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Network Vision/LTE - Western & Central Pennsylvania Markets (Lancaster, Scranton, Erie, State College, Williamsport)


jeremyandrew

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Unfortunately for Sprint I will most likely not be around long enough to see LTE in State College.  I've just had it with promise after promise and delay after delay.  Every other provider (including T-Mobile) has had LTE in this market for ages yet not only am I stuck with sucky 3g speeds and often 1X when I'm roaming, but I still have dropped calls, failed data and tons of issues that just aren't worth hassling with.  Contract's up in November so we'll see what they do between now and then but I'm betting I'll be bolting then.

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I haven't heard of any promises about Sprint LTE in State College. In fact, I believe I have been saying for years that State College will be one of the last places to get Sprint LTE. I wouldn't expect it this year at all.

 

Robert via Samsung Note 8.0 using Tapatalk Pro

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Both you guys and Eastern Iowa, the last frontier, lol.

Nope. You'll likely see GMO's converted in East Iowa before Western PA market.

 

Robert via Samsung Note 8.0 using Tapatalk Pro

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  • 3 weeks later...
  • 3 months later...

This thread's pretty much gone totally silent as of late so how about an honest answer from someone who knows.  Has Sprint pretty much stalled their build-out efforts or is the LTE rollout ongoing?  As you know here in State College we have no LTE whatsoever to speak of and everytime you so much as ask them what the plan is you get the run-around.  You'd have to think at this juncture that someone somewhere has seen at least a proposed timetable yet they act as if a date hasn't even been thought about.  Its extremely discouraging.  Also does anyone know how (or if) you can email the CEO's office directly to ask questions or voice complaints about service and coverage issues?  I for one and tired of getting the canned replies from their customer service cronies.  It'd be nice to speak with someone of authority to at least feel as though my concerns have been heard. 

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This thread's pretty much gone totally silent as of late so how about an honest answer from someone who knows.  Has Sprint pretty much stalled their build-out efforts or is the LTE rollout ongoing?  As you know here in State College we have no LTE whatsoever to speak of and everytime you so much as ask them what the plan is you get the run-around.  You'd have to think at this juncture that someone somewhere has seen at least a proposed timetable yet they act as if a date hasn't even been thought about.  Its extremely discouraging.  Also does anyone know how (or if) you can email the CEO's office directly to ask questions or voice complaints about service and coverage issues?  I for one and tired of getting the canned replies from their customer service cronies.  It'd be nice to speak with someone of authority to at least feel as though my concerns have been heard. 

 

I somewhat feel your pain.  I know there a bizillon other reasons, but you would think that being a college town would get a few bonus points in the schedule.  (Insert REAL reasons why sites are upgraded in the order they are upgraded.)  I am kind of coming from the Microsoft/Apple vendor lock-in that happens in K-12 through higher-ed.  (Get students to use MS/A software in school and they will want it as employees after graduation...and companies want people familiar with MS/A software so schools teach/use it.  It is a hard circle to break.)

 

If a student comes to school with a phone on a parent's plan and gets crappy service a good number will move to providers that provide better service at school.  They will then stay with that provider for a long time after graduation.  If they get good service, they will stay and probably bring some of their friends over from the "poor" carriers.

 

In my case, there is one site in Kalamazoo that has NV 1.0 equipment installed and has been accepted for 3G/800 for close to a year.  (Moderators...I think that I can say that, if it is premier info, please edit post accordingly.) All of the other towers in town except for one other (a high power line tower site) have been upgraded with LTE.  The first site is right on Western Michigan University’s main campus with 25,000 students.  So students get decent to great LTE (800/1900/2500) around town, but campus is fringe coverage.  Luckily Wi-Fi on campus is pretty good.

 

Now if you were to upgrade to premier membership here, you could take a look at some information that is better than what the CS cronies want to tell you.

