coverage, if you have a tri-mode
>>phone, versus a digital-only Cingular phone. There is simply no way around
>>this, AMPS coverage is still very good, and even after the FCC permits it
>>to be turned off in 2008, it will still remain in service in areas where
>>digital service is not available.
>>
>>There are areas of the country, where Verizon was not the A or B side
>>cellular carrier (and hence is 1900 Mhz only), where the Cingular digital
>>coverage should be better, i.e. South Florida.
>>
>>
>>>I have had my verizon phone go out of coverage in one place, a middle of
>>>nowhere paintball field. Everyone else's phones also had no service.
>>
>>This is often the case in my area, the San Francisco Bay area (not on a
>>paintball field, but in the outlying areas in mountains and valleys that
>>are not close to a city or town). Now some people will claim that they
>>like to not be available when relaxing on a hike or whatever, but this is
>>really a cop-out because for many people, the very time they most want
>>their phone to work is when they are out in the boondocks.
>>
>>Sprint is also very bad in my area, because of the lack of towers, and the
>>shorter range of the 1900 Mhz sites.
>
>
>
I was on Verizon almost 4 years. Now I am on Nextel. Why. Because
over the last year more and more of my incoming calls were not ringing
my phone. I would get the message waiting beep instead. Some days 2/3s
of my calls went straight to voice mail. Very annoying. But when my
vtext messages started arriving hours or even days late that was it for
me. Verizon must be selling subscriptions like Disneyland sells
tickets; Until you are doing the nut to butt shuffle through their
park. I left verizon not because they did not have great coverage but
because I needed to get my calls and text messages. Also I find the Off
network walkie-talkie feature more important than MP3 players or camera
phones. Imagine a phone feature you can use without needing to pay extra
for it.

columbotrek wrote:

> I was on Verizon almost 4 years. Now I am on Nextel. Why. Because
> over the last year more and more of my incoming calls were not ringing
> my phone. I would get the message waiting beep instead.

Hmm, I've gotten that occasionally as well, though it's pretty
infrequent, maybe once a month or so. Yet it would occur in areas with
perfectly good coverage.

SMS wrote:
> columbotrek wrote:
>
> > I was on Verizon almost 4 years. Now I am on Nextel. Why. Because
> > over the last year more and more of my incoming calls were not ringing
> > my phone. I would get the message waiting beep instead.
>
> Hmm, I've gotten that occasionally as well, though it's pretty
> infrequent, maybe once a month or so. Yet it would occur in areas with
> perfectly good coverage.

CDMA has one big flaw. Incoming call delivery. It's the most prone to
failure out of all of the technologies.

>>
> I was on Verizon almost 4 years. Now I am on Nextel. Why. Because over
> the last year more and more of my incoming calls were not ringing my
> phone. I would get the message waiting beep instead. Some days 2/3s of my
> calls went straight to voice mail. Very annoying.

For several years I carried a nextel handset, EVERY DAY I had at least 2/3s
of my incoming calls going straight to voicemail. -Dave

Did you remember to charge the battery and "turn-on" the Nextel handset?

"Mike T." <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>>>
>> I was on Verizon almost 4 years. Now I am on Nextel. Why. Because over
>> the last year more and more of my incoming calls were not ringing my
>> phone. I would get the message waiting beep instead. Some days 2/3s of my
>> calls went straight to voice mail. Very annoying.
>
> For several years I carried a nextel handset, EVERY DAY I had at least
> 2/3s of my incoming calls going straight to voicemail. -Dave
>

....
> Did you remember to charge the battery and "turn-on" the Nextel handset?
>

Oh you're hilarious. Yes, it was the same with several nextel handsets, so
it wasn't just one handset. As I've written before, for years I was using
my personal handsets on Cingular (and Verizon, and ATT and USCellular) to
make business calls as the nextel handsets (more than one, provided by
employers) that I carried:
1) Rarely had a signal, even in major metropolitan areas
2) Would have Most incoming calls go straight to voicemail, even in
areas with strong signal
3) Would be hard to connect outgoing calls, even with a strong signal
4) (this is what REALLY pissed me off) Would beep to let me know I had
voicemail waiting HOURS AFTER someone left me a voicemail, IN AREAS WITH
STRONG SIGNAL, WHEN THE HANDSET NEVER ****ING RANG TO LET ME KNOW THAT
SOMEONE WAS CALLING

I just thought it was funny to see someone switch to nextel because they
were having problems with incoming calls going straight to voicemail. Talk
about jumping out of the frying pan and into the fire!!!

