RAvirani
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Posts posted by RAvirani
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49 minutes ago, PedroDaGr8 said:
Seems like Verizon is giving it the love you requested. They submitted a permit in October to Colo on the CC monopole.
Yes—I’m involved in that project
. There may be some small cells coming soon too 
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36 minutes ago, xmx1024 said:
Do you know what RAN is behind those Omni's? LTE (bands?) are they pushing any NR through them? Very curious
Those are usually left over from the initial AWS deployment, so all run B13/B66 with support for BC0/BC1 (although that’s been shut off on most sites). No NR.
Sites with the later Ericsson radios got an OTA update and broadcast B2. On those sites, a B5 OTA update was also available (and tested), but ultimately rolled back. Putting up all that power/spectrum severely degraded the B13 output.
The site atop Crystal Mountain is another story and uses the same setup as the site on the ridge near Neilton. These antennas were selected for their vertical beamwidth.
Most modern directional antennas have small vertical beamwidths and would require extreme downtilt to cover the road next to a steep ridge. Thus, they would have a severely limited coverage footprint beyond the road. Omnis can be a better choice in these instances, especially when there’s LoS to the coverage objective (since they’ll generally have lower gain figures).
Omnis also don’t run in to the horizontal sector edge problem, which can be difficult to optimize for with directional antennas that have complex or irregular 3D gain profiles. That’s why on a lot of sites on mountains, you’ll see wider antennas used. For example, the Verizon site on Joyce Ridge has three sectors with 80-degree HBW antennas.
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8 minutes ago, PedroDaGr8 said:
Holy crap, I just assumed Verizon was on the CC monopole. Those might be some of the oldest equipment in the area.
The same equipment is up on a site in Newcastle and a site in the Laurelhurst neighborhood. Both the Crystal Mountain sites are old-fashioned omnis as well.
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59 minutes ago, PedroDaGr8 said:
Oh yeah, last weekend they had finally started the upgrades on eNB 84743 a block away (the former Clearwire site). First time in the area that either AT&T or Verizon had upgraded a tower first before T-Mobile. Hopefully those upgrades will improve the performance down 132nd. I'll test it and let you know when the upgrade goes live.
That’s good to hear.
While AT&T has the latest and greatest up on the CC monopole, I believe Verizon is still running omnis on top of the bowling alley there. That whole area really needs some love from Verizon.
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4 hours ago, PedroDaGr8 said:
Interesting, T-Mobile is demolishing a Sprint B25-only site that even Sprint wasn't using anymore. Sprint moved from that pole to a former Clearwire site on a nearby much taller mast but never demolished this original site. Up through 2021, there was still power to this site. Some time during COVID, the lights on the RRUs were no longer lit.
https://permitsearch.mybuildingpermit.com/PermitDetails/ENR24-01067/Kirkland
Ah—I wish they had kept the south-facing sector on that site. Going south on 132nd is a dead zone until the road curves and becomes 134th.
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Those sites are from T-Mobile’s partnership with Rock Island Communications.
They use T-Mobile’s spectrum to provide fixed wireless home internet (and avoid upgrading their wireline network). In exchange, T-Mobile gets a super dense network on the islands. Win-win.
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1 hour ago, dkyeager said:
It should be correct in SCP on a standalone basis, ideally in a way that the SignalCheck map can handle either way with some adjustments.
Same with any other SignalCheck map fixes, which should also be fixed at the source in SCP.
The app only sends raw cell IDs to the map. The map does all of its computations independently from the app.
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On 11/21/2023 at 4:42 PM, RyanThaDude said:
For months I've been complaining on CellMapper about DISH Wireless's (313340) current method of obtaining its gNB is incorrect, where sites are split between gNBs, mismatch sectors, and other general errors. Today I mapped several of DISH's sites on SCP and it also seems to be using the same method as CM.
The SignalCheck map should calculate Dish gNBs correctly—are you seeing issues there or just in-app?
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On 8/29/2023 at 11:11 AM, RAvirani said:
I’ll be at Arthur Ashe for the US Open next week. Last year the service was abysmal; hopefully it’s better this year.
Forgot to follow up on this. The service was once again abysmal
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49 minutes ago, tybo31316 said:
Does enabling SA on the 15 Pro Max cause the phone to heat up like the 13pro line?
Been doing it for a for couple now and no issues yet…
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It looks like Dish n66 is showing up as n1. I sent a diagnostic this past weekend.
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On 9/7/2023 at 10:31 AM, S4GRU said:
Now after Tmo overbuilt almost all USCC coverage, now they want to sell. Rich. The spectrum is not all that valuable to them, and they may have to give some up. It would really just be a play for customers and rural market share.
