Network Vision/LTE - Richmond & Southern Virginia Markets

[Raheim_M4]

What makes me mad is how Sprint has LTE everywhere on the eastern seaboard but Central VA is in the middle of the no 4g LTE gap according to sprints website I know there's LTE in NoVA and there's LTE in NC but it's like they skipped us to do us last because of our area code 804.

 

I'm going to give Sprint until mid June because I been getting the "faster data speeds upgrades" text but my phone only speeds up after midnight they claim that Sprint is all over Midlo/chesterfield tuning towers but sensorly still hasn't changed that much except there's LTE on the turnpikes but we need it in the suburbs.

 

Another thing to point out is that they need to make 1900 LTE stronger idc if it's not a low frequency but I shouldn't have to be outside and in towers view to get 5 bars sprint already added 2.5 and 800 but now they might get 600 which means tri band devices are a rip off once they buy that spectrum because you need another device. If I can't get 1900 LTE in my house whenever they "finish upgrades" since the tower is barely 2 miles from me and is behind my school I'm going to T-Mobile straight up. I rather have HSPA+ and a little bit of LTE.

 

My friends get mad when they claim they call me and I have to remind them Sprint is under Network Vision which is some bs because VA hasn't been fully LTE equipped except for the Beach and NoVA meanwhile people around the state are randomly getting connection to Verizon XLTE which may be as fast or even faster than Spark only time will tell. Sprint needs to Sprint their asses up on these towers so I can use my s4 like I do on wifi.

[Hurrcayne_dre]

#1 Richmond Market also consist of some 434 area code.

 

#2 The towers in Midlothian have only been accepted into Sprint system for about 2 weeks now.  It takes around 4 Weeks for the towers to tweaked to perform. I use the worst phone for RF signal and I can pull LTE on the 1900 inside Walmart on Brook Rd.

 

#3 Northern Va not faring that much better than us, and don't be impressed by 7 cities either. The only thing I can say is either wait for the other bands or move on.

 

I have been actively running Sensory mapping on my phone and I put it on my sister's phone since her phone is tri band and she lives in a brick damn fortress. Her tri band phone (HTC One Max) picks up a way stronger RF signal than my phone and her LTE experience is so much better than mine. 

 

I fully expect Sprint to launch Richmond Market next month with only outlining areas let to fill in. 

[COZisBack]

What makes me mad is how Sprint has LTE everywhere on the eastern seaboard but Central VA is in the middle of the no 4g LTE gap according to sprints website I know there's LTE in NoVA and there's LTE in NC but it's like they skipped us to do us last because of our area code 804.

 

There are areas of the country that have zero Network Vision sites accepted yet. Meaning not even 3G accepted yet. You're fortunate to be in an area that has sites active on 3G which means 4G LTE isn't far behind to those sites. Depending on if the ISP in your area has completed the backhaul work they were supposed to by now.

 

Even if your area happens to be last to receive LTE, they didn't skip you, schedules change and hey, somebody has to be last. As stated above, yours isn't last.

 

I'm going to give Sprint until mid June because I been getting the "faster data speeds upgrades" text but my phone only speeds up after midnight they claim that Sprint is all over Midlo/chesterfield tuning towers but sensorly still hasn't changed that much except there's LTE on the turnpikes but we need it in the suburbs.

 

We don't host Sprint complaints/rants here. Please refer to the posting guidelines:

 

Negative comments. We understand that Sprint's network suffers in many places, especially the legacy network.  However, negative comments about Sprint or S4GRU must be constructive in nature, relevant to the topic and the conversation, illustrate facts, be made rationally and intelligently and cannot have an attack tone. Rants will not be allowed. We do not host Sprint complaints. Complaints about Sprint should be directed to their customer service channels.  People come to S4GRU to discuss Network Vision deployment and do not want to sift through uninformative complaints to find useful information.

 

http://s4gru.com/index.php?/topic/1197-s4gru-posting-guidelines-aka-the-rulez/

 

If you would like a place to host your complaints, let me grab that link for you...... one moment...... https://community.sprint.com/baw/welcome there ya go!