I generally disagree with Consumer Reports on just about EVERYTHING. But in
their latest issue, they show nextel being dead last to everyone, as far as
reception goes. At least CR got something right for a change. Of course,
CR also waffles on the issue by saying that they don't know what's going to
happen now that nextel and sprint are marrying different technologies. My
prediction: Nextel goes from terrible to even worse. -Dave

columbotrek wrote:

> I was on Verizon almost 4 years. Now I am on Nextel. Why. Because
> over the last year more and more of my incoming calls were not ringing
> my phone.

If you find Nextel more acceptable than Verizon, then you must not leave
the urban areas very much. I still chuckle about being at the Anchorage
airport, and having a Nextel subscriber ask me which carrier I had,
because his phone didn't work. I informed him that Nextel had no
networks in Alaska, and he was pretty upset, saying that he had to have
a phone. I directed him to a Wal-Mart to pick up a prepaid phone. I
guess he just assumed that Nextel would at least have a network in the
biggest cities in every state.

Mike T. wrote:

> I generally disagree with Consumer Reports on just about EVERYTHING. But in
> their latest issue, they show nextel being dead last to everyone, as far as
> reception goes. At least CR got something right for a change. Of course,
> CR also waffles on the issue by saying that they don't know what's going to
> happen now that nextel and sprint are marrying different technologies. My
> prediction: Nextel goes from terrible to even worse. -Dave

Unlikely to get any worse. There will be dual mode phones for a while,
until the iDEN network is shut down. As long as Sprint-Nextel continues
to allow roaming onto other CDMA networks, it'll be okay, but of course
PTT won't work when you're roaming. I don't think Nextel can get much
worse than it is now in terms of coverage.

verizon does not have a network in AK either.

Yes, but can they roam? Can Sprint roam on any digital networks in AK?

"Jerome Zelinske" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> verizon does not have a network in AK either.

SMS wrote:
> columbotrek wrote:
>
>> I was on Verizon almost 4 years. Now I am on Nextel. Why. Because
>> over the last year more and more of my incoming calls were not ringing
>> my phone.
>
>
> If you find Nextel more acceptable than Verizon, then you must not leave
> the urban areas very much. I still chuckle about being at the Anchorage
> airport, and having a Nextel subscriber ask me which carrier I had,
> because his phone didn't work. I informed him that Nextel had no
> networks in Alaska, and he was pretty upset, saying that he had to have
> a phone. I directed him to a Wal-Mart to pick up a prepaid phone. I
> guess he just assumed that Nextel would at least have a network in the
> biggest cities in every state.
The last 3 months all my calls have rung through and all my pages are
getting to me within 30 seconds. I really like the direct talk feature.
Imagine a phone feature which you can use without paying a tariff to
the carrier. All the other features they are pushing come with more air
time required. Its as though handset enhancments were selected to make
them money.
Rumor I heard was that soon Sprint/Nextel will merge their services to
one handset. It will be iDEN for PTT and CDMA for voice. I also wonder
if Sprint/Nextel will take advantage of each others towers and where it
makes sense, put more radios on place to help fill in coverage.

Jerome Zelinske wrote:
> verizon does not have a network in AK either.

True, but at least there are CDMA networks to roam onto, and a very
extensive AMPS network out in the boonies. Ditto for TDMA. When I was
there two years ago there was no GSM, but the TDMA carrier, Dobson, is
adding GSM now.

I presume that Sprint can roam onto the CDMA networks in Alaska.

I was in Anchorage in Sept. 2001 and my Sprint phone roamed on the 1900
CDMA signal of Alaska Digitel http://www.alaskadigitel.com

A post in this newsgroup by Andrew Shepherd on 6/12/2004 reported Sprint
native service in Anchorage, Fairbanks, and Juneau, as SPCS has a
license there and is required by the terms of its license to cover a
certain percentage of each MTA's population.

ACS Alaska also offers CDMA service. http://www.acsalaska.com/

The PRL interpretations at
http://mallard.rainyday.mb.ca/~dialtone/
show Sprint has native coverage and roams on ACS and Digitel
and show Verizon roams on ACS and Digitel.


Mij Adyaw wrote:
> Yes, but can they roam? Can Sprint roam on any digital networks in AK?
>
> "Jerome Zelinske" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
>
>>verizon does not have a network in AK either.
>
>
>

--
Frank Harris in San Francisco with an A680

I suppose they can and do. But roaming is not service from your
carrier. All their verizon services will not work.