Rural Users

rickms80

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Sep 18, 2011
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Anyone have much experience with usage in rural areas such as frequent travel to or live in one? I live in Mississippi. Between the T-Mobile and Sprint coverage here, there is a lot of the state shown with no coverage on the fi map. Sprint being the worst. Sprint relies on a lot of partner coverage here. So the areas on the fi map show no coverage but I know Sprint and US Cellular have partners here that provide coverage in those areas. I would like to give fi a try but all that blank coverage makes me nervous. I've read that some fi users will get partner coverage but data is restricted to 3g or 2g speeds or none at all. Any truth to that? Also if it's true why doesn't the fi map reflect that. Anyways, any input would be appreciated.
 

hallux

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Jul 7, 2013
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Have you tried signing up yet? There was a time where the system would evaluate the coverage in your area and not allow you to sign up if T-Mobile was weak. T-Mobile is considered the "primary" carrier and during that time you needed to have decent T-Mobile coverage in order to complete activation. This may still be the case so they may not offer you coverage due to this, if T-Mobile is weak or has no coverage where you live.

Another bit of evidence of T-Mobile being the "primary" carrier - the data-only SIM cards run only on T-Mobile and as of now any handset that doesn't support carrier switching (looking at you, iPhone!) will only connect to T-Mobile. While Fi will now allow devices other than those previously supported, many of those will not fully support the capabilities of those devices.
 

wyelkins

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I live in rural Georgia. I moved here about 8 months ago. Verizon is King here. I use wifi at home I am in a dead zone except 3g. Still keeping Fi anyway. About 2 miles down the highway LTE kicks in.
 

rickms80

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I definitely would qualify for Fi. My city has plenty T-Mobile coverage and I know I'll be good in my primary area. My primary concern is traveling into rural Mississippi. A lot of family live in those areas. T-Mobile and Sprint are really weak or none existent in those areas. Their partners however provide way better coverage. My questions is more technical in that I would like to know how or if Fi works with T-Mobile, Sprint, or US Cellular partners. Are Fi customers allowed to use partner coverage? If so is it voice only or voice with very slow data? I'm also brain storming how to test drive Fi.

I live in 39402 area. If you plug that zip into sprint or us cellular. They show plenty of coverage. Way more then what's reflected on the fi map. If you zoom in further you'll see that sprint and us cellular are relying heavily on their partners. I'm just wanting to know, as a fi customer, would I have access to that partner coverage.
 
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fireidiot

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Jul 7, 2012
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I definitely would qualify for Fi. My city has plenty T-Mobile coverage and I know I'll be good in my primary area. My primary concern is traveling into rural Mississippi. A lot of family live in those areas. T-Mobile and Sprint are really weak or none existent in those areas. Their partners however provide way better coverage. My questions is more technical in that I would like to know how or if Fi works with T-Mobile, Sprint, or US Cellular partners. Are Fi customers allowed to use partner coverage? If so is it voice only or voice with very slow data? I'm also brain storming how to test drive Fi.

I live in 39402 area. If you plug that zip into sprint or us cellular. They show plenty of coverage. Way more then what's reflected on the fi map. If you zoom in further you'll see that sprint and us cellular are relying heavily on their partners. I'm just wanting to know, as a fi customer, would I have access to that partner coverage.

Fi will automatically switch you between TMobile, Sprint, or US Cellular. You don't get to pick which one you are on. I travel a lot and used to be strictly with AT&T, and I can tell you I have signal in places that I did not have before. However YMMV.
 

fireidiot

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I should have also mentioned that I haven't seen slow data. Obviously on LTE you are getting a higher speed than say a 3G connection.