 

Another thing to point out is that they need to make 1900 LTE stronger idc if it's not a low frequency but I shouldn't have to be outside and in towers view to get 5 bars sprint already added 2.5 and 800 but now they might get 600 which means tri band devices are a rip off once they buy that spectrum because you need another device. If I can't get 1900 LTE in my house whenever they "finish upgrades" since the tower is barely 2 miles from me and is behind my school I'm going to T-Mobile straight up. I rather have HSPA+ and a little bit of LTE.

So let me get this straight? Sprint shouldn't sell devices to their customers now to support all 3 bands that they offer now.... because of something they're considering purchasing a year from now and won't have equipment for for about 2 years and ready for full time deployment for 4 years?

 

Do us all of us a favor and head on over to T-Mo. Save all of us some time.

 

My friends get mad when they claim they call me and I have to remind them Sprint is under Network Vision which is some bs because VA hasn't been fully LTE equipped except for the Beach and NoVA meanwhile people around the state are randomly getting connection to Verizon XLTE which may be as fast or even faster than Spark only time will tell. Sprint needs to Sprint their asses up on these towers so I can use my s4 like I do on wifi.

 

See 2nd response. Watch your language please, as stated in those guidelines mentioned above. 

[Raheim_M4]

Well first of all I'm not bashing Sprint so don't attack me. My Mom been on Sprint when Nextel was hot back in 2003 I got my first phone in 2010 it was a sanyo flip I was younger when I had it service was decent but things changed it's 2014 I have a Gs4 non triband do you see how many years it's been since Sprint been saying that 4G LTE is coming to Richmond? Since 2012. I seen T-Mobile comeback and I'm worried about Verizon XLTE it may take away Sprint's Spark literally I hate seeing them advertise their LTE maps I see Framily commercials it gives me hope. But as a customer I want the New Network that'll let me watch a standard 5 min video on YouTube without any buffer probs. That's what I want people so people can stop calling us The Slow Network.

[Dkoellerwx]

Well first of all I'm not bashing Sprint so don't attack me. My Mom been on Sprint when Nextel was hot back in 2003 I got my first phone in 2010 it was a sanyo flip I was younger when I had it service was decent but things changed it's 2014 I have a Gs4 non triband do you see how many years it's been since Sprint been saying that 4G LTE is coming to Richmond? Since 2012. I seen T-Mobile comeback and I'm worried about Verizon XLTE it may take away Sprint's Spark literally I hate seeing them advertise their LTE maps I see Framily commercials it gives me hope. But as a customer I want the New Network that'll let me watch a standard 5 min video on YouTube without any buffer probs. That's what I want people so people can stop calling us The Slow Network.

And you'll get it. Someone had to be last. Sprints upgrade is much more comprehensive than Verizon's or T-Mobile's. They are replacing every single element of the network. It take longer than just slapping on new AWS antennas and moving on like Verizon has done.

 

Spark on the other hand, is similar to XLTE in that all Sprint has to do is slap on new antennas and RRUs, scale up the backhaul and you're good to go. Once NV 1.0 is largely completed, NV 2.0 should roll quickly.

 

Sent from my Nexus 5

[Raheim_M4]

Okay I get it but once this finishes the question I wanna know is will we be able to beat verizon not coverage wise but what about speeds and network time on 4G LTE I always noticed that our phones will skip out on a 2 bar 10 meg DL LTE signal and downgrade back to tiny 1 meg DL full bar 3g signal I witnessed it.

 

Seems Like Verizon S4 stays on LTE even in a basement they rarely experience 3g but will sprint stay on LTE & I noticed that in Midlothian/RVA/CField Sprint has a faster 3g & LTE speeds on Ookla Speedtest but that AWS spectrum could change it.

 

Also isn't At&t testing VoLTE for the future? No hate but according to Ookla my friend's At&T iphone pulls down to 36 meg DL while Sprint gets 20 DL and Verizon 1.50 meg DL() I dont know about TMO because they only get Hspa & Hspa+ in these areas it's pretty fast but it's not LTE just a "boosted 4G" I just want someone to knock Verizon from the throne I'm not mad at at&t for trying to get 1st but I'm tired of Sprint Being in 3rd Place and TMO's Legere attacking sprint on twitter saying it's only a matter of time until they beat us out of 3rd place.

