Verizon Wireless Ranks Highest On Network Coverage In Most Regions

Looks like Verizon has placed top or tied for the top rating for network coverage in many areas of the country according to a recent J.D. Power and Associates Survey.

Now, I'm guessing Cincinnati is actually is in the "North Central" region.

The article on J.D. Power's web site doesn't really say where the regions are.

For the North Central region, U.S. Cellular and Alltel rank highest. Alltel is in the process of being acquired by Verizon, but neither carrier is active in the Cincinnati region.

Neither AT&T nor T-Mobile, the two large GSM carriers, ranked highest in any reason.

Now this is no major surprise in this area.

About two years ago people started telling me, "Ax, you won't believe it - I switched to Verizon and I don't lose calls at I-275 & Reed Hartman or Montgomery & Kemper any more!"

Sure enough, having recently switched to Verizon Wireless myself recently there are no significant dead areas in any of the places I regularly go - with the notable exception of the Eastgate Lanes just outside of Milford, and I could have sworn I had a signal in there on AT&T (anyone out there still on AT&T who can verify this for me?)

The only thing that worries me a bit on Verizon is that they do seem to have a pretty locked-down data network. To use any J2ME goodies at all (Opera Mini, etc.) you pretty much have to have a Blackberry.

However, their sound quality is TREMENDOUS. When Mrs. Axinar calls me from the saloon now on her new Samsung Flipshot I can hear her over the noise almost perfectly. She cut out REALLY badly on her old phone on T-Mobile.

Yes, Verizon does have one magnificent network - let's just hope they open it up at some point.