Dallas Sporting Venues = Bizarre iPhone Behavior

[muskratboy]

The last few times i've been to Dallas sporting events with my iPhone, it has just acted strangely.

Last week on the way to Texas stadium, my phone:

showed five full bars of 3G, but would not actually connect anywhere or make a call. even when i manually turned off 3G, it still showed 5 full bars of 3G... but was essentially a paperweight, communications-wise.

so i restart. it comes up No Service for about 5 minutes. Then shows 2 bars of EDGE, and seems to be connecting online...

Then back to 5 bars of 3G. Except this time, now it is fluctuating between 3-5 bars 3G... still unable to connect or even make a call. Even when turning off 3G, i still got the same fluctuating-but-strong 3G connection / no connection.

The ballpark did the same sort of thing... showing connected but not actually connected.

anybody else get this?

 

[scaredpoet]

The last few times i've been to Dallas sporting events with my iPhone, it has just acted strangely.

Last week on the way to Texas stadium, my phone:

showed five full bars of 3G, but would not actually connect anywhere or make a call. even when i manually turned off 3G, it still showed 5 full bars of 3G... but was essentially a paperweight, communications-wise.

so i restart. it comes up No Service for about 5 minutes. Then shows 2 bars of EDGE, and seems to be connecting online...

Sporting events are common choke points for cell networks, and there are areas where [insert cell carrier here] hasn't beefed up cell towers to accommodate stadiums that get full. So you're going to see this in areas where there's a lot of people and not enough cell capacity to handle everyone making calls, sending texts or transferring data.

Some cell companies do better jobs than others in different places. AT&T apparently hasn't beefed up in Texas.

I work near a university stadium, and prior to AT&T I was on Sprint. On nights where there's football games, not only was I stuck at work late because traffic's a mess, but I couldn't make calls on the SPrint phone either until the area cleared out. AT&T is somewhat better in my case though.

 

[S Brake]

I had the same problem at a football game on Saturday but we won so I wasn't too bugged.

 

[trs23]

This happens everywhere I go to a game

White sox at us cellular
Cubs at wrigley
Cardinals in stl
Edward jones dome -> STL

It also happened at the air and water show (my wife could only send me a SMS we couldn't call each other)

also happens most evenings on the brown or red line in chicago right between armitage / fullerton (tons of students at depaul).

ATT Just doesn't give enough capacity at those areas. Super annoying