NGeorge

Just an update -- in the last 6 - 8 months, Sprint has added Bell, Telus, ICE and Sasktel as roaming partners in Canada (it's on their partners page as well). I go to BC every few months, and while it still defaults to Rogers as primary, I was able to connect to both Bell and Telus; the speeds were slightly slower than Rogers. I noticed that it tends to prefer Bell to Telus when I've been in areas where Rogers has weak coverage... that said, with all 4 networks, you should have coverage pretty much everywhere up there. N

This is a very long thread so I apologize if this has been covered earlier earlier in the discussion -- but has this been happening to anyone else? WiFi Calling has been practically useless to me on both my iPhone 6 and HTC One M9. The iPhone 6 is on my work phone and account and the HTC is my personal line -- so the accounts are completely different, so it has to be a network level thing... Basically a good 70% of the time I will try to place a call over WiFi and the phone will say "dialing" then "call failed" almost immediately... try again... same thing... try again... same thing... try again... third time's the charm and it works great. It doesn't seem to matter which WiFi network I do this on, it is VERY hit or miss if I can place calls. I've tried this on multiple networks in many places. It's worse than flakey at best, and downright unusable at worst. Even worse is when I try to receive a call when WiFi is active -- half the time I will answer the call and it will immediately say "call failed". I've tried all sorts of resetting and provisioning... checked that my firewalls are off... went circles with tech support. I'm about to throw my hands up and throw my hands against the wall. My parents are also having similar issues since their Airave crapped out and Sprint refused to send them a new one saying "we don't offer those anymore, but we do have WiFi calling which is what we are replacing Airaves with" -- both have iPhone 6S's. So has anyone else had these types of problems -- and more importantly, have you found a solution? N

I've seen the 600k streaming number posted on a number of their plans for quite some time. I also read that while Sprint has the capability to do so, they have never implemented it. Going back to Framily didn't they say that other plans could be prioritized, and streaming was limited to 600k? They've said this on Boost and Virgin for some time. In fact, I thought I just read that they were REMOVING any throttling from their unlimited plans because AT&T got hit by a lawsuit. So even though that is there, does Sprint only have it mentioned as a safety measure or for congested situations? While I completely agree with everything you say, and I think the whole All In thing is a huge joke, are we getting worked up over something that is actually happening, or is it just fine print in case they need it later?

Got a Thanksgiving gift from Sprint -- got Band 41 today in Olympia -- looks like it's on the downtown site and the Tumwater site on the hill... Decent speeds too 51/13

Eh I agree with the OP... they are popping up all over the place, and I've yet to connect to one successfully. I did get to a Comcast login page once, and when I entered my info it just directed me to a blank screen and I still didn't have any access. I have to keep telling my phone to forget them as well. Does anyone have any idea how Comcast is doing this? Are they actually going out and installing base stations on their cable poles the way Earthlink tried to do with their Feather service a few years back, or are they merely broadcasting a public signal from a business account's router? If it is the later, it makes me a little uncomfortable -- especially since I've heard rumors about them trying this, and even wanting to do it with residential routers... it also seems to me that the service would really suck (which it seems to be) if they aren't setting it up with proper external antennas.... N

No, Ubiquitel was the only affiliate in Washington and they were over on the Spokane side -- not sure what equipment they used. It actually was a corporate market, then Ubiquitel took it over in 2000. Probably that Lucent limitation you mentioned because it ALWAYS happened in that area like clockwork. I know that Qwest back in the day was all Ericsson from back when they experimented with CDMA on their own the first time -- I vaguely remember all sorts of complaints about the gear--that it was very compact and that was about all that was good about it. Sprint did a complete rip and replace when they added those sites into it's network, but Qwest dropped in this same spot... not sure who Verizon uses, but they have the issue too; they took over Qwest's licenses while Sprint got the towers so they could have an unbroken network between Seattle and Portland, so Verizon has to deal with an A-E switch there as well... The GSM carriers don't have an issue. Nat

