Since it is a sister company of Verizon, I was curious if anyone has used TW on the AT?
How was the coverage?
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Since it is a sister company of Verizon, I was curious if anyone has used TW on the AT?
How was the coverage?
Down South, Verizon was the only thing to receive constant service. Up north, it varied....
Total wireless is a Verizon mvno
You get verizon service, on verizon towers
You do not get any roaming on partner towers
Native verizon service provides roaming on partner towers
Sprint is one (cdma). Verizon roams on sprint. Sprint doesnt roam on verizon.
There are regional partners as well, and 4glte can potentially roam on almost any network thru agreement, depending on phone.
Bottom line is service is not quite as good as pure verizon. You do get what you pay for.
But at half the price, $33 gor 5 gb, I live with the drawbacks. I started using it because att was poor in area where i had to travel for work. Eventually i dropped my att phone.
Upload/download speeds are capped. Only times I have issue is when streaming live video of my daughters college softball games. My video is about a minute behind my wifes ATT service, and it stops and buffers routinely. Was very aggravating in super-regional recently. First time I was unhappy with it. Other than that, I have no problem with it.
I can recall a few spots with no service on AT, but dont know if would have had any better with pure verizon. Damascus-grayson comes to mind. I do know from hiking with ATT , it definitely was worse in south years ago, but things change too over time. I expect its not as bad now as 5 yrs ago.
I have been a customer of Straight Talk and now TracPhone with both using the CDMA Verizon network. I took a hike on the AT in Virginia between Harper's Ferry and Catawba 3 or 4 years ago and had pretty spotty service. My son wants to set out to hike that in May and my wife is insisting that we get him an InReach or some other kind of sat communicator. I'd rather not have to pay for the unit or their inflated subscription, but it would be nice to hear if coverage has improved or if he should switch to actual Verizon (or ATT) service instead of the pay-as-you-go cheapskate service.
I did have a few times where I didn't have service, but other hikers who had AT&T had service and even allowed me to text my worrisome other half.
Conventual wisdom says Verizon has the best coverage. Still, there are a lot of places where there is no coverage no matter who you have. They're just dead spots. There's a lot spotty service all though New England. Some of it is the terrain, some of it is the low population density.
I carry a TracFone and rarely had issues, but then I've never had a need for more or less daily contact with someone or the internet. The best time to check for service is during the day while your high up on the ridge and have a better shot at "seeing" a cell tower someplace.
You will have better service with real Verizon coverage then with the mvno which doesn't provide for roaming. This is absolutely not a problem along well-traveled roads and highways. But when you get into rural areas really rural areas...it can be.
I'm still using total Wireless and there were times on the CT that I had no /poor service even even though others with Verizon service had great service in spots. I don't think I had any decent service from Salida to Silverton. But others had good service in lake city, etc.
I can only speak to my experience, but Total (Verizon) service has been light years ahead of Virgin (Sprint).
Done many sections in the south with a friend who has Verizon. I have ATT. His is better. I can tell you that.
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I hiked with AT&T last year, and one of my hiking partners had pure Verizon. In the south, I could get LTE occasionally on some of the higher ridgelines, and sometimes only once or twice a day. The closer to VA I got, the better. From VA north, I had reasonable service everyday until I got to the Whites, and had virtually no signal in Maine. I carried an InReach mini knowing my wife would want to stay in contact every day or so (she's a worrier and I'm also clumsy, lol).Quote:
Originally Posted by MuddyWaters
My hiking partner had service every day, usually multiple times a day even down in gaps and valleys. I really wish I had switched to Verizon before my hike, it would have been so much less of a headache (and so much easier to call shuttles, etc.). I also hiked with a couple that had Sprint. They had service in GA and some of TN/NC, but that was about it. It was bad.