Return-Path: <gap+@ALECTRO.SOAR.cs.cmu.edu>
Received: from ALECTRO.SOAR.CS.CMU.EDU by ux4.sp.cs.cmu.edu id aa26860;
          17 Jun 98 12:50 EDT
From: "Gary Pelton <gap@cs.cmu.edu>" <gap+@cs.cmu.edu>
Reply-To: Gary Pelton <gap@cs.cmu.edu>
Subject: Re: which cellular service
To: oz@cmu.edu
CC: bovik@cs.cmu.edu
Date: Wed, 17 Jun 98 12:49:58 EDT
Sender: gap+@alectro.soar.cs.cmu.edu

I went to Bell Atlantic. My survey went as follows:

  I talked to all the big vendors AT&T, Bell Atlantic, Sprint, Aerial.
  I was sort of more interested in digital, though an analog system
    was a consideration. I was interested in holding the cost of
    the phone under $400 for the first year.

  AT&T was big well known and had the marketing muscle to support
    their system. It is a TDMA (Time Division Multiplexing) system
    which I considered weaker technology than the CDMA systems.
    Dave Johnson agreed on this point. 

    However, they were going to be around for a long time, and
    could force their way down many a competitor's throats.

    Bottom Line, calls on the top of the line AT&T digital phone 
    sounded like they were going through a ZOOB Tube. They had all 
    sorts of strange harmonics. BLEACH.

  Aerial - GSM TDM technology. Big win was this is a European Standard.
    Many phones all over Europe. Second win was the "smart card" (actually
    a small PC board) that holds all the user's information. This card
    can be put into any phone and the correct user gets billed. Some
    access information is necessary to use a card when it gets installed.

    I decided that TDM technology wasn't what I wanted.

  Sprint - CDMA Digital phones. Clear, but their programs cost too much
    $30/month + you had to buy the phone $150-$400.

  Bell Atlantic - CDMA Digital + Analog. Different frequency range of
    CDMA than sprint. Their packages came in under $400. They also
    had analog service which is useful outside the city limits.

I got a BA phone.

Now the bad news, the stupid belt clips didn't work well enough.
The phone came off my belt, somewhere in the strip. Went to BA and
temporarily suspended my service. About a month later went in to
talk about how to resolve my situation. They would of been happy to
sell me a digital phone at retail cost ($400). That wasn't in my
budget. They were also happy to give me a Motorola Flip analog phone
with charger, and convert me to an analog plan. At the end of my
year, I can go back to digital if I want to. The analog plans are not
quite as cheap as the digital ones, but this still seemed the right
thing to do. Mel Siegel has shown me a web site 

  http://www.bianchiinternational.com

that makes belt cases for policemen etc. that aren't the stupid
clips. It makes answering the phone a little harder, but not much.

Gary