[devin_mm]

I always thought Verizon was evil because they like to severely disable features in phones and like to charge you to use them, like the BB 8830 apparently they turn off the GPS and charge you like $10/month to use it.


Oh yeah I'm using Telus (I call it Teh-lose) I may dislike the company but they have really good coverage and my phone is completely unimpeded.

 

[ozz]

yeah if your on the family plan verizon is definitely not the cheapest
and yes they charge extra for evey feature.

 

[grawk]

If service is all you care about, go with verizon.

I have accounts with AT&T, Cellular One (which is now AT&T), and Sprint, and am happy with all 3.

 

[MrSlacker]

I am on AT&T for the last 4 years and been pretty happy with them.

 

[fallen.angel]

I have been with T-Mobile for a while. I think they usually provide more whenever minutes than major competitors for similarly priced plans. Customer service has been acceptable to me.

 

[kugino]

i'm on verizon now...and their coverage has been pretty good. but i hate the way they cripple the features on phones...

my contract with the verizon devil ends in a month and i'll make another contract with the at&t devil while picking up an iphone...oh well. since i live in an urban area i'm not so worried about coverage...

but like someone said above, i think your best bet is with verizon if all you're worried about is coverage

 

[OptionTrader]

I had Verizon and they were, at best, okay. If you have to travel outside of the US, however, a GSM carrier is best. For the past 6 years now, I have been with AT&T (did the whole circle: AT&T, Cingular and back to AT&T) and have been very pleased with the quality of service.

If you are using a GSM phone in the US, you need to use a decent quality phone, not the vast majority of crap that's out there that you get for cheap when signing a contract. It's the transceiver quality that matters. I've been purchasing higher-end unlocked Nokias (from Nokia directly) and rarely ever had problems.

 

[jclinton46]

Every provider has its pluses and minuses. I had BellSouth/Cingular for years. When my daughter went away to college, she could only get coverage by leaning in a certain spot against her 2nd floor dorm window. We changed her to Verizon and later my wife. I planned to stay with Cingular and asked that they transfer my wife's remaining contract over to my number (I had fulfilled my requirements several months previously). Anyway, they acted very crappy about any accommodation so I waited a couple of months while I depleted my 1500 minute rollover then jumped ship.

I have been fairly pleased with Verizon coverage, etc. Still don't like their crippling of features or charging for ringtones you could get free with other carriers but heck I don't download ringtones anyway.

I don't think there is a "best" carrier, just one that fits you maybe a bit better. Good luck.

 

[DSlayerZX]

AT&T for me
in my house and school, AT&T has great reception, full bar almost everywhere I go
while T-Mobile has zero to 2 in my house, 0 during anime expo
almost 0 in my dorm, and such,...

 

[rhythmdevils]

I dont know about now, but 2 years ago I went on a road trip through the boondocks in Nevada with some friends. All in all, we had Sprint, AT&T, and my Verizon phone.

I was often the only one with service.

 

[PFKMan23]

I use AT&T/Cingular, and I find it works fine for me. It does help though that a cell tower is right next to my dorm.

 

[Sh0eBoX]

as far as i've noticed... verizon seems to do the coverage thing best. i've had verizon for the last 4 years and it's been very, very good as far as being able to get service where i'm at. my friends who are on AT&T, Sprint, and various other service providers seem to be struggling to get service when I have at least a bar or two.

as far as coverage... verizon is definitely the best. they're not the cheapest, however. Also, they do really like to cripple their phones by removing features and making you pay for them... and also their stupid Verizon UI (although neither of my last 2 phones had it). Also, about the ringtone thing... there seems to always be a way around it. you can find ways to make your own ringtones and put them on your phone for free.


i would pick verizon if i was looking for coverage. otherwise i would go with cingular to get the iphone... but the iphone is not the best at being an actual phone. also, the new firmware update pretty much gets rid of third party apps (for now, at least)

 

[HardHeadCase]

Stay away from Verizon, they owed me money for a cancelled contract within the first fifteen days and 8 months later tried to have a lawyer take me to court for about 8 bills. I had a receit showing they owed me 20 dollars that was supposed to be in the form of a check,,,,,,,it never showed,,,,,,read up on Verizon billing problems, you will see. Cing/ATT always worked best for me.

 

[grawk]

Quote:

Originally Posted by appophylite /img/forum/go_quote.gif I've been using Dobson/Cellular One for the last 3 years. They've worked pretty well for me so far. But they just merged with AT&T, so it looks like I automatically am going to get moved over to their network.

In fairbanks, their network will be the dobson network.

 

[Jon118]

I've pretty much used Verizon exclusively and it has always been pretty good. Coverage is better than any of the carriers my friends have. But you do have to pay for pretty much everything.