We have truck drivers on regular runs through northern Ontario. We always had reasonable good Bell service with our old flip phones, using the 1X network. We upgraded to Blackberrys (Bold 9700) Big mistake. We now lose service at Sault St Marie. Have a bit at Thunder Bay and then dead until almost to Manitoba. I understand that our Blackberrys are using the Bell 3G network and there is no 3G coverage up there. We dont have to have data, but it sure would be nice to have Texting and Calling.
Our Blackberrys refuse to connect to the 2G network, if we select 2G only then we get the SOS. This happens at home where Know that there is great 1X service on older phones.
So is 1X not the same as 2G???
Or are the Blackberrys too high tech to use the older service???? If so why do they even have the 2G option???
Wirelessly posted (WhiteBerry Bold 9780: Mozilla/5.0 (BlackBerry; U; BlackBerry 9780; en-US) AppleWebKit/534.8+ (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/6.0.0.668 Mobile Safari/534.8+)
It's nothing to do with it being a BlackBerry, it's all to do with the fact that Bell has two separate networks.
1: CDMA - This is their older network which has a larger footprint than the new network. Data runs on EVDO (3G) or 1X (2G) as a fallback.
2: HSPA - Next month will be two years since Bell & TELUS launched their jointly owned HSPA network. The fallback to this would be a 2G GSM network, which Bell unfortunately doesn't have.
Bell's 2G network is the 1X network referenced in number 1 above, and unfortunately CDMA and HSPA are not compatible. So because your 9700 is an HSPA device, you will have a smaller coverage area, and you don't have a 2G fallback option.
If your business takes you to these dead zones often, you may want to consider a BlackBerry 8530 or something else that runs on the CDMA network.
What I can't comment on, is whether or not Bell has any roaming agreements with Rogers or MTS. You'll probably want to have this thread moved to the Bell forum.
Thanks......I was afraid thats the reply we would get. I never paid enough attention to the finer details of network coverage. We just assumed that being our old Bell phones worked, Blackberrys would have the same coverage. Not sure yet what we are going to do. We have been running this way for almost a year now. Perhaps Bell will improve their HSPA network in that area............Can always hope so.
I would follow your suggestion and move this thread to the Bell forum, but i am new to Howard Forums and havn't figured how to do that.
I'm kinda curious, does your phone hit DMTS on the way into Manitoba?
Cheeri'o...
Frankie...
Please Note: I do not work for Bell. I also do not work for any wireless retail outlet.
Do not ask me about promotions or offers from wireless providers.
I thought Bell has a roaming agreement with Rogers for their GSM coverage in Manitoba and Northern Ontario?
That's why I asked my question. There's very little GSM serving some of those routes along the way. Some are indeed covered but there's more than one way to get to the Manitoba border.
Thanks......I was afraid thats the reply we would get. I never paid enough attention to the finer details of network coverage. We just assumed that being our old Bell phones worked, Blackberrys would have the same coverage.
This isn't about BlackBerries, it's about the fact that Bell/Telus are the only carriers in North America to have 'migrated' from CDMA (1X/EV-DO/etc) to UMTS/HSPA, two technologies of more or less the same generation that aren't designed to interoperate.
So, Bell is buying the same UMTS hardware, like the 9700, that's designed for operators like AT&T, Rogers, the European carriers, etc. None of that hardware has any ability for CDMA fallback (it can do GSM/EDGE fallback, but that doesn't do Bell any good), because, well... nobody other than Bell/Telus would have any use for that functionality.
I think Bell has done a very reasonable job of covering almost everywhere with UMTS, except for the places (e.g. TBTel, MTS, etc territory) where they don't have any control over the CDMA infrastructure, towers, etc. In those cases, they only really have two options: 1) convince the CDMA operator to follow on this migration path (see: Sasktel), or 2) if the CDMA operator refuses or hops into bed with Rogers (see: MTS), build their own infrastructure from scratch using Telus' 1900MHz spectrum (and given the low population in many of these places, I suspect the business case for that expenditure is hard to make)...
I guess I worded that a bit wrong. It sounds as if I am blaming our Blackberrys for not getting a signal. What I meant was that up till a week ago I didn't know how these different Bell networks work, and had just assumed that if one Bell device has a signal, then the next one would too.
Thanks to all of you, I understand it a lot better now.
I sure wish we had done this research before doing our upgrade. Thanks again guys.
This isn't about BlackBerries, it's about the fact that Bell/Telus are the only carriers in North America to have 'migrated' from CDMA (1X/EV-DO/etc) to UMTS/HSPA, two technologies of more or less the same generation that aren't designed to interoperate. ....
Technically, there are more carriers than Bell/Telus that migrated from CDMA directly to HSPA - TBaytel, Sasktel, MTS, Alltel, etc, however it doesn't reaaly change the meaning of what is written.
Also:
The original competitors in that area of Northen Ontario were TBaytel (CDMA) and Rogers (GSM/2G). Bell CDMA customers were allowed to use TBaytel's CDMA network. Tbaytel then decided to migrate from CDMA to 3G:
For whatever reason, Bell and TBaytel couldn't come up with an agreement for HSPA/3G. That is the reason by Bell CDMA devices work there, but not Bell 3G devices.
Rogers built the small GSM/2G network in that area. Rogers and Tbaytel came up with an agreement that allows Rogers 3G customers onto TBaytel 3G network. TBaytel inherited the Rogers 2G customers as part of that agreement. When you switch the BB9700 into GSM/2G, all it can see is the Rogers 2G network which is why it shows SOS only
If you really want coverage along Hwy 17, then your options are:
1. Switch back to CDMA devices on Bell
2. Switch to Rogers
Sorry for the late reply... DMTS (Dryden Municipal Telephone System) runs a GSM 850/900 network throughout NW Ontario, from Kenora to Thunder Bay. Currently has 2G roaming with Rogers, and 3G roaming with Bell. Roaming doesn't always work 100%, but the only other GSM carrier on Hwy. 17 west of Thunder Bay is TBayTel/Rogers, who *definitely* does not have a roaming agreement with Bell.
If you have a CDMA phone, you'll hit KMTS towers, but I don't know how far East those reach. They've got coverage as far as Dryden, not sure about anywhere else.
So, to recap:
-BELL CDMA should roam on KMTS
-BELL GSM/HSPA/etc. should roam on DMTS starting around Thunder Bay. I don't know if there's any coverage between TBay and Sudbury, however.
-Rogers/TBayTel GSM/HSPA/etc. should work "natively" on TBayTel towers now operated by Rogers.
Other than that, dunno. If you want 100% coverage everywhere, buy a satellite phone - I hear rates are down to almost $1/minute by now :-).
Can a Bold 9700 not use the Bell 2G network.
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Originally Posted by Rogido
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