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This thread's pretty much gone totally silent as of late so how about an honest answer from someone who knows.  Has Sprint pretty much stalled their build-out efforts or is the LTE rollout ongoing?  As you know here in State College we have no LTE whatsoever to speak of and everytime you so much as ask them what the plan is you get the run-around.  You'd have to think at this juncture that someone somewhere has seen at least a proposed timetable yet they act as if a date hasn't even been thought about.  Its extremely discouraging.  Also does anyone know how (or if) you can email the CEO's office directly to ask questions or voice complaints about service and coverage issues?  I for one and tired of getting the canned replies from their customer service cronies.  It'd be nice to speak with someone of authority to at least feel as though my concerns have been heard. 

As has been stated before, if you are unhappy with the service, move on. Most students here, excluding myself, are overly worried about using their data limits. Regardless, Penn State WiFi is essentially everywhere on campus, and most people would rather use WiFi here. 

 

Now, instead of mentioning what S4GRU has said time and time again about the deployment schedule, I will make a recommendation.

 

T-Mobile here has LTE, with a Bandwidth allocation of 15 MHz according to my engineering screens. Speeds downtown range from 15 to 25 Mbps. Speeds near the Home Depot max out at 40 Mbps, on LTE again. Near the Bellefonte and Pleasant Gap area, T-Mobile has started GMO style conversions and is broadcasting LTE on Band 2 (1900 MHz). Simply try out T-Mobile, it is decent within the area. You will, however, get edge outside of the areas mentioned. 

 

To further answer you, do not expect LTE or 800 MHz in western PA until the very end, if at all. That's the sad truth, Sprint has no plans now to upgrade these sites past GMO.

 

We are not here to read complaints, but to have a discussion. And as I mentioned earlier, college students will use the abundant WiFi around campus and downtown more often than data. 

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An honest answer? I think I have repeatedly said that there will not be any LTE in the Western PA market in 2014. If the stars align perfectly it may start in 2015. But I don't even think that will happen. This is the lowest priority market for Sprint. I'm not sure why Sprint has put W-PA so low, but they have. And I have stated that repeatedly for many.

I have also suggested several times for folks in this market, that if Sprint 3G does not work for you, you should probably find another provider. But most of the remaining Sprint customers in this area won't leave, because they use unlimited significantly. Some even use Sprint as their personal ISP. Hence why they want it to be faster.

It's not coming soon. You need to move on. Or live with it.

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Well I don't know what Lancaster is considered in all this...but there's 800mhz all around, but my phone would rather stay on 1900mhz, but it does switch from time to time. It's nothing like when I visit york and stay on 800mhz though. I just wish b41 was here sooner, but my recent trip to Baltimore made me kind of sad because I wasn't really getting fast speeds anymore compared to when spark first launched there.

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Well I don't know what Lancaster is considered in all this...but there's 800mhz all around, but my phone would rather stay on 1900mhz, but it does switch from time to time. It's nothing like when I visit york and stay on 800mhz though. I just wish b41 was here sooner, but my recent trip to Baltimore made me kind of sad because I wasn't really getting fast speeds anymore compared to when spark first launched there.

 

Lancaster is in the Central PA market and has been deployed pretty well with Sprint LTE bands.  We have schedules available for the Central PA market in the Premier Sponsor thread.

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While I can understand the long stretch of I-80 being dead last (and that is a large chunk of this market) on Sprint's radar, I am still surprised that none of the sites (even say a third of them) in Erie and State College weren't programmed to receive LTE (at least B25) by the end of this year.

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While I can understand the long stretch of I-80 being dead last (and that is a large chunk of this market) on Sprint's radar, I am still surprised that none of the sites (even say a third of them) in Erie and State College weren't programmed to receive LTE (at least B25) by the end of this year.

 

It's surprising. But it's also something we've known since 2012.

 

Using Nexus 5 on Tapatalk

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Lancaster is in the Central PA market and has been deployed pretty well with Sprint LTE bands.  We have schedules available for the Central PA market in the Premier Sponsor thread.