[Dkoellerwx]

Okay I get it but once this finishes the question I wanna know is will we be able to beat verizon not coverage wise but what about speeds and network time on 4G LTE I always noticed that our phones will skip out on a 2 bar 10 meg DL LTE signal and downgrade back to tiny 1 meg DL full bar 3g signal I witnessed it.

 

Seems Like Verizon S4 stays on LTE even in a basement they rarely experience 3g but will sprint stay on LTE & I noticed that in Midlothian/RVA/CField Sprint has a faster 3g & LTE speeds on Ookla Speedtest but that AWS spectrum could change it.

 

Also isn't At&t testing VoLTE for the future? No hate but according to Ookla my friend's At&T iphone pulls down to 36 meg DL while Sprint gets 20 DL and Verizon 1.50 meg DL() I dont know about TMO because they only get Hspa & Hspa+ in these areas it's pretty fast but it's not LTE just a "boosted 4G" I just want someone to knock Verizon from the throne I'm not mad at at&t for trying to get 1st but I'm tired of Sprint Being in 3rd Place and TMO's Legere attacking sprint on twitter saying it's only a matter of time until they beat us out of 3rd place.

 

Gotta be honest, I had a hard time reading your post.

 

Sprint will never be able to match Verizon's nationwide coverage, not without significant expansion. I think you know that.

However, within Sprint's footprint, they will be able to improve their coverage quite a bit. Band 26, 800Mhz LTE has very similar propagation and penetration characteristics as Verizon's. Anywhere you have previously been able to get Sprint 3G, you will be able to get LTE. It won't provide the speed of Verizon XLTE, but that is a higher frequency LTE band, so it's not likely you'd be able to get that inside large buildings or in basements and whatnot. 

 

Part of the problem right now is not even half of the towers in Richmond have been upgraded to LTE. Just having all the towers upgraded will provide much better coverage, and should give you LTE in most places you previously had a 3G signal. When Band 26 goes online, it will improve even more on that coverage, provide you have a tri-band (Spark) device. 

 

Sprint Spark (Band 41), when it is deployed, will be able to provide speeds of 150+Mbps by next year. However, it will require new LTE-A equipped devices. Just like XLTE requires a new device.

[Hurrcayne_dre]

 

 

 

Sprint Spark (Band 41), when it is deployed, will be able to provide speeds of 150+Mbps by next year. However, it will require new LTE-A equipped devices. Just like XLTE requires a new device.

 

that's not 100 percent accurate 

[ajbrad]

Noticed that the last couple of days I've been getting ev-do rev a (B41) with some lte mixed in. Anybody else getting this?

[Raheim_M4]

Noticed that the last couple of days I've been getting ev-do rev a (B41) with some lte mixed in. Anybody else getting this?

Yeah I have around Midlothian my neighborhood has LTE in a slight cusp(came on last Friday) even though the tower is 2 miles from here. Sadly 1900 LTE stops at my front door but runs fine through my school, weird my school is concrete and bricks, my house isn't nowhere in that range with building penetration. I get better 3g now but I need LTE 1900 to come thru my house. My phone will go to Ehrpd switch randomly to ev-do and goes to LTE. Even when I'm in a area where LTE is present unless I cycle my connection it'll take a while for my Galaxy s4(non triband) to notice. Network Vision towers act crazy during upgrades like 3g gets really good but when LTE signals come through it doesn't stay on. I don't know if 1900 LTE is just a weak spectrum in general or towers that just upgraded to LTE have to start off with weak signals in order to get stronger? Or maybe my tower is just weak overall...Has anyone find their 4gLTE network signal to get stronger weeks after upgrades? Does it take time for tower's to reach their full potential is the question I'm asking? But 3g evdo is nice with good speeds and strength. Edited June 3, 2014 by Raheim_M4

