Their maps have nothing to do with facts. I live in a major US city so I assumed it would be listed as full coverage but just for sh*ts and giggles I went to their website and put in my exact address and it says I am under their best coverage... lie! Not trying to be rude but someone that has just came to Sprint probably should not be making posts about how reliable their service is because you don't know what you are talking about. Their are people that do recieve good reliable service where they live and that's wonderful but until you have gone on vacation or even to varying parts of your city and have had them for a few months you won't actually know how reliable their service is and you might be singing a different tune. I have had AT&T and T-Mobile and lived with 2 seperate roomates that have VZW (whose phone I had to borrow on more than one occasion) and for me personally I never had an issue with any of them. The only reason why I don't leave Sprint is because I have a large account and it would cost a small fortune to cancel all of my lines and buy new phones on another service. I have seen some improvements but not enough to classify them as reliable.
I have had Sprint over ten years while moving back and forth from Kentucky and Tennessee. I have lived in the Knoxville area and Chattanooga area. Paducah, KY and Owensboro, KY. In these areas I always had great cell reception. My family also took a vacation to Canada and (in the states obviously) we had cell service the entire way. We never actually used our cell phones in Canada we were only there for a few hours looking at Niagara Falls. But in New York and all the states we were in and stayed in going from TN to Niagara Falls we had good cell service. My family mostly lives in IL and yet again, we always get goo service in that state. This is over ten years of experience with the carrier. I personally haven't used ATT and Verizon but know plenty of people who do. ATT had great service in Chattanooga and has horrible service in the Knoxville area. I had a customer the other day moving from PA to CA and her call dropped seven times. She hated ATT and told me she never gets good service. I mentioned Sprint and Verizon (saying she should switch since she had an iPhone) and she said she might go back to Sprint because she always had good service with them.
Again, I also said I know depending on where you live you may not get good service. But don't think for one moment I stay in one spot and say Sprint has been dependable. Because thats not the case.
I clearly said it was MY experience, I also clearly said there are people that recieve relaible service. I have never seen an article saying they had the most reliable service. I have seen a few people here and there on sites like this tooting Sprints horn but that's about it. They don't play up unlimited data and no mention quality of service in all of their commericals for nothing, if what you were saying was true you would think they would mention it just like VZW and AT&T do in addition to their unlimited data. I'm not saying that everyone has these issues but I know numerous people that are on Sprint and 99% of them share my opinion but to each their own.
Well now you have.
A Day in the Life of 3G | PCWorld
Quote: "n Novarum's tests for us, Verizon Wireless demonstrated a good mix of speed and reliability. Across more than 20 testing locations in each of the 13 cities we tested, Verizon had an average download speed of 951 kbps. Verizon demonstrated good reliability, too;
the network was available at a reasonable and uninterrupted speed in 89.8 percent of our tests.
Sprint's 3G network delivered a solid connection in 90.5 percent of our 13-city tests. Sprint's average download speed of 808 kbps across 13 cities wasn't flashy (at that speed, a 1MB file downloads in 10 seconds), but dependability is an important asset. The Sprint network performed especially well, both in speed and in reliability, in our test cities in the western part of the United States.
The AT&T network's 13-city average download speed in our tests was 812 kbps. Its average upload speed was 660 kbps. Reliability was an issue in our experience of the AT&T system: Our testers were able to make a connection at a reasonable,
uninterrupted speed in only 68 percent of their tests.
Somewhat surprisingly, our testers also found that the "bars of service" readings on their phones were rarely an accurate predictor of the quality of the ensuing connection. In most places and with most wireless providers, the "bars" did little more than indicate whether the phone had access to some service or to no service."
This test is consistent with what new iPhone tests are showing. Sprint is the slowest. But at least -- in their 13 city test -- Sprint was the most reliable.With Verizon literally being right behind. And ATT being way behind. And Sprint has said in the past (this is when I actually heard about this study) that based on independent study they are the most reliable.