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Sprint to expand to Montana using shut down CellularOne sites


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It does look like a 5x5 chunk of PCS-B Block in all the critical parts of Montana are leased to AT&T from Sprint.  Until June 2015.  That only leaves Sprint a 10x10 in the interim.  And strangely, that 5x5 lease is right in the middle of the block, leaving only 5MHz on each side.

 

However, my guess is that Sprint wouldn't fire up new NV sites in Montana until next summer anyway.  So probably no loss.  And if they only started out with one B25 and one B26 LTE carrier, and one 1x/EVDO carrier in PCS and one 1x carrier in SMR, then the lease doesn't impede anything.  And they could fire them up as they complete, even before the lease expiration.

 

Robert

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We know that Sprint also conducted their B26 FIT in Montana.  So there may be additional sites already ready in Montana that will add to this new pickup.  Or, part of me wonders, if Sprint already had this worked out long in advance and Cellular One hosted the FIT.  Interesting stuff.  

 

I wish we had folks in Montana that could have been monitoring sites and found the B26 FIT.  Maybe we can pick up some Montanans now?

 

Robert

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I find this very exciting even though I will prolly never use it.

I must be crazy living in Massachusetts and excited for towers in Montana! Smh..

 

You are probably not the only one that fits that definition...

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We know that Sprint also conducted their B26 FIT in Montana.  So there may be additional sites already ready in Montana that will add to this new pickup.  Or, part of me wonders, if Sprint already had this worked out long in advance and Cellular One hosted the FIT.  Interesting stuff.  

 

I wish we had folks in Montana that could have been monitoring sites and found the B26 FIT.  Maybe we can pick up some Montanans now?

 

Robert

 

Road trip? :lol:

 

 

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Well I'm heading to Montana right now but I don't have a Sprint phone with me. I find this Cellular One stuff very interesting as I was a subscriber of their's right after they switched over from CDMA to GSM. I know most of their tower locations in the Billings Hardin area

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Well I'm heading to Montana right now but I don't have a Sprint phone with me. I find this Cellular One stuff very interesting as I was a subscriber of there's right after they switched over from CDMA to GSM. I know most of their tower locations in the Billings Hardin area

 

Take pics of any Cellular One towers you come across.  Would love to see some.  See if anything interesting appears.

 

Robert

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Take pics of any Cellular One towers you come across. Would love to see some. See if anything interesting appears.

 

Robert

Will do.. My parents live about a mile from one of their towers I'll try and get close and take some pics
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That is many, many hours I don't have.  That doesn't even include tower spotting and fried chicken breaks!   :hah:

 

Robert

 Having driven from Missoula to Fargo a few years ago (stopping only for gas and fast food), I completely understand!

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Looks like it's the network too.  Probably can fire up the existing network right away for Sprint customers and will just need to schedule the Network Vision conversions thereafter.

 

Chinook PCS aka sham Cellular One has a 3GPP only network.  It used to be cdmaOne, but that was scrapped after a flash cut to GSM.  So, the existing network -- other than maybe backhaul -- is not of much use to Sprint right away.  

 

AJ

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I really hope they AT LEAST achive complete complete coverage of the interestates in MT, ND, and SD. Ideally they'd cover some of the US highways too, starting with US2.

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C'mon, baby!

 

Seriously though, this stokes my fire.

 

Come on, Robert, just combine those two statements...

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MifWlrkEBD4

 

AJ

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Yeah, they have 15x15 PCS locally.  Also, they have 7x7 SMR.  And B41 EBS too, but no BRS.

 

Robert

 

Really? Interesting, so Sprint could/already does offer service there?

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I could see some of these sites bring protection like sites. Ground mount the RRUs , reuse the panels, upgrade backhaul where needed,(in time). But basically put the ground equipment needed and broadcast LTE/1x and keep the license.

