I got the Shine about the time I moved to the area so I'm not sure whether the others had the same problem. I do think that the other phones got better signal in other areas although I can't be 100% sure. My brother's phone usually gets one more bar than mine and it's a $20 Motorola phone. I got Cingular service around 5 years ago and I'm beginning to think I should switch providers. I see people walking around Wal-Mart using there phones everyday and yet I can't even get one bar inside. It's not just Wal-Mart, service coverage from AT&T hasn't ever been very great in my area. Not to mention no 3G coverage within 60+ miles.
I usually have 2-3 bars before I go inside, when I go inside they fade away until I have nothing. I'll try turning it off and see if that helps, but it seems to me that it should do it's best to regain a signal whenever possible on it's own.
What about the occurrence of bars and no carrier name at the bottom? Sometimes I'll be standing outside of Wal-mart after coming out and have 5 bars, AT&T absent from the bottom and when trying to make a call it says "Service unavailable". Is it giving me a glipse of what kind of signal I'd have with another carrier or what? :laugh:
I failed to mention that I'm using prepaid service. I'm not sure if you noticed that I'm using AT&T's GoPhone service and I think this makes a difference.
I'm thinking about switching to either Alltel or Verizon, staying prepaid though. Which would you recommend? I want the best coverage possible. I hardly ever use the internet features on phones, just check the weather every now and again. The biggest used features with my service are voicemail, call waiting, and very light text messaging. I really just need service that'll work best around my area.