T he peace and quiet cradles you like a baby in a warm blanket. In the stacks of the University Library you find a sanctuary for scholars looking for a place to get some work done without interruption from the hustle and bustle of the campus community.

Suddenly your focus is shaken when you hear the obnoxious ring of a cell phone in the pocket of a fellow student at the next table. “HELLO?” They say into the receiver at a decibel beyond the hush of standard library etiquette, and then continue to take the call.Who would of thought that a hand-held device would revolutionize how society communicates with the world?

The cellular phenomenon has taken America by storm and the Sacramento area has become flooded with cell phone users over the past 14 years. And to accommodate the overflow of wireless users, the valley has become saturated with cell phone providers. AT&T, Verizon Wireless, Cingular (formerly Pacific Bell) and RCSWireless are among the most popular carriers. With all the new cell users, providers have to set up more broadcast towers to conduct service as customers travel from ‘cell’ to ‘cell.’ Each ‘cell’ covers a few miles in radius and collectively controls a much larger area. So as a cellular customer travels from place to place their service is passed from tower to tower until the call is completed.

“AT&T has been around for nearly 35 years and has about 500,000 towers around California, so it?s rare to ever have a dropped call, I?ve never had one,” said Phillip Clausen-Tuft, the manager of AT&T Cellular Warehouse. A “dropped call” is the term for a call in progress that all of a sudden goes dead. If you are out of your service area then the phone will begin to roam in order to resume the call.

“When you get roaming charges at 35 cents to 50 cents a minute, it?s because your carrier doesn?t have a tower in that area and the phone is “roaming” the area for the best carrier it can find to handle your service,” Clausen-Tuft said. And the roaming charges add up fast.

“So if you?re an AT&T customer and you go out of range then you could get picked up by a Sprint tower and then Sprint will bill AT&T,” he said. “That?s where people pay high prices to AT&T, because Sprint can charge what they want.”

Freddy Cohan of Cohan Communications is an alumnus of Sac State and owns many of the RCS stores in Sacramento, including the station in Arden Fair?s Market Square.

” You can?t count on a cell phone to do everything. Personally, I hate these things, but I make a lot of money selling them,” Cohan said. “It?s the price everyone?s looking at.”

RCS offers a plan of $39 a month for unlimited anytime minutes to any 916 or 530 area code while in the coverage area, but the customer has to buy the phone if they don?t sign a contract. The phones range from $99 to $225. And you can?t pick just any phone. For example, the new Nokia 8200 costs $200 and can only be purchased with an AT&T plan. RCS also sells Verizon, Sprint and Cingular plans. Neither AT&T nor Verizon have the $39 unlimited plan. However, RCS is the only provider that will sell a plan and a cell phone without a credit check or a contract. Features such as voice-mail and detailed billing are an extra charge each month, according to RCS. A prepaid long distance calling card is required for long distance and directory assistance is also a part of the unlimited calling plan.

“They don?t make money on the phone, the money is in the service,” said Bruce Boehm, a former sales consultant for Pac Bell and Sac State student majoring in communication studies.

All the other carriers require a credit check and there?s no way of telling who will be approved or denied.

“It varies, some get approved for Verizon but won?t with Pac Bell, each company has different standards,” Boehm said.

RCS Wireless is the rookie provider in the cellular game and “piggybacks” the Sprint network. The Sprint network has about 250,000 towers in California. RCS has the least amount of coverage in the Sacramento area, which raises the likelihood of dropped calls,poor reception and roaming fees, but lowers the rates to sign up for service. For those with a little more change to spare and a need for quality reception, Verizon and AT&T are the top carriers to look at.

“AT&T is the best and has the largest coverage in the country,” Cohan said.

Boehm also agreed that AT&T has the better service.

” If I didn?t have Pac Bell, I?d get AT&T,” he said. “When it comes to customer service AT&T is like Nordstroms, you go dressed up nicely and sales people are like ‘hi, can I help you?? Verizon is like Nordstroms on a Saturday afternoon, and Pac Bell is like JCPenney?s, while some are really helpful they all want to get to Nordstroms.”

