Anybody know about cell phones?

[Mike]

Does the QUALITY of the phone you buy (or get for "free") have any bearing on what quality your service is---as in dropped calls and conversations breaking up? We're considering losing the landline phone and going to cell phones and a cable internet service; anybody done something like that?

Thanks!

Mike and Diana

 

[Karlynn]

From what I understand, it depends on what the "free" phone retails for if you are going to buy it outright. My phone was "free" but it's a $125 phone. I don't know about dropped calls, but how good the phone is does effect reception/quality of sound to some extent.

We are also thinking of dropping our landline for another cell phone. Now that you can take your home phone number and put in on a cell phone (dropping the land line) we're thinking of doing that. We're having lots of problems with our phone company right now and it would only cost us an additional $9 a month to turn our home phone into a cell. The problem is, then there's only one phone in the house.

 

[catwoman]

Mike:

Not sure if the quality of the phone you purchase affects the quality of service.
I have Cingular service -- was a longtime AT&T customer who was resisting "migrating" over to Cingular when Cingular bought out AT&T. Had an old but very reliable Nokia 5165 candy bar-style phone. Calls started dropping in certain areas of Fort Worth. Cingular is phasing out the cell towers that service the old AT&T customers and announced an extra $5 monthly charge for those customers.
It was a no-brainer. I "migrated."
I have not dropped any calls since I got the new phone, a Nokia 6102i. It was not a "free" phone, but I did get a $50 VISA rebate card. I'm very pleased with it. This phone was very easy to get used to -- and I'm a very low-tech person. I love the Bluetooth -- it's glued to my ear so I can take calls while working and it not disturb co-workers.

Downside: Cingular doesn't have towers near my sister's lake house in east Texas. She & family can't use their cell phones until they get about 10-15 miles away. So they have to keep a landline.

We are keeping a land line for the time being -- can only get dial-up right now where we live.

 

[tobagotwo]

In discussing this very thing with a number of cell phone salespeople, and heaven knows there are a lot of them, the concensus was that there is very little actual reception difference between the expensive phones and the cheap phones. Rather than looking at the made-up "list" price and whether it has a camera or camcorder, the biggest issue is the quality of the sound from the unit. If the sound is clear, you can understand even a weak signal better. A surprising number of expensive phones have lousy sound quality.

Other suggestions for reception... Get a metal replacement antenna for your graphite one, if yours screws off. Get that silly stick-on thing that looks like a big, gold-tone printed circuit - most say that it actually helps some.

Thoughts... Get an extra battery right away. Keep a 12-volt cell charger in each car. Get an emergency power pack that uses AA batteries. Get an extra charger for travelling, in case you lose it.

Most of these things are available for only a couple of bucks on the web or through eBay. Buy them all at once to save on shipping.

Best wishes,

 

[greg]

I don't pretend to know why but in this part of the world a Konica phone just doesn't seem to get as good reception as Motorolla. (Only 2 I've tried)
I'm not bad mouthing or praising either. I know they are both good quality.
Just seems to be that way.

 

[maka]

Don't know much about the subject, but just wanted to add a comment. I've been told that it is best to keep a land line for security reasons. If you need help in an emergency, the policy can find out exactly where you are calling from even if you don't have the opportunity to tell them your address. Maybe you want to consider this and find out more about it.