Comments on: AT&T Has Differing Coverage Areas For Pre-Paid vs. Contract Customers? http://www.techcraver.com/2008/07/29/att-has-differing-coverage-areas-for-pre-paid-vs-contract-customers/ Craving tech, craving life! Tue, 06 Jan 2009 05:09:01 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.7 hourly 1 By: Vienn http://www.techcraver.com/2008/07/29/att-has-differing-coverage-areas-for-pre-paid-vs-contract-customers/comment-page-1/#comment-1497 Vienn Tue, 11 Nov 2008 18:34:50 +0000 http://www.techcraver.com/?p=279#comment-1497 I don't believe its the phone. My husband and my daughter have the exact same phone, only my husband is on a at&t contract and my daughter is on a pay as you go phone. My daughters phone shows full bars but no service, yet my husband gets full bars and service, here at our house which is in a rural area. So I do believe the owner of a go phone is not able to roam. I don’t believe its the phone. My husband and my daughter have the exact same phone, only my husband is on a at&t contract and my daughter is on a pay as you go phone. My daughters phone shows full bars but no service, yet my husband gets full bars and service, here at our house which is in a rural area. So I do believe the owner of a go phone is not able to roam.

]]> By: T-Mobile vs. AT&T, a Pre-Paid Mobile Smackdown! « Techcraver.com | Craving tech, craving life! http://www.techcraver.com/2008/07/29/att-has-differing-coverage-areas-for-pre-paid-vs-contract-customers/comment-page-1/#comment-1001 T-Mobile vs. AT&T, a Pre-Paid Mobile Smackdown! « Techcraver.com | Craving tech, craving life! Tue, 29 Jul 2008 18:06:37 +0000 http://www.techcraver.com/?p=279#comment-1001 [...] posting earlier about AT&T’s discriminatory practice of only giving pre-paid subscribers a subset [...] [...] posting earlier about AT&T’s discriminatory practice of only giving pre-paid subscribers a subset [...]

]]> By: Jason Harris http://www.techcraver.com/2008/07/29/att-has-differing-coverage-areas-for-pre-paid-vs-contract-customers/comment-page-1/#comment-1000 Jason Harris Tue, 29 Jul 2008 18:04:37 +0000 http://www.techcraver.com/?p=279#comment-1000 Hey Josh - the E71 is a quadband phone so I don't think it's because of a missing frequency. It is good that they're showing it, you're right. Hey Josh - the E71 is a quadband phone so I don’t think it’s because of a missing frequency.

It is good that they’re showing it, you’re right.

]]> By: Josh Bancroft http://www.techcraver.com/2008/07/29/att-has-differing-coverage-areas-for-pre-paid-vs-contract-customers/comment-page-1/#comment-999 Josh Bancroft Tue, 29 Jul 2008 17:57:58 +0000 http://www.techcraver.com/?p=279#comment-999 My guess is this has more to do with the cell phones themselves, and the towers, than any nefarious plan from AT&T. AT&T is a GSM carrier, and GSM (voice) can operate on 4 different bands: 850MHz, 900MHz, 1800MHz, and 1900MHz. A few years ago, when AT&T was Cingular (actually, I think it was even earlier, when they were still the pre-Cingular AT&T), they made a big deal about how they were "improving their coverage". They did this, not by building more towers, but by adding 850MHz radios to the existing towers. 850MHz has a longer wavelength, and is less succeptible to being blocked by things like trees, buildings, etc. than the higher frequencies. So this did, in fact, improve their coverage. But it was a big pain for people who had older phones that weren't able to operate on the 850MHz band. These people had to either suffer with really crappy coverage (the towers had been built with spacing for the longer wavelength frequencies, but were running on the shorter wavelength frequencies, which made swiss cheese of their coverage), or pay to switch/upgrade to an 850MHz-capable quad-band or tri-band phone. So in this case of the pre-paid phones having different coverage, my guess would be that there's one or more missing frequency bands on the phones, and not every tower has radios that work on every band. I'm actually kind of impressed that their online coverage map actually shows this discrepancy. That shows they at least know it's going on. I'd have expected them to just show the same coverage, and shrug their shoulders when people with pre-paid phones complained about lack of coverage. Just my $0.02. :-) My guess is this has more to do with the cell phones themselves, and the towers, than any nefarious plan from AT&T.

AT&T is a GSM carrier, and GSM (voice) can operate on 4 different bands: 850MHz, 900MHz, 1800MHz, and 1900MHz.

A few years ago, when AT&T was Cingular (actually, I think it was even earlier, when they were still the pre-Cingular AT&T), they made a big deal about how they were “improving their coverage”. They did this, not by building more towers, but by adding 850MHz radios to the existing towers. 850MHz has a longer wavelength, and is less succeptible to being blocked by things like trees, buildings, etc. than the higher frequencies. So this did, in fact, improve their coverage.

But it was a big pain for people who had older phones that weren’t able to operate on the 850MHz band. These people had to either suffer with really crappy coverage (the towers had been built with spacing for the longer wavelength frequencies, but were running on the shorter wavelength frequencies, which made swiss cheese of their coverage), or pay to switch/upgrade to an 850MHz-capable quad-band or tri-band phone.

So in this case of the pre-paid phones having different coverage, my guess would be that there’s one or more missing frequency bands on the phones, and not every tower has radios that work on every band.

I’m actually kind of impressed that their online coverage map actually shows this discrepancy. That shows they at least know it’s going on. I’d have expected them to just show the same coverage, and shrug their shoulders when people with pre-paid phones complained about lack of coverage.

Just my $0.02. :-)

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