Network Vision/LTE - Atlanta/Athens Market

[Camcroz]

Sprint does have a tower directly across from the development on 16th street adjacent to the fire station. One sector points directly at Atlantic Station, which is why their service is so awesome here. Several of my coworkers have Sprint triband phones as well and report nothing but fantastic service in this area. Even 2 floors down in the massive parking structure that Atlantic Station sits atop, i am consistently on LTE (band 26, of course). So i am just having a great deal of difficulty wrapping my head around your negative experience in this immediate area. Bizarre.

Ya I don't know why that could be. Unless Sprint improved greatly in the 3 months since I got rid of them however my 3 family members still are on Sprint and to this day my brother asks me why he is on 3g all the time. His experience mirrors mine. I'm almost inclined to get a cheap prepaid on Sprint to see if service has improved in these three months I've been gone. I would be happy to see the results you have and it bums me out that I never experienced the same.

Someone posting from a T-Mobile variant LG V10 is not using Sprint at the time. That alone is suspicious.

 

AJ

Yes but my 3 family members still use Sprint. I monitor performance with there phones now and service is basically the same as since I switched. Tmobile is very good in Atlanta but there really no better than Sprint in Atlantic station. I've thought it must just be a dead zone for all the carriers.

 

Sent from my LG-H901 using Tapatalk

[WiWavelength]

Yes but my 3 family members still use Sprint. I monitor performance with there phones now and service is basically the same as since I switched. Tmobile is very good in Atlanta but there really no better than Sprint in Atlantic station. I've thought it must just be a dead zone for all the carriers.

 

Secondhand evidence is, well, secondhand.  That is not as sound as firsthand evidence provided elsewhere in this thread -- especially when that secondhand evidence comes from a self reported 17 year old who uses T-Mobile while other family members use Sprint.  Strange.

 

AJ

[Camcroz]

Secondhand evidence is, well, secondhand. That is not as sound as firsthand evidence provided elsewhere in this thread -- especially when that secondhand evidence comes from a self reported 17 year old who uses T-Mobile while other family members use Sprint. Strange.

 

AJ

What's strange is that you seem butthurt ever since I switched to tmobile. I still like Sprint. I want Sprint to do good. If I didn't I wouldn't be here. And it's more than just second hand evidence I use service mode on there phones, monitor there dbm levels, and occasionally run speedtests. Its not like I just glance over and see that there on 3g or that there videos are buffering.

 

Edit. Age doesn't matter. It doesn't define my ability to monitor the network and it doesn't say how much I know about telecommunications

 

Sent from my LG-H901 using Tapatalk

Edited February 9, 2016 by Camcroz

[WiWavelength]

What's strange is that you seem butthurt ever since I switched to tmobile. I still like Sprint. I want Sprint to do good. If I didn't I wouldn't be here. And it's more than just second hand evidence I use service mode on there phones, monitor there dbm levels, and occasionally run speedtests. Its not like I just glance over and see that there on 3g or that there videos are buffering.

 

Edit. Age doesn't matter. It doesn't define my ability to monitor the network and it doesn't say how much I know about telecommunications

 

At S4GRU, we do not sway people to Sprint.  I could not care less that you switched to T-Mobile.  What I do see is a seemingly unexceptional teenager, who uses words such as "dude" and "butthurt."  And you expect to be taken seriously?

 

Like it or not, the character of the witness matters.  No one should accept an anecdotal report without checking qualifications of the source.  Compared to you, I have the benefit of 20 more years, college, and higher education teaching experience.  Plus, I am on record in thousands of posts and articles at S4GRU and elsewhere.  I have made my name -- and backed it up.

 

You, on the other hand, are an unknown.  Accept that.  If you want to change that fact, go for it.  I encourage you.  But start by presenting yourself in a more appropriate, intellectual manner.

 

Back to the Sprint issue.  You do not use Sprint on a daily basis.  Others in the Atlanta area do.  They may agree or disagree with your observations, but their assessments have greater relevance than do yours.

