<p>so, which is better? what do ut students use the most?:D</p>
<p>FYI. I do not know about cingular and verizon. However, I have t-mobile. When I was at UT during freshen orientation, I had great signals around the campus but a weak or no signals in buildings, except in my dorm room.</p>
<p>I don't know about Verizon but we have Cingular and it works well in Austin and on campus. Cingular has limited coverage if you travel 50+ miles outside Austin going west or northwest and there are other gaps in Cingular's coverage in some parts of Texas and nationwide. Check the Cingular coverage map to see if the areas you will be traveling in have coverage and use that to help you decide: <a href="http://www.cingular.com/shop/maps%5B/url%5D">http://www.cingular.com/shop/maps</a></p>
<p>t-mobile is awful on campus; there are so many points where you'll have no signal or points in which you'll have signal and the call gets dropped seconds into the conversation. avoid it.</p>
<p>Cingular is a great service. I drive to San Antonio alot and never seem to find holes, even in the smallest of towns. My friend has verizon, he's always losing connection between me and him, even in town.</p>
<p>Look for a cell phone provider that offers free roaming. </p>
<p>If you are in a spot where your provider does not have a signal, you will be automatically switched to another provider that has a signal in that area. </p>
<p>On some Sprint PCS plans, roaming is free as long as your roaming is no more than 50% of your total usage.</p>
<p>Good point, m1817. We have free roaming but when we travel from Austin to West Texas there are several places where we can't make calls. I guess there aren't enough people in some areas of central and west Texas to justify putting in towers, but I once traveled with a friend who subscribes to Verizon and we successfully used that phone the entire trip.</p>
<p>On the other hand, most UT students are from Houston/Dallas/San Antonio/OOS so this probably doesn't affect that many people. My experience is that Cingular has excellent service in those areas.</p>