s2kmugen is my god! I wish i knew as much as he did, so I can be as ballah!

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by s2kmugen
[B]

Great plan.. but what happens when you leave your your "home" area?.... you get roaming, can't use your mobile to mobile, and lose tons of features like battery life, caller ID.. etc.

Christople.. sorry about the TDMA.. didn't mean to insult you like that ... I dont know how that came out.. but you're correct.. 1800 and analog.. but those networks can't support your 1x features such as photo's, your internet, and your Sierra wireless air card speed capabillities.

 

No, he is referring to the fact that many of the CDMA based features offered by Verizon don't work in areas where they have purchased and integrated carriers who were and still are TDMA based.

With regards to the GSM conversions resulting in new handset requirements, well yeah they do, but the end result is a better product offering. GSM (which still uses TDMA as it's carrier protocol) is the way to go from a consumer standpoint and frankly makes the last U.S. CDMA hanger-ons seem a bit archaic.

Depends on how you qualify that. Most carriers, including your own have claimed to have 3G services for over a year. A few smaller carriers are offering the real deal to business clients as well ...

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by dkhl
[B]

Well, isn't it true with any carrier?

 

Ok guys, let's cool it down and stop talking about the perks and who has better technology and billing systems and blah blah blah.....

IMHO, it all boils down to this:

I need a wireless phone that actually does what it's supposed to - help me stay in touch with people while I'm away from home. All other features are just that - feautres. What good is a phone with tons of features if it does not work when I need it? Coverage area and reliability are my first requirements. I would pick an analog phone that works at most places over a digital phone that works at some places any day.

Verizon is the best in my experience, followed by AT&T followed by any other company BUT Sprint.

I have been a Verizon customer for over 5 years now. I travel all over NorthEast and never had any problems with service anywhere - well maybe once or twice in Western Mass Mountains. My wife had a Sprint phone for years but she'd never get a signal and always ended up using my phone when we were on the road. Finally she switched to Verizon and is happy now. She did not even get signal at home or work with Sprint. I know many other people with Sprint phones who do not get a signal at their homes - what good are the extra DIGITAL minutes to them?

Sprint always talks about how their technology is superior (and it is) and all but it just does not have a reliable network or the capacity so it's all worth nothing.

 

Very good feed back on your experience with wireless carriers Mas. Sorry to hear that Sprint didn't work very well for you and for others here. But there's a lil kick that a lot of Sprint reps selling Sprint service never tells the consumer (and I dont understand why they dont). Sprint phones or just like mini computers. Lets say I bought a P2, 400 mhz computer 5 years ago running windows 98. Years later, it's not as fast as it use to be... needs more data in the memory, video card out of date, needs an update windows platform. So what do people do ? Upgrade the software and add new toys to the computer.. Same thing w/ Sprint phones. Keep the same hardware(phone) and update the software.. what does that do? It allows the consumer that was once receiving bad service to good service(what they had at the beginnig) By upgrading the software, it allows your phone to be "retuned" and catch the new towers that have been put up or been "moved" to catch the other towers signals. If you don't upgrade your software, your phone is still reading the same old paramiters as it was before, so hense.. bad signal. Customers should go into the Sprint store and receive this service for free every 5 months or so. This should help out our following members if your experiencing any problems w/ you phones. Also when we leave our computers on.. what happens the next day? It lags doesn't perform as it should.. so you reboot.. same thing w/ phones.. reboot the phone to "reentergize" the phone.

 

Err, sorry but no. Software revs have nothing to do with towers; some of them do occassionally address buggy features with the phones however.

So you want a phone that works well but don't mind getting overcharged every month for it because the billing system is crap? In my view there are many factors that play into which carrier one should choose, quality of service is chief among them, but not alone.

Go pick up an analog phone, use it and deal with charging it every day and then come back and say that.

 

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by steve c
[B]
So you want a phone that works well but don't mind getting overcharged every month for it because the billing system is crap?

 

if signal and reception is what someone craves for, how many people charge their phones at night anyway? i do... i have a habit of just plugging it in next to my bed.. so if i had an analog phone, no big difference..

I can tell you, as far as billing systems go, here in my region, we don't have a problem anymore. Our conversion problem that happened two years ago has been fixed. So, currently, i have never had a customer tell me that they got billed for something they shouldn't have.

So basically, you are telling me, the technology that is currently being offered by Verizon in it's 1x system won't work if i go out of my verizon coverage? DUH!!!! why would it work on a partner network if they are not verizon 1x??? that is just basic common sense.

But isn't it also true that if you purchase a GSM phone, the services you purchase with that phone can only be used on a GSM network?

Actually, it is good to update your phone's programming once in a while. PRL's and other features change month to month, so you never know when a new tower has decided to join your companies list of towers... so.. going to a store, or doing it over the air, will benefit your reception...