Digital service in FL

I plan on going to The Villages, FL. The last time that I was there I had
trouble with my 4400 CDMA phone on highway 441/23. No calls would go
through. I want to buy an all digital phone but I wondered why in such a
populous area that I couldn't put a call through. Someone in this newsgroup
suggested that I use analog but how does one do that? Wouldn't it switch to
analog automatically? Please help.

Jo

On Sat, 12 Nov 2005 10:57:52 -0500, "Jo" <jomcg@optonline.net> wrote:

Last April, a golfing buddy and I (both VZW users) drove from Maine
to Orlando with a stop at The Villages, Lady Lake, FL. We stayed
pretty close to the coast on the way south except for a bypass around
NYC/NJ. I have a pre-paid that roams on anything other than native
VZW, he has AC2 plan. We both had a VZW signal the whole way except in
northeast PA and some spotty coverage in area between I-95 and Myrtle
Beach, SC.

Signal in FL was all VZW - generally full bars.

My golfing buddy stayed in The Villages (I went on to Orlando) and we
spoke on the our phones over a four day period and had good reception.
Going north we took the more inland route and had some signal problems
in the mountains in NC and some dips in western VA. WV was roaming for
the four miles we passed through there and then VZW the rest of the
way except for that same blackout spot in NE PA (which has been
discussed extensively in this NG).

My phone is a four year old Moto 120c - tri-band. His was a new Nokia.
I don't recall going to analog anywhere along the trip.

jeb

>I plan on going to The Villages, FL. The last time that I was there I had
>trouble with my 4400 CDMA phone on highway 441/23. No calls would go
>through. I want to buy an all digital phone but I wondered why in such a
>populous area that I couldn't put a call through. Someone in this newsgroup
>suggested that I use analog but how does one do that? Wouldn't it switch to
>analog automatically? Please help.
>
>Jo
>
>

"Jo" <jomcg@optonline.net> wrote in news:srodf.1807$ha2.146@fe08.lga:

> I plan on going to The Villages, FL. The last time that I was there I
> had trouble with my 4400 CDMA phone on highway 441/23. No calls would
> go through. I want to buy an all digital phone but I wondered why in
> such a populous area that I couldn't put a call through. Someone in
> this newsgroup suggested that I use analog but how does one do that?
> Wouldn't it switch to analog automatically? Please help.
>
> Jo
>
>
>

Isn't ol' Verizon stuck on the PCS 1900 Mhz band in that part of FL with
the wonderous 2 mile cell range? There wouldn't be any AMPS coverage on
that band and the range in the trees really sucks.

--
Larry

John Brandt <john.brandt88@verizon.net> wrote in
news:toccn19ofu35tnef22co392atmsted443k@4ax.com:

> some spotty coverage in area between I-95 and Myrtle
> Beach, SC.
>

Up until recently, Verizon had no coverage from Georgetown to the NC line
as other companies had all the licenses in the lucrative Myrtle Beach
resort area. They bought some 1900 Mhz rinky-dink I've forgotten the name
of to get coverage up there to compete with Alltel's 800 Mhz B carrier, but
I don't know if they ever improved the rural coverage of it. Their 800 Mhz
license in Coastal SC covers from about the Santee River south to Savannah,
now, after they bought out the 800 Mhz carrier south of Charleston's
Cellular One system GTE bought up earlier. Verizon had no coverage S of
the Charleston County line beyond Jacksonboro, SC, a tiny town on the
Edisto River before that acquisition because the other carriers refused to
let GTE on their systems. We used to get a warning message from South
Carolina Cellular (or something like that) and it hung up. They finally
bought this A carrier S of Charleston inland to Walterboro on I-95.

Alltel holds the B 800 Mhz license all East of I-95 to the ocean from NC to
GA and beyond. It used to be called 360 Communications and something else
before that a long time ago. W of I-95, Alltel switches to the old Bell
Atlantic A 800 Mhz system.

Verizon's Myrtle Beach coverage has always sucked, bigtime. It used to
hard roam.



--
Larry

How do you remember or keep track of all this information?? Do you have a
book that you write these things in?? A 'cellphone diary' perhaps???

:-)

Thanks for the information. So, John, would you recommend that a digital
phone would work down there?

