More towers in central Virginia!
I do not have Alltel service, but I do use Verizon out of the DC market. I utilize I-64 almost on a daily basis between Charlottesville and Waynesboro. About the time I hit the Crozet interchange, my service, which roams on Alltel, drops the call consistently. This is an area where towers could be built that look like trees so as to not stand out and be ugly. I am aware of the mountains and the problems around Afton/Wintergreen, and I don't expect my phone to work there while I'm on I-64...pretty tough to get a radio wave through the mountain pass, but the other location, what's with that? I would be willing to bet that the Alltel customers in the Charlottesville market have the same problem. Would love to hear some reaction to this.
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I am constantly in Harrisonburg, Virginia (at James Madison University) and get the same problem. Dropped calls, roaming signals, etc. When I went to my local Alltel, they tell me to "update my firmware" and I do, still doesn't help. Alltel says its in their coverage area and its prime spot, but no Alltel locations in the area :-|
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It's my understanding that Verizon is in and is very strong in Harrisonburg (I work in Waynesboro). If you have Alltel, should you not be utilizing Verizon's towers at JMU?
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Well, I think some of it is my cell, I have a cheapo Kyocera they discontinued ages ago, not to mention the fact that its pretty beaten up. No worries though, works where I live.
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The same thing seems to be happening here as Alltel goes through their towers and changing them over from Western Wireless. May be just a timing thing.
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Interesting. Seems to me that since Verizon will roam on the Alltel network any day of the week, anyone with an Alltel phone who goes into a Verizon area should get pretty decent coverage most of the time. Sure wish Alltel would take care of some of the "bare spots", especially along the interstates like I-64. The fact is, if there is a moratorium on towers, I understand that. But the fact is that towers can be made to blend right into woodwork, and a whole bunch of us, Alltel and Verizon alike, would all benefit.
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That area has nothing to do with signal strength. It has to do with an inter-network handoff. What you're experiencing is a dropped call because you are crossing into a new market that uses a completely seperate switch located in a seperate city. The networks cannot "hand-off" your call to each other just yet; thus leaving you on the last tower in the system until the signal eventually fades. As soon as you hang up, the phone registers with the new network and you can make a call again. Alltel is working on the hand-off issue across the country but it is a difficult task because of all the different systems they operate (motorola, lucent, ect.) Verizon seems to have a better hold on their networks when it comes to handoff's.
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