Verizon doing away with Analog phones and Analog Roaming?

[Blaise]

I was in a Verizon store today and the sales rep said Verizon is slowly doing away with their tri-mode analog phones and within 6 months the you will no longer be able to roam on analog!


Is this true? Can anyone confirm this??

[Critic]

Originally Posted by Blaise

I was in a Verizon store today and the sales rep said Verizon is slowly doing away with their tri-mode analog phones and within 6 months the you will no longer be able to roam on analog!


Is this true? Can anyone confirm this??

To quote a great man, "You are CORRECT, sir." All mobile carriers will be phasing out analog over the next few years. (GSM doesn't have an analog counterpart, but some GSM carriers still have older towers running TDMA/analog - and those will be going away too.)

[danf100]

The FCC has mandated that carriers need to support some level of AMPS until February of 2008, so don't expect to see AMPS go totally away until then. However, since digital is FAR FAR more spectrally efficient than AMPS, you'll see the players do exactly that: support AMPS minimally until then.

[Andy]

Verizon is doing away with Analog capable phones, but that doesn't mean you can't still get them. There's still a few phones in their lineup that have AMPS capabilites. You will be able to roam on analog systems even after the next 6 months. What Verizon is doing is changing their PRL lists to support the CDMA digital side before reverting to the analog side of their roaming carrier, not only so you are not using their analog, but also to make use of the roaming carrier's digital network before going to Analog, since digital has greater talk/standbye time and voice quality.

[Blaise]

So what is going to happen when they finally do away with analog?

The Verizon service in my area is very heavily reliant on analog roaming. In a lot of spots, if there is no analog there is no signal unless you have a GSM phone!

So basically when analog goes away the Verizon service will suck in my area unless Verizon adds new digital sites?

[Jay2TheRescue]

Originally Posted by Blaise

So what is going to happen when they finally do away with analog?

The Verizon service in my area is very heavily reliant on analog roaming. In a lot of spots, if there is no analog there is no signal unless you have a GSM phone!

So basically when analog goes away the Verizon service will suck in my area unless Verizon adds new digital sites?

Sounds like it. If you're roaming on analog then the carrier who owns the sites would need to upgrade them. If you're roaming on the analog counterpart of a TDMA network then you're screwed. Verizon would have to install towers in your area then.

-Jay

[Blaise]

Originally Posted by Jay2TheRescue

Sounds like it. If you're roaming on analog then the carrier who owns the sites would need to upgrade them. If you're roaming on the analog counterpart of a TDMA network then you're screwed. Verizon would have to install towers in your area then.

-Jay

The carrier who owns the sites is Unicel and they are upgrading all there current sites to GSM. There current sites still have TDMA / AMPS capability.

They have also added many new GSM only sites.

So I guess I am screwed with Verizon.

[agentHibby]

Rural Cellular does do CDMA on most of there wireless towers. If they don't see a reason for CDMA in your area then they might just do GSM. That same is true vicea versa

[BillRadio]

I would not take the word of a retail store employee as final. What he is saying MAY have some truth to it, but the end of analog is not that near.

First, since Verizon is required by law to maintain analog until at least until February of 2008, it is actually MORE efficient to allow users to access these analog channels. Customers actually using these channels are helping overall capacity.

2nd, there are still systems that are still analog-only. Some of these are Verizon roaming partners. Why cut off customers who travel in these areas when it makes no difference to Verizon capacity?

3rd, all pre-mid-2004 OnStar customers use analog exclusively. Does Verizon want to suddenly make these units not work? If they did, it would prudent to notify OnStar & their customers who have at least a 1-year contract for service.

4th, it is true there are fewer analog-capable phones, but they are still being sold, because there are many of us who still want to buy, and use them.

5th, there are still Millions of phones capable of analog roaming. What would be the financial implications of cutting off the revenue from these sources?

Of course some of these imply logic, and not all businesses make logical decisions. But not one carrier has announced they will discontinue analog before the federally-mandated date, and none have announced it will even drop analog after that date, either. Cingular HAS announced they will drop TDMA at that time, and Alltel has dropped both TDMA and GSM from some newly-purchased markets, but they still have analog available.

[walkguru]

Wirelessly posted (Walkguru's: Nokia6682/2.0 (3.01.1) SymbianOS/8.0 Series60/2.6 Profile/MIDP-2.0 Configuration/CLDC-1.1 UP.Link/6.3.0.0.0)

Originally Posted by Critic

To quote a great man, "You are CORRECT, sir." All mobile carriers will be phasing out analog over the next few years. (GSM doesn't have an analog counterpart, but some GSM carriers still have older towers running TDMA/analog - and those will be going away too.)