Jo

--
"This is the day that the Lord has made.
Let us rejoice and be glad in it." Ps.118:24
"John Brandt" <john.brandt88@verizon.net> wrote in message
news:toccn19ofu35tnef22co392atmsted443k@4ax.com...
> On Sat, 12 Nov 2005 10:57:52 -0500, "Jo" <jomcg@optonline.net> wrote:
>
> Last April, a golfing buddy and I (both VZW users) drove from Maine
> to Orlando with a stop at The Villages, Lady Lake, FL. We stayed
> pretty close to the coast on the way south except for a bypass around
> NYC/NJ. I have a pre-paid that roams on anything other than native
> VZW, he has AC2 plan. We both had a VZW signal the whole way except in
> northeast PA and some spotty coverage in area between I-95 and Myrtle
> Beach, SC.
>
> Signal in FL was all VZW - generally full bars.
>
> My golfing buddy stayed in The Villages (I went on to Orlando) and we
> spoke on the our phones over a four day period and had good reception.
> Going north we took the more inland route and had some signal problems
> in the mountains in NC and some dips in western VA. WV was roaming for
> the four miles we passed through there and then VZW the rest of the
> way except for that same blackout spot in NE PA (which has been
> discussed extensively in this NG).
>
> My phone is a four year old Moto 120c - tri-band. His was a new Nokia.
> I don't recall going to analog anywhere along the trip.
>
> jeb
>
>>I plan on going to The Villages, FL. The last time that I was there I had
>>trouble with my 4400 CDMA phone on highway 441/23. No calls would go
>>through. I want to buy an all digital phone but I wondered why in such a
>>populous area that I couldn't put a call through. Someone in this
>>newsgroup
>>suggested that I use analog but how does one do that? Wouldn't it switch
>>to
>>analog automatically? Please help.
>>
>>Jo
>>
>>

"Jo" <jomcg@optonline.net> wrote in message
news:srodf.1807$ha2.146@fe08.lga...
>I plan on going to The Villages, FL. The last time that I was there I had
>trouble with my 4400 CDMA phone on highway 441/23. No calls would go
>through. I want to buy an all digital phone but I wondered why in such a
>populous area that I couldn't put a call through. Someone in this
>newsgroup suggested that I use analog but how does one do that? Wouldn't
>it switch to analog automatically? Please help.
>
> Jo
>
>
>

We have friends in Winter Springs FL and have never had problems with my
4400B anywhere in central FL. Granted, Winter Springs is about 50 miles SE
of Lady Lake so I can't tell you specific coverage in that area. We travel
between Winter Springs / Sanford and Lakeland and never lost Verizon signal.
Our friend in Winter Springs has an LG 4500 (all digital) and loves it ...
no coverage problems. As far as analog goes, I don't think you will need it
but, yes the 4400 will automatically switch to analog if the PRL "selects"
an analog tower and you have not forced the phone to CDMA only in the
maintenance menu (menu 0).

"Bob the Printer" <bdolson@comcast.net> wrote in
news:RKOdnT84fbwuRuveRVn-hA@comcast.com:

> How do you remember or keep track of all this information?? Do you
> have a book that you write these things in?? A 'cellphone diary'
> perhaps???
>
>:-)
>

I've used the 800 A system Verizon bought since 3 days after it came online
in Charleston as Cellular One of Charleston and had two towers, Otranto Rd
at US52 in N Charleston and Citadel Mall Hwy 7 at US 17S, even before any
cells existed downtown. I was there for the buildout, as a customer
waiting for more towers. I was on the system through all the mergers,
first when Cellular One bought the system from the locals, then GTE
Wireless which became Verizon Wireless. I roamed on the other 800 Mhz
carriers N and S of Charleston when you had to register with your credit
card to the local system operators before you were allowed to spend
$1.75/minute, a real bargain over the $3.75-4.95 we paid on IMTS on the
Carphones. You quickly learned where your bagphone worked and where it was
spotty and where it was useless, forcing you to go back to the Carphone in
the car to make calls.

It's a history you don't soon forget. At first, most of us customers even
knew each other, having talked at the nice lounge Cellular One of
Charleston had for us at their garage where you waited for the boys to
install the cellphones into your car. The company used to have customer
appreciation days when they'd break out the BBQ and setup tables in the car
bays for us, the appreciated customers paying for the new towers going up.
Cellular phone was as much a club as a phone and you met really nice people
all with this common interest. The company staff listened intently to our
signal reports, especially in new areas of the new towers, which were quite
different from the computer-generated coverage maps the software predicted.
This resulted in antennas being moved and tilted, tower heights being
adjusted, to improve coverage or to fix a hole along a major roadway. We
even had a special number to call, once we got back to coverage of course,
to report outages and failures. You feel appreciated when the company
staff is interested in your reports, not just reading some damned script
written by the lawyers blaming your phone for every problem...

GTE changed all that....

--
Larry

John Brandt wrote:
> On Sat, 12 Nov 2005 10:57:52 -0500, "Jo" <jomcg@optonline.net> wrote:
>
> Last April, a golfing buddy and I (both VZW users) drove from Maine
> to Orlando with a stop at The Villages, Lady Lake, FL. We stayed
> pretty close to the coast on the way south except for a bypass around
> NYC/NJ. I have a pre-paid that roams on anything other than native
> VZW, he has AC2 plan. We both had a VZW signal the whole way except in
> northeast PA and some spotty coverage in area between I-95 and Myrtle
> Beach, SC.
>
> Signal in FL was all VZW - generally full bars.

