dkyeager

In the conference call they had two question on additional spectrum. One was the 800 spectrum. They are not certain what will happen, thus have not really put it into their plans either way (sale or no sale). They do have a reserve level. Nationwide 800Mhz is seen as great for new technologies which I presume is IOT or 5g slices. T-Mobile did not bite on use of their c-band or DOD. mmWave rapidly approaching deadlines not mentioned at all. FWA brushes on this as it deals with underutilized spectrum on a sector by sector basis. They are willing to take more money to allow FWA to be mobile (think RV or camping). Unsure if this represents a higher priority, for example, FWA Mobile in RVs in Walmart parking lots working where mobile phones need all the capacity. In terms of FWA capacity, their offload strategy is fiber through joint ventures where T-Mobile does the marketing, sales, and customer support while the fiber company does the network planning and installation. 50%-50% financial split not being consolidated into their books. I think discussion of other spectrum would have diluted the fiber joint venture discussion. They do have a fund which one use is to purchase new spectrum. Sale of the 800Mhz would go into this. It should be noted that they continue to buy 2.5Ghz spectrum from schools etc to replace leases. They will have a conference this fall to update their overall strategies. Other notes from the call are 75% of the phones on the network are 5g. About 85% of their sites have n41, n25, and n71, 90% 5g. 93% of traffic is on midband. SA is also adding to their performance advantage, which they figure is still ahead of other carriers by two years. It took two weeks to put the auction 108 spectrum to use at their existing sites. Mention was also made that their site spacing was designed for midrange thus no gaps in n41 coverage, while competitors was designed for lowband thus toggles back and forth for n77 also with its shorter range.

"The company’s unique multi-layer approach to 5G, with dedicated standalone 5G deployed nationwide across 600MHz, 1.9GHz, and 2.5GHz delivers customers a consistently strong experience, with 85% of 5G traffic on sites with all three spectrum bands deployed." Meanwhile they are very close to a construction deadline June 1 for 850Mhz of mmWave in most of Ohio covering 27500-28350Mhz expiring 6/8/2028. No reported sightings. Buildout notice issue sent by FCC in March 5, 2024 https://wireless2.fcc.gov/UlsApp/letterPdf/LetterPdfController?licId=4019733&letterVersionId=178&autoLetterId=13060705&letterCode=CR&radioServiceCode=UU&op=LetterPdf&licSide=Y&archive=null&letterTo=L No specific permits seen in a quick check of Columbus. They also have an additional 200Mhz covering at 24350-25450 Mhz and 24950-25050Mhz with no buildout date expiring 12/11/2029.

Was true in my market. Likely means a higher percentage of 5g phones in your market.

Definite usage quirks in hunting down these sites with a rainbow sim in a s24 ultra. Fell into a hole yesterday so sent off to T-Mobile purgatory. Try my various techniques. No Dish. Get within binocular range of former Sprint colocation and can see Dish equipment. Try to manually set network and everybody but no Dish is listed. Airplane mode, restart, turn on and off sim, still no Dish. Pull upto 200ft from site straight on with antenna. Still no Dish. Get to manual network hunting again on phone, power off phone for two minutes. Finally see Dish in manual network selection and choose it. Great signal as expected. I still think the 15 minute rule might work but lack patience. (With Sprint years ago, while roaming on AT&T, the phone would check for Sprint about every fifteen minutes. So at highway speed you could get to about the third Sprint site before roaming would end). Using both cellmapper and signalcheck.net maps to hunt down these sites. Cellmapper response is almost immediate these days (was taking weeks many months ago). Their idea of where a site can be is often many miles apart. Of course not the same dataset. Also different ideas as how to label a site, but sector details can match with enough data (mimo makes this hard with its many sectors). Dish was using county spacing in a flat suburban area, but is now denser in a hilly richer suburban area. Likely density of customers makes no difference as a poorer urban area with likely more Dish customers still has country spacing of sites.

Mike if you need more Dish data, I have been hunting down sites in western Columbus. So far just n70 and n71 reporting although I CA all three.

Drove out into the country today. Dish stuck to my phone like glue. At least -120 rsrp. Likely only good for phone calls (should have tested.) It then switched to T-Mobile. Getting back on Dish was another issue. I am used to dragging out coverage so I expected a few miles, but had to drive at least 10 miles towards a Dish site. Airplane mode, which worked for Sprint, did nothing. Rebooting did nothing. Finally got it to change over about 2 miles from the site by manually setting the carrier to Dish then it had great reception. Sprint used to have a 15 minute timeout but I did not have the patience today. Previously I did a speed test on Dish out in the country at the edge of Dish coverage. My speeds were 2g variety. Dish has really overclocked some of these sites. Seen rssp readings in the 50s. Would have called them boomer sites with Sprint but much more common with Dish.

