Network Vision/LTE - Shentel Market (Shenandoah Valley/Hagerstown/Harrisburg)

[S4GRU]

Yep. Right under a site is awful to measure throughput performance. Your phone will bounce between all three sectors. You also get interference from the other two sectors. And the main beam of the signal from each antenna is over your head. Best place is to be out a few hundred feet, centered as close to the middle of a sector, with a LOS to the antenna panel. Preferably with an obstacle behind you, like a big building, shielding from interference from the other direction.

 

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[A2CKilla]

Well, went out to york yesterday, is shentel working on backhaul? The speeds where extremely low, I mean single digits to low teens in most areas I went to

[chamb]

Well, went out to york yesterday, is shentel working on backhaul? The speeds where extremely low, I mean single digits to low teens in most areas I went to

Yes, Shentel is installing a fiber ring through Franklin, Adams, York, Cumberland, Dauphin counties.  Lots of money being spent to establish it. I have no info as to the completion date but it may be active in some areas.  Actually, single digits and low teens is not bad if B-41 is not yet active.

[ajm8127]

Yep. Right under a site is awful to measure throughput performance. Your phone will bounce between all three sectors. You also get interference from the other two sectors. And the main beam of the signal from each antenna is over your head. Best place is to be out a few hundred feet, centered as close to the middle of a sector, with a LOS to the antenna panel. Preferably with an obstacle behind you, like a big building, shielding from interference from the other direction.

 

Using Tapatalk on Note 8.0

 

Exactly. Not only is the antenna not designed to cover directly down, but you have interference from the other sectors on the site leading to poor SINR and low throughput. 

 

 

This image of the vertical pattern of the RFS APXVRR13 PCS band antenna shows the main beam out in front and the side lobes above and below. This particular antenna and the RFS APXVSPP18 is used extensively in the Sprint network. The difference is the APXVSPP18 supports 800 MHz as well. What you notice is almost none of the energy radiated is straight down (90°). So not only will the coverage directly below this antenna be poor relative to the main beam, but you have almost equal signal strength coming from the other two sectors at the site.

 

I realize the band you were measuring was 2500 MHz, but for the sake of this discussion, the vertical pattern will be similar.

 

If you want to do a throughput test on the sector, get out directly in front of it about 0.25 miles away. Use Signal Check or the debug screen to look for a SINR of at least 20 but preferably better than 25 dB. A SINR of 20 dB means the serving PCI is 100 times more powerful than the summation of the interference of the other PCIs and any noise in the band.

[leozno1]

Well, went out to york yesterday, is shentel working on backhaul? The speeds where extremely low, I mean single digits to low teens in most areas I went to

 

Are you connected to B41 when getting single digits and low teens? If that's on B41 you may have a very weak signal.

 

If you're getting low teens on B25 that sounds perfectly acceptable to me. If anything that's much faster than what we have been seeing in York over the past year. At my home I was barely able to get 2 mbps on B25. For a while I was able to get faster speeds on 3G by turning off the LTE radio (I was getting almost 2.5 mbps on 3G.) And even after the 2nd carrier went live, I couldn't crack 5-6 mbps. 

 

Now this past weekend, just before connecting to B41 for the first time, I was getting 12-15 mpbs on B25. I take it that the tower nearest to me (in Resevoir Park behind York College) has indeed had it's backhaul upgraded.

[chamb]

 

If you want to do a throughput test on the sector, get out directly in front of it about 0.25 miles away. Use Signal Check or the debug screen to look for a SINR of at least 20 but preferably better than 25 dB. A SINR of 20 dB means the serving PCI is 100 times more powerful than the summation of the interference of the other PCIs and any noise in the band.

 

I agree with this 100%.  The situation I had in Chambersburg was not enough time and once I backed away from the cell site, I had blockage by the buildings in the city.  I need more time to find the spot with a little elevation and not blocked by the downtown buildings.