 

Harrisburg and York are in Shentel hands. And we know they did a great job to roll out LTE.

Lancaster is in the hands of Alcatel but it has priority focus on Philly or Allentown. Sometimes I hope Lancaster will be assigned to Shentel to deploy LTE.

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  • 2 months later...

Well guys, some very exciting news!!!!!! Lancaster has some b41!!!!!!!!! Now I couldn't really do a test because I was driving and mapping some areas, but when I glanced down and saw this, I just had to take a screen shot. Man this makes me excited....GO SPRINT!!!!!!! This was near the HACC lancaster campus if anyone was interested. I'm going to go back over there and do a little bit of testing and I am using a nexus 6.

BvMIWpkh.jpg

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Well guys, some very exciting news!!!!!! Lancaster has some b41!!!!!!!!! Now I couldn't really do a test because I was driving and mapping some areas, but when I glanced down and saw this, I just had to take a screen shot. Man this makes me excited....GO SPRINT!!!!!!! This was near the HACC lancaster campus if anyone was interested. I'm going to go back over there and do a little bit of testing and I am using a nexus 6.

BvMIWpkh.jpg

 

Congrats on coming across it in Lancaster.  I can tell you that there are a few deployed B41 towers in Lancaster that have been accepted for 8T8R equipment, but no-one has confirmed if they are broadcasting.  Can you pull down the tower info once you connect and let us know which ones you found it on?  I don't think I can give out any additional information from the Premier Section without violating the rules, sorry.  If Robert is all right with me giving out the general vicinity (no specific tower info) with which to look for the B41 8T8R towers to check I would gladly give it to you to go check if you were interested.

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Congrats on coming across it in Lancaster.  I can tell you that there are a few deployed B41 towers in Lancaster that have been accepted for 8T8R equipment, but no-one has confirmed if they are broadcasting.  Can you pull down the tower info once you connect and let us know which ones you found it on?  I don't think I can give out any additional information from the Premier Section without violating the rules, sorry.  If Robert is all right with me giving out the general vicinity (no specific tower info) with which to look for the B41 8T8R towers to check I would gladly give it to you to go check if you were interested.

I'll try to, when I went back to the area I couldn't get it to connect again, it was very brief. So I'll have to be more thorough when I get a chance to go back. And no worries, I just wish we could put it out for the whole community instead of just a paying few, because as we just saw, anyone can spot these towers. But I will say though, it really looks like they're optimizing b26 very well around here, almost in the lower 90s when I connect to it just like ehrpd, and the hand off has gotten way better, rarely do I drop down to 3g, it stays between 1900 and 800, just wish that magical 2.5ghz would turn on around my house instead of near school :blink:

Edited by A2CKilla
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Congrats on coming across it in Lancaster.  I can tell you that there are a few deployed B41 towers in Lancaster that have been accepted for 8T8R equipment, but no-one has confirmed if they are broadcasting.  Can you pull down the tower info once you connect and let us know which ones you found it on?  I don't think I can give out any additional information from the Premier Section without violating the rules, sorry.  If Robert is all right with me giving out the general vicinity (no specific tower info) with which to look for the B41 8T8R towers to check I would gladly give it to you to go check if you were interested.

This is everything I got, some decent speeds too even on b26. I can now confirm that this is a tower near the HACC lancaster campus as I only get the signal when I'm there, it drops off to b26 fairly quickly once I get off the campus but hopefully that will change in the next few months.

 

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Hello again, can anybody give me an update on Erie, PA?  Download speeds in the city and surrounding areas still rarely get above 1.0 Mbps and most are <0.5Mbps.  I'm a DM out here and our customers are getting a little upset (putting it nicely) and I only have access to Glance when my IAE is in one of my doors but even that doesn't tell me much.  Especially with the summer fast approaching, I need to know whether it's going to be worth the money to do any sort of marketing/events.  It hasn't been in the past but it could be with a better network!  Any honest answers would be helpful, thanks in advance!

