I’m looking to get my own cell phone and get off my parents’ bill, but am looking for reviews of service. Have been with Sprint with my parents, but am not particularly attached to them. Looking for reviews of T-mobile, Verizon, Cingular etc… Any horror stories? Horrible service? Crappy phones? Or on the other side, got awesome stories? Awesome service? Tell me about it!
All six of us (me, Hubby, and four teenagers) are on Cingular.
In Georgia, close to me, perhaps you’d get similar coverage. Reception is good here, I don’t have problems with that. Phones? I loved the Nokias, after swearing off Motorola, but Hubby and I both got new Motorolas this summer and have had good experiences per reliablilty. Mebbe Motorola got a clue !
The best advice I can give to you is regarding your service package. If you love to text message, BE SURE to buy a bunch up front. This can get expensive. 
Try to pick a package which suits your usage (of calls made too).
One thing I like about Cingular is that you can change your service options on-line. This may be true of other providers, I dunno.
Are you going to be travelling outside the US? If so, make sure you get GSM. T-Mobile (what I have) and I think cingular offer this system. Whilst abroad, you can just get another GSM card on the cheap and put it in your own phone and you’re all set. On the other hand, this doesn’t work as well in remote areas of the US. TDMA is your best bet then, which is what all the other guys have, as far as I know. That being said, I’ve never been anywhere outside in the US where my T-Mobile doesn’t work, but if you live a ways from a city or interstate, study the coverage maps carefully.
Handset wise, I’ve been using Nokia’s for years, and wouldn’t have it any other way.
Just as an aside to the GSM comment - it isn’t wholly guaranteed that a GSM phone will work outside of the US. Some phones are locked to only work in the US, and many are locked to only accept SIM cards from the service provider. If that’s a factor you want to consider, be sure to ask the cell provider - very clearly - if your phone will indeed work outside the US, as is, and whether it will accept other providers’ SIM cards. The cell phone I brought with me when I moved here would indeed work using my Cingular SIM card, but will not accept anyone else’s SIM cards without getting the subsidy code for Cingular. I just went ahead and bought a new phone.
And last I checked, Verizon utilized CDMA, not TDMA, but that may very well have changed.
Consumer Reports had a review of cellphone services not too long ago. Also you might find something on phonedog.com.
I’ve had service with AT&T, Sprint, Cingular and Verizon, and can say that hands down, Verizon had the best coverage (in Northern NJ). I was with Verizon for a few years but tried switching to Cingular after they bought AT&T b/c I was sucked in by the marketing, but switched back after one month because I didn’t have a single call that didn’t drop or wasn’t marred by such terrible interference that I had to end the call. I’m happily back with Verizon.
But note- Verizon’s phones generally aren’t as cool as other carriers’, because they choose to put their energies into the network coverage rather than bells & whistles. Personally, all I want a phone for is a clear call, and don’t need cameras, downloadable ring tones, video & music playback, PDA capabilities, etc. YMMV.
This is a first for me - I am cutting and pasting my response to another thread on cell phones:
My SO and I have the T-Mobile family plan - two phones, about 400 minutes per month during business hours and unlimited weekend calls, plus unlimited calls between other T-Mobile phones so our conversations are unlimited 24/7. The whole package, with tax and charges is under $50 a month. We also have it connected to Powernet so we can even make international calls for pennies.
And at least here in Las Vegas, have never had a problem with connections.
I used Nokia phones with AT&T for many years, but never really cared for the service. In February I decided to ditch my land line and get a more robust cell phone/plan, and I switched to Verizon (and a Samsung SCH-a670). I’ve been happy as a clam ever since. 
One word of advice if you pick Verizon: When you sign up, pick the cheapest plan with the least amount of minutes. You can always switch to a more expensive plan with no problem, but if you sign up with a more expensive plan and then try to switch to a cheaper one, they will tack time on to your service agreement. I signed up with 450 minutes @ $40/month, but within a month I switched to 900 minutes @ $60/month. Last week I switched back to 450 minutes @ $40/month, and was told they’d have to add time to my service agreement – until I pointed out that this was the plan I’d signed up with. The guy was like, “Oh. Ok. In that case, let me just change this…” So it’s just something to watch out for.
(BTW, all plans include free nights/weekends.)
I have a Motorola V710 under Verizon, which is actually a decent phone from a Pit-worthy company. The coverage is great; I can’t complain about that at all. I can get a signal just about everywhere but underground (and once in a while even then, depending on the building on top of me).
Problem is that all the phone’s advanced features are crippled. For example, I can’t use Bluetooth to move files back and forth off the phone, because Verizon decided that it wanted to make money by forcing people to use their grab-stuff-off-the-web access. I can technically use an instant messenger with it if I wanted to, but instead of using minutes like everyone else, it uses text-messages. Verizon actually got sued over it recently… they lost, so they gave everyone $25 in credit, instead of fixing it. I’m told that even using a supplementary computer-cable doesn’t always work the way you’d expect it to.
If you are going to be travelling inside the US and get GSM, get a GSM phone that has both GSM-850 and GSM-1900. This will give you better rural coverage.
If you are going to be travelling outside the US, get an unlocked quad-band* GSM phone. It will work just about anywhere except Japan and South Korea (which do not have GSM). Even in Japan and South Korea, you can roam by putting your GSM SIM in a special rental phone.
Make sure that you can roam to wherever you are going.
[/sub]* Disclaimer: I edited the linked Wikipedia article. It mentions five GSM frequency bands, but you can ignore GSM-450. AFAIK, it was only implemented in Tanzania, which also has service on at least one of the other four.[/sub]