I recently read somewhere that T-Mobile and Cingular made an agreement to provide T-Mobile customers with service on Cingular's network anywhere in Upstate, and parts of downstate New York. Is that true? I kinda need to know because im going to a friend's house, who has Cingular there, but T-Mobile doesn't have service for almost 50 miles.
I suppose the question is where in upstate New York. If you go out route 17 between Windsor and Deposit, Cingular has service and T-Mobile does not and you cannot roam. However, go out west on route 17/I-86 beyond Vestal, NY, including Elmira, and you do roam on Cingular. Your best bet is to check the T-Mobile coverage map as well as the http://home.se.t-mobile.com/zip-search.asp site where you can enter the zip code of the location you are going to. The latter site will tell you the name of the carrier you can roam on if any.
I believe they indicate what percentage of the given ZIP code has the level of coverage specified. For my ZIP code, I see "Great Coverage" at 56%, "Good Coverage" at 56% and "Fair Coverage" at 100%. To me this says there is 100% fair coverage throughout my ZIP code and 56% has great coverage. I am one block away from a rather tall water tower that has a TMO site on it (in addition to Cingular and Sprint) so I get great coverage even in my basement.
It is not all parts of upstate NY. Here in Rochester you cannot however down near Dansville and Cohocton, NY I can roam on Cingular...as well as Dobson (CellOne).
