For about 1.5 years I have been thinking that Samsung couldn’t possibly leave the Phone/Contacts app on the Galaxy Note 3 unpatched, yet in fact they have done just that. If you search for a friend by name, even after telling the app note to show contacts without phone numbers, you get a huge list of “contacts,” many of whom do not have the name searched for and for almost none of whom the phone has any number. I made a video of the remarkable behavior of this software.
Another knock against the phone/Samsung software/Android is that we couldn’t get it to work with a rented Nissan last month, either for phone calls or to play an audiobook yet a friend’s iPhone worked immediately.
I am about ready to switch to the iPhone 6 Plus partly for compatibility with the rest of the world, e.g., that Nissan, partly because I know that it won’t consider someone to whose email I responded 8 years ago a “contact,” and partly because of the image-stabilized camera and Apple’s excellent camera software. At the same time I am considering switching from Verizon to T-Mobile because Verizon has almost no coverage in my suburban neighborhood while T-Mobile and AT&T have at least some. T-Mobile seems to be about 1/2 the price of Verizon if there is any international usage at all (where T-Mobile is 1/6th the price per minute for voice calls and infinitely cheaper for data and text ($0 extra)). The plan is to use WiFi when calling from home so the iPhone and T-Mobile would have to hand off the call from WiFi to a tower if I were to head out for a walk in the neighborhood with Mindy the Crippler.
What do readers who’ve switched from Verizon to T-Mobile have to say? Is there an obvious reason to pay 2X for Verizon if your house happens to be in a place with poor Verizon coverage? (VZ has worked well most other places, though I have been afraid to turn the device on in a foreign country.)
Finally, is it fair to say that, in terms of keeping Apple stock price high and Apple products popular, the most important contributors are programmers at Samsung, Microsoft, and other potential competitors?
I switched. I live in Chicagoland. T-Mobile service is definitely more spotty than Verizon, but not to any serious degree in the urban area. Maybe out in the boonies it’s different. Voice over wifi, a feature T-Mobile offers, works about 85% of the time without issue. On an iphone, I enter airplane mode when I’m at home, and turn wifi and bluetooth on, to force it to use the better wifi signal over t-mobile’s. Which brings me to a different matter, seems as if the airplane mode is silly at this point. To turn off cellular signal but leave on wifi and bluetooth, which I believe is allowed on most airplanes at this point, I have to hit three buttons. It would be better if the airplane mode were just a cellular signal button, which I could turn on and off at will.
Maybe your particular neighborhood is an exception but generally speaking T-mobile has far worse coverage. Before you spring for a T-mobile iPhone, I would get a cheap prepaid phone that runs on the T-mobile network such as PTel. For $30 they will give you a free phone and a $25 plan and you drive around that phone for up to a month (while keeping your old phone) to decide if you really can live with T-mobile’s coverage.
If you’re thinking of moving off the Verizon network and going over to T-Mobile or AT&T, you could save a lot more money in the long-term by buying an unlocked iPhone and using a T-Mobile or AT&T network-based MVNO like Ting (on their GSM network), Consumer Cellular, or Walmart’s FamilyMobile. Their rates are significantly lower than even T-Mobile, let alone Verizon or AT&T.
Walmart’s FamilyMobile offers very attractive flat-rate service starting at around $29/month. Ting and Consumer Cellular have very customizable rate plans so you pay for what you use and don’t have to pay too much extra for what you don’t. BTW, Consumer Cellular and Ting are the highest rated cellular service companies in the latest Consumer Reports ratings.
Consumer Cellular uses AT&T’s cellular network, Walmart’s Family Mobile uses T-Mobile’s network and Ting uses either Sprint’s and T-Mobile’s network (though I would just stick to Ting’s beta T-Mobile GSM network since Sprint has the worst cellular network in the USA in my opinion).
Phil – I think this may hide some of your unwanted contacts.
In the phone/contacts app:
1. Select settings
2. select Contacts to display
3. select customize
4. expand your google account and make sure you only have My Contacts selected.
Daniel: Thanks for the idea. I tried this. As with the “only those with phone numbers” option it cuts down on the contacts that you see when browsing alphabetically, but not when searching.
I added the text “Paul” to the notes on one of my iPhone contacts whose name is not Paul, and searching for “Paul” brought this contact up.
You might not escape the St. Paul Street issue even on iPhone!