 

AJ

[Camcroz]

At S4GRU, we do not sway people to Sprint. I could not care less that you switched to T-Mobile. What I do see is a seemingly unexceptional teenager, who uses words such as "dude" and "butthurt." And you expect to be taken seriously?

 

Like it or not, the character of the witness matters. No one should accept an anecdotal report without checking qualifications of the source. Compared to you, I have the benefit of 20 more years, college, and higher education teaching experience. Plus, I am on record in thousands of posts and articles at S4GRU and elsewhere. I have made my name -- and backed it up.

 

You, on the other hand, are an unknown. Accept that. If you want to change that fact, go for it. I encourage you. But start by presenting yourself in a more appropriate, intellectual manner.

 

Back to the Sprint issue. You do not use Sprint on a daily basis. Others in the Atlanta area do. They may agree or disagree with your observations, but their assessments have greater relevance than do yours.

 

AJ

I understand that I don't use Sprint regularly. However I was having a simple discussion about service at a certain area of town. We both gave our points of view and excepted it. I thought that's what this website is about. Discussion of network performance. If Johnny gets more credibility because he uses Sprint than so be it. I stated my observation and he stated his. End of story.

 

Sent from my LG-H901 using Tapatalk

[WiWavelength]

I understand that I don't use Sprint regularly. However I was having a simple discussion about service at a certain area of town. We both gave our points of view and excepted it. I thought that's what this website is about. Discussion of network performance. If Johnny gets more credibility because he uses Sprint than so be it. I stated my observation and he stated his. End of story.

 

Not the end of story.  Not S4GRU, not anyone, not anything should grant all discussion equal credibility.  Some evidence carries more weight.  That is what the older, wiser, and more educated among us are here to sort out.

 

AJ

[JonnygATL]

Sprint does have a tower directly across from the development on 16th street adjacent to the fire station. One sector points directly at Atlantic Station, which is why their service is so awesome here. Several of my coworkers have Sprint triband phones as well and report nothing but fantastic service in this area. Even 2 floors down in the massive parking structure that Atlantic Station sits atop, i am consistently on LTE (band 26, of course). So i am just having a great deal of difficulty wrapping my head around your negative experience in this immediate area. Bizarre.

3 months? No, this has been a product of years of hard work by Sprint and we have been reaping the rewards for a couple of years. The two channel CA? Well, about 7 months. But great speeds even on one 20x20 b 41 channel have been present for around 18 months. 3? No. Again, i just do not understand your experience. I ran multiple speed tests in the area tonight and kept my eyes peeled to SCP even more closely than usual just because of our conversation and can only further confirm that my Sprint experience is pretty fantastic and, at times, exemplary. Especially in and around Midtown, West Midtown and Atlantic Station. I'm sorry you have, oddly enough, not been able to successfully replicate my experience.

[themuffinman]

Ya I don't know why that could be. Unless Sprint improved greatly in the 3 months since I got rid of them however my 3 family members still are on Sprint and to this day my brother asks me why he is on 3g all the time. His experience mirrors mine. I'm almost inclined to get a cheap prepaid on Sprint to see if service has improved in these three months I've been gone. I would be happy to see the results you have and it bums me out that I never experienced the same.

Yes but my 3 family members still use Sprint. I monitor performance with there phones now and service is basically the same as since I switched. Tmobile is very good in Atlanta but there really no better than Sprint in Atlantic station. I've thought it must just be a dead zone for all the carriers.

 

Sent from my LG-H901 using Tapatalk

I understand that I don't use Sprint regularly. However I was having a simple discussion about service at a certain area of town. We both gave our points of view and excepted it. I thought that's what this website is about. Discussion of network performance. If Johnny gets more credibility because he uses Sprint than so be it. I stated my observation and he stated his. End of story.

 

Sent from my LG-H901 using Tapatalk

Not knocking you in anyway, but I figured something was up. The thing is you made it seem that you currently had sprint service when in fact you left sprint months ago, maybe even longer than that for all we know but thats besides the point. Now sure, there are a lot of areas in the country where sprint customers may have the right to complain but I would find it extremely difficult to believe that sprint customers in atlanta(with relatively newer devices) would have any reason to complain when it comes to actual network performance. Like I said previously atlanta's service is top notch wherever I have been east, west, north and south and inside the perimeter. The only time, and I mean the only time, I may have had a slight issue with speed is when I am at the airport which would be obvious from the worlds busiest airport.