Sprint finally fixed a major SID boundary issue that's plagued me since I've owned a cell phone (1998) -- the line between the Seattle and a Portland markets, which they had also set on a CMA license boundary... Back when I had US West/Qwest Wireless, it was where they changed from the A block in Seattle to the E block for Portland -- and the call would drop. Then I got Sprint, and although they have the B block on both sides, the call would drop because of the SID change. Verizon inherited the licenses from Qwest so they could offer native service when Sprint bought the rest in 2004, and sure enough -- when Verizon flips from A-E, the call drops as well -- almost at the exact point just north of the Toutle river bridge, just before you get to the overpass (if your heading North)... So imagine my surprise when I drove though there and it didn't drop... same thing happened again on the way back... I actually held a call for almost a half hour. So they've either moved the boundary from right across the freeway, or they've figure out how to get the call to stay even while changing SIDs. This all happened once NV was cut over -- so that was an extra little benefit

Everyone has a theory on the Montana FIT -- but I just have a feeling they are located on Sprint's towers that they acquired from Qwest in 2004... If you remember, Qwest provided native service in Montana, then Sprint did for a few years after they got ahold of them until the Alltel thing happened -- and even after the Alltel thing happened it also appeared to me, since I was in Billings and Butte and while my Blackberry happily camped on Alltel's 850 1x and EV-DO as native, my Epic 4G camped on native Sprint, using the Spokane SID for 1x at PCS, while Alltel's EV-DO for data -- but only in the old Qwest areas; everywhere else it picked up Alltel for both... so up until around 2011 Sprint still had CDMA on these towers... apparently when AT&T pulled the plug, they also pulled their native 1x service off the Qwest towers... Here are two examples that are under the Sprint name: This one is active: http://wireless2.fcc.gov/UlsApp/AsrSearch/asrRegistration.jsp?regKey=2612078 ...one that was dismantled: http://wireless2.fcc.gov/UlsApp/AsrSearch/asrRegistration.jsp?regKey=2612652 I did this search two years ago and came up with a lot more that had been renewed in 2010 (16 sites IIRC which was about the number of sites Qwest had in Montana) and under the Sprint name at that but can't seem to find them now. I have a feeling they leased them out to CCR or someone else -- since if they would have dismantled them they would have shown up.. so the only way to track them down would be to look at all the towers and find the ones originally built by US West Wireless... that will be labor intensive.

I went through this same thing at my office but with Metro Ethernet... absolute worst telecom experience of my life. I wish it upon noone. We were using 4 bonded T1's w/ a MPLS link to another office with T's as well. It was supposed to be a 20 meg line, and 4.5 months later I ended up with 10 megs (after multiple visits, 'line conditioning', plus a couple visits where techs showed up with no clue what they were doing) -- coming up on nearly a year and it's still at 10. My CLEC XO Networks says Centurylink can't deliver enough clean pairs to provide me the 20 megs that they swear are available; Centurylink says that XO's equipment can't support the additional pairs, but if it could, they'd totally install them -- THEN XO calls and says "we'll just bring fiber to the premises" -- no build charge -- HELL YES I say... CenturyLink says their still waiting on the orders -- but it'd be a 70 grand job if I ordered from them... Meanwhile I constantly have 1-2 of my 8 pairs inoperable and our service is more like 7-8 megs (Comcast can't build to our location for less than 100 grand as no cable even comes up this far let alone FTTP -- but at least the guy who came out and inspected was honest and upfront). I wish I would have just added a couple more T1's and sat happy with 9 megs. The T1's were rock solid. So if the cell companies are dealing with ANYTHING like this with thousands and thousands of sites, I can only imagine the PURE HELL and feel a little more sympathetic about the delays.... Back on topic -- MTPCS used the 10 mhz. F block in central and eastern Montana. Not a large amount of spectrum, and nothing contiguous with Sprint. That said, it is contiguous with AT&T, who has the lower C block in these locations -- and it makes perfect sense. Especially if Sprint reclaims the 10 mhz. lease they had to AT&T in the middle of their B block...

Love the HD voice... I know plenty of people on Sprint so have been getting it more and more. Surprised a couple people too who hadn't heard it yet We were one of the original test areas so I've enjoyed it for quite a while... started when both were on LTE, then moved to people in the same region. Now the only time I don't seem to get it is if I'm calling through the Airave or roaming (or if the other person is).

