[m419]

Yeah because if you are a Virgin Mobile 3G customer you will be using:

T-Mobile or Orange's 2G network and then you will be using 3's 3G network, its like one big network and can't see the goverment going with that!

However when Virgin and T-Mobile signed agreements and contracts for Virgin Mobile to use the T-Mobile network the contracts generally run for a period of 5 to 10 years, so they can't just kick them off. Its like when you sell a house with sitting tennants in, you can't just chuck them out.

What if Virgin uses the 3 network, that is more likely to happen, following reasons:

3 won't be expensive, 3 will get desperate and will offer Virgin Media a good deal.

3 does not compete with Virgin Media on services such as homephone,broadband,dial up internet,Analogue TV,Digital TV,FM Radio or business telecoms products.

So that will create a good partnership.

O2 competes with Virgin Broadband

Vodafone competes with Virgin phone and Virgin Broadband with its Vodafone at home service.

Orange also competes with Virgin phone and Virgin Broadband,Orange also offers Business telecoms products which you could say compete with NTL Telewest Business services.

Orange and Vodafone work with Arquiva formerly NTL Broadcast, Arquiva is planning to launch IPTV services similar to Tiscali TV in the UK, When France Telecom got rid of its shares in NTL, it quit working with NTL UK and some kind of industry dispute arose, so I cannot see Virgin Media working with a group that competes in every way and cannot see Virgin Media working with orange when it works with Arquiva as its planning to launch a TV service which threatens Cable TV.

So for good working relations, 3 would be the best partner.

3 will offer 98% 3G coverage of the UK population, in the past it had issues with network coverage, that was because the network was new and 3G technology was just taking off in Britain, I have seen an improvement.

I think once 3 has completed its improvements to network coverage it should launch a new advertising campaign focusing on the network coverage issue, it could offer a 30 day money back gaurantee if customers find the network coverage poor, and then launch something similar to Orange's network performance promise, where phone calls drop due to poor coverage offer reimbursements.

From my experience, I found Orange 2G and 3G quite bad where ever I go, on the 2G reception from Orange, the reception bars would bounce up and down and offer poor sound quality during calls, when sending texts, i would sometimes have to press resend because the reception bars would immediately go to 0 or 1 bar and this was with a few phones. Now my problem with Orange 3G, I would get no coverage in my house and if I put it on dual mode, while i'm out it would constantly bounce from 2G to 3G all the time which meant missing incomming calls during the automatic process. Another problem with Orange 3G is that when using features such as You Tube, it would frequently keep braking out when streaming.

Now I don't get any of those problems with 3.

Now the problem with T-Mobile 2G, indoor coverage is shocking,not just my house but at work and virtually every building i go into, and as for basement flats! Forget it! Voicemail definately useful there lol Another problem I have experienced is when going outside london especially semi rural areas, the reception again lets me down.

I have no proper experience of T-Mobile's 3G coverage, as I have always had 2G phones when using T-Mobile or Virgin Mobile.