[Camcroz]

 

 

Not knocking you in anyway, but I figured something was up. The thing is you made it seem that you currently had sprint service when in fact you left sprint months ago

Ya although I still try to keep track of service the best I can I will admit that it's not as "creditable" for lack of a better word as someone who currently has the service.

3 months? No, this has been a product of years of hard work by Sprint and we have been reaping the rewards for a couple of years. The two channel CA? Well, about 7 months. But great speeds even on one 20x20 b 41 channel have been present for around 18 months. 3? No. Again, i just do not understand your experience. I ran multiple speed tests in the area tonight and kept my eyes peeled to SCP even more closely than usual just because of our conversation and can only further confirm that my Sprint experience is pretty fantastic and, at times, exemplary. Especially in and around Midtown, West Midtown and Atlantic Station. I'm sorry you have, oddly enough, not been able to successfully replicate my experience.

3 months was just the time since I left. So I'm saying it could have improved more since then. I've noticed the same improvements around the city that you were seeing before I left. I'm gonna to have to activate a phone to see how it is cuz our difference in perception is interesting.

 

Sent from my LG-H901 using Tapatalk

[themuffinman]

Ya although I still try to keep track of service the best I can I will admit that it's not as "creditable" for lack of a better word as someone who currently has the service.

3 months was just the time since I left. So I'm saying it could have improved more since then. I've noticed the same improvements around the city that you were seeing before I left. I'm gonna to have to activate a phone to see how it is cuz our difference in perception is interesting.

 

Sent from my LG-H901 using Tapatalk

What device were you using when you had sprint?

[Camcroz]

What device were you using when you had sprint?

Galaxy s6

 

Sent from my LG-H901 using Tapatalk

[Camcroz]

For anyone in Atlanta wondering about the progress of NGN I have some good news. I spotted some small cells all around the buckhead area tonight. One of them I am positive is Sprint (I'm pretty sure although I couldn't get a pic of it) the other 3 looked like the picture below. If anyone knows who's small cell it is in the pic then please speak up. If these all really are Sprint small cells though then it's great news for where sprints network is heading in Atlanta.

 

This is the antenna.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B0ki3pkK_7qjRFNTMklObGxBRjA/view?usp=docslist_api

 

This is the box at the bottom. I don't necessarily know it's function.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B0ki3pkK_7qjaU5tdW9CWmFPUUk/view?usp=docslist_api

 

Sent from my LG-H901 using Tapatalk

[nexgencpu]

For anyone in Atlanta wondering about the progress of NGN I have some good news. I spotted some small cells all around the buckhead area tonight. One of them I am positive is Sprint (I'm pretty sure although I couldn't get a pic of it) the other 3 looked like the picture below. If anyone knows who's small cell it is in the pic then please speak up. If these all really are Sprint small cells though then it's great news for where sprints network is heading in Atlanta.

This is the antenna.https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B0ki3pkK_7qjRFNTMklObGxBRjA/view?usp=docslist_api

This is the box at the bottom. I don't necessarily know it's function.https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B0ki3pkK_7qjaU5tdW9CWmFPUUk/view?usp=docslist_api

Sent from my LG-H901 using Tapatalk

I does seem to look like Sprint small cell. Can you get better shots?

 

Also signal check pro screen shot while maybe connected to it, if indeed Sprint small cell.

[Camcroz]

I does seem to look like Sprint small cell. Can you get better shots?

 

Also signal check pro screen shot while maybe connected to it, if indeed Sprint small cell.

I was in a moving car and had to zoom in. I won't be around there again for a couple weeks but when I go back I'll be ready to take better pics. And I would do the SCP thing except I am on tmobile. I saw the small cells though and got very excited as I would love to see Sprint excel here.

