said by tagman:They lied to us saying that they would have coverage. We did not.
That zipcode shows decent coverage most places but not all 4G. I'd also wonder about a roof antenna (my experience with and without one below). Was it just a hotspot or something? Just curious. »
www.verizonwireless.com/ ··· lte.htmlsaid by N4ST:Yeah, I had wondered if the external antenna used for the Verizon installed Internet might yield better results.
End of '12 I went with Millenicom (Verizon) 3G from very congested, borderline unusable Wildblue. Averaged at least 2.5 meg down 99% of the time. Perceived performance, web browsing, page loading, etc. was MUCH faster than Exede5 here. Few months later they switched on 4G, for about a year I averaged 20-30 meg down 100% of the time 24x7, anytime I tried. They raised the price by $20 at the same time a regional GSM carrier upgraded from 2G to what they call 4G. I now have that GSM carrier, taxes are about $8 including 911 fees etc., $58 total for up to 4 meg (average over 3 all the time), 8 meg is $25 extra. Started unlimited, but said they were going to 100GB cap, tapered down 300GB, then 200GB and it's still there a year later. They list 200GB on the web now, so I don't know if they will stay there or get down to the 100 they said before. Millenicom was shut down, Verizon offered 20GB hotspot plans for $90 or $99 (?) for those that wanted to stay. Their LTE Internet installed is the old Homefusion, same 4G network, good all in one solution with antenna. Bit better pricing than hotspot plans. Other than no free zone, if not on a congested tower, good option. I don't miss the crazy fast speeds though when I can now download anything I want, and little difference is noticed with all but the heaviest web pages. HD streaming works fine from Amazon. If not for this regional carrier, I'd have Verizon. Their signal gets out much better than the regional carrier as well, much greater range.
Anyway, I am 9 miles from the Verizon tower, have 1/4 mile of dense trees right behind my house and a couple other groves further out on my property, without a roof antenna it was very picky, borderline no signal at the very best, hard to get any signal lock except in about one place and didn't work good, not fast and would cut out. Wilson Sleek 4G, then later a regular Yagi roof antenna without a booster, all got me 100% reliable signal with the speeds I mentioned. Since I switched to the GSM provider, I got a Wilson wireless booster (I think they are called something like "Weboost" now since they bought out another company), I now have cell service in the house where I didn't have any before, and it works great, multiple devices at the same time, don't have to connect directly to each device. Roof antenna wired directly into device worked fine for one device.
If what OP mentioned was without a roof antenna but in a 4G area, I'd suspect that a roof antenna would have helped. Unless the tower is very congested. Can't speak about AT&T vs. Verizon as they only have roaming coverage in most of my state, never been around their service.
edit: "Voice", I have Straight Talk home phone connect, $16 total for unlimited calls, crystal clear service, better than the landline here ever was. With good cell service I wouldn't pay more for satellite voice, but I know that would vary with location.
