beaups
join:2003-08-11
Hilliard, OH
| Doesn't Surprise Me
ATT is bad for whatever reason at handling large groups of people. Every OSU football game I go to I get 100% signal strength yet cannot access data EVER. I wonder if they shut data off at those towers during games to leave bandwidth open for voice/text. When I do large conventions in Vegas, same problem. |
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Simba7
join:2003-03-24
Billings, MT | Sounds like you're paying for data service, but not getting it.
I'd chew some AT&T ass on that one. If I pay for services, I'd better damn well get them. |
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b10010011
Whats a Posting tag?
join:2004-09-07
Bellingham, WA | Why is everyone so supprised?
It is standard practice in the wireless industry to over sell your capacity. ISP's have been doing this for decades. |
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MrMaster
What If
Premium
join:2000-12-16
Austin, TX
clubs:
 ·RoadRunner Cable
1 edit | reply to beaups
Re: Doesn't Surprise Me
said by beaups  :ATT is bad for whatever reason at handling large groups of people. Every OSU football game I go to I get 100% signal strength yet cannot access data EVER. I wonder if they shut data off at those towers during games to leave bandwidth open for voice/text. When I do large conventions in Vegas, same problem. Same problems in Austin when you have ACL fest. No data. I only have EDGE and getting data is not a guarantee for me even when there is no huge event.
And switching isn't something I want to do cause then I'd have to buy more minutes. Too many people with AT&T. |
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digiblur
Got Sipura?
Premium
join:2002-06-03
Louisiana
| See this all the time
I was always told this was an issue with the way GSM works with large groups in one area.
I know I've let people borrow my Sprint phone several times during large population events. Their AT&T phone wouldn't dial out at all. Mine was a little delayed in connecting than normal by a few seconds but it worked just fine every time.
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Make your Sipura/PAP2 speak. »www.voipurize.com
SouthWest Louisiana PC Users Group »www.swlapcug.com |
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Insider
@buckeyecom.net
| reply to b10010011
Re: Why is everyone so supprised?
said by b10010011 :It is standard practice in the wireless industry to over sell your capacity. ISP's have been doing this for decades. Everyone oversells access in the telecom industry. Any circuit that passes through a CO / RT / whatever is subject to overload. There is no such thing as guaranteed bandwidth, no matter what any advertisements would have you believe.
- Tate
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dcdeadbeat
join:2008-10-07
Washington, DC
 ·Covad Communications
1 edit | reply to beaups
Re: Doesn't Surprise Me
That's your opinion. However I live in D.C. and even when 4 million flooded the City for the inauguration there were no interruptions in service. AT&T worked fine.
All of the carriers are good in some areas and bad in others. You cannot expect the carriers which are struggling financially to spend lots of money on temporary events.
So get over it and realize that cell phones are a "nicety" but not an "necessity".
Have you ever tried using your Sprint or Verizon phone in a third world country? Oh wait, you usually can't because most of the world uses UTMS not CDMA. |
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powerspec88
Premium
join:2007-03-11
Harrisonville, MO
 ·Sprint Mobile Broa..
·AT&T Yahoo
| KC Auto Show last weekend.
AT&T's 3G was cutting in and out, and when i did have 3G, uploading pics to twitpic took about 30sec to a 1min. And this was downtown Kansas City!
Should of brought my Sprint EV-DO card and laptop, would of been much faster.
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»twitter.com/powerspec | »netisinc.com | »kcmogaming.net/speedtest |
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Transmaster
Don't Blame Me I Voted For Bill and Opus
join:2001-06-20
Cheyenne, WY
·Qwest.net
2 edits | reply to digiblur
Re: See this all the time
It is for reasons like this that in an emergency for wireless communications the Hamradio operator with a 2 meter Handy Talky can be depended on to get a message through. No there is no twittering on a iPhone but at least the traffic gets through. Back in the mobile phone days, this is before cell phones, Bell Telephone built their systems with what one friend of mine who used to service this network called obscene amounts of backup. The Bell system built it to be as close to the reliability of their POTS as possible with wireless communication as it was done in those days. Now with Cell phones, cut throat competition, and little in the way of Government standards of performance a cell system only needs to work when things are mostly normal for everything else the Telcos have found it cheaper to make up excuses. 
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I am quite sure now that often, very often, in matters concerning religion and politics a man's reasoning powers are not above the monkey's.
- Mark Twain in Eruption |
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dcdeadbeat
join:2008-10-07
Washington, DC
·Covad Communications
| reply to powerspec88
Re: KC Auto Show last weekend.
I have cards from AT&T, Sprint, And Verizon. Why? Because they are all bad in some areas but good in others.
Does no one realize that we are in a recession and the cell phone companies are not going to spend money at this time?
That is unless they receive money from the federal government to "stimulate" the economy. Personally I don't want to increase my taxes so that people can get better cell phone reception. |
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gopnick
join:2005-01-07
Benton, AR
·Charter Pipeline
·AT&T DSL Service
| Overselling
I was at the World Series in 2006 in St. Louis when the Cardinals won in Game 5. After the game, it took me 30 minutes to get a call out on AT&T. The guy next to me had Verizon... same situation.
Overselling capacity isn't just telecom... the airlines do it constantly... and I'm sure that with more coffee I could think of a dozen more examples. For that matter, POTS lines are oversold too. It doesn't matter 99.9% of the time...
