geekhack
geekhack Community => Off Topic => Topic started by: mushman on Wed, 12 October 2016, 08:49:26
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Up until now I've been very happy using T-Mobile. For reasons I can't explain I'm going to get a significant discount in the near future but can only pick between these four providers:
AT&T
Sprint
Verizon
GCI
Can you lend a hand in choosing one? I feel like a traitor for leaving T-Mobile since other than having a very rare coverage issue I've had absolutely zero problems. However the discount I am faced with is too good to ignore.
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I have been with T-Mobile for most of the past decade and a half and have been very pleased.
A few years ago I switched to Sprint for one contract period (because, for the first time, T-Mobile did not reward me for being a good, loyal, long-term subscriber). Sprint was horrible and dishonest made me very angry, because in the 1990s I was a Sprint advocate and was even a Sprint re-seller for a brief period.
It is heartbreaking that, in recent years, many companies have taken to offering great deals to secure new customers, while taking every opportunity to fleece their existing loyal customer base. I chaulk it up to the decline of civilization in general.
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IMO the only way to get a good read on this is to talk to people you know locally. Coverage maps and such don't tell the whole story, and what's important is that your devices have good coverage where you actually use them.
Other than that, there are going to be horror stories and "X has been fine for 15+ years" stories with every carrier. I, for instance, have been with AT&T for nearly 20 years. I say nearly because I'm honestly not sure when we first got our cell phones, but it had to be sometime between 1994 and 1997. I've shopped around often over the years and just never had a good enough reason to switch. I've never had an issue with the customer service for ATT Wireless, either. U-Verse, on the other hand, has been nothing but trouble for the few people I know who tried it, but they're related only in name and are actually two separate entities.
tl;dr Talk to people in your area. If you can, test out speeds and connection quality from different providers at places you frequent to get a picture of what you would be working with on a daily basis.
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Tp4 mostly communicate online
Over the past 5 years, paid a total of $100 on my cell phone bill on a prepaid plan..
Oh yea.. Tp4 doesn't haz any friends, so no one calls or txts that's not work related..
Most people get their phone through their work though,
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If you want to switch, Verizon or US Cellular. They are both cdma but sprint has horrible covage and atnt propbably makes like half the money in the bank.