AT&T service is SO bad in Berkeley and North Berkeley. Used to live on MLK and Parker and it was bad, but not as bad as North Berkeley. When job searching, I had to buy a Vonage phone so I could do phone interviews. Now I'm lucky if I can go to Safeway and call home to see if we're out of milk. When on BART, the very second you leave McArthur, the service drops down to zero. I am happily switching to Verizon (even though it's more expensive) which has way better reviews in San Francisco (where I work) and Berkeley (where I live).

I just moved to North Berkeley from SF. Everybody loves to bash AT&T in the city, but I always had great reception on my current and former iPhone there. However, since moving to Berkeley Hills last week I've been disappointed to learn how awful the coverage is here. In my apartment on Regal Rd.my phone alternates between no reception to poor reception. If I stand near one corner of the house I can make calls, but the audio quality is often poor. Also, when I drive down Marin Ave. my calls drop with consistency in a few places until I'm nearly to the highway. I run a small startup company which I was planning on relocating to North Berkeley from SOMA, but the lack of cell phone reception here has made me decide to keep my office in the city. My point of bringing this up is to show how the lack of cell phone coverage can affect the tax base, and probably property values as well. Surely I'm not the first business owner to decide against starting or relocating a business here because of the awful cell phone reception.

I've had AT&T "service" for about four years. Service in my home has been consistently terrible. Earlier this year, AT&T gave me one of their "mini towers," which has helped a bit. Often the mini drops out - just like the big towers. My wife and I will be switching to Verizon by year's end. All of our friends who have V find the service quite reliable.

Voice seems ok, but data has dropped off considerably in the past month or so. I used to get 4g service here just fine, but now Verizon has dropped down to 1g all over campus.

ATT is a total waste of money--no reception at home in Berkeley hills

Absolutely horrible. when you get a call at least 30 percent are dropped. mystery voicemails when there wasn't a ring. All around North berkeley is generally bad the biggest problem being the dead zones which are from block to block. The all digital network needs a straight shot to a tower to work so it's not really something to brag about when there is not enough towers.

There is zero reception with AT&T along Grizzly Peak towards Orinda.

We live in a particularly difficult spot for reception, in a shallow valley halfway between the Shatuck and Solano towers. I use a rooftop antenna plus repeater and service is tolerable (2 bars) in most areas of the house. I do not blame T-Mobile - Berkeley currently has only two cell phone "tower" locations. New towers are opposed by activists who oppose cell towers on principle. The Berkeley City council, hearing very little to the contrary, is compliant with this argument, and requests for new towers or antennas are rejected with the claim that no additional service is necessary.

This is a difficult service area in the Berkeley hills. AT&T service is extremely spotty and very poor when it exists at all. My Verizon tablet usually gets and holds 3 bars. I'll be switching my voice line to Verizon once my contract term is up.

I just got this phone and cannot get a signal anywhere in my apartment. Worthless. I switched from Verizon, which had great reception in the apartment. My gf's AT&T iphone works good here, too. Guess I'm gonna have to cancel and switch back. What a hassle.

We've been at this location for more than 3 years and never had a problem with signal strength and call quality until recently. Our problem (on both phones / lines) is that the first call doesn't always have audio when dialing and connecting. The call would go through but you can't hear the other person; you can't hear the dialing tone either. It's not a dropped call but a connected call without sound. So we'd have to hang up and redial and always, the second time it's fine. We've been having this issue for more than 2 months now and am considering leaving TMobile once our contract expires.

this is a dead zone no matter what phone you have and ATT wont let you out of your contract report them to the public utility commission and you should know that there are SEVERAL class action law suits against them in several states for not letting folks out of their contracts

We have a family plan and in one of the cell phones there is no reception at all. In my second line if I'm lucky and if I stay in the good spot then I have 1 bar. I live in Berkeley downtown and thinking to switch to any other company because I'm sick of ATT, but I have to pay early termination fee. ATT is horrible I also have internet issues with them, well if you could my recommendation is avoid it.

The guy at the AT&T store in El Cerrito said a new tower is going up at Hopkins and Carlotta by Dec 31st so hopefully that will improve reception.

AT&T has had it's ups and downs over the years, but since mid summer totally coverage in Berkeley has been absolutely AWFUL. Lots of drops and missed calls (right to voicemail), coverage holes (e.g. Marin from Albany border pretty much all the way up the hill, also northside and above campus). Forget about any kind of real-time data, in the time it takes Google maps to load a page you can get across town. Driving from Berkeley to SFO area I expect 5 or 6 drops - at least once getting to the freeway, again on the bay bridge near YB, couple more passing by downtown SF.. another at hospital curve. It's insane. The FCC&FTC need to start probing AT&T.. that, or I wish some class-action firm would get interested in bringing a case.

I have been living in Berkeley for only 3 weeks. I rarely have more than 2 bars. Every now and then, for a few minutes, I have more. I have dropped many calls and when I am able to have an extended conversation, the reception is really bad. This was also true when I visited for extended weekends in May and July. I had the same phone and AT&T service in Seattle for three years with no issues. In Seattle the reception was unbeatable. I never dropped calls, always had 4-5 bars of reception and consistent connection to the Edge network. If you live in Berkeley, I do not recommend AT&T. The service is so poor that I am likely going to give up my beloved iPhone, because it's essentially useless here. It's most certainly not worth the month cost.

Very poor reception with AT and T. I just got the new iphone and am close to returning it within the 30 days! I hate it, when compared to my old spring phone and that was not great either. But this one is 1000 times worse. Is Verizon the best in the Berkeley hills? thanks

I share the frustration of all those AT&T customers. What's the use of having an iPhone if it's just an app machine and can't receive a phone call? I finally got out of a 2-year contract, and for all of two years I've dealt with hundreds of dropped calls, crackly reception, etc. I just wish I knew if this "Bermuda Triangle" of reception in Berkeley is an AT&T problem or a problem for all the carriers (the map shows that all the towers are pretty much located in the same area for all the carriers). At this point I think the only way to figure it out is to literally find other carriers' active phones and bring it to your house. Don't believe anything someone tells you from one of their companies, they are not in the business of being honest about their reception quality.

1 bar since June 13th 2010. AT&T customer service and technical support are aware that tower at I-80 and University has been down since this date(2 others have on and off) and there is no 3g coverage. Their official response- SPEND MORE MONEY. They are happy to sell you a new contract and phone(will it work?) or a micro-cell(149.99). Since I am out of contract and have been for years, this option is a joke. AT&T's best suggestion to date has been "buy a pre-paid phone until this tower is up". FYI- AT&T, this is one of the more populated areas of the country with motivated consumers that will be happy to share this information on every social networking, consumer and review site on the internet. Also, everyone I know with Verizon in the Bay Area has little or no problems with reception. AT&T- not taking care of your customers will be a policy that you will find to be very regrettable.

1 bar in my house only in certain spots, many dropped calls.