Network Vision on 1x Only Towers

[NGeorge]

It seems like it would be a cluster to clear out the 900 mhz. SMR band, the same way it was for 800...

 

That said, the thread above said that 900 SMR is part of 3gpp2's band class for SMR... if this is in fact the case, if they could make all 4 mhz. contiguous, that would bring them up to a total of 18 mhz. in SMR (14 mhz. together in 800, 4 in 900)... I wonder if they could they could then split the frequencies between low and high bands (e.g. low band downlink, high band uplink) for another 1x channel or two (or another purpose down the road)... could particularly come in helpful in SoLinc areas where they could still use 10 mhz. for LTE and keep the single 1x channel in 900...

 

I do doubt that the 900 is in the band class though -- I've never seen 900 mentioned in the RF testing of phones...

[Fraydog]

Our entire spectrum policy in the US is a cluster.

 

I am kind of amazed at the quasi-technical reasons that come up to defend it. It seems like it's supporting a lot of cruft and a lot of legacy tech that is being used by hospitals, the DOJ, and amateur radio that could be shifted to other frequencies.

 

That said, as long as the idea persists that corporations and not the people of the United States owns spectrum, this kind of cluster will continue.

[dontsh00tmesanta]

Why not make use of iden towers

[IamMrFamous07]

Why not make use of iden towers

They are. They are recycling the towers and turning it to cash

[dontsh00tmesanta]

They should use them to broadcast their signal

[halcyoncmdr]

They should use them to broadcast their signal

 

Most of the iDEN-only towers have bad leasing agreements, or overlapping coverage with CDMA towers. Some towers were determined to be advantageous to upgrade to NV, others weren't. Towers with horrible leasing agreements are being let go entirely. In some cases that leaves the tower owner with absolutely no leased space. An unused tower will bring in no money so they may end up offering Sprint a discount rate later down the line if they can't find another leasee.

[digiblur]

Most of the iDEN-only towers have bad leasing agreements, or overlapping coverage with CDMA towers. Some towers were determined to be advantageous to upgrade to NV, others weren't. Towers with horrible leasing agreements are being let go entirely. In some cases that leaves the tower owner with absolutely no leased space. An unused tower will bring in no money so they may end up offering Sprint a discount rate later down the line if they can't find another leasee.

 

That's been my theory as well as I know several locations near me that would be perfect for CDMA adds that when iDen is brought down there will be no carriers on the site after that and all the other guys in the area already have good coverage in that area.

[halcyoncmdr]

That's been my theory as well as I know several locations near me that would be perfect for CDMA adds that when iDen is brought down there will be no carriers on the site after that and all the other guys in the area already have good coverage in that area.

 

I believe that about 50% of the purpose of the Nextel shutdown is to save costs. Bad leasing deals mean less profit. It's pretty easy to just end a bad lease when the network is shutdown and lose that coverage since the Sprint CDMA customer side never even knew it was there in all likelihood. Continuing to pay a high lease for coverage that may not be very profitable doesn't make much sense since most of the CDMA customers there won't even notice. There's always the possibility as I said that they could add it again in the future at a lower lease amount, it is after all more likely that an empty tower will have lower costs associated with it since no one is using it and it will just cost the tower company that owns it to maintain it. Some money coming in is better than none.

 

The other 50% was getting the 800MHz spectrum back for use with 1x and LTE.