I upgraded my phone because Verizon told me it would help the reception problems. I suffered thru the rude customer service at the Verizon store at Bruceville and Laguna, and that was the manager, brought my new phone home only to have the same problems. Anywhere I am in my home or the front or back yard every conversation has dead spots with no voice. As soon as my contract is up I'm going shopping.

Useless inside my house. Even drop calls in my front and back yard. What happened AT&T... you used to be the best.

I used to get decent reception, perhaps average, before my iPhone 4. Now I get dropped calls left and right. The reception has never been great here, that's for sure.

Missed and dropped calls occur often in my area and other parts of Elk Grove.

I've been thru several phones at Verizon. No matter which phone you get, if you're in a radio wave dead area, nothing much helps except a signal extender. As explained to me, the tower transmitters are "aimed" in a direction to give as much cell coverage to the most people possible. If you're in an area that doesn't have an transmitter pointed your way, you're out of luck until they either build another tower or re-aim the transmitters. They have it figured out which way works best for most of the people and the others just have to suffer thru lousy reception. I get either one bar or no bars, and have to stand near the sliding glass door to get decent reception without intermittent swatches of conversation. I also have the person I'm talking to call me on the hardline house phone. Verizon doesn't plan to re-direct transmitters for a couple years and there's been too much controversy over putting in cell towers... even those that look like trees. Folks who happen to get good reception are happy... .those of us who don't have very few options. Clearwire may solve some of this, but it's too soon to tell.

In July of 2008, we jettisoned Sprint for AT&T and the iPhone. After eight years, Sprint finally had improved their local coverage, but they were too late to satisfy us -- we were tired of the terrible phone hardware options. On AT&T, indoor reception fluctuates between 4-5 bars here (we're between Laguna Blvd. and Elk Grove Blvd., one mile west of Bruceville Road). Initially, the local iPhone / AT&T combo was marginal at best. But Apple and AT&T quickly upgraded the iPhone 3G software and tweaked the local towers and for the most part, it's been smooth sailing ever since. As with Sprint, the local AT&T 3G network occasionally gets overloaded -- and incoming calls roll directly to voicemail rather than ring. And when traveling, we have encountered several metro areas not serviced by AT&T 3G. But the iPhone more than makes up for much of AT&T's network. It really is a joy to use. The iPhone has turned out to be a terrific cell phone AND a versatile handheld computer and gaming machine. There is no other cellular product like the iPhone.

Spotty at best. Upstairs I can usually get 2 or 3 bars, maybe. Downstairs is 1 bar, if I'm lucky. My wife has an older phone, so she gets no reception until she gets closer to Bruceville and Laguna near Target. AT&T is horrible.

3-5 bars on all three cell phones we have at home and hardly any dropped calls.

my AT&T works great in my house, it's my personal phone. My Verizon cheapy phone sucks in the house, it's my work phone. Have to stand in my kitchen to make work calls! A lot of times, it's the phone quality that makes a difference. If I had a better work cell phone, it might be better!

Reception is good when I am at the Kohl's shopping center, but at home which is 1 / 2 mile away, I get dropped calls all the time and about 50% of the time I can't even make a call or connection. I have complained to Cingular but they say I should turn my phone off and back on so it locates a new signal. This does not work either.

service sucks... dropped calls all the time... sometimes can't get service at all in my home!

Verizon was OK outdoors but reception dropped to 1 bar in the house (LG VX6100, Motorola v60, and another LG model... I forgot). I switched to Cingular and now have 5 full bars with my Motorola L6. A friend's Razr gets 5 full bars and my brothers Nokia gets full bars. On top of that, the phone indicates wireless data network (3G?) available. This is all indoors. I guess Cingular has really built out their network in this area since 2005. For service reception: Cingular or any of the roaming partners is highly recommended.

I had to switch from Nextel because of no reception and constantly dropped calls when I did have reception. Very disappointed with support from Nextel. No sense of caring when my problem was brought to their attention. No help and / or compensation.

Verizon has been fabulous. Very good reception and wonderful customer support. Switched from Nextel because of no reception and constantly dropped calls.

My phone shows 2 or 3 bars until I use it, then it goes to one or none. Other times it will show 5 bars. When I answer incoming calls it takes a couple of seconds for the connection to open so I often miss the first few words a caller says. I think it's the phone. I swore I'd never get another Motorola after the Startac. Should have kept my word. My solution has been to forward incoming calls to my land line when I'm home and go outside for outgoing. Very businesslike... not. I think I'm going back to Nokia.

I just switched from Cingular to Verizon because I never could get a decent signal. Now I have 4 bars to 5. Nextel did not get a decent signal either.

After five years of poor reception and well-lnown coverage gaps in the Laguna subdivisions of Elk Grove, Sprint PCS cellular signals started improving in the summer of 2005 when the company opened a store (on Laguna Blvd.near 99). Our home is located between Laguna Blvd. and Elk Grove Blvd. (about half way between 99 and I-5), just north of Laguna Lakes subdivision. In addition to the SPrint PCS Store on Laguna, Their are a couple of Nextel dealers here in town. Back in 2000, we barely received 1 bar of signal strength inside our house south of Foulks Ranch School. In the fall of 2005, we finally have a full 5 bars! Aside a mediocre selection of business phones and features, Sprint's Sanyo models provide the best cellular reception, Samsung probably are the worst. Sprint's biggest problem now may be tower capacity (bandwidth). Often, my phone never rings and just rolls directly to voice mail, and I've been told by some that this is a sign that the towers are operating at capacity...

T-Mobile has pretty good reception in my area. Not many dropped calls, even in my house!

Reception is always 4 to 5 bars even in my downstair bathroom.

When on my AT&T TDMA phone my reception was great. I then made the switch to Sprint PCS and my reception went right down the tubes. Things were so bad that I made the move back to AT&T. At that time I was "forced" to a GSM phone and plan and went with a Motorola V220 phone. The reception I received now is poor (1 bar same as Sprint) around the house. If I drive a half-mile in any direction it improves (2-3 bars) but it is never as good or clear as my TDMA phone was. So much for new technology and mergers. I am currently swapping out the V220 with a Motorola V551 and am getting a new SIM card too. Customer Service says it can't be the coverage, must be the phone. So much for unlimited nights and weekend calling from the house. Makes me feel so satified when I watch the "More bars everywhere" commercials on TV.