[spark731]

Yeah I have around Midlothian my neighborhood has LTE in a slight cusp(came on last Friday) even though the tower is 2 miles from here. Sadly 1900 LTE stops at my front door but runs fine through my school, weird my school is concrete and bricks, my house isn't nowhere in that range with building penetration. I get better 3g now but I need LTE 1900 to come thru my house. My phone will go to Ehrpd switch randomly to ev-do and goes to LTE. Even when I'm in a area where LTE is present unless I cycle my connection it'll take a while for my Galaxy s4(non triband) to notice. Network Vision towers act crazy during upgrades like 3g gets really good but when LTE signals come through it doesn't stay on. I don't know if 1900 LTE is just a weak spectrum in general or towers that just upgraded to LTE have to start off with weak signals in order to get stronger? Or maybe my tower is just weak overall...Has anyone find their 4gLTE network signal to get stronger weeks after upgrades? Does it take time for tower's to reach their full potential is the question I'm asking? But 3g evdo is nice with good speeds and strength.

Its possible that your home is covered by multiple towers. If you're getting b25 until the front door then that means another tower may have kicked in. My apartment is covered by two different towers and I experience this.

 

You just have to wait for the other tower(s) to be upgraded to get your LTE in home.

 

If you become a sponsor you can see the sponsor maps which will give you an idea of which towers might cover your home and their progress.

[Raheim_M4]

My phone connects to a tower on Genito rd that's my main one and the second tower is on Bailey Bridge Rd. They both have LTE upgrades signals but extremely weak strength unless I'm walking around in the line of sight of the towers. There's a recently built tower behind my neighbors house in the woods I thought it was sprint but sadly it's At&t & Tmobile that share it, what's even worse is that the tower has no antennas on they built the base and the tower without no antenna so it just sits there as a pole eating power for no reason. I wish it was Sprints I know for a fact if it was LTE would be through the roof. Is it possible for multiple carriers to share a tower that's own by another company like At&T, and T Mobile to have Sprint panels at the bottom to help out other tower's or is the whole cdma vs umts difference a problem with sharing? Somebody help ms out with some knowledge.

[billym2]

Anyone have any info on when 800mhz might be coming to richmond? I live out by lake chesdin in chesterfield and have awful coverage but I remember looking on sprints site and seeing that Nextel had me in the greatest signal strength color.

[cjstealth]

Came home from work today and caught a 4GLTE signal in my neighborhood. I'm near Genito and Hull St. Sprint has turned on quite a few towers around that area.

 

Sent from my Samsung Galaxy S3 powered by the Sprint Network via Tapatalk 4

[DanielB]

Anyone have any info on when 800mhz might be coming to richmond? I live out by lake chesdin in chesterfield and have awful coverage but I remember looking on sprints site and seeing that Nextel had me in the greatest signal strength color.

 

After a very insightful conversation with an insider yesterday, I got a lot of good info on progress and timeframes in the Richmond area....including info on why some LTE towers (including Clear B41) aren't broadcasting yet even though they've been accepted. To answer your question: November (as long as the nice weather holds out) We'll have full Spark tri-band service in the Richmond market by November. 

[grapkoski]

After a very insightful conversation with an insider yesterday, I got a lot of good info on progress and timeframes in the Richmond area....including info on why some LTE towers (including Clear B41) aren't broadcasting yet even though they've been accepted. To answer your question: November (as long as the nice weather holds out) We'll have full Spark tri-band service in the Richmond market by November. 

 

Thus, mother nature will have to bring us a derecho.

[DanielB]

Hahaha. Yup.

[ajbrad71]

Well all tower eventually be lte or some will just be 3g

[DanielB]

The plan is to put LTE on every single tower, barring a literal handful that won't be upgraded due to extenuating circumstances. 

[speedin07si]

LTE is now live Colonial Heights, been waiting a long time for this. ????

 

Sent from my SM-N900P using Tapatalk

[JT3D]

Confirming LTE now live on Fort Lee. Didn't get any LTE earlier today in CH but picked it up on my way to work around 8 pm. Happier days are here finally. Lol.

