Wireless provider in Wilmington area (2015, live in, bars)
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I took my Verizon phones to Total Wireless. $60 a month (total) for 2 lines and 8 GB of shared data. Using a large cell phone carrier is like banking with a large bank...no reason to do either.
We had tmobile before moving. But we had it here while on vacation. Def no beach coverage and tmobtmobe signalis not good cutting through buildings. So if your somewhere with a big building beside you and thats the direction of your cell tower , the signal is bad. If you are in wilmington the signals great, start going out 40 too far and no data. For the price it can't be beat. But if you gps on your phone or stream music or movies, there's gonna be alot of issues outside the wilmington area
May i ask how long ago that was? The rep my husband talked to said that yes, a few years back, the coverage sucked, but that T-mobile put up more towers and it's much better now. Would hate to switch and find out he didn't tell the truth...
You may want to check on your specific phones. Some phones come with CDMA, GSM and LTE bands. Yours may be interchangeable.
You can pick up a used or refurbished phone on Ebay, or new ones on Newegg, often for <$200. You'd be surprised how inexpensive phones can be if you look beyond the exact dozen popular ones carried in the stores. There are lots of unlocked phones that will work.
I'm pretty attached to my iPhone 6s plus and wouldn't want to go down "just to have A phone". My husband has a high end android phone and we like to keep our phones for several years.... so that doesn't sound like an attractive option, unfortunately.
Doing the drive from Fayetteville to Wilmington on several occasions, my girlfriend's AT&T service was borderline useless for miles while my Verizon never missed a beat. I was streaming Pandora the entire trip down 87 without missing a beat while she spent a significant portion of the trip with a NO SERVICE screen.
I cannot comment on T-Mobile and Sprint, but I can tell you with certainty that Verizon is far better than AT&T in that area. Around Wilmington Proper, you'll probably be fine with anyone, but I was surprised how spotty her AT&T coverage was once she left the immediate boundaries of the city. I'm used to Philadelphia where everyone is rock solid. I think hers was even crummy on the beach, which is as open and flat as you get. Go figure.
we are in Carolina Beach now (been here 2 months, 1 more to go till house is ready). Coverage is fine. Beach can be spotty, but i talk to my mom in Russia almost every day while walking on the beach (for close to an hour) using Line and sometimes it's spotty, but totally doable
Last April we had tmobile. Coverge was great in Wilmington, but go outside the "city" and it was spotty. We went to the beach in Topsail and there was no coverage there. We didn't go onto pleasure island at all to judge the coverage there. I will tell you tmobile will still have issues getting a signal through a building when they're stacked up. The bandwidth they run is nothing compared to at&t and verizon. There's a spectrum coming up for sale that would help them getting through buildings, but they need to win the bid for it.
You may want to check on your specific phones. Some phones come with CDMA, GSM and LTE bands. Yours may be interchangeable.
You can pick up a used or refurbished phone on Ebay, or new ones on Newegg, often for <$200. You'd be surprised how inexpensive phones can be if you look beyond the exact dozen popular ones carried in the stores. There are lots of unlocked phones that will work.
Just checked and both my iPhone and husband's Nexus 6P both will work on Verizon! off to explore options.
Last April we had tmobile. Coverge was great in Wilmington, but go outside the "city" and it was spotty. We went to the beach in Topsail and there was no coverage there. We didn't go onto pleasure island at all to judge the coverage there. I will tell you tmobile will still have issues getting a signal through a building when they're stacked up. The bandwidth they run is nothing compared to at&t and verizon. There's a spectrum coming up for sale that would help them getting through buildings, but they need to win the bid for it.
that's a bit concerning. Lack of coverage is probably my main worry about going with T-Mobile. But now that we discovered our phones work fine with Verizon coverage, looking into more options.
I took my Verizon phones to Total Wireless. $60 a month (total) for 2 lines and 8 GB of shared data. Using a large cell phone carrier is like banking with a large bank...no reason to do either.
Could you comment on what your experience has been like? Also, what about activation fees, etc? The price looks appealing (we'd do 3 lines with 12Gb for $85)
Could you comment on what your experience has been like? Also, what about activation fees, etc? The price looks appealing (we'd do 3 lines with 12Gb for $85)
The actual phone service is exactly the same as when I was on Verizon, and Verizon has the best level of coverage in SE NC and most everywhere else. No activation fee, although you do have to buy a SIM card for something like $7. Customer service is crap, but that's true for most all cell phone companies.
Its a fairly simple process, although a bit nerve racking the first time you do it. Order the SIM card off the website, call them from another phone, and they guide you through the process. They will port your old number of course. And they will say it can take up to a day or 2 to go into effect...I've done it several times and its always been virtually instantaneous.
Overall, I'm happy. They screwed up the billing when I added a second phone, but after a couple of calls they got it straightened out.
Edit to add: As hsw55 points out, Total apparently slows down data speeds. I'm not a frequent data user on my phone, so its not an issue for me. YMMV.
Last edited by BC1960; 01-31-2017 at 11:34 AM..
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