US service availability

I've had my tri-band Sony Z600 on O2 for a while and it has been to
the states several times and served me well. Last year I did a 7000
mile road trip from San Francisco in a big circle as far east as N/S
Dakota and back to San F. In all that time I received a service in
only 4 places - San Francisco, Las Vegas, Moab Utah and somewhere in
Kansas briefly when a text arrived. It was definitely no service and
not no signal, as several times I saw people using phones in fairly
remote areas, and in reasonably sized towns where there should have
been service.

Although I've covered large distances on the eastern side of the US -
east coast to Indiana, down to Mississippi and back to east coast
without a problem, I began thinking it was time for a quad band update
as this was possibly the reason for no service. However a couple of
friends recently did a road trip - California, Arizona and Nevada, and
they said their service with their quad band phones was also
appalling. I'm not sure who their provider is - probably O2 or Virgin.

So.... is it down to the provider, lack of quad, or both? Anybody
highly recommend a UK provider who can do better than O2? Thanks.

MJ

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On 2008-10-03, [email protected] <[email protected]> wrote:
> So.... is it down to the provider, lack of quad, or both? Anybody
> highly recommend a UK provider who can do better than O2? Thanks.

Could be lack of GSM service - the locals you saw using the phone when
yours had no signal could have been using one of the CDMA networks,
which your phone won't be able to use.

--
-- Michael "Soruk" McConnell Eridani Star System
MailStripper - http://www.MailStripper.eu/ - SMTP spam filter
Second Number - http://secondnumber.matrixnetwork.co.uk/

In message <[email protected]>, [email protected]
writes
>I've had my tri-band Sony Z600 on O2 for a while and it has been to
>the states several times and served me well. Last year I did a 7000
>mile road trip from San Francisco in a big circle as far east as N/S
>Dakota and back to San F. In all that time I received a service in
>only 4 places - San Francisco, Las Vegas, Moab Utah and somewhere in
>Kansas briefly when a text arrived. It was definitely no service and
>not no signal, as several times I saw people using phones in fairly
>remote areas, and in reasonably sized towns where there should have
>been service.
>
>Although I've covered large distances on the eastern side of the US -
>east coast to Indiana, down to Mississippi and back to east coast
>without a problem, I began thinking it was time for a quad band update
>as this was possibly the reason for no service. However a couple of
>friends recently did a road trip - California, Arizona and Nevada, and
>they said their service with their quad band phones was also
>appalling. I'm not sure who their provider is - probably O2 or Virgin.
>
>So.... is it down to the provider, lack of quad, or both? Anybody
>highly recommend a UK provider who can do better than O2? Thanks.
>
>MJ
>
> Posted Via Usenet.com Premium Usenet Newsgroup Services
>----------------------------------------------------------
> http://www.usenet.com

If you look at the US providers web sites (Sprint. T Mobile and the
like) you can see coverage maps which show very big blank areas in the
West - regardless of the band you are on. On my recent trip (California
to Montana via the interesting bits) I bought a $10 phone card and used
hotel phones - $10 bought me 400 US minutes/200 minutes to UK. I've
still got over half left on it. I didn't actually use my quad band
phone at all and most of the time had no signal. The lack of a working
mobile was liberating and habit breaking: I reckon I have used mine less
since I came home.

(It was a treat to walk in the National Parks and not have people around
me barking into their mobiles: a disease which afflicts all but the
wildest parts of the UK now. "'Ello sharon I'm walking up a mountain
I'll 'ave to shout 'cos its windy ....".)
--
Richard C

[email protected] wrote:
> I've had my tri-band Sony Z600 on O2 for a while and it has been to
> the states several times and served me well. Last year I did a 7000
> mile road trip from San Francisco in a big circle as far east as N/S
> Dakota and back to San F. In all that time I received a service in
> only 4 places - San Francisco, Las Vegas, Moab Utah and somewhere in
> Kansas briefly when a text arrived. It was definitely no service and
> not no signal, as several times I saw people using phones in fairly
> remote areas, and in reasonably sized towns where there should have
> been service.
>
> Although I've covered large distances on the eastern side of the US -
> east coast to Indiana, down to Mississippi and back to east coast
> without a problem, I began thinking it was time for a quad band update
> as this was possibly the reason for no service. However a couple of
> friends recently did a road trip - California, Arizona and Nevada, and
> they said their service with their quad band phones was also
> appalling. I'm not sure who their provider is - probably O2 or Virgin.
>
> So.... is it down to the provider, lack of quad, or both? Anybody
> highly recommend a UK provider who can do better than O2? Thanks.
>
>
My daughter recently drove across the northern half of the US, and
returned to the east coast through the southern half. She used ATT, and
her phone handles both US GSM bands. She had pretty good coverage. One
of her travel companions was using T-mobile, and had spotty coverage.

On 2008-10-03, [email protected] <[email protected]> wrote:
> Although I've covered large distances on the eastern side of the US -
> east coast to Indiana, down to Mississippi and back to east coast
> without a problem, I began thinking it was time for a quad band update
> as this was possibly the reason for no service. However a couple of
> friends recently did a road trip - California, Arizona and Nevada, and
> they said their service with their quad band phones was also
> appalling. I'm not sure who their provider is - probably O2 or Virgin.
>
> So.... is it down to the provider, lack of quad, or both? Anybody
> highly recommend a UK provider who can do better than O2? Thanks.

There are several problems with mobile phone coverage in the rural
western part of the US, and you probably had trouble with all of them.

First, while there are generally lots of operators in cities, including
some at 1900 MHz, in rural areas the choice of operators will often
drop to just a couple (often small companies that you've never
heard of) and they'll both be operating at 850 MHz only. You really
need a quad-band phone if you are travelling in the country.

Second, CDMA is somewhat more popular than GSM in the US and, while
this isn't a problem in cities where there's lots of choices, in
the country when you are down to a couple of 850 MHz operators there's
some chance that neither of them will be GSM operators. There's
no fix for this, except maybe buying a CDMA prepaid phone from a
US operator.

Third, the small GSM operators you do find between cities may not
have roaming agreements with UK operators or, if they do, may be
incapable of doing the accounting required for roaming with a PAYG
SIM with your operator. A UK paid-monthly SIM may hence work better
than PAYG. Also, US carriers do tend to have extensive roaming
agreements within the country so a US SIM will probably do better
with this than a foreign one, though there's a catch here too in that
US prepaid SIMs often provide less extensive roaming than contract ones
do, if any at all (I don't think AT&T PAYG SIMs allow it at all,
though T-Mobile prepaid SIMs do).

Unfortunately, what all this means is that there is really no great
solutions for a foreign traveller in rural parts of the US, particularly
in the western part of the country. I think the best you can do for
as little money as possible is to bring a quad-band phone and buy a
US prepaid SIM which allows in-country roaming (e.g. T-Mobile), and
put up with what you get. A prepaid CDMA phone might be better
(if someone wants to do this the MVNO Pageplus is good) but having
to acquire a phone you can't use anywhere else is annoying.

For what it is worth, however, there is no perfect solution for
many rural areas in the west, especially in mountainous areas.
When I travelled there I carried both a contract CDMA phone (from
Verizon) and a contract GSM phone (from AT&T) and still found
places where neither phone worked. Making sure you have a good
way to make the calls you need to from payphones, hotel rooms or
Internet connections is not a bad idea regardless.

Dennis Ferguson

Thank you all for your replies. Much appreciated and very informative.

MJ

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