 

Sent from my SM-N900P using Tapatalk

[ajbrad71]

Got the update for the radio's on my M8. Much better signal, but seemsto stay on 3g way mmore often now. Anybody else notice this.

[Hurrcayne_dre]

Got the update for the radio's on my M8. Much better signal, but seemsto stay on 3g way mmore often now. Anuybody else notice this.

Don't know, depends on where you visit, Highland Park and East End still crickets

[Raheim_M4]

I don't know what the heck Sprint is doing they just realeased new LTE & Spark markets for june where's RVA? Richmond getting Spark that early is impossible especially with inconsistent 3g data between .35 dl all the way up to 1.4megabits) in DL speeds after Network Vision and now that my towers turned on LTE I can only get it while sitting outside. Some other things to point out is why does my phone signal jumps from 1 bar to full bars & back to 1 this happens within seconds every hour. If 1900 was going to be weak and slow why didn't Sprint just use Nextel 800 from the start. Even if I ride my bike to my tower I only get 3 or 4 bars on LTE never full! I'm hoping for the Merger between Sprint & T-Mobile because the logic of Sprint3G/4gLTE and Spark doesn't add up. Sitting outside for LTE is lame but you gotta do what you gotta do when it comes to watching 7+ mins YouTube videos. I was told by Sprint it world be coming in June and when it got here it's been nothing to rely on indoors but outside coverage is useful when streaming music while exercising I'm hoping Sprint puts 8T8R Antennas in Richmond because when I was in Brooklyn my non Spark GS4 connects to Spark Towers 1900 signal and I pull 40 megabits DL and I'm somewhere in the high teens and early 20s on upload. I can get 2 megs DL on 3g sometimes Those 8T8R's shut me up but that's Network Vision 2.0 and 1.0 isn't substantial completed even though it's "mid year 2014" I'm very impatient I been waiting since 2010 for usable 3g I got that now, but now I need LTE because times changed unlike the people who own Spark phones I can actually Surf and Talk which is critical when "dad who lives in ATL calls and needs me to quickly search bus tickets" I'm hoping that if I'm still on this network in the future Spark users get qualities that svlte has currently.

[Hurrcayne_dre]

I don't know what the heck Sprint is doing they just realeased new LTE & Spark markets for june where's RVA? Richmond getting Spark that early is impossible especially with inconsistent 3g data between .35 dl all the way up to 1.4megabits) in DL speeds after Network Vision and now that my towers turned on LTE I can only get it while sitting outside. Some other things to point out is why does my phone signal jumps from 1 bar to full bars & back to 1 this happens within seconds every hour. If 1900 was going to be weak and slow why didn't Sprint just use Nextel 800 from the start. Even if I ride my bike to my tower I only get 3 or 4 bars on LTE never full! I'm hoping for the Merger between Sprint & T-Mobile because the logic of Sprint3G/4gLTE and Spark doesn't add up. Sitting outside for LTE is lame but you gotta do what you gotta do when it comes to watching 7+ mins YouTube videos. I was told by Sprint it world be coming in June and when it got here it's been nothing to rely on indoors but outside coverage is useful when streaming music while exercising I'm hoping Sprint puts 8T8R Antennas in Richmond because when I was in Brooklyn my non Spark GS4 connects to Spark Towers 1900 signal and I pull 40 megabits DL and I'm somewhere in the high teens and early 20s on upload. I can get 2 megs DL on 3g sometimes Those 8T8R's shut me up but that's Network Vision 2.0 and 1.0 isn't substantial completed even though it's "mid year 2014" I'm very impatient I been waiting since 2010 for usable 3g I got that now, but now I need LTE because times changed unlike the people who own Spark phones I can actually Surf and Talk which is critical when "dad who lives in ATL calls and needs me to quickly search bus tickets" I'm hoping that if I'm still on this network in the future Spark users get qualities that svlte has currently.

B was sensory mapping LTE in the projects today. That is the first time I ever gotten LTE in the Projects. Inside the bricks and I didn't even use my  HTC One Max but my SGIII .