 

Sent from my LG-H901 using Tapatalk

[Deval]

I saw something similar to that posted on /r/Tmobile and it turned out to be a Sprint NSN small cell.

[red_dog007]

So I was in ATL a couple weeks ago.  I totally forgot to pay attention to B25.  I unfortunately wasn't logging. 

 

Looking at FCC, Sprint has some healthy PCS spectrum holdings there.  Sprint deploy more than just the G-Block for LTE?

[Flompholph]

Connected to a few nokia mini macro sites along I85. Luckily I went through a couple hours before the bridge fire.

 

 

gci pci tac dl_chan strongest_rsrp strongest_latitude strongest_longitude

[03AA5932] 122 7638 0 -87 33.525919 -84.615696

[03AA5A3B] 120 7638 0 -101 33.501206 -84.638091

[03AA6439] 161 7652 0 -106 34.082037 -83.872862

[03AA7031] 381 7652 0 -103 34.114647 -83.772525

[03AA7132] 383 7652 0 -105 34.097227 -83.800432

[03AA7D32] 71 7629 0 -101 33.683212 -84.499802

[03AA9939] 32 7652 0 -100 34.126486 -83.734896

[03AA9A32] 31 7652 0 -95 34.117403 -83.761988

[03AA9B33] 30 7652 0 -105 34.125638 -83.739929

[03AA9B3B] 30 7652 0 -105 34.125954 -83.738692

[03AAC13A] 91 7652 0 -98 34.082037 -83.872862

[03AAC233] 90 7652 0 -102 34.09519 -83.818286

[03AAE332] 304 7652 0 -98 34.09519 -83.818286

[RAvirani]

So I was in ATL a couple weeks ago. I totally forgot to pay attention to B25. I unfortunately wasn't logging.

 

Looking at FCC, Sprint has some healthy PCS spectrum holdings there. Sprint deploy more than just the G-Block for LTE?

I'm in Atlanta right now. I haven't yet seen any B25 other than the 5x5 G-Block carrier although I have been on B41 and B26 for the most part. I'll keep my eye out and let y'all know if I find anything though!

[RAvirani]

I'm about to leave Atlanta now. Overall my experience in the area was pretty good.

 

Band 25 is limited to the single G Block carrier although they have three B41 carriers online (at 40978, 41176 and 41374) in most areas and two separate B41 carriers (at 40072 and 40270) for small cells. Speaking of small cells, I came across a few on the west edges of the Georgia Tech campus. The handoff between the small cells and surrounding B41 macros was a bit messed up. Sometimes my phone would hop from B25 to the B41 macro network and sometimes it would hop from B25 to the B41 small cell network although I couldn't seem to hand smoothly between the small cells and the B41 macro network. A little bit of work is probably needed there...

 

I drove out to Suwanee to visit relatives and service was good there and back. In the city, things were good although I did have some service problems in a few Georgia Tech buildings. It seems like they could use a site or two on campus. The airport is the only other big issue. The DAS here needs to be upgraded to support B41 because the B26 and B25 5x5 carriers are not cutting it - even basic web browsing is pretty slow.

 

Overall a positive experience. I was excited to see small cells on air and hopefully deployment will continue as the year progresses.

[themuffinman]

I'm about to leave Atlanta now. Overall my experience in the area was pretty good.

 

Band 25 is limited to the single G Block carrier although they have three B41 carriers online (at 40978, 41176 and 41374) in most areas and two separate B41 carriers (at 40072 and 40270) for small cells. Speaking of small cells, I came across a few on the west edges of the Georgia Tech campus. The handoff between the small cells and surrounding B41 macros was a bit messed up. Sometimes my phone would hop from B25 to the B41 macro network and sometimes it would hop from B25 to the B41 small cell network although I couldn't seem to hand smoothly between the small cells and the B41 macro network. A little bit of work is probably needed there...

 

I drove out to Suwanee to visit relatives and service was good there and back. In the city, things were good although I did have some service problems in a few Georgia Tech buildings. It seems like they could use a site or two on campus. The airport is the only other big issue. The DAS here needs to be upgraded to support B41 because the B26 and B25 5x5 carriers are not cutting it - even basic web browsing is pretty slow.

