Looking for love from U.S. Cellular
Recently, I contacted U.S. Cellular and asked to review their Kyocera E1000. Since late spring is always a slow period for new cell releases, I can take the extra time to review handsets from smaller carriers. In the four and a half years I've been at CNET, I've examined a U.S. Cellular phone only a couple of times.
So while browsing through U.S. Cellular's lineup, the E1000 caught my eye. I fooled with this intriguing model at its unveiling at CTIA 2007, but my playtime lasted only a few minutes. And since I haven't reviewed a Kyocera handset in six months, I thought this would a great opportunity. But last Friday to my surprise, U.S. Cellular turned down my request because the San Francisco Bay Area is outside of U.S. Cellular's native coverage area. Shucks.
San Francisco is also outside Alltel's home area, but Alltel sends me phones all the time. After I pointed that out to my U.S. Cellular contact, the carrier agreed to reconsider and now I expect we'll come to agreement.
But just today, it occurred to me that I might be getting ahead of myself. I ask you Crave readers, are you looking for more CNET.com coverage of U.S. Cellular? Quite a few of you have sent e-mails requesting just that. And while I'm more than happy to do so, I need U.S. Cellular to activate a device and send it to me. Please tell me what you think below.
Kent German is a senior editor for cell phone reviews at CNET. When he's not testing the newest handsets on the market, he's blogging about cell phone news for Crave. In his On Call column, he answers reader questions and gives his take on the rapidly changing mobile industry. E-mail Kent.
Thanks
You should know that U.S. Cellular has a big user base in WI because AT&T does not have coverage in rural areas, so people who either live in, or commute though the rural areas usually are forced to go with U.S. Cell. So with that said, I would highly advice Crave to rate USCC phones.
Another point to mind is USCCs approach to the firmware on phones. While Verizon puts, in my opinion, their crappy OS on all of their phones, USCC usually has a hands off approach (usually just a link to their sub-par download service). That will give you guys an idea of what, for example (my phone) the performance of a V9m using the Verizon OS and a V9m using its native OS (likely to be faster and more user friendly). Just thought I would point that out. Thanks for putting the question out there..
It would be extremely helpful if US Cellular would allow CNet to review their phones.
I hope your campaign is successful--I will be watching CNet closely.
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by portlightlin
June 25, 2009 4:22 PM PDT
- I would really like to see more U.S, Cellular reviews on cnet. There are a lot of us stuck in the midwest that enjoy the carrier's call plans, but it's next to impossible to find well done, impartial reviews of its phones.
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(8 Comments)As to cnet in general, am I the only person out there who would like to know the reception strength of the various phones? Perhaps it is dependent on the coverage areas of each carrier?