Before you ditch the phone at least try and install Cyanogenmod for an install as close as possible to vanilla Android. I’ve just tried on my Samsung phone with CM11 (Kit Kat) and searching in the phone app only brings up contacts with a phone number (this automatically lists all contacts with phone numbers from the full contact list as shown in the “People” app). Added side effects from installing CM include a lot less crud and more control over your phone (ie, block permissions for different apps).
I switched. A primary reason was that TMO does, and VZW and ATT don’t, support Wi-Fi calling. (This distinction is not supposed to outlast this year.)
re rob sama’s comment: I don’t invoke airplane mode at home, but I (usually) always have Wi-Fi enabled. I’ve had no problem with the phone switching to Wi-Fi calling without action on my part. I took advantage of TMO’s offer of a TM-1900 router, which is advertised to have special firmware that prioritizes voice traffic (over, e.g., video streaming). It’s otherwise the same as the ASUS RT68U high-end router. It is (or was as of late last year) available free on a loaner basis with a $25 deposit. I don’t think, however, that the phone’s switching automatically to Wi-Fi calling is dependent on this router, as the switch occurs also when I’m away from home.
Phil, if you you want to get an unlocked phone, as I did, and want maximum flexibility as to future carrier choice, get a VZW “device only” phone at an Apple Store. It will be unlocked and will be usable with any of the three mentioned carriers. I did this; after I left the Apple Store and before I went to a TMO store for a TMO SIM and network activation, I removed the VZW SIM.
Occasionally where Wi-Fi’s not available I’ve had coverage which was likely not as good as VZW’s, but it hasn’t been a significant problem for me.
I took my Verizon iPhone 5S to the Bahamas a month ago. The newer Verizon phones are all unlocked so I bought a sim card and put some minutes and data on the account. Everything worked well, except I couldn’t get LTE/4G speeds, only 3G. Before I got to the Bahamas I popped the sim card out so I didn’t need to worry about potential roaming costs. That trick should cut your apprehension about traveling with it.
My son has T-Mobile, I use Verizon. His T-Mobile doesn’t get reception at our house, but it’s reasonably good in the surrounding urban area. If you leave the urban area or a major freeway corridor, TMO has little to no coverage, but VZN does.
TMO’s “uncarrier” polices are admirable but unprofitable.
Phil, after having servicing issues with several carriers, I’ve stumbled onto Consumer Cellular. My first conversation and subsequent account setup convinced me these were good guys. No long telephone holds when you call them, you always speak with someone in the USA with good English, and their techs are fast and sharp at solving issues. They run on the AT&T net, no contract, and their prices and terms are clear and fair. I expect to save a lot of lifetime hours for much more enjoyable things than frustrating phone conversations with phone carriers.
I have been with T-Mobile, AT&T and Verizon.
Where T-Mobile has coverage, it is really fast. But I found lots of places in the Washington, DC area that lacked coverage. T-Mobile is really bad inside buildings like hotels and office buildings. I left T-Mobile due to the spotty coverage.
AT&T is pretty good but I find Verizon has the best coverage. They keep me connected the best.
If Verzion didn’t have coverage where I live I would sign up with AT&T.
On the issue of price, both Verzion and AT&T offer various corporate and other discounts. If one applies to you may find the price difference with T-Mo is less than you may think. For example, with my discount and extra data offered by Verizon I reckon I still pay more than I would pay on T-Mo but not that much. Having said that my priority is staying connected and for me VZW is hands down the best. And if you look at the 4G coverage maps VZW really does have the best network. In my opinion, this is an example of you get what you pay for.
I’m on an ATT plan with my daughter, “Mobile Share Value 3GB with Rollover Data”
Me: unlimited talk and text = $25
Daughter: unlimited talk and text = $25
Data: share 3GB w/rollover unused previous month = $40
Total ATT per month = $90
Plus tax and fee crap = $10
Net-net payout each month = $100
I live in northwest Connecticut (rural) and travel throughout New England extensively. I get good service at my house (***) and in most civilized locations in New England. I’m retired/explorer/wanderer type that seeks out no-service areas. Getting hard to find.
ATT service at their walk-in stores has been excellent. I tell them “I’m old and stupid” and the young techies are more than happy to help me. I’m a happy customer.
Buy ATT stock when it pulls back a bit. 5% dividend helps pay for my iPhone 6 service. If you can’t beat them, join them.
fyi.. Growing up in 50s, early 60s:
— For few years we had a two-seater out back, hand pumped well bottom of the hill, dried up in summer, froze in winter.