There goes the so called verison advantize.

[Jay2TheRescue]

Originally Posted by BillRadio

... Cingular HAS announced they will drop TDMA at that time, and Alltel has dropped both TDMA and GSM from some newly-purchased markets, but they still have analog available...

Here's my two cents worth:

I don't see Cingular maintaining analog long after they shut down TDMA, as their analog service is tied into their TDMA network. Once the FCC allows them to shut it down I think they will. Yes, there may be some revenue for analog roaming, but Cingular has to pay for that bandwidth and maintain the analog equipment, and their customers are getting nothing out of it. Analog is a bandwidth hog. With the increasing cost of bandwidth carriers will be forced to make the best use of the bandwidth they already own. To me this means they will shut down analog & add more capacity to their current network technology, be it CDMA or GSM. Maybe some small local & regional carriers may maintain analog but I see the large, national carriers like Cingular, TMO, Verizon & Sprint shutting down their analog systems ASAP to use that bandwidth elsewhere in their networks.

That's the way I see it.

-Jay

[Andy]

In urban areas where digital service is good I do see carriers dropping AMPS as soon as they can, because in some areas carriers can very well use that gained spectrum for other things.
In areas where Verizon's roaming partners are switching from TDMA/AMPS to GSM, Verizon will either build their own sites or a different roaming carrier will start to cover those areas, because Verizon will not just suddenly leave people with no service whatsoever.

[agentHibby]

Verizon is not for sure what they will do. I think it is safe to say that in Metros analog coverage will go bye bye in 2008.
see SEC 2005 10-K filing PDF page 12, page 10 on document

[RJB]

I dont mind this in fact I probably wont even notice it is gone.

[agentHibby]

98% of the VZW customers care less about analog today

With my new phone the analog only signal when was in WY was very very little.

I am sure the only people that truly care use there phone in a place where there is no CDMA network since both Cellular providers are doing GSM or one with GSM and the other is TDMA.

[Andy]

Agent Hibby, did you ever give us a coverage report of your trip???

Something like 98% of all calls made on the Verizon network are made on their CDMA network, so saying goodbye to analog even completely wouldn't really cause too much trouble, but I do see carriers keeping analog up in rural areas, especially since they have enough capacity there to support it.

[Fullstrength]

Originally Posted by Andy84094

Agent Hibby, did you ever give us a coverage report of your trip???

Something like 98% of all calls made on the Verizon network are made on their CDMA network, so saying goodbye to analog even completely wouldn't really cause too much trouble, but I do see carriers keeping analog up in rural areas, especially since they have enough capacity there to support it.

I still wonder if there will be a cdma/gsm phone for the US. Even for those who have on-star. There isnt complete coverage for any technology except analog.

[vroberts]

Originally Posted by Andy84094

Agent Hibby, did you ever give us a coverage report of your trip???

Something like 98% of all calls made on the Verizon network are made on their CDMA network, so saying goodbye to analog even completely wouldn't really cause too much trouble, but I do see carriers keeping analog up in rural areas, especially since they have enough capacity there to support it.

Andy - I came over here to discuss the same issue, the relative lack of Verizon tri-mode phones. But the discussion raises another issue. If carriers are required to maintain some level of anaglog service until Feb 2008, why did Verizon in Fla tell me they were an "all PCS" network and why did my StarTac fail to work on either the high frequency CDMA band or the analog band? Somehow it seems strange that my tri-mode phone would have failed in two of its three modes and work perfectly well in the third.

[Andy]

Verizon is all PCS in Florida, which means that Verizon does not operate an analog AMPS network there. PCS networks do NOT run AMPS networks, only Cellular networks, whether they run GSM/TDMA/CDMA have to have AMPS until 2008. Cingular owns both Cellular licenses in most of the STate, and I believe Alltel owns one of the two in some areas of the State. IF Verizon does not allow roaming on Cingular AMPS where you were, then that's why your phone would not have worked. Are you on an America's Choice Plan, vroberts?

[Andy]

Well in Eastern FL, your Verizon phone should first look for a Verizon signal, then for a Sprint signal, both carriers are PCS there, and then for Cingular AMPS, and your phone did neither of that which is strange.
In Western FL, your phone should first look for VZW, then Sprint, and then ALLTEL digital and Analog AFAIK so I have no idea why your phone didn't revert back to analog...something seems fishy.