TMobile is the absolute worst bay area provider. Rather they should be termed: T Immobile because that's what you have to be immobile in my PacHeights neighborhood in order to use their service. Problems? Plenty and you name it: drop calls, no signal, no reception, garbled ghost voices, echoes everything and anything. Solution? From them? Not a chance! They blame everything but their lousy infrastructure. You, your phone, the phone manufacturer, where you live and even your household plants and I quote: "Do you have any curtains or plants, sometimes a tree infront of you can block out your signal. Nothing we can do about that." That's just BS and they are full of it.

I've been with T-Mobile for about 3 years now. T-Mobile is FANTASTIC if you want to use it overseas. They have the best int'l roaming rates and a lot of their phones are tri- or quad-band. I have absolutely no problems when I'm in Europe. I travel a lot, so I stick with the problems I have in the States. I also text message a lot, and they definitely have the cheapest text message plans. Yes, there are parts of SF that I get zero or very little reception. Haight Street, Mission / Valencia, parts of Noe Valley / Castro (especially when in sight of Sutro Tower - which I believe affects most cellular coverage). I recently moved from 27th and Castro to Oak and Clayton. My reception inside my house is generally 2-3 bars, but I can hear the calls clearly and I haven't had a dropped call yet. In my old house, I had to stand in one spot and not move the phone around. I'm also using my old, unlocked Sony Ericsson (was my 1st T-Mobile phone) for a Cingular pay-as-you-go SIM, for text messaging to my one colleague in Italy who is on Vodafone. I can receive his texts on my T-Mobile Blackberry, but he doesn't receive my texts from the same phone (we've both tried speaking to our cellular providers, it turns out T-Mobile USA doesn't have a contract to send messages to Vodafone IT). The Cingular card works well for it, but I have to say, Cingular's GSM coverage is not much better than T-Mobile's. Also, I frequently get his texts twice or three times, or he'll get mine twice or three times, and I'm charged for it each time - annoying! My firm is thinking of switching to Verizon's Blackberry service. This will most likely give me better reception in the Bay Area and will allow me to send / receive texts to my colleague in Italy (they contract with Vodafone directly for their European cellular coverage), but what I'll lose is the ability to use my Blackberry overseas, and I might lose the ability to text my US based, non-Verizon-using friends / colleagues. Plus I have no idea how much int'l text messages will cost - T-Mobile is currently $0.15 per message. Someone please, please ask these companies to standardize!

The Sprint guys told me there is an antenna above (or just behind) the Castro Theatre. I get great coverage in the neighborhood. I live with 3 people who also have Sprint with Samsung and LG phones: they get 4 bars at all times. A neighbor had T-Mo and he used to get in the street to make a phone call! He is now with Cingular. I get perfect coverage all over the City and in Palo Alto, where I commute every day. Sprint may not be the sexiest carrier, but they have very good coverage.

Verizon is awful. I have to stand outside my apartment to make calls and even then, most calls are dropped within 10 minutes. I have tried customer service with zero response. Verizon is expensive and now my screen is dying, too. I rarely get so passionate about stuff like this, but have really grown to hate verizon.

Reception varies between below average and no reception on Lower Terrace and Roosevelt. I hardly ever receive calls, only voice mail alerts of missed calls. I avoid calling from home, except for quick calls to tolerant friends, because calls drops are the norm.

Verizon doesn't work well around here. I'm switching to cingular.

Verizon is TERRIBLE. My friend with AT&T / Sprint never has any problems at all in my apartment. I get 0 bars of service.

I haven't yet found an area in San Francisco where my Spring mobile phone doesn't work.

Horrible. If I get a signal, the calls often cut off in the middle of the call randomly. I'm looking for a better carrier.

I will get the SMS message indicating a voicemail without the phone ever ringing! Since I am on-call for work, this isnt a good thing. Sometimes I have to turn it off and on to make a call. I called customer service and was told that they "are constantly improving the network." They also opened a repair ticket which "could" prompt them to install more towers... .yeah right! I have been with TMB since day one, and it has NEVER gotten any better with regards to reception, customer service or billing (very hard to decipher the bill)! It may be well worth the $200 cancellation fee to go to Cingular so I can actually get a call!

Reception is spotty to non-existent. So much for Cingular -- wish I'd consulted this site before signing up.

Poor reception on CINGULAR towers; however, my phone allows selection of AT&T network (Cingular refers to RED and BLUE networks). AT&T (only) is 2 to 3 bars. So as long as I keep my phone 'locked' to AT&T towers, I've got service (I'm concerned about 'upgrading' phones to lesser-capable model--Cingular REQUIRES manufacturers to give company total control, removing user features enjoyed with European phones / networks).

No bars. Occasionally a phone call will get through. Have to walk 2 blocks sometimes. Neighbor believes is do to granite rock embedded in hill, generating cosmic rays.

I live in on Minna "alley" between 6th and 7th streets, and I can never get reception inside my apartment. Sometimes if I go outside it will jump up to full strenght, but I often need to walk out to the corner on 7th street just to get weak reception. I've had a few friends with Cingulair get reception inside my apartment, so I think it might be T-mobile.

At my apartment on Dolores, between 15th and 16th, I generally get no bars. If I go outside of the building, sometimes I get one bar, two on very rare ocassions. Sometimes I have to go all the way up to Market before reception gets at all dependable.

I've had Sprint for over 7 years and have never had a dropped call. The reception at this location has always been perfect. I've rarely had any reception difficulties in the city, East Bay or on the Peninsula. I'm very satisified with Sprint.

I get 2-3 bar reception in the east side of my house, little to no reception in the rest of the house.

Great reception with VZW.

Get reception only in the bedroom. Rest of the house is a blackhole.

Reecption pretty good inside and around my house. A bit of static sometimes.