Well sure, but remember the iPhone signal strength riots of 2010? If you can't make a call at location A with new phone A when your old phone B could, it's definitely a negative mark against new phone A, and worth mentioning in a review.

Really? What we learned from antennagate - hardware design has a huge impact on reception and call quality.

It would be like testing a car and never driving it.

eh, not really, there can be a big difference in reception between different cellphones.