7 replies to this topic

[startrek1997]

Hey guys,
i is have a question. Any one that has a Virgin Mobile phone can tell me if there service sucks?
In a building i get 1 to no bars and my 3g in painfully slow.

Thanks,
Matt

[alphamale]

If you live near a tower or ride a bus VM may be ok because it runs on the sprint network which is the worst. i have heard of people that were happy or just did not know better.but that is far and between. most folks are just happy with the terms not the service. sorry i could not be more positive.

[helpifIcan]

AS long as your in a populated area it works great head to the farmlands then no so good. Also they do not do roaming so if not near their tower no service.

But, boy it's hard to beat the price and no contract.

[xendrome]

Virgin Mobile service is through Sprint. So check their Coverage Maps. With almost any pre-paid you won't get roaming on other networks, so if there is no Sprint coverage you won't have any service. The Sprint network is undergoing some major upgrades at this time, adding LTE and expanding 3G coverage nationwide.

[startrek1997]

I hope they do some upgrades. I am just useing this phone for a tethering device so i have internet where ever but i can never seam to get internet...

[Shadrack]

My wife has sprint and in our area the 3G is painfully slow. She also gets 1 bar at her work and it sucks battery like crazy.

It really just depends on the area as the USA is a very vast country land-wise. Sprint and T-Mobile are the smallest networks that own their own towers (I think). It just depends where you live and where you go if their coverage is good enough for you.

There are other prepay networks that use AT&T and Verizon towers so you might consider switching.

AT&T rocks my socks in my area. I think that the vast majority of folks in my area use Verizon so the AT&T towers are undersaturated here. Just a theory I have. I use StraightTalk with an AT&T SIM and I get 1.5-3.5mbps (nominal). At lunch one day a coworker who has Verizon and I did a speed test. He was getting about 600kbps and I was getting about 2mbps.

[startrek1997]

I am going up to a mall latter tongiht and will see if i get any better reception when i am up there.

[Blackhearted]

Virgin Mobile service is through Sprint. So check their Coverage Maps. With almost any pre-paid you won't get roaming on other networks, so if there is no Sprint coverage you won't have any service. The Sprint network is undergoing some major upgrades at this time, adding LTE and expanding 3G coverage nationwide.

Around here it seems like their network is actually getting the exact opposite, major downgrades. With regular delays on texts and constant 1xrtt instead of evdo rev. a for many weeks now sprint has never been worse.