[chamb]

Now this past weekend, just before connecting to B41 for the first time, I was getting 12-15 mpbs on B25. I take it that the tower nearest to me (in Resevoir Park behind York College) has indeed had it's backhaul upgraded.

My local Shentel site is almost ready to go live with Band 41.  But it recently got a big boost when a mini-microwave system was replaced by a fiber ring.  When on the microwave, the site was almost unusable during heavy traffic periods.  Since the switch to fiber backhaul, I can pull 5 Mbps on either Band 25 at a -111 level or on band 26 at a -102 level from 3 miles away. The equipment for Band 41 is on site and I expect it to go live in the next week.

[ajm8127]

Backhaul is a piece to the puzzle, but I think it is often the air link where the bottleneck is. If the B25 air link is averaging around 60-70% utilized or higher you are going to see a quality of service degradation. The addition of B41 to a site can take a lot of the load off B25 and result in better performance in the B25 band without upgrading the backhaul.

[Dkoellerwx]

Backhaul is a piece to the puzzle, but I think it is often the air link where the bottleneck is. If the B25 air link is averaging around 60-70% utilized or higher you are going to see a quality of service degradation. The addition of B41 to a site can take a lot of the load off B25 and result in better performance in the B25 band without upgrading the backhaul.

 

In this case, sounds like it was the backhaul that resulted in the improvement, since B41 isn't live yet.

[A2CKilla]

Yes, Shentel is installing a fiber ring through Franklin, Adams, York, Cumberland, Dauphin counties.  Lots of money being spent to establish it. I have no info as to the completion date but it may be active in some areas.  Actually, single digits and low teens is not bad if B-41 is not yet active.

 

Okay, good, I was really starting to wonder

 

 

Are you connected to B41 when getting single digits and low teens? If that's on B41 you may have a very weak signal.

 

If you're getting low teens on B25 that sounds perfectly acceptable to me. If anything that's much faster than what we have been seeing in York over the past year. At my home I was barely able to get 2 mbps on B25. For a while I was able to get faster speeds on 3G by turning off the LTE radio (I was getting almost 2.5 mbps on 3G.) And even after the 2nd carrier went live, I couldn't crack 5-6 mbps. 

 

Now this past weekend, just before connecting to B41 for the first time, I was getting 12-15 mpbs on B25. I take it that the tower nearest to me (in Resevoir Park behind York College) has indeed had it's backhaul upgraded.

 

No, was not connected to B41, was mostly a general question because I'm so use to double digits (upper 20s-30s) here in lancaster and high 50s-70s on a CA device even off B41. It was just a shock because I saw you guys posting about sightings of B41, I thought they got backhaul in most areas after all this time.

[Dkoellerwx]

high 50s-70s on a CA device even off B41. 

 

Is that what you meant to write? That's not possible off of B41 in your market. 

[chamb]

In this case, sounds like it was the backhaul that resulted in the improvement, since B41 isn't live yet.

Yes, when the fiber backhaul was activated and the microwave dish was removed at the site, the performance was much better and no B-41 was activated.   Maybe they had inadequate capacity near the other end of the microwave??    Fiber bqckhaul surely improved the site.   Ping time went from 323 ms to 40 ms.

[A2CKilla]

Is that what you meant to write? That's not possible off of B41 in your market. 

 

Did a test at work and with the sprint rep as well when I was showing him CA in the area with an S6 and I had my nexus 6, I use signal check pro, wasn't reporting being connected to b41 like usual nor B41 second carrier. Unless the app was acting up which it usually doesn't, I could be wrong. But I'm just going by what's being shown.

[Dkoellerwx]

Did a test at work and with the sprint rep as well when I was showing him CA in the area with an S6 and I had my nexus 6, I use signal check pro, wasn't reporting being connected to b41 like usual nor B41 second carrier. Unless the app was acting up which it usually doesn't, I could be wrong. But I'm just going by what's being shown.

 

If you are getting speeds of 50-70Mbps, you are on B41. No exceptions in your market. 

