Since we moved to Rancho Cordova two years ago we have had to deal with the AT&T cell phone curse! Now, I will admit that we live somewhat in the middle of nowhere. We are ‘on the way’ to Elk Grove if you want to take the ‘back roads’ instead of the freeway.

We have experienced No Bars in More Places with AT&T since we have lived out here. I use my phone for work and often times if you were to take a peek at me in my office while on my cell phone you would have to laugh. I have had to develop a few work arounds that have gotten me through a phone call with my boss or a client. The only way to get a really good signal in my office is to be tall (need an Uncle Josh) so I have to either stand on a stool and talk or sit at my desk and hold up my phone with one hand and take notes with the other, but sometimes I can also just lean the phone up on the wall next to my printer and for some reason that works well too. But just about every where else in the house, nothing but static, dropped calls and robot voices. We contacted AT&T and did get our phones changed out because they had upgraded the antenas in our phones. But overall they said that the signal was just not strong in our area because there isn’t a cell tower nearby. My parents live a few houses down from us and their AT&T phones don’t even get a signal.

We did some research with other family members phones and found that Sprint had the best coverage in our house, even in the office…without a stool!

So we had been trying to find the right phones for us both with a specific price range of 100.00 after rebate. There were a large number of phones to chose from within this range so it was a little bit of a task.

Initally, I really wanted the Samsung Instinct but the more I played with it at the Sprint Store the more I didn’t like it. I really wanted the Treo 800w because I had a Treo before and really liked it and this one is now a windows based phone but it was way out of the price range. There were others on our list too but due to our price limit we had to exclude those phones.

We have really been active with our text messages and photo messages and we love to have the internet on our phone so we went with the Sprint Family Share 1500 minute Unlimited Text & Internet. This plan even ended up being less than what we would have padi with AT&T for the same services so we were stoked about that.

With the Sprint Everything Plan you get more than just the unlimted do dads, you get so much more. Sprint TV, Sprint Radio, NFL Mobile, Nascar Mobile. Since we would have access to those things with our service plan we wanted a phone that could do those things as well.

Sprint is now offering the Blackberry Curve 8330 for $99.00 after rebate. This a great phone that retails for $569.00 and they give you a $370.00 instant rebate and then you send in for the $100.00 rebate. Great deal on a super duper phone. I got a red / black one and Louis got a black / silver one (he really liked that idea since he is a Raiders fan).

We are selling our old Samsung BlackJack’s on Ebay right now. We are hoping to fetch $50.00 for my set and $65.00 for Louis’. He had a few more accessories than I did so hopefully his will go for more.

If you are looking for a new phone or carrier, give Sprint a try, they have a lot to offer.

Cell Phone Update: Our cells phones both sold on Ebay within just a few hours of posting the auction. Yippie!!