It would be something if Tmo ends up being the dominant rural provider. Remember when they were just urban areas practically? They didn't even equal Sprint's highway coverage. A decade later, it's a totally different story.
Robert
Even in the rural areas T-Mobile has overbuilt, USCC tends to have a denser/more refined network.
I also think increased rural market share would be a big win for T-Mobile. Their home internet offering has the potential to be particularly successful in rural areas that tend to lack alternative high-speed options; awareness and customer loyalty in these areas could really boost home internet traction.
USCC’s 700, PCS, AWS and 2500 would all be welcome increases in T-Mobile’s spectrum portfolio, too. And maybe Cellular could be traded to AT&T/VZW in exchange for midband…
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On 8/27/2023 at 8:35 PM, Paynefanbro said:
Same deal by Arthur Ashe Stadium in Queens. Looks like T-Mobile hopped on whatever private oDAS is installed there because I mapped some nodes while driving on the Grand Central Parkway. They're collocated with the AT&T eNBs in the same area on Cellmapper.
I’ll be at Arthur Ashe for the US Open next week. Last year the service was abysmal; hopefully it’s better this year.
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12 minutes ago, PedroDaGr8 said:
I must have been updating my post when you responded. The new T-Mobile site is eNB 375718/gNB 1872606. This site used to be a Sprint Nokia B41-only site with the eNBs 748630/748632/748633.
Ah yes—that one is long overdue.
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25 minutes ago, PedroDaGr8 said:
The old Sprint mMIMO site in Bridle Estates (Cottage Lake area) has been converted. This fills a huge TMO coverage hole that used to exist in that area. Unlike the two nearby towers, it has the full suite of bands.
Which site are you referring to?
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On 8/8/2023 at 3:42 PM, PedroDaGr8 said:
Looks like the site on Sparc apartments in Bellevue is live. That is another weird site in a REALLY dense and already well-covered area.
I believe that site is aimed to provide indoor coverage for the new large buildings in the Spring District. It would be nice to see an alpha sector delete on SE02405 to keep noise low, though…
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16 hours ago, WiWavelength said:
Photographed last week Thursday 7/20/2023. Site live today Monday 7/24/2023.
Are you in the SignalCheck BETA? Would love to see these sites on the map…
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On 7/8/2023 at 12:51 PM, Yuhfhrh said:
Another visit to T-Mobile n77 in Houston
Is this site right off 288?
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3 hours ago, PedroDaGr8 said:
This really cryptic permit came up recently for a colo on the Kirkland Urban building. T-Mobile is already there and Verizon/AT&T are looking to move to a tower down by the water front. The only provider without a tower near downtown would be DISH. That being said the number of antennas per sector (three) is more than Dish uses in the area.
Yes I believe that is a Dish site.
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The Chinook Pass site is live! The rest of 410 should be coming soon…
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Ran a fair number of speed tests at the final four on Saturday and the championship game today, and T-Mobile performed pretty well. I mostly saw download speeds between 100 and 250 mbps with uploads between 25 and 50 mbps.
AT&T’s performance was similar, maybe marginally better than T-Mobile’s. Verizon really struggled. I almost never broke 10 mbps in either direction.
Overall, a good showing for T-Mobile
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1 hour ago, mikejeep said:
Still good news on this front?? 🤞
Have not encountered the issue still! It’s hard to prove a negative, but I’m pretty convinced
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2 hours ago, S4GRU said:
I imagine it's pretty expensive to do it that way. Engineering, structural design, construction, more extensive permit review, higher lease fees being in the top position.
This work is actually almost entirely handled by ATC/CC/similar as per Dish’s agreements with them.
The leases are on the pricier side, though.
2 hours ago, S4GRU said:But they are trying to reach build out status on licensing. So you gotta do what you gotta do. Probably 0° downtilt too.
In some rural areas, you’ll even see up to 2 degrees of uptilt.
Urban/suburban areas are getting more careful treatment. With such little spectrum, keeping the noise floor low is super important to keep the MCS index as high as possible. More 45 degree antennas would be really nice…
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53 minutes ago, mikejeep said:
How are we looking with the latest update.. any improvement? 🤞
Anyone else seeing stale NR after connection is lost? This is the primary hurdle remaining that is keeping fron rolling this version out to a wider audience.
Today I noticed my Dish phone only showing one connection. I opened up service mode, and the secondary connection had no service.
So the issue might be fixed!!! I’ll keep watching the next few days and let you know what I see.
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. There may be some small cells coming soon too 
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SignalCheck - Android app to monitor your Wi-Fi/2G/3G/4G LTE/5G-NR signal strengths
in General Topics
Posted
Hey Mike—I’ve got a lot of professional experience with this sort of stuff. I’d be happy to help. Feel free to shoot me a PM and we can discuss further!