IPhone 3G S has dropped over 83 calls in the last day. 3G is the culprit.

Question

It started yesterday (Oct 3rd, 2009) as a nuisance, but it grew to make my phone not useable.
The symptoms where:
iPhone has full bars and the 3G indicator is active.
1: Dial a call phone waits longer than usual to dial, but gets the call through.
2: user on the other line picks up long enough to say hello, and the phone does its hated beep,beep,beep after 3 seconds!
3: cannot receive calls.
4: try the internet or mail, and you get the connection error. (Obviously we have a network error here!)
I called 1800 my iphone , and the tech basically told me to do what I had done repeatedly for 5-6 hours.
1: shut the phone down and re-start. (No kidding, I didn't think of that!) +Did not work+...
2: hold the power and home button until the phone restarts. +Did not work+
3: go to settings> general> reset>reset network settings. +Did not work+
4: go to settings> general> reset>reset all settings. +Did not work+
5: remove the sim card and re-insert into phone. +Did not work+
The tech tells me to bring the phone to the Apple Store. Of course there's not an a appointment available for 2 days. (thank god for Skype, even though you need Wi-Fi for it to work, it works!)
The tech blames my software on my phone, and says that I should restore the phone to factory settings.
Next, I decide to go a little deeper... Since my phone will not work for the next two days, I decided to do the : settings> general> reset> ERASE ALL CONTENT AND SETTINGS. (You still have your last back-up, but once you start you're in for at least and hours worth of restoration. )
After the phone restarts from its complete erase, and comes back up as a "new" phone I simply connect it to my laptop just to reactivate it... I re-activate the phone as a "new" phone. (This means theres not one piece of third party software on the phone. This also means the phone doesnt have any settings other than factory setting.
Confident I call my wife again... "Hi honey lets try this again...beep, beep, beep!!!"
I just wasted another hour of my life!!!!
Finished with apple tech support, I call AT&T tech support. I got straight to a customer service rep. She seems competent enough... She asks me whats happening, I tell her. She suggests the following:
1: Dial #002# and press the call button. The wheel spins for a second, and then you get a screen with a bunch of error messages... She says to ignore all the messages and shut the phone down.
2: I shut the phone down and wait 2 minutes.
3: I re-start the phone.
4: she has me repeat step one again.
5: I call my wife. I talk to my wife for 35 seconds. Confident that this has worked I hang up with her, and decide to call again. the next cal I get beep, beep ,beep!!
Ok so I'm in full tech mode now. So I decide to go "old school" and turn 3G off... (Which I should have done way earlier in the game, but I decided to give AT&T the benefit of the doubt. My mistake!!!)
I go to settings> general> network, and turn the 3G slider to the "OFF" position. (Yep we're back to "E", not empty, but the EDGE network, which is close to empty!!!!) suddenly my phone begins to go on the internet. I start getting the beloved ding (incoming email messages, and voice mails) Hooray for me! Two multi-billion dollar companies couldn't get my phone to work, but I am at least able to get it to work in part, all with my own troubleshooting. +THIS WORKED!!!+ but now I'm on a much slower network. So I guess I can call it the iPhone "E S".
Although apple has amazing products, they have a mayor flaw. They're freaking stubborn! Here's probably the greatest handheld device out there, but they have bogged it down by putting it on probably the most unreliable network in the US. I've gotten better service in Cancun while roaming... Seriously!
Just like refusing to have a two button mouse for years, until demand and constant barraging from customers made them add the feature. ( and even then its not a true second "button" on laptops ) I think they are going to do the same thing with the AT&T only thing.
Apple, you're a bunch of smart, but stubborn people!

Answer 1

After calling AT&T tech support one more time, and explaining to them that the glitch was on their network, they admitted that the problem was at their tower...
I continued to use the phone on EDGE mode for two more days until the problem was fixed.
I even got a call back from a tech support guy asking me if my phone was working properly....
I wish they would have admitted to the problem before I sat at the apple store for 2 hours.