On Sun, 2 Jan 2022 13:25:36 -0800, sms wrote:

> T-Mobile also includes taxes
> and fees in the price (on some plans) which can be a big savings if you
> live in an area with high taxes, though it seems like subscribers in
> low-tax areas are subsidizing those subscribers in high tax areas

I pay $100/month on T-Mobile for unlimited everything (even in Europe except
calls are 20 cents per minute in Europe) with about $16 in CA taxes & fees.
<https://i.postimg.cc/L6dFGXVd/tmopromo03.jpg>

> Where T-Mobile was really poor was in the Santa Cruz mountains where we
> spend a lot of time in state and county parks. The coverage maps from
> the FCC and Whistleout confirm this, see <https://i.imgur.com/D7t9cKl.png>.

I live in the outskirts of the Santa Cruz mountains where all three carriers
aren't the greatest in signal strength simply because there are no towers
within miles.... <https://i.postimg.cc/xCbVQ2pj/signal02.jpg>
but all three will give you for free (if you ask nicely) a femtocell or a
microcell which gives you _perfect_ coverage inside the home.

The carriers used to offer three different types of augmentation
1. A femto cell (which plugs into your router)
2. A repeater (which sits in an upstairs window) & transmitter
3. A wi-fi router (nowadays they're all wi-fi enabled though)
But now most of them seem to prefer the femto cell (or micro cell).

Since they're free, you may as well get them (I've talked all three carriers
into giving them for neighbors), where the T-Mobile 5G speeds outside have
been getting better and better lately for some reason (mine are at 250Mbps).
<https://i.postimg.cc/mggy315q/speedtest05.jpg>

Dunno about other carriers' 5G speeds in the Santa Cruz Mountains though but
I know T-Mobile sells a $55/month wireless Internet box for some areas
(but not yet for mine where we don't even have the option of cable so we
have to get our Internet from an access point which is miles away over LOS).
<https://www.t-mobile.com/responsibility/consumer-info/policies/internet-service>

To always be helpful to others, and while it's impossible to obtain
graphical wi-fi or graphical cellular signal strength data on iOS, the
Android free ad free google free Android apps I like best is this one.
<https://play.google.com/store/search?q=cellular-z&c=apps>