I guess overselling doesn't bother me as long as they plan for big events. You CAN bring in more lines and erect a temporary tower (I heard they did this at the political conventions this past fall). The scary part is natural disasters. When tornadoes hit here, you can't get calls out. With phone lines down, you REALLY need your cell to work! |
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beaups
join:2003-08-11
Hilliard, OH
| reply to dcdeadbeat
Re: Doesn't Surprise Me
I posted no "opinion" in my post. Fact is, at OSU football games att data doesn't work. At all. I am not complaining or even suggesting that I have a problem with it....nor did I state anything about it being a "necessity". I was merely providing an observation.
What exactly does my experience at football games have to do with a 3rd world country? |
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dcdeadbeat
join:2008-10-07
Washington, DC
·Covad Communications
| actually you did say:
ATT is bad for whatever reason at handling large groups of people.
That is an opinion just like I when I say that all of the carriers are bad in some areas and good in others.
AT&T should not be singled out here. The technology of cell phones and the lack of funding to correctly deploy it to get around its limitations are the real culprits. |
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dcdeadbeat
join:2008-10-07
Washington, DC
·Covad Communications
| reply to gopnick
Re: Overselling
said by gopnick : You CAN bring in more lines and erect a temporary tower (I heard they did this at the political conventions this past fall). The scary part is natural disasters. When tornadoes hit here, you can't get calls out. With phone lines down, you REALLY need your cell to work! Ever try to build or temporarily setup something in a big city? City governments (for example here in D.C.) are notorious for requiring a horrible amount of paperwork, permits, site reviews, etc.
It's surprising that any cell towers are ever built.
So let's not single out the carriers. There is plenty of blame to go around. Of course you need a permit to blame the city, fill it out in triplicate, and dance around like a fool. |
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raptor1418
Premium
join:2002-12-03
Denver, CO
 ·magicjack.com
·Mesa Networks
| reply to gopnick
said by gopnick :....The scary part is natural disasters. When tornadoes hit here, you can't get calls out. With phone lines down, you REALLY need your cell to work! As it was stated above, this is why I have my HAM license. Saw it during Katrina and how much my buddy was able to help. So that urged me to get my license.
Doing over subscription is in a lot of area's of IT. That online storage system Comcast is going to offer is also going to be over subscribed storage. They wouldn't make nearly as much or none at all if they didn't use a thin provisioning method. |
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MrMaster
What If
Premium
join:2000-12-16
Austin, TX
clubs:
·RoadRunner Cable
| reply to dcdeadbeat
Re: Doesn't Surprise Me
said by dcdeadbeat :That's your opinion. However I live in D.C. and even when 4 million flooded the City for the inauguration there were no interruptions in service. AT&T worked fine. All of the carriers are good in some areas and bad in others. You cannot expect the carriers which are struggling financially to spend lots of money on temporary events. So get over it and realize that cell phones are a "nicety" but not an "necessity". Have you ever tried using your Sprint or Verizon phone in a third world country? Oh wait, you usually can't because most of the world uses UTMS not CDMA. What planet do you live on? AT&T has billions to spend. Are you even in the right thread?
Cell phones are more reliable than landlines in most 3rd world countries.
AT&T is not CDMA
We are talking data here, some of us who are paying $39.99 a month for so we damn well better have a working service.
Austin specifically, has had data issues for as long as I lived here (2.5 years) but AT&T has better coverage than Verizon for me, especially in the Hill Country. |
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GeekJedi
RF is Good For You
Premium
join:2001-06-21
Mukwonago, WI
clubs:
·CenturyLink
·VOIPo
·Vonage
·RoadRunner Cable
| reply to raptor1418
Re: Overselling
...and one of the reasons I built a 440MHz repeater at a broadcast site that has generator power and good HVAC...so that even when powers out and the cell networks are down, you can communicate with your HT! 
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The goal of the broadcast engineer is to get all the meters on the transmitter to go as far to the right as possible!! |
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tiger72
SexaT duorP
Premium
join:2001-03-28
Saint Louis, MO
clubs:
·T-Mobile US
·RoadRunner Cable
| reply to digiblur
Re: See this all the time
said by digiblur :I was always told this was an issue with the way GSM works with large groups in one area. I know I've let people borrow my Sprint phone several times during large population events. Their AT&T phone wouldn't dial out at all. Mine was a little delayed in connecting than normal by a few seconds but it worked just fine every time. has nothing to do with GSM. Has everything to do with cheap networking.
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"What makes us omniscient? Have we a record of omniscience? ...If we can't persuade nations with comparable values of the merit of our cause, we'd better reexamine our reasoning."
-United States Secretary of Defense (1961-1968) Robert S. McNamara |
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rec9140
Provoice just DO it
join:2003-07-29
Mulberry, FL
| reply to dcdeadbeat
Re: Doesn't Surprise Me
said by dcdeadbeat :
Oh wait, you usually can't because most of the world uses UTMS not CDMA.
Can't use CDMA phones, but guess what....
UMTS is W-CDMA.  |
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not quite right
I'm not cool enough to be a Mac person
join:2001-06-23
Puyallup, WA
| Am I the the only one? ....
Am I the only one that picked up on this? .... Most of the complaints about the AT&T network problems came from users connected to the surprisingly robust SXSW Wi-Fi network. Recent data indicates that about 42% of iPhone data is sent by WI-Fi. If most of the complaints were from people using the SXSW Wi-Fi network ... then what does that have to do with at&t's 3G network.... 
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"Not many people know this, but I happen to be quite famous." |
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