Vic Smith wrote:

> I'm assuming coverage always includes good signal quality. SMS has
> claimed he can get a signal - with PagePlus I think - in some isolated
> backwoods area he frequents,

Not so backwoods actually. All on fairly major roads, often not far from
mid-size to large cities. One of the routes to Lake Tahoe, past a major
ski area (CA 88). Much of Crater Lake. Much of Yosemite and the roads
into it (served by Golden State Cellular, a Verizon affiliate). Much of
CA 1 between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz. None of these are out in the
woods at all.

It's true that if you never leave the urban core that prepaid services
that use AT&T's network are fine. What you want to avoid, at least out
in the west, is any Sprint or T-Mobile based prepaid carrier, as both
the 1900 MHz GSM and 1900 MHz CDMA networks are _much_ less developed
than AT&T's 800 MHz GSM and Verizon's 800 MHz CDMA networks.