Florida is pretty good for VZW, even though in many places they are 1900
Mhz only.

I think that the only time I was on analog in Florida was in the
mountains, when I was skiing Mount Dora.

I thought their license in all of FL was 1.9 GHz. Of course no analog,
CDMA only.


SMS wrote:
> John Brandt wrote:
>
>> On Sat, 12 Nov 2005 10:57:52 -0500, "Jo" <jomcg@optonline.net> wrote:
>>
>> Last April, a golfing buddy and I (both VZW users) drove from Maine
>> to Orlando with a stop at The Villages, Lady Lake, FL. We stayed
>> pretty close to the coast on the way south except for a bypass around
>> NYC/NJ. I have a pre-paid that roams on anything other than native
>> VZW, he has AC2 plan. We both had a VZW signal the whole way except in
>> northeast PA and some spotty coverage in area between I-95 and Myrtle
>> Beach, SC.
>> Signal in FL was all VZW - generally full bars.
>
>
> Florida is pretty good for VZW, even though in many places they are 1900
> Mhz only.
>
> I think that the only time I was on analog in Florida was in the
> mountains, when I was skiing Mount Dora.

On Tue, 15 Nov 2005 13:14:29 GMT, Jerome Zelinske <jeromez1@earthlink.net>
chose to add this to the great equation of life, the universe, and
everything:

>SMS wrote:
>>
>> Florida is pretty good for VZW, even though in many places they are 1900
>> Mhz only.
>>
>> I think that the only time I was on analog in Florida was in the
>> mountains, when I was skiing Mount Dora.
>
> I thought their license in all of FL was 1.9 GHz. Of course no analog,
>CDMA only.

From the Mount Dora Chamber of Commerce:

Elevation: City rises in terraces from Lake Dora to 184 feet. Some homes
have basements.
Average Temperatures:
* Winter - 60.3 F
* Spring - 70.0 F
* Summer - 82.5 F
* Fall - 70.00 F


You think there's really a lot of good skiing there?

(But, what should I expect from a top-poster?)

--
David Streeter, "an internet god" -- Dave Barry
http://home.att.net/~dwstreeter
Remove the naughty bit from my address to reply
Expect a train on ANY track at ANY time.
"Like I said, I've got too much respect for women to marry them, but that
doesn't mean you can't...support them emotionally and financially."
- Sylvester Stallone

Mountains & snow in FL, you must be on crack!!


SMS <scharf.steven@geemail.com> wrote:

>John Brandt wrote:
>> On Sat, 12 Nov 2005 10:57:52 -0500, "Jo" <jomcg@optonline.net> wrote:
>>
>> Last April, a golfing buddy and I (both VZW users) drove from Maine
>> to Orlando with a stop at The Villages, Lady Lake, FL. We stayed
>> pretty close to the coast on the way south except for a bypass around
>> NYC/NJ. I have a pre-paid that roams on anything other than native
>> VZW, he has AC2 plan. We both had a VZW signal the whole way except in
>> northeast PA and some spotty coverage in area between I-95 and Myrtle
>> Beach, SC.
>>
>> Signal in FL was all VZW - generally full bars.
>
>Florida is pretty good for VZW, even though in many places they are 1900
>Mhz only.
>
>I think that the only time I was on analog in Florida was in the
>mountains, when I was skiing Mount Dora.

The Drifter wrote:
> Mountains & snow in FL, you must be on crack!!
>
>
> SMS <scharf.steven@geemail.com> wrote:
>
>
>>John Brandt wrote:
>>
>>>On Sat, 12 Nov 2005 10:57:52 -0500, "Jo" <jomcg@optonline.net> wrote:
>>>
>>>Last April, a golfing buddy and I (both VZW users) drove from Maine
>>>to Orlando with a stop at The Villages, Lady Lake, FL. We stayed
>>>pretty close to the coast on the way south except for a bypass around
>>>NYC/NJ. I have a pre-paid that roams on anything other than native
>>>VZW, he has AC2 plan. We both had a VZW signal the whole way except in
>>>northeast PA and some spotty coverage in area between I-95 and Myrtle
>>>Beach, SC.
>>>
>>>Signal in FL was all VZW - generally full bars.
>>
>>Florida is pretty good for VZW, even though in many places they are 1900
>>Mhz only.
>>
>>I think that the only time I was on analog in Florida was in the
>>mountains, when I was skiing Mount Dora.

Don't top post.

The skiing part was a joke.

You can still roam onto AMPS from the other carriers, even though
Verizon doesn't have AMPS in most of Florida.

It does snow on occasion in northern Florida. I've been there when it
has snowed.

"http://www.usatoday.com/weather/resources/climate/2004-12-21-florida-snow_x.htm"