i use to have it in my last ride and yes Onstar is very HOT for phone service.
during some last trips my cell phone didn't catch any signals on some short period of time and Onstar green light was always on green. But it cost some money each month.

 

Who was your cell provider and what year vehicle did you have?

Just curious to see if your provider is the same as the carrier OnStar uses up here and if the type of unit you had made a difference.

 

Bell was my cell provider and the last ride was an 04 Impala SS it happened during a trip to Florida between Platsburgh NY and Albany NY where they are big mountains.

 

On my way to work one morning saw a T-bone accident in front of me,with injuries, pushed blue button,got ambulance in 3 min. That's FAST!! Now I feel
funny driving my Dodge truck which dosen't have On Star.

 

I'm not sure I'd like them knowing where I am at all times. If they can unlock your car for you then chances are they could also unlock it for someoneelse, maybe not a theif but what about thecops or anybody else who thinks they might need in your car for some reason. I think it would be cool if you could shut it down so they coild not locate the car and you could turn it on when you needed it. Not that I'm going to rob a bank or run from the cops anytime soon it;s just that privacy is becoming harder and harder to come by. If they know where your car is they can see it with satelite imaging. I think I'd like to have it thought, it just makes you think about things, thats all.

 

I can't say much about it, but it's not as simple as calling up and getting them to unlock the vehicle. There are checks and balances in place to prevent unauthorized access.

 

The 04 most likely had a dual mode unit (analog & digital) in it and fell back on the analog signal in the mountains when the digital signal went away.

The latest units may not do that since they are 100% digital. But with analog cellular being shut down next year the carriers are hopefully putting in more towers to fill in the gaps in the digital service.

 

I don't have onstar in my hhr but i have it in my HD truck and have not ever used it. you get a discount on your insurance for it so i keep on renewing it they change my unit to digital about two months ago for free. When I had a accident they never called me. I think that the airbag has to activate.

 

The phone in the OnStar system is a CDMA system with a full 3 watts on the Verizon system. Most cell phones operate at a fraction of a watt something on the order of 0.5 or 0.6 watts. Anything higher and the battery life would be awful. Since OnStar is 6 times as powerful it naturally has a greater range.

 

Totally agree. My HHR didn't come with onstar and glad of it.