Best coverage in So Central WI?

[mavrick1903]

Wondering what y'alls thoughts are on best coverage in south central WI. Madison area, but need good boondocks coverage as well. generally my travels take me through the Sauk City, Baraboo areas, all over Dane County, through eastern WI, Milwaukee, and the Fox Valley area. much of my travel is by motorcycle, so I need cell coverage that is not just great on the highways. any thoughts are appreiceated. I'm currently with USCC. my contract rolls in August for a 2 phone plan for my wife and I.

[Charlyee]

Originally Posted by mavrick1903

Wondering what y'alls thoughts are on best coverage in south central WI. Madison area, but need good boondocks coverage as well. generally my travels take me through the Sauk City, Baraboo areas, all over Dane County, through eastern WI, Milwaukee, and the Fox Valley area. much of my travel is by motorcycle, so I need cell coverage that is not just great on the highways. any thoughts are appreiceated. I'm currently with USCC. my contract rolls in August for a 2 phone plan for my wife and I.

Hello & WELCOME to WA.

Realistically USCC has the best coverage in the areas you defined. I think I read in another post that you are unhappy with their phone choices and the prices, is that why you are looking to change? If that is the case I would still recommend that you stay with USCC for coverage.

If you are absolutely determined to change then here are some alternatives:

1. Verizon - reasonably good coverage in the areas you mentioned, specially in the rural areas. Their indoor coverage is a problem just about everywhere in WI. One advantage is that USCC is their roaming partner and so you will be covered if an area does not have native coverage, but only if you lose Verizon coverage completely.

2. Cingular - very good indoor and outdoor coverage in Madison & Milwauke areas but sporadic dead spots in the Fox Valley area & Baraboo. I think Sauk City did have good coverage. This may not be a good alternative for boondocks coverage.

3. Sprint & T-Mobile - I would stay away, the coverage is very sporadic.

After forcing my Verizon phones to roam on USCC for better signal for 4.5 years, I am looking into porting out to USCC next month.

Verizon has a trial period as does Cingular & others so make sure you check out the coverage in the places you need during that trial period, if you decide to leave USCC.

Good luck in your decision. Keep us posted as to how it works out.

PS: Did I make it perfectly clear that you have the best provider for your location and needs, at present with USCC ?

[mavrick1903]

Yep. it's about what I figured. any info on Alltel in the areas mentioned? Right now, I'm figureing on waiting to do anything till q3 when we see the RAZR V9 come out. I do wonder how long it will take USCC to pick up that phone though. the others like Verizon I expect will offer sales on the new one, but USCC does not exibt that bit of history. their hardware sales offers always seem to be weaker.

I figure they know they've got the market for coverage, and the rest try to make up for it with good deals on hardware, your thoughts on that?

[Charlyee]

Originally Posted by mavrick1903

Yep. it's about what I figured. any info on Alltel in the areas mentioned? Right now, I'm figureing on waiting to do anything till q3 when we see the RAZR V9 come out. I do wonder how long it will take USCC to pick up that phone though. the others like Verizon I expect will offer sales on the new one, but USCC does not exibt that bit of history. their hardware sales offers always seem to be weaker.

I figure they know they've got the market for coverage, and the rest try to make up for it with good deals on hardware, your thoughts on that?

I absolutely agree with you, USCC has such good coverage that they don't have to follow the other's way of doing business.

Alltel does not have service in Milwaukee at this time. You could probably still get a Alltel service if it is available where you live, and be roaming in the areas that don't offer service. I think if you are on their National Plan, roaming is free, not quite sure on this.

Here is their Service Locator by Zip Code.

[Andy]

Good morning everyone,

I think Charlyee really pointed out to you that U.S. Cellular is the best option, and while I don't live in that area that is what I've always heard as well. If you are REALLY unhappy with U.S. Cellular's plans or phone offerings, you could port to either Sprint and Verizon and then force your phone to roam on U.S. Cellular. There are no roaming charges for you, you'd just be roaming most of the time and get U.S. Cellular coverage with a Verizon or Sprint phone and plan. Not sure what good of an alternative that would be...just throwing it out at you.

[ElwoodBlues60657]

I've also heard that USCC has the best coverage in South Central WI. My mother-in-law has USCC and has been very happy with the coverage and reliability. She only really needs to use the phone in So. Central WI and northern Illinois, so she didn't need a national roaming plan. We travel a lot for business, so we went with Verizon, as their national roaming is cheaper (and better) than USCC's.

We were also unimpressed with USCC's phone selection, data plans and online payment options when we switched to Verizon about a year and a half ago. USCC's easyedge plan bills at $.01/KB or $10 for unlimited. On top of that, you pay $2.50/month for an email address, and $3-5 for news, sports and weather. Assuming you wanted unlimited, that's $15-17/month for a service that Verizon provides for only $5/month.

We've been very happy with Verizon. We haven't really hit any dead spots in Madison yet. I've run across a few when driving out in the country (like along state highway 213 between Evansville and Beloit), but those have been pretty rare.

Before we switched to Verizon, my wife and I both had Cingular, and their coverage in Madison was *horrible.* We moved here from Chicago and coverage there was fine, but we both had constant dropped calls here in Madison. A co-worker of mine didn't listen to me and recently switched from Sprint (he had good coverage in the city, poor coverage outside of town) to AT&T/Cingular. He's had nothing but problems since he switched. In addition to the frequent dropped calls, he's also had problems where calls don't go through, or are routed incorrectly (he dials a number, but is connected to a different number, or people dial his number and are connected to someone else).

Hope this helps...