audiomusiclover

Hi Everyone. With the carrier merger agreement pending, I wanted to see what you guys think for us using the 800 MHZ band. How will Sprint users be affected by the Dish purchase of Sprint's 800 MHZ as it will be pulled away I expect reasonably soon. I am wondering once the merger deal is finalized and Sprint has to relinquish their 800 band, will that mean "so long" to broad ranging LTE coverage using a fairly new legacy Sprint phone? Thanks.

I did want to add here. I did listen to HD radio with my old car, but when I lost it, I determined there is a better alternative and haven't looked back. The web provides so many more streaming options and our beloved Sprint, allows me to stream hundreds of stations and music services as I want. For us who have Sprint unlimited data plans, it is better than radio or HD radio. The limitiations of Clear Channel and the other large radio station owners have bleached local radio in my opinion. Sprint and the web offer me far more to listen to and enjoy as I travel.

I believe it was posted somewhere but does anyone remember if there is a site map showing the outsourced vendor responsible for updating the particular regions, such as Ericsson, Samsung, etc? This site is large so I am having trouble finding the locations.

I hope the 800 upgrades start spreading up to the Huntersville area soon. As long as one stays near I-77, things are pretty nice with at least a weak 4G in most areas. Here in north Huntersville after you go east a mile or so away from I-77 however, it is tough to pull anything beyond weak 3G on my LG G2, and on Sammy S4. We can only muster about -105dbm or less on either 1xRTT or eHRPD near our house in that area. The inside signals at my home in a busy neighborhood are awful as always. I called and they said H-ville was receiving updates in April, but here in June that appears to not have occurred yet. Also at IBM Drive (near Harris Blvd), it seems that the 4G is weaker there over the past month as I believe the 4G has been turned off at the Tower there and can only be received over near the Hilton hotel area. At IBM, one mostly falls back to the very slow 3G now, so not sure if they are still doing updates there too.

The G2 purchase was a no brainer for me. At the point of my pre-order, I bought it from Best buy for $99, minus a $50 gift cert. This is by far the best phone I have owned and at a killer price. I love the phone and when comparing it to my wife's Sammy S4, it seems so much smoother and refined. For the money in my opinion, nothing touches it when comparing to other phones. Especially when comparing it to the Note 3's much more expensive cost. I love the N3 but just didn't see the extreme price differences for my uses. As you can tell, I am very satisfied with the G2 even as Sprint is still working on the N2 upgrades in my area. I am able to connect to LTE at work and pull in 12+ mbps (at -108dbm) generally this week all day and it does not drop off. I do expect even more speed when we have more options than the 1900mhz band as well for LTE. As for home, my signal is generally very poor and low 3G only. This has been problematic and takes a toll on any phone battery unless you leave on Wifi mode. My HTC Evo would die in just a couple of hours flat from full charge (new battery) but my G2 does last much longer even though I have not tested to see how long it goes from 100% to 10%. Those that give the 36 plus hours on a battery are obviously either within a mile or so of a tower, or on Wifi. That is just not possible with most phones if you tend to get -110dbm or worse while at home from the sites. Bottom line is, the G2 is a killer phone and I love it even more than I had expected as it is smooth and very fast in everything I have tried..... Gorgeous screen too.

Some of us have been waiting for the big, bad tri-band G2 since August, so I guess I can wait one more day to get the phone....

I receieved an email this morning from Best Buy saying I can come pickup my G2 on Friday, Nov 8. So, I expect to go pick it up mid morning on Friday. I hope there are not too many people there getting the G2, or the other new phones that are coming out on the 8th, but will see how crowded it may be. I had purchased from the BB store a couple of weeks ago with the $99 deal with $50 gift cert coming. Hopefully can finally pick it up Fri morning. Whew.....

Thanks for the clarification on NV1.0 vs 2.0 That makes sense. Here's hoping that the 800mhz band is not delayed as much as the 2.5ghz band overall.

It just seems to me that this may also be a way of communicating the not so good news as it sounds like the NV updates are no longer going to be almost completed even by late 2014 (limited to some cities) and may take years longer even. I know the ntwk is changing but believe many expected the "Spark" updates to be almost completed by end of 2014. I could be wrong but it sort of appears they have used this great communication and marketing push (finally!!!) to also send out the later than hoped delivery dates for the overall NV vision. . Oh well, as long as they continue to work on it I am still all in....

The next week will start dragging like crazy as the G2 date approaches. Has anyone heard any different dates for Best Buy getting in their allotment of G2's? I pre-ordered at a BB store a little over a week ago so expect it to arrive there. Just wondering if anyone has heard if they are getting them in on 11/8 as well?