Edited by RedArmyNews
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Hello again, can anybody give me an update on Erie, PA?  Download speeds in the city and surrounding areas still rarely get above 1.0 Mbps and most are <0.5Mbps.  I'm a DM out here and our customers are getting a little upset (putting it nicely) and I only have access to Glance when my IAE is in one of my doors but even that doesn't tell me much.  Especially with the summer fast approaching, I need to know whether it's going to be worth the money to do any sort of marketing/events.  It hasn't been in the past but it could be with a better network!  Any honest answers would be helpful, thanks in advance!

 

We just haven't heard anything more than GMO sites in the Western PA market are getting backhaul upgrades to ethernet this year.  Which is good news and could lead to LTE finally getting started.  However, this is THE bastard market for Sprint.  Only market worse is the Swiftel affiliate market in Eastern South Dakota.

 

If I were to guess, I'd believe that Marcelo will pull the trigger on this market this year, given all the news of network expansion and all.  We just haven't heard or seen anything more than backhaul upgrades.  And given the history of this market, I'm surprised there are any Sprint customers left.  Much like South Dakota.

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If I were to guess, I'd believe that Marcelo will pull the trigger on this market this year, given all the news of network expansion and all. .

Are you saying that resources - money and manpower - are available yet sprint chooses to delay the upgrades?

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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Are you saying that resources - money and manpower - are available yet sprint chooses to delay the upgrades?

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

Neither.  For some reason the Western PA market has been completely skipped in Network Vision.  It was by choice.  And I don't know the reason behind it.

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Neither. For some reason the Western PA market has been completely skipped in Network Vision. It was by choice. And I don't know the reason behind it.

We just haven't heard anything more than GMO sites in the Western PA market are getting backhaul upgrades to ethernet this year. Which is good news and could lead to LTE finally getting started. However, this is THE bastard market for Sprint. Only market worse is the Swiftel affiliate market in Eastern South Dakota.

 

If I were to guess, I'd believe that Marcelo will pull the trigger on this market this year, given all the news of network expansion and all. We just haven't heard or seen anything more than backhaul upgrades. And given the history of this market, I'm surprised there are any Sprint customers left. Much like South Dakota.

There were customers there when I was in school in Erie just a few years ago, but that was before NV and I cannot imagine they have faired well these past few years. It was only city people that had the service, b/c it falls off the radar once you pass over 90. And of those customers, I would venture to say half or more were probably prepaid brands.

 

The benefit to sprint is that this area has 5 colleges (Penn state Behrend, Mercyhurst, Gannon, LECOM, and Edinboro to the south) not only will some students have Sprint service before they get to school, but if Sprint were to sure up coverage South of the city, they could take back market share quickly by targeting students with promotions. But no one will be fighting to get the cutting edge <1mb/s 3G service Sprint is currently selling!

 

I know that this was originally an affiliate area that was later bought by Sprint, and I remember my first htc windows phone that had 3G that blew away my friends by streaming videos. And they haven't touched it since.

 

I would encourage Sprint to look into making sure all college areas are among the best covered b/c if you want the next wave of subscribers, that's where they will form an opinion.

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Even the demographics being what they are, there has to be something specific about the W PA market. There are other 4th Round markets with unfavorable demographics that Sprint has converted or at least partially converted. Only this market and the affiliate market Swiftel have no LTE sites.

 

The only thing I can think of is perhaps when they purchased the affiliate in that market, there may be some weird or sketchy ownership or transition in the deal. Because Sprint always neglects this market in all their plans and does nothing but ground mount RRU's at the sites and leave. It's just completely different than every market. From the beginning. I'd love to know the story.

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  • 3 weeks later...

I'm curious to see when they're going to get to the Tri-State area of NY, NJ, and PA, specifically 12771, 18336, and 18337. All 3G only areas, some areas weaker than others. They've done some work as we're seeing more 3G coverage in the Delware Water Gap area but that's the only noticed improvement.

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