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Well, if you ask for calling plans available in central illinois,
"Preferred Nation" is no longer on the list, and "Nation" specifically
says it's not compatible with the two available GAIT handsets.

Also, if you look at the map for the Nation plan, it says it requires
a GSM phone, and I believe the only areas on the map are GSM areas
(not sure about that, but the coverage is certainly sparse in areas
where I think there is/was TDMA before).

Basically, the effect of this is that if you are a new customer, you
are now paying roaming charges for any TMDA calls outside the GSM
network.

On Sat, 05 Jul 2003 19:06:48 GMT, in alt.cellular.cingular you wrote:

No AMPS capabilites = useless phone.

Too many places I go where there is no TDMA coverage, much less GSM
coverage.

Call the store and ask.

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I thought of that too, but I'm sure that they simply don't allow you
to use the TDMA or AMPS networks no matter what phone you
put your SIM card into. The GSM part of the phone works off
the SIM, but the TDMA and AMPS parts do not, as far as I
know.

The only advantage would be is that you could probably make
credit card calls on AMPS and TDMA when no GSM network
is available.

It seems counter-intuitive that the Nation Plan, which is for people
who want ubiquitous coverage and are willing to pay extra for it,
is the one plan where you are not allowed to use a phone that can
provide that coverage. What Cingular is saying in essence is:
"our GSM and TDMA networks are so limited, that we don't want
to have to pay for your roaming charges on other carrier's TDMA
and AMPS networks so you can't have a GAIT phone on the
plans with free roaming. But if you want to pay for off-network
roaming, you're welcome to get a GAIT phone."

I'd choose the GAIT phone and pay for roaming off-network. A lot
of people need AMPS coverage at certain times; i.e. on vacation,
driving through sparsely populated areas with no digital coverage,
to cover the dead spots of the digital network, etc. I suppose that
if you never leave your own area you can get away with digital only,
but even in the Bay Area I find a lot of places with no (or poor)
digital coverage.

I.e. at my sister-in-laws house in Moraga there is no AT&T TDMA
or GSM coverage, no Cingular/T-Mobile GSM coverage, CDMA
coverage on Verizon in the front of her house but not in the back,
and AMPS coverage is fine (but you need a phone that you can
manually force to AMPS). She won't give up her AT&T phone
number so every few hours she drives to where coverage is available
(five blocks down the hill) and checks her voice-mail. Coverage starts
just by the high school, and the parking lot is filled with people sitting
in their cars making calls. When number portability happens she'll
switch to Verizon and I'll put up an antenna on her house to try to
get digital coverage all over the house. But at least she can switch
to AMPS if necessary (her AT&T Nokia phone does not let her
switch to AMPS even though there is no digital signal).

I don't want to presume to speak for "most" people, but in my circle
of friend's and family and colleagues we often travel to places with
no digital coverage, often just within an hour or so of our homes.
Clearly there are some people that never go anywhere like that,
and I even once read a post from someone who planned their
vacations to not be anywhere without digital coverage! It's my
view that it's an exceedingly bad idea to not have a phone with
AMPS coverage no matter which digital system you normally
use.