Gives them some entertaining store videos.

Finally got a rainbow sim after about a year of occassionally trying. N70, n71, and n66 working on byod s24 ultra. Speed around 550Mbps down, 40 up during rush hour: https://imgur.com/a/ENhnSI2

https://news.samsung.com/global/one-ui-6-1-brings-galaxy-ai-from-s24-series-to-even-more-galaxy-devices So it will be missing the advanced photo editing. Likely the same for the S21 series. Google may be covering that for phones from Android 8 with 3GB of Ram, although they are reserving some functions just for Pixels.

Google is opening up its AI type editing features to "To use some features, you must have at least 3 GB RAM and Android 8.0 and up." Of course some features are reserved for Pixel phones. Wonder if this will cause Samsung to expand what the s21 can do in terms of AI in future firmware updates? Of course what we are really talking about is the data that they can capture from photos. Access to all your photos is required.

Worked no problem.

Finally got latest update within the hour. Duplicate GCI updates: Most used s24 ultra: none. S21 ultra #1: 0.3%, s21 ultra #2: 0.1%. Networks: T-Mobile, Verizon, AT&T. All have dual sims, but recently disabled second sim given scp issues. All with latest firmware.

Yes, I did not want to turn over all my photos either for AI

What do you all think of UI 6.1 on the S23?

Seen press predictions of late April

2.1MB download for Google play system now available. Must go to about phone | software information and select it. Same March 1st date.

Cruel Summer

Cool for the Summer

N41 coverage expansion likely related to auction 108 new licenses: the northern run from Columbus to Pittsburgh now shows n41 (except between Coshocton and Newcomerstown, around Tappan Lake, and Hopedale) on the T-Mobile coverage map. The northern run is 161, 37, 16, US 36, US 250, US 22 and is 2/3 divided highway. It is a more picturesque alternate to I-70 and I-79. If true, this would be a big change. I did not see this a month ago. Even if just a plan, it is still good news for Home Internet in new rural areas.

All tests have been done on 1 sim. US Mobile has a plan for multiple carriers automatically switching to the strongest signal in dual sim phones (announced on Reddit by CEO) with existing hardware. Beta testing was to begin right away but now has reportedly been delayed to June. Perhaps waiting for dual sim firmware updates. Tested s21 ultra, s22 plus, s24 ultra all with latest released factory unlocked firmware. Tested tonight during busiest times and occasionally in the afternoon and as noted above. Rapid switching between n41 SA 100Mhz and 80 Mhz no longer occurs. Basically one is chosen and it rarely changes to the other. Checked with other sites. I also tested for NSA. The s21 ultra, s22 plus, and s24 ultra all with latest released factory unlocked firmware. All just displayed 5G-NR with hardly any other details. SCP diags sent in. one for s22 plus should be ignored (two sims). I also tested A32 5G with April 1, 2022 firmware (T-Mobile and Factory Unlocked). Both displayed NSA fine, ie 5G NR 2500 with details and neighbors. They do not go into SA 5G, which used to work iirc. Maybe lack of VoNR?

https://www.fiercewireless.com/5g/verizon-network-slicing-operational-trials Smart political move bt Verizon. The FCC can't complain about network slicing used to support first responders.

since we started looking in depth at this, the firmware has updated on the s24 ultra and the s21 ultra (both factory unlocked). Doing these tests with only one sim active. This earlier morning and now I am not seeing rapid switching between the n41 SA 100Mhz and the 80Mhz channels. Nr-arfcn matches in both cases. s21 switched from 80 to 100 and reported it fine. If I airplane mode the s21 I will frequently get the 5G-NR for either band (sent a diag). I will check again tonight during peak traffic times.

How did SCP do on reporting the n77? Any SA? Was the full 160 used at once? Did the n77 frequencies change between the two? Thanks

The s21 ultra with the same scp version as yesterday will often show 80 or 100mhz as 5G-NR but will also show either correctly. sent diags. (dual sim). With only t-mobile network sim it only show 100Mhz and stayed on 100Mhz for me tonight. Verizon only uses 100MHz here as visible to me, even with n77 sa enabled on phone as well. I asked NYC for help.

I believe Verizon has 160Mhz of n77 licenses in NYC, which have been available since last summer. Have any of you seen more than 100Mhz? Does SCP report it correctly in terms of band and nr-arfcn? Of course ideally it would be SA lol.