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Well I'm heading to Montana right now but I don't have a Sprint phone with me. I find this Cellular One stuff very interesting as I was a subscriber of their's right after they switched over from CDMA to GSM. I know most of their tower locations in the Billings Hardin area

I didn't even realize they were still around! Here in Eastern PA Cellular One became Cingular and then AT&T
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Chinook PCS aka sham Cellular One has a 3GPP only network. It used to be cdmaOne, but that was scrapped after a flash cut to GSM. So, the existing network -- other than maybe backhaul -- is not of much use to Sprint right away.

 

AJ

I thought they still had their CDMA network. Neal disabused me of that notion earlier today.

 

Robert via Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

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I thought they still had their CDMA network. Neal disabused me of that notion earlier today.

 

I have never done a full spectrum inventory on MTPCS aka Chinook PCS aka sham Cellular One.  It was too small an operator to warrant my attention, and as you can tell, I do not like the company.  It licensed the Cellular One name not that long after Alltel acquired Western Wireless, which had operated as Cellular One in Montana and much of the West.  You just know that MTPCS did so because many people who were displeased at being absorbed into Alltel would think that their Cellular One had returned to the market.  SBC and Cingular did much the same thing with AT&T and AT&TWS.  It is a shamelessly deceptive practice.  But I digress.

 

MTPCS, as I recall, operated in relatively little spectrum:  10-20 MHz per market.  So, a flash cut away from cdmaOne was basically necessary.

 

AJ

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If they are going in this big in Montana...much bigger than just the build out requirements would necessitate...then can I start to get hopeful about Western South Dakota?  They don't have any CCA/RRPP members here.  And they do also have G Block Build Out Requirements here, and EBS Protection Sites.

 

C'mon, baby!  No Whammies!  No Whammies!  STOP!!!

 

Seriously though, this stokes my fire.  This is much bigger than I ever thought Sprint would do in Montana.  I was expecting just a site or two each in Billings, Great Falls, Missoula and Kalispell.  The old Sprint never would have done this.

 

Robert

I'd absolutely love to see coverage in western SD. My family takes a road trip to the black hills just about every summer, and 3g coverage would be really nice.

 

I agree that the old Sprint wouldn't have been this aggressive, although I think it was eventually part of Hesse's plan to expand the footprint at some point down the road. 

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I didn't even realize they were still around! Here in Eastern PA Cellular One became Cingular and then AT&T

Cellular One was always a "brand" that the various A side* wireless operators used rather than a single company. For example, when I lived in Oxford MS I had "Cellular One" service from a company called Rural Cellular Corporation (until they had an outage at their core and I switched to Sprint in disgust); eventually they stopped bothering licensing the Cellular One name and renamed their service Unicel but kept using the same font. An incomplete version of the sordid history of Cellular One is here at Wikipedia.

 

* The original cellular A block was reserved for non-incumbent wireline operators, while cellular B was designated for the incumbent wireline operator (usually a Bell System company, i.e. the precursors to today's Verizon and AT&T wireless divisions).

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Yeah, they have 15x15 PCS locally.  Also, they have 7x7 SMR.  And B41 EBS too, but no BRS.

 

Robert

 

I guess there are huge chunk of MT covered by IBEZ so that they cannot use SMR

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A few iDen conversions in Idaho along with this purchase should just about give Sprint complete coverage for the entire length of I-15...

Ok. Covered another Interstate by interstate carrier

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I guess there are huge chunk of MT covered by IBEZ so that they cannot use SMR

They did the B26 FIT in Montana somewhere. They may be clear on the Canadian side of the border in that region. And if not, it would just impact Kalispell and Great Falls.

 

Robert via Samsung Note 8.0 using Tapatalk Pro

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They did the B26 FIT in Montana somewhere. They may be clear on the Canadian side of the border in that region. And if not, it would just impact Kalispell and Great Falls.

 

Robert via Samsung Note 8.0 using Tapatalk Pro

 

There is not much on the Canadian side of the border...Of course there is not much on the US side of the border there either...

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