I thought GMO sites were getting LTE on Band 25 -- but needed to be converted to full build (with new antennas) for Band 26 and 41? It was my understanding that "most" GMO sites could get the Band 25 LTE, unless they were ancient antennas from the very first round of sites back in the '90s (which very well could be the case in Iowa being a lot of it was an affiliate market, and 1x at that)? N

I spend a lot of time in that area, and have friends in Waukee as well as Clive, and bounce around the state quite a bit when I go there a number of times a year. I used to curse Sprint when I'd head to Iowa... it really, truly, was one of their horrible markets (I think it was originally an affiliate area). That said, in the last year, they've done AWESOME... lots of Band Class 10 as well as Band 26 LTE -- it's basically made what was a bit too widely spaced PCS network into a fairly dense SMR network with PCS available whenever you can get it to keep the SMR from completely choking up... and it's on LOTS of sites. In other words, what they are doing in Iowa is what I'm looking forward to across the entire network. That said, if you plan on lots of driving, nothing beats USCC and Verizon in Iowa... nothing -- but I'd say the SMR now puts them on par with AT&T which is PCS-only for voice and does fairly good. If you don't stray too far into the corn you'll be happy -- but if you do, you'll have roaming on both USCC and Verizon. Luckily your Sprint phone won't flip between native and roaming nearly as often as it would before. The only way Sprint can improve in Iowa is if they ever snap up USCC when they get the chance -- and I hope they do N

A lot of the microwave backhaul has moved up to the 60-80 ghz. range where they can have many hundreds of mhz. wide channels... if you have dead perfect line of sight it's pretty nice -- the radios are able to automatically adapt the bandwidth to deal with rain, snow, fog and pretty much anything that will interfere with signals that high.

Yeah there's been some speculation that Sprint is just building their own network out in Ntelos areas and dropping them as a "native roaming" partner... they are the last remaining company with this sort of deal, and it sounds like they are on their way out... So either Ntelos is moving along with LTE all quietly, or Sprint really is "building a new network" in your area lol

I just stumbled across this thread... I agree, a Canadian expansion would be a LOT to take on right now, and I don't think they should be distracted with anything they are doing domestically -- but that said, there is one (possibly two) possibilities that could make some sense without buying any additional spectrum -- particularly #1... #1 Public Mobile -- Public Mobile is a low cost provider in Toronto and Montreal and seems to be doing OK compared to Mobilicity. It's also licensed in the PCS G block (they have the 10 mhz. license) and is using 1x CDMA currently--they also already have a low-cost roaming agreement with Sprint, providing .20/min roaming in the US (which is insanely cheap up there). Even without LTE they could buy the network, source phones from Sprint (giving them a much better selection) and a presence on both sides of the border. If they did a 1.5-3 mhz. LTE network, it would provide something comparable to the HSDPA providers up there -- again, not going for a national presence--but covering Toronto and Montreal is a start and could provide "USA Included" up there and "Canada Included" plans down here -- and it's already in CDMA, and in a block that isn't foreign to Sprint. Keep their Canadian division as a value play for Toronto/Montreal, get it self-sustaining, and only down the road add Vancouver, Alberta etc. into the mix (I believe Public owns the G block in the eastern half of Canada--there's a small holding company with the G block in the west) #2 Mike -- the IDEN provider in Canada... I don't know what the re-banding situation is up there, but if Sprint could somehow buy Mike from Telus and basically do what they have done in the US, they could get a large (compared to Public Mobile) network they could convert to CDMA -- launch 3x3 or 5x5 LTE and 1x on it, share phones, have roaming between the countries -- with the additional benefit of harmonizing 800 on both sides of the border -- and getting rid of the SMR exclusion zone in the process... In either scenario, I'd see Sprint being a value player in Canada -- I wouldn't expect them to really build out the network to a huge extent... they could pull this off with the 10 mhz. G block and or SMR (I'm assuming Mike has the same 14 mhz. like Nextel here -- possibly more) if they could provide city wide coverage in the 5 largest cities in Canada, with highway coverage to the border (and reasonable roaming rates inside Canada), that's really all they need -- especially if they had free roaming between the USA & Canada (on both sides) either included or for a small add-on fee, the service would be VERY compelling. Nat