Tulane cell phone service

[exgatr]

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Hey everyone,

I'm moving to New Orleans soon and I was wondering what company has good service in the area. I'll be going cell-phone only (won't have a regular phone), so I'm trying to decide between Nextel and Cingular.

Does anyone know which one has better quality?

 

[WiscoFan14]

Cingular has some Tulane-only deals that they pimp in the lobby of the med school every tuesday I think. Lots of students have gotten free phones and major discounts through Cingular...plus their store is right down the street from school. Not sure about nextel.

 

[inshanesworld]

I was wondering this too 🙂 I don't know about service quality...but...Cingular seems to give you a lot more minutes for the money than Nextel and they let you roll over unused minutes into the next months. I am with Verizon right now. Not sure if I should switch when I get down there. 😕

 

[Jsscales05]

What about internet? What service seems to be the best? I have used Cox while in undergrad and I know that Cox' headquarters is in NO, but are there any other viable services? Thanks

 

[randomlogik]

I use Verizon for my cell and have been happy with it. If you can get a better deal with Cingular, then I would go with that then. I havent really heard how their service is though. As for high speed internet I use BellSouth and have had no problems with it. Cox and Bell South are the two major companies.

 

[LvlyBlkPreMed]

I have T-Mobile service which I used while I was down in New Orleans and it seemed to work fine. I just extended my service a few months ago so I will have to keep it.

 

[Aucdoctobe]

I can answer this one. My wife works for Cingular Wireless. And I'm a level two data and voice technician for Sprint (for a little while longer).

Cingular Wireless has better coverage (nationwide), but Nextel has better service. Now, Cingular Wireless just bought AT&T. If that gets approved in November, they will have the nation's largest network.

However, Cingular is also in severe cost cutting mode. The 41 Billion that they have invested has put them in financial straits. So, they are not building any new towers.

Where as Sprint is building 1500 towers next year alone!

Currently Sprint has more towers than any other carrier, followed by Verizon, AT&T, and Cingular.

Nextel is one of the smaller cell phone carriers. There customer service has recently been rising but they are ranked pretty badly. The only company's ranked worse are Cingular, AT&T, and Sprint.

Also, Two-way walkie-talkie is becoming outdated, as Voice over IP becomes the fad. Stay away from TDMA all together if possible. Go with a CDMA carrier and you will have better options -- especially when you?re in the hospital.

Hospitals are "restricted zones" for towers. So, signal will always be poor there. The key is to get a phone that can operate on poor signal through data compression. Sanyo's are coveted for this, as are Sony phones.

Hope that helps.

 

[Samoa]

So what you're saying is, it's as much about the phone as it is the service?

 

[Aucdoctobe]

Exactly..

Signal strength is heavily regulated. Something about some studies showing a correlation between cancer and certain levels of signal strength caused the Feds to regulate this.

However, not all phones are equal. Data compression allows a cell phone to pick up a weak signal and compress it into a much stronger signal. This is especially helpful if you are in an area of weak coverage (like a hospital).

 

[deleted4401]

My 2 roommates and I have Sprint, and it is HORRENDOUS. We're all from places that had good Sprint service and never changed. Bad mistake, oh well.

I think that Verizon is awesome here, you get service everywhere - elevators, hospitals, wherever. It isn't that much pricier then Sprint, and Verizon has good service nationally.

Just get anything but Sprint, and it will save you a lot of hassle.

Oh, Cox Internet is so-so, but the service is typical of New Orleans, so don't expect much. Service goes out once in a while, and they usually don't pro-rate the bill, so you end up paying for days that you don't even have internet. I haven't heard if anyone uses BellSouth or a DSL service, but those could be options.

Have lots of fun here at Tulane - I'm now a senior, and started to get sad at the prospect of leaving!

Simul

 

[Aucdoctobe]

I?m not surprised by your problems. The truth of the matter is that every cell phone company has major coverage holes ? areas with little to no coverage. I get customers who switch all the time from Verizon, Cingular, AT&T (soon to be Sprint), T-Mobile, ect? It just depends on what area you are. Sprint covers 93% of the country.

New Orleans is a strong coverage area. If you?re having those sorts of problems, especially after a move to another area, than you need to call technical support and let someone diagnose your problem.

Most of the time poor coverage (if your not in the 7% with no coverage) can be alleviated by getting a PRL update, ESM refresh, and dialing *82 to sync with the towers. If you have a Samsung phone, than you?re just screwed. They suck.

 

[Samoa]

I use Bellsouth DSL. No complaints. I've also used Earthlink here with no service problems. But their tech support people are idiots, and their sales and billing people are not interested in retaining your business long term.

ps. I had Sprint for my cell phone service when I came here as well. I stopped using my phone entirely, the coverage was so awful. So I'm now one of those dinosaurs without a cell phone.

 

[Aucdoctobe]

I use Bellsouth DSL. No complaints. I've also used Earthlink here with no service problems. But their tech support people are idiots, and their sales and billing people are not interested in retaining your business long term.

ps. I had Sprint for my cell phone service when I came here as well. I stopped using my phone entirely, the coverage was so awful. So I'm now one of those dinosaurs without a cell phone.

Interesting... New Orleans is a very strong coverage area. I speak with people all the time who tell me that coverage is great in that area. But there are always exceptions.

I recommend anyone having problems with Sprint go to:

http://www.sprintsitesusa.com

Regular customers can register and request a tower be built in a certain location. The corporate bigwigs take those requests seriously.

If you having heavy duty problems, you may call this confidential number:

Executive Services = 1-866-519-5698

This is the corporate people's direct, confidential telephone number. As I said before, hospitals are restricted zones. Towers cannot be built within a certain radius of hospitals. If you speak directly to the corporate people, they will be able to do more than anyone else to resolve the issue.

By the way, a sucky phone will cause sucky service! Don't forget that.

 

[geromine]

Here are some facts:
ATT gets good reception in town but not in medical school building or the hospital. They have crappy customer service. Dont get em.

Verizon is great in and outta buildings.
T-mobile also seems to be good.

Cingular is very bad at least around the school area. I dont know how the merger of two crappy services (ATT, cingular) will help the situation but we'll have to wait and see.