CNET to add phone service data to handset reviews
Thanks to the hard work of Kent German, Bonnie Cha, and Nicole Lee, CNET's reviews of mobile handsets are unparalleled: we are the place on the Web to get in-depth evaluations of nearly every handset offered by the major carriers.
But we're not satisfied because we know you're not.
Judging a phone by its features, design, and quality is just half the story when determining whether it is worth purchasing. The other half of the equation is the quality of service provided by the carrier--and that's a factor we have not yet provided. After failing to find a solution for many years, we've finally arrived at one that I expect will rattle the market.
We've partnered with a company called Root Wireless, which is led by some cellular-industry veterans, to provide consumers with detailed, real-world coverage of major U.S. cities.
(Credit:
Root Wireless)
With Root, we're now collecting data in eight major metropolitan markets: New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, Chicago, Washington, Dallas, and California's Orange County. Once enough data is sampled, the information will be available on CNET for cell phone buyers to determine the quality of service around their home, on their way to work, and at the office.
The information, being collected for the four major wireless carriers--AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile, and Verizon Wireless--covers three key service concerns:
- Average signal strength and the number of signal bars for the selected carrier in a specified area
- Data connectivity and throughput
- Network issues such as drop calls or failed data connections
This is no small effort. It entails installing software on a variety of phones and collecting real data on those key metrics. The information--which includes time of day, terrain, and number of users in an area--is transmitted to a database and made available via a Web interface. Users can drill down to see how the big carriers perform in their neighborhood or zoom out to view the coverage on their commute route.
We're doing this because we know there's a huge need. We recently conducted an online poll of our users in which 26 percent of you said you had returned a cell phone due to poor service, and nearly half of you feel that there is not enough information available on service quality.
It may be premature to write about this now, but I couldn't wait. I've seen the working prototypes, and I know that this is going to be big hit for our users. Rather than rely on anecdotal evidence from friends or user reviews, or even from CNET's editors, you will have empirical data on which to base your purchasing decisions.
We have collected data in those eight markets so far, and we'll be beta-testing for the remainder of 2009, with a general release as early as January 2010. And don't fret, if your city wasn't listed in the first batch of eight because we'll be adding many more areas in the next year.
Cnet did a report on a guy a few years back who mapped out areas not gettign service and he put his results online and was sued by his cell phone company.
An interesting question will be whether the carriers will all band together to destroy this, or if there will be a few notable exeptions coming out in support of it.
Another interesting datum would be how much data is actually traversing a network at any given moment, but I have no idea how that could be collected without the active participation of the carriers... The best we can do now is to attempt to find this by inference from many other factors.
Take this app out where people actually work for a living and getting coverage in a variety of locations is important. County-wide data would be very valuable.
For example, a carrier can reign supreme in one area, but lag behind all others in another.
(also, add PDX to the pile, damn you :) ).
So yea...piling on ATT is laughable
locohuge is dead on. It won't change much because people buy iPhones only because they are a great tool, but choose to over-look the fact that they get little to no actual signal. "Who needs signal when I can order pizza without calling Domino's?"
I read a funny quote that "living in the Northwest/Seattle is like being married to a beautiful woman, who is sick all the time" - due to the rain. Basically you can use this with the iPhone being Seattle, and the rainfall being AT&T! bleh.
Somebody get this guy an iPhone! There are options, you know...
Like plenty of better or alternative options.
So, after 2 months of having an iPhone 3G and jumping Verizon's ship, I returned it and came back running to Verizon since what felt like 50% of my calls were either Dropped, or said Call Failure. very frustrating. So my "plenty of better or alternative options" became BlackBerry Tour. LOVE IT. If the Pre or iPhone ever come to VZW, I'm sure I'll at least try it out...we'll see
thanks Paul, what are you using?
If ATT throws a fit and sues, Cnet should remove all ATT phone reviews including the iPhone. There are ways to stop a lawsuit.
If I were to place bets on the first company (or group) to do this project before CNET released this article, my bets would have been Google all the way. You would think Google would have collected this information while collecting images for their street-view, but I guess Google is too busy with something else which allowed CNET to take the initiative. This would be quite an accomplishment for any site if this project is successful and remains as up to date as possible but I'm glad it is CNET instead of Google.
Oops, the 2nd half of that comment was supposed to be sent out 2 years ago. Please disregard.
- by teedo October 7, 2009 12:38 PM PDT
- I am willing to capture data for this project especially if it is software based and I only need to download a program onto my phone.
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