For those cell phone virgins who are looking to sign up with a wireless company, Boehm suggests that the consumer do a little research before deciding who will get their business.

” Call the Customer Care department before you buy a phone,” Boehm said. “Call at a peak time like a lunch hour or a Saturday afternoon to see how the person treats you, even just to ask where a local store is. Pay attention to how long you?re on hold. I find it?s always a half-hour with Pac Bell,” he said. ” And that relates right back to the JCPenney/Nordstroms analogy.”

Whether you’re a veteran cell user or just considering losing your innocence, beware of a few things such as peak times and unnecessary options.

The peak times can be a little tricky for some people. On some plans it is from 6:59 a.m. to 6:59 p.m., but it depends on the plan, the cellular provider and what is stated in the contract. Some plans claim 6:59 a.m. to 7:59 p.m. as their peak times and that last hour is what shows up on the customer?s bill as extra charges.

Another misconception is that if you pay AT&T or Cingular for what they call “mobile to mobile service,” using one cell phone to call another, you are wasting your money. It?s $9.95 a month on top of the normal charges to use “mobile to mobile.” The trick with AT&T and Cingular is that the person you are calling has to be paying the $9.95 as well or it doesn?t work and the time you stay on the phone comes out of the plan minutes. At any rate, calling plans should be researched when a consumer explores the option of buying a cell phone.

However, if you take anything away from this article, take this important piece of advice from both cell phone users and vendors: Make sure to purchase insurance. “People like to steal phones,” Boehm said. “Phones are a lot like cars, they’re worth more in 18 pieces than they are whole.”

Batteries can be sold for around $40, face plates for $20, the antenna is $10, back housing $35, LCD (display panel) $40 to $60 and the keypad, earpiece and microphone have a wide range of value, Boehm said. Insurance is usually around $3 a month, but if the phone is stolen after five months of use then the company will replace the phone. Typically there is a deductible of around $25, couple that with the five months of insurance that’s been paid and it still only adds up to $40. Compared to the alternative of bypassing the insurance and losing the phone, the company will charge full price ($150 to $200) for a new one.

Whether you decide to stay connected or join the cellular ranks, it’s the way you use the phone that counts.

No matter where you go, the level of consideration for others and their right to enjoy a movie, a meal, a class or even a simple elevator ride is becoming a matter of great concern. “The one place that is really annoying to me is in the elevator, it happens a lot here,” said Kristin Steensrud, financial consultant at Irwin Home Equity in San Ramon. ” It?s obnoxious when they get into the elevator and they are talking so loudly that everyone stops talking because all you can focus on is that person screaming into their phone. Then the jackass on the phone gives you a dirty look for listening, but it?s like if the conversation is that private, don?t talk on the phone in the freakin elevator!” Steensrud said.

A few years ago it was the soccer moms with their brick-sized cell phones and their minivans that you had to avoid on the road, but now every third driver has one hand on the wheel, and one on the cell phone yakking their way through traffic. As if it?s not hard enough with all the dumb drivers out there, now you have to deal with the distracted and inconsiderate.

Freeman Keophet is a manager at RCS Wireless and feels that his phone is his only way of staying in touch with his friends.

“I have a lot of friends, and I have to keep in touch with them. If I get a call in the car I can talk all the way home,” Keophet said.

For many, keeping in touch with each other is the main motivation behind having a cell phone, so do the homework before making a decision, and stay in touch with your checkbook.

There are so many different plans and so many different providers trying to bring in new customers daily, the market is continually expanding.

The bottom line is that the plan that works for your individual situation is the best plan to invest in. It depends on what is best for your lifestyle and budget.

So do some homework and take some time to compare all the carriers, the Sacramento Valley is littered with them.

“If you stay in a major city you can choose any carrier you want,” Clausen-Tuft said. Just make sure to READ the fine print.