Is anyone yet certain that Best Buy will have the 32gig version of the Sprint G2? When about to pre-order it there for $99 (for existing Sprint customers) the cust svc person via chat said it was the 16gig model. Of course I had thought only 32gig versions were to be used and tried to tellthem that. The BB Cust Svc person said they were sure their G2 for Sprint will be 16gig though. Does anyone here know for sure that this is incorrect and that Best Busy will sell the normal 32gig version? They do not have the memory size posted anywhere on their site so I just can't be sure. 16gig and no mem expansion is a no-sell for me, so reason for me delay. I dont want to pre-order with BB until I can tell what memory is on their G2 for sure. I am almost certain reading here and around that it will be the 32gig, but since they said otherwise, I want to make sure. Thoughts???

Okay, that makes sense. Too bad then.....

I have a question from the above statement about all of Sprint's phones will have tri-band capability. Do we know that all of the Sprint phones being sold as of January 2014 will have Tri-Band capability? Phones like the S4, HTC One, Note 3, for example? I had not heard that as I thought that the line, if introduced before 2014, would always have the same radios and FCC approvals unless resubmitted. What is the scoop for the phones that are sold as of Jan 2014?

I had such high hopes but it is now turning into disappointments this year. I sat for many months waiting for the right phone. This has been a major release year and one would think a phone would be coming that could fill 2 common requests, as well as utilize Sprint’s new network. I almost jumped on the Sammy GS4 with my wife, she went for it but I held out waiting for the upcoming promised Tri-band phones. Late July into August, here came the LG G2. I first lusted over it when reading about it in very early Aug. It had what I was looking for, the SD slot, removable battery, and I am thinking Sprint announced tri-band just afterwards. Then I later found some updated info on it and discovered that I had been looking at the Korean version. The international version would be getting tri-band for Sprint, but would not have the SD slot, or a removable battery. I could get past the SD slot if enough on board memory was there, but I tend to have phones where the second year, the battery has to be replaced. So, there was the G2, the almost perfect phone, but it is a “fail” as it has neither option that I was hoping for. So, I decided to wait on the new king in town, the Galaxy Note 3. It is a beast as I could use it at work as long as it was tri or dual-band (800mhz reception at least). Where I am, the 1900 LTE does not penetrate inside and the 3G is useless. So, I thought the Note 3 would be the perfect phone! Then, I hear it will NOT be Tri-band for some crazy reason. I was VERY disappointed on it but over ther last few days, I sort of decided to maybe go with the Note 3 anyway, since it does have the removable battery where I could use it for years without worry. I would have to make do with the 3G in most places though. Well, I now see the Note 3 will be $350 up front with the 2 yr agreement. WHAT???? I am very disappointed now and have decided to set the Note 3 a "fail" as well. So here we are, I see no phone coming with Sprint that I am going to be interested in. There probably hasn't been a better year overall for Smartphones but with being on Sprint, I do not see any phone that can satisfy the 2 or 3 of the requirements I was hoping for. (Tri-band, SD Slot, removable battery). I am bummed over this and will have to settle like everyone else has to do with Sprint. Yes, we are spoiled but I saw so much potential coming this year but it is turninn out to be a year of near misses. Thanks for allowing me to vent from a guy who loves s4gru as this is the ONLY place where real info is supplied.

This is a great discussion. One thing that occurs to me with this however is where the Android phones are going in the future. It appears that most ff the phone manufacturers are moving us to the built-in non-removable battery. Even the much anticipated LG G2, has the locked-in non-removable battery and has caused me to possibly not consider it, even though I love the tri-band receiving feature it will have. My family has a few phones and we all have had to purchase new batteries after a year of so as the batteries with them have tended to fade. This will be an issue with the new wave of phones where we will not have easy options to replace the battery as they fail. I think the phone makers know that as phones become faster and better, they will soon be in the same situation as PCs, where most users don’t need to update their PCs as often as they are fast enough for most users. To get around this, the phone makers are producing phones that must be replaced after a couple of years, even if their specs are still pretty close to the top. I want the G2 as mentioned, but as a guy on the move with bad charging habits, I tend to do many of the things noted above. (over charging & under charging at times). It is tough spending $600 plus for a phone that will need to be battery repaired or be a throw away in 1.5 to 2 years. Who would buy a new Laptop that had an internal battery that could not be replaced? Think of the labor charges and the overpriced battery costs. Reading this discussion convinces me more that if the phones continue down the path of non-removable batteries,, we will be pushed to prematurely disposable phones. I hope this movement does not continue as I hate knowing I have to keep a charger on hand everywhere I go after the phone is over a year old….. .