Hi, I am Jim. I live in Green Valley Ranch near I 70 and Tower.
I am pretty new to all of this having got a Mingle to use on Freedompop a few months ago. Since then I also picked up a LG Tribute Duo for use on RingPlus. I have the Leo 4 plan with 1400/1400/1200 and free tethering, the usual 1 gig free on Freedompop.
Here both devices get 0-1 bar of signal with LTE and the 3G coverage is strong. Speed test are pretty low but pages load acceptably except for photobucket. So here I tend to use my Cricket phone as the coverage and speed is better,
That advantage leaves as soon as we leave the house which is technically outside of Sprints LTE coverage by a half a block. Once on the road the Sprint signal jumps to at least 50% and higher meaning speed test from 12-23 download so far. I know the Mingle isn't the fastest but I am learning of bands and such.
I will be getting a T-Mobile hotspot here soon that I will be able to compare speeds with around town. The reason I have the different low cost solutions is for when we are on the road in the RV. Having multiple carriers will give us the best chance to gain a connection. Combined they will be 17 gigs a month plus Binge on and that's more than enough for us.
So besides learning bout the bands and such, I am also interested in coverage in the mountains. Where we camp 20 miles outside of Jefferson at 10.000 ft get TnT all day on AT&T but Data only in the mornings. So far the coverage maps for Sprint and T-mobile are zilch in those areas.
So I will learn how to find out what bands I am using and try resetting near the towers to get better. I know the Mingle isn't capable of the highest speed and replacing it for $169 just to get them is not going to happen. One more day of testing and I will have to let the Sprint devices sit as I have already burned through half their allotments for the month.
As for the speeds you all are posting, holy cow batman.