This discussion also points out potentially problematic issues for me about upgrading from my 3GS (w/iOS 4.3.5) to the 4S and switching from ATT to Verizon at the same time. Since my first iPhone I have wanted to get away from ATT, after so many city + countryside connection & coverage issues and consequently using their Mark the Spot app way too many times.
My use includes city (mostly decent ATT coverage but still gaps and dropped calls) + rural countryside where coverage is sparse and the service level commonly drops back (from 3G to E or o, with very widely varying functionality of voicemail, text and data) and ATT evidently providing service via others' towers. What good is a cell phone if I have to go somewhere with 50 mile views toward a city or Interstate to make a call or see if there's a voicemail?! Waiting for any WiFi connection is a DOA idea. Being able to communicate outside cities & off Interstates is crucial to my (& a whole lot of others!) occupation & Verizon users often have equal or better service than ATT - which appears to be my only comfort, even if I have only one example of an iPhone 4 user. Plus, when I had Verizon years ago I had good city coverage (from a different house then) and countryside use would commonly switch to analog (real nice to have _swapable_ large capacity battery then!). Plus Verizon consistently scores much higher in service and customer satisfaction than ATT (Consumer Reports)
Getting a home cellular repeater doesn't address my issues, but a mobile one might help. I used to use a plug-in external antenna with a mag mount on the roof of the rental car, which helped a lot, but is useless with the iPhone. I still wish the iPhone had an external antenna jack!
I also have not seen any clarity about the ability of the 4S to use, say, a Verizon standard account + buy a GSM SIM card for domestic (Xc/min) use and being able to switch between them as needed or useful. This capability would add another option to the menu of choices here and might be a way to address many of the reception issues which complicate the 4S/Verizon iPhone choice. I could use Verizon in-city and have better coverage alternatives while in the countryside.
So, what to do? Stay with ATT & 3GS or upgrade to a 4S? If upgrade to a 4S, will I be better off with Verizon or ATT? Or postpone decisions for an iOS5 update to see if the options landscape changes? Its clear from the uncertainties explained in these discussions that there's issues which are not yet transparent (Apple?!) or settled which affect such choices. I, like any consumer, when faced with such situations won't budge until there's more comfort about all this - hear that Apple???
Overall, Apple's making these devices for only the mass market. The cell companies invest in the mass market too, i.e., coverage & capability wherever the customer base is most dense. These two factors stack up against all of us who's situations, use or needs are at the margins of the mass market. It appears Apple's mainly interested in enabling users who want to travel, i.e., the world phone feature, while leaving the 'rest of us' rural area users out on a limb. Apple's 'solutions' are limited to using WiFi, let us turn off a few features to better avoid high cell provider bills or allow a few choices among carriers. Apple's dumbed down OS management of hardware we own to the point we cannot retrofit a prior functional OS in the same device, an example of mass market-only idiotology. Ditto for having the option to upgrade iOS from 4.x.x to 4.3.5 now that 5 is available, except for devices which won't run on 5. We really have very limited flexibility here, which is fundamental to what everyone's complaining about in this and other related threads.
This is all why its becoming increasingly unwise to jump on the latest OS or hardware - mass marketing does not serve marginal users, even with transparent and complete information about the choice at hand. I'm seeing the same phenomenon in the iOSification of the Mac OSX (Lion) - with similar complaints about loss of flexibility and ability for power & network users to modify & maintain their OS as they've long done. Apple is at the forefront of this mass market trend in tech, but the rest of the market isn't far behind, so switching brands is at best a delay tactic. All these companies need to realize users are widely stratified so need a range of OS/device management/control options, and the # of users in marginal situations are legion - so design for and give us what we too need and want - even if our marginal situation is caused by somebody else: the cell provider(s).
