Making the Switch

After two years of having Verizon Wireless out here in the Alden area I've made the switch and it couldn't come at a better time. My contract with Verizon Wireless ends on January 17th, 2006 so instead of renewing it I decided to try Cingular Wireless out one more time. I previously tried it when it first rolled out service in 2000 and was less than impressed. Back than I had dropped calls in places I had full service and less that admirable sound quality on my phone. But it's been about 5 years since that time and GSM technology has come a long way since then. So first before we get into my review of Cingular's Service let me list the reasons I decided to drop Verizon Wireless in the first place.
Verizon while it's touted as have great reception, prices, and customer services, I find it falls short in some of those areas. For instance when I first got my phone I had great reception in my basement where my room is, where as now I get crappy reception, frequent dropped calls, and shady reception in other areas around town. And yes, I'd always keep my phone with the most up to date prl's. The prices I can't agrue about but the customer service I found to be very bad and difficult to deal with. I mean I'm paying the bill here but whenever I had to take to Verizon on the phone they didn't even care to talk about any issues I've had or at least the CSR I've gotten had been that way with me.
Now on to Cingular! First off Cingular has begun to put themselves in a position that helped Verizon get to where it is today. Cingular starting January 2nd, 2006 had begun selling Phones and Service in RadioShacks WorldWide, replacing Verizon Wireless. Then I decided to get the Motorola Razr V3 Black which yes, I know Verizon has a CDMA version but Verizon cripples their devices which Cingular so far and to my knowledge has not. Next is the GSM network, which to my understanding works in 3 parts. The first part takes up part of the tower to connect to the call, when that is done it move on to part two and frees up more space for other people to connect to the tower to place and recieve calls. The second part is when you are actually connected to the call and having your conversation. And finally after that it frees up that part and moves to part three which disconnect the call. So this is done to allow more people on a tower at a time and compared to what I've read it allows up to twice as many people on a Cingular tower comapred to Verizon and their CDMA technology.
Now after getting Cingular again I was skeptical but after playing around a bit I must note that the sound quality is fantastic, the Motorola Razr is fantastic, and customer service is very helpful and willing to work with you on various issues. So hands down Cingular so far seems to be a great buy and even better when they launch their Ringback tones equivalent AnswerTones sometime this Spring.