— Was a “pin boy” in high school. (hand set pins at an Elk’s Club bowling alley, 10 lanes)
— Didn’t see my first microwave until I was in the Navy (68-74).
— The Navy gave me a four function calculator my last patrol, 1974. Before that, slide rule.
— My iPhone is a magical device… BLOWS-ME-AWAY !!
One reason I haven’t tried one of the ‘other’ carriers that use ATT’s network is that I assumed ATT prioritizes their customers on their network, likely throttling the ‘little guys’ first during peak demand times.
Does anyone know if this is true?
I can’t speak directly in regards to AT&T and its MVNOs like Consumer Cellular but when I switched over one of my unlocked phones (a Moto E LTE) from T-Mobile Prepaid to Ting’s GSM network (that uses T-Mobile’s network) the download speeds felt just as fast as I when I was using it with T-Mobile Prepaid SIM. In fact now on Ting, my Moto E Android phone finds and locks onto LTE longer than when I was using it with T-Mobile Prepaid.
Sam, you are looking at this backward. From AT&T’s perspective you are just one shnook good for $100/month or so, while some of the MVNO’s are buying millions of $ worth of data and airtime on the AT&T network on a wholesale basis each month. For each retail customer they have to send out a separate bill and have someone in the Philippines talk to you on the phone if you have a problem which eats up a lot of the profit. For all of the customers of an MVNO they send one giant bill and the MVNO has to provide its own customer support and chase after non-paying customers. If you get frustrated and switch they have lost a few $ of profit. If Consumer Cellular switches all its customers to T-mobile, they lose millions. Who would you treat better?
Peter – thanks for the info.
Izzie – I understand your point about ATT, but that still doesn’t answer my question about whether throttling occurs for MVNO’s (new term for me).
Articles/lawsuits regarding the legality of throttling specific services like Netflix have been in the news the last couple of years. It seems like ATT could throttle MVNO’s as easily as they throttle Netflix if they thought it was in their business interest.
Are ATT/Verizon/T-Mobile relying on customer loyalty to support their higher prices? Or are there other advantages to sticking with the big 3 (or two)?
With the Big 3 you get a “free” phone, bricks & mortar stores, better customer service, etc. A phone call is a phone call but there are other aspects to the purchase. Once you get home, a bag of sugar bought from Aldi is the same as a bag of sugar purchased from Wegmans, but the experience is different.
Yes, with the Big 4 (Sprint, T-Mobile, AT&T and Verizon) one gets brick and mortar stores, but not necessarily better customer service. The web support AND phone support one receives from Consumer Cellular and Ting is better than what one usually receives from Sprint, T-Mobile and AT&T and on par with Verizon though with Consumer Cellular you are also guaranteed U.S.-based phone support.
On the other hand, other MVNOs like Page Plus offer worse phone and web support than the Big 4, and with FamilyMobile almost no direct phone support with a live person (though their website is pretty functional and easy to navigate for web support).
The two main advantages with sticking with the Big 4 are face-to-face support one can receive by going to one of their retail stores and the ease of international use (since it’s usually easier to enable international calling, texting and data with the Big 4 and not always supported directly through MVNOs SIM cards), but one pays a hefty price for this convenience.
It’s usually far less expensive to purchase a SIM card overseas and use it on your unlocked GSM phone to make international calls, texts or use the data network while traveling than to pay the Big 4 what they charge in-house to make calls, text or use cellular data while using one of their phones overseas.
@Consumer Cellular comments
They are great. The plans are easy to understand. The support people are knowledgeable. When I was in another country, there was no problem getting the “unlock code” from them so that I could use a different SIM card.
Relatively recently, they bumped up the number of data/minutes on the plans without even mentioning it. If you exceed a plan’s usage, you can retroactively upgrade your plan.
> is it fair to say that, [..] the most important contributors are programmers at Samsung, Microsoft, and other potential competitors?
The contributors are those who call the shots on what’s a priority or not. I’m not sure who they are, but I’m fairly sure they aren’t the programmers, especially not in the companies you’re giving as examples.
Actually, when something fails so strategically, the real culprits aren’t the direct decision makers : they’re those who gave decision-making powers to people with the wrong incentives and/or inadequate personal abilities. That would be the top management, which keeps failing at paying more than lip service to global user experience.