[stealth]

Here's just a general question. What causes high rsrq like -12dBm and higher and high ec/lo for cdma?

[chamb]

Here's just a general question. What causes high rsrq like -12dBm and higher and high ec/lo for cdma?

EC/IO

The EC/IO is a measure of the quality/cleanliness of the signal from the tower to the modem and indicates the signal-to-noise ratio (the ratio of the received/good energy to the interference/bad energy). It is measured in decibels (dB). In a perfect world, where there is no true interference, the interference level is equal to the noise level resulting in an EC/IO = 0 dB. Once the EC/IO is above -5.0 dB, your connection is going to suffer. There are several factors that can contribute to a higher EC/IO value, including florescent lighting, electric motors, equipment, power supplies, bad/poor cabling, trees, hills, buildings, walls, shorted connectors, inaccurate antenna alignment, wrong antenna polarization, congestion at the tower, etc

 

http://www.laroccasolutions.com/training/78-rsrp-and-rsrq-measurement-in-lte

[ajm8127]

In this case, sounds like it was the backhaul that resulted in the improvement, since B41 isn't live yet.

 

Not disagreeing. My comment was more of a generalization than a reply to a specific situation. Back haul design and capacity is still a very important part of the network. I would guess his results are not typical of most MW to fiber conversions though. If his ping before the conversion was 300 ms, then I would blame the design of the MW link(s) or congestion on the fiber at the hub site. Some sites make two or three MW hops before they get to a fiber. Of course when the back haul was designed (probably at the NV conversion) the data demand was much, much lower and the design was likely adequate. Times change and the volume of data moved by wireless networks has exploded.

 

I can tell you BH capacity and congestion are something that modern network operators monitor closely and the deployment of B41 has only made this more important. Six carriers each with the ability to move 82 Mbps equates to a lot of data. Sites previously operating with 50 or 100 Mbps fiber links will need to be upgraded to prevent congestion.

 

Without knowing chamb's location, I cannot comment with more specificity.

[tekjunkie]

I've got Verizon now and the speeds are slow. I'm in Ntelos land now, soon to be shentel. I'd like to switch but I have a 22% discount with vzw. Is there any hidden fees in sprints 50% off plan?? Current plan is 18gb 3 lines for ~280 a month.

 

 

 

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[Jaramie3]

I've got Verizon now and the speeds are slow. I'm in Ntelos land now, soon to be shentel. I'd like to switch but I have a 22% discount with vzw. Is there any hidden fees in sprints 50% off plan?? Current plan is 18gb 3 lines for ~280 a month.

 

 

 

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My wife and I just did Best Buy's Sprint share pack of 25GB for $50, access fees are $15 a person. I'm happy and my wife lives in Lynchburg so we are going through the upgrades. Check out your local best buy and see what they can do!

[Galaxyguy]

Just found another 10x10 PCS second carrier in Woodstock, VA. It had to have happened in the past couple weeks. I'm going to check a few more and see if they are deploying this elsewhere yet. That's 3 towers in Woodstock that I know of that have it.

 

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[ajm8127]

Just found another 10x10 PCS second carrier in Woodstock, VA. It had to have happened in the past couple weeks. I'm going to check a few more and see if they are deploying this elsewhere yet. That's 3 towers in Woodstock that I know of that have it.

 

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Should be a number of 10x10 second carriers in Winchester too now.

[Jones]

I found a 10x10 carrier by the apple blossom mall today as I was pulling into see star wars ☺

[bakedc4]

Should be a number of 10x10 second carriers in Winchester too now.

We have at least five now in Winchester. I noticed the first one on Black Friday.

 

 

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[Galaxyguy]

I picked up at least one on 81 near the mall as I was passing by there earlier today. I didn't get a chance to today, but I'm hopeful next week I'll get to check more in Shenandoah Co to see how many more there are in my neck of the woods. I'm guessing Strasburg may possibly have it too, but I'll check.

 

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[Jones]

Sitting at the BP in Inwood, WV getting another 10x10