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Leaving AT&T Wireless for a Verizon iPhone 5

I imagine that headline sums up a pretty common course of action these days. I just dropped AT&T wireless, after 6 years of iPhone fun. Things had gotten a bit better following our move to the suburbs. Back in Chicago's Bucktown neighborhood, it was common to have no service whatsoever. AT&T explained that a cell tower had completely failed in our neighborhood, creating a "dead zone", and that there were no current concrete plans to repair it. And still, they offered no solutions whatsoever. No microcell, no equipment swap, no SIM replacement, nothing. Basically, a "deal with it" stance. Which is their prerogative.

Further unbundling - back to AT&T landline, Comcast Internet.

A few months ago, we moved to DirecTV, which has been fantastic. the HR34 DVR (now called the "Genie" in marketing material) is, two months in, still essentially perfect. We're finally finishing with WOW, switching our phone to AT&T - WOW never managed to make the VOIP work with our security system - and switching our net to Comcast for the time being. I recently purchased an Arris cable modem for $40 on eBay, which will pay for itself in about 5.5 months now that I'm not paying the $7 modem rental fees. WOW is currently charging us about $80 monthly for unlimited phone and 20 Mbps Internet. Under the new plan, we'll pay AT&T about $35 (plus, granted, 7 cents/min for long distance) and Comcast $30 (at first- they'll raise the price after 6 months or so). We'll get 30 Mbps instead of 20, and the combined price will be 65-70-ish, at least at the outset. But really, trying to save a little money is secondary. We just want a system that wo...