 

Overall a positive experience. I was excited to see small cells on air and hopefully deployment will continue as the year progresses.

Yeah, the airport will always pose a problem due to the ridiculous amount of daily traffic that passes through but other than that atlanta is an excellent market to be in if you are a sprint customer. 

[lordsutch]

Yeah, the airport will always pose a problem due to the ridiculous amount of daily traffic that passes through but other than that atlanta is an excellent market to be in if you are a sprint customer. 

 

I'm pretty sure Sprint wants folks on Wi-Fi at the airport, given their Boingo partnership and including no-login-needed Passpoint support on most of their recent (non-Nexus/Pixel) phones.

 

But in general Sprint is pretty good until you hit the market boundaries and transition to ex-affiliate territory, where performance falls off due to the lack of B41 deployment (and, to the west on I-20, even LTE deployment).

[Tengen31]

I'm about to leave Atlanta now. Overall my experience in the area was pretty good.

 

Band 25 is limited to the single G Block carrier although they have three B41 carriers online (at 40978, 41176 and 41374) in most areas and two separate B41 carriers (at 40072 and 40270) for small cells. Speaking of small cells, I came across a few on the west edges of the Georgia Tech campus. The handoff between the small cells and surrounding B41 macros was a bit messed up. Sometimes my phone would hop from B25 to the B41 macro network and sometimes it would hop from B25 to the B41 small cell network although I couldn't seem to hand smoothly between the small cells and the B41 macro network. A little bit of work is probably needed there...

 

I drove out to Suwanee to visit relatives and service was good there and back. In the city, things were good although I did have some service problems in a few Georgia Tech buildings. It seems like they could use a site or two on campus. The airport is the only other big issue. The DAS here needs to be upgraded to support B41 because the B26 and B25 5x5 carriers are not cutting it - even basic web browsing is pretty slow.

 

Overall a positive experience. I was excited to see small cells on air and hopefully deployment will continue as the year progresses.

Is 10x10 B25 possible in ATL?

 

Sent from my SM-G900P using Tapatalk

[troyd96]

Anybody seeing slower to useless LTE speeds in the south Dekalb area? Actually quite a few places in the metro? Some of it is worse than before LTE was even brought to the Atlanta Market and sadly making my phone 3G only actually gives me better speeds in certain areas cause no one is using it.

 

Sent from my LG-LS997 using Tapatalk

[JonnygATL]

Rootmetrics seems to agree with you. In their most recent sampling for the second half of 2017 they show the average download speeds slipping very significantly. That's unfortunate but, of course, could be due to any great # of issues, including conducting tests in areas that have always been bad that they perhaps did not sample before. Who knows?

[JonnygATL]

Glad this thread is so quiet.  It only speaks to the excellent quality of the Sprint network in our beloved yet often bizarre metropolis.  

But I actually have a point or, rather,  something I'd like to share. I was just at Kroger recently on Howell Mill near I-75 and was waiting outside in the unusually chilly weather for my Uber when I noticed via SCP that I was on a second band 25 carrier. Now, 2 things to note:  1. Atlanta has had a second band 25 carrier live for at least 18 months so this wasn't immediately unusual and 2. Atlanta has such widespread and healthy band 41 deployment that I rarely see anything but. The network is just that damned good.

No, the odd part was that when I went into my "enginerring" l screen, it indicated that carrier aggregation was indeed active.  Like I said, I've been on a second b25 carrier in this city many times before but I had never noticed them being aggregated. See evidence below.

 

My feeling is that band 41 was so widely deployed here before that they felt no great rush to enable b25 CA in this market.  In many other previously band 41 starved markets  like Lexington, KY, band 25 CA has been live for well over a year,  likely even longer. Those areas needed the extra capacity until those band 41 mini macs could rise to the challenge. They now very much have, by the way. 

But now that those smaller areas are finally getting widespread band 41 coverage, Sprint has seen fit to come back to the bigger areas like Atlanta and make great even better.  At least that is my theory!