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Network Vision/LTE - Central Iowa Market (Des Moines and surrounding areas)


sweyers

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ok, good to know, now how do i set the PRL back to an older one??????????

 

this post has some links to guides for various phones

 

http://s4gru.com/index.php?/topic/3059-800smr-s4gru-sponsors-prls/

 

as a side note, i randomly got connected to 1x800 again today. i wasn't even in a low 1900 signal spot, was just doing airplane mode searching for LTE and next thing i knew it was connected to 1x800, have been on it since then.

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this post has some links to guides for various phones

 

http://s4gru.com/index.php?/topic/3059-800smr-s4gru-sponsors-prls/

 

as a side note, i randomly got connected to 1x800 again today. i wasn't even in a low 1900 signal spot, was just doing airplane mode searching for LTE and next thing i knew it was connected to 1x800, have been on it since then.

I saw that too.

 

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Sent from my SPH-L720T using Tapatalk

 

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

My downtown tower is severly overloaded again and there is no data whatsoever. I'm using an iphone 5 but i also have a moto x. Would it be better to switch to the moto x? i think it has band 25, whereas the iphone 5 does not.

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I was actually surprised at how quick we got it at two downtown sites to be honest. One of them that was one of the last to get NV and then fairly quickly had LTE light up.

So it's another month....and I was expecting LTE since last year at the State Fair...still surprised?

I'm surprised that there are so many LTE sites in town that have 1.5 download speeds if that. Sprint is gonna really have to come thru and beef up the bandwidth if they want us to stay.

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My downtown tower is severly overloaded again and there is no data whatsoever. I'm using an iphone 5 but i also have a moto x. Would it be better to switch to the moto x? i think it has band 25, whereas the iphone 5 does not.

 

neither one of those phones are tri-band phones, so they are both limited to B25, so you will have the same experience no matter which one you use.

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So it's another month....and I was expecting LTE since last year at the State Fair...still surprised?

I'm surprised that there are so many LTE sites in town that have 1.5 download speeds if that. Sprint is gonna really have to come thru and beef up the bandwidth if they want us to stay.

If you need more right now you should go. Instead of threatening Sprint around the internet.

 

Robert via Samsung Note 8.0 using Tapatalk Pro

 

 

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So it's another month....and I was expecting LTE since last year at the State Fair...still surprised?

I'm surprised that there are so many LTE sites in town that have 1.5 download speeds if that. Sprint is gonna really have to come thru and beef up the bandwidth if they want us to stay.

 

you should probably just go ahead and switch carriers, sprint is obviously not working for you where you work/live/play. sure there are 2 more "downtown" towers to get LTE, but there are also so many people downtown during the work week it probably won't make things much better, not until B41 comes along anyway. thats the bane of downtown areas, wireless is a finite resource, each sector sprint is deploying has a max capacity of 37meg down, that is shared by every user on it, so in a downtown area where you have several hundred, if not a thousand, people they are all sharing that 37 meg pipe.

 

sprint has been great for me everywhere i work/live/play, i get speeds anywhere from 5 meg to over 25 meg down consistently. i highly doubt that when the other 2 towers come online speeds will increase enough to make you happy. will they be usable, probably, but they won't be amazing with so many people there. so if its affecting you that much you need to look at other carriers.....

 

EDIT: sitting at work and just got this for a speedtest

3399682087.png

and really that speed is more limited by my signal than tower load, if i move my phone to a spot with better signal i can get closer to 10 meg down.

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If you need more right now you should go. Instead of threatening Sprint around the internet.

 

Robert via Samsung Note 8.0 using Tapatalk Pro

Wow.....really? So having no service in a downtown area is MY problem? I know you get tired of people complaining on your site but c'mon it's been almost a year and a half.

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Wow.....really? So having no service in a downtown area is MY problem? I know you get tired of people complaining on your site but c'mon it's been almost a year and a half.

I didn't say it was your problem. But it is. Finding the best service for me is my problem, as it is for you. They have not given up on Des Moines. They are actively working. And if it's not fast enough for you, you should go. That's all.

 

Robert via Samsung Note 8.0 using Tapatalk Pro

 

 

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Actually I agree with that. I have stuck it out this long. I have read on the BAW site about des moines that indicates that completion in DSM is scheduled for 90 days. I think my real frustration is that I work in the business of providing bdw for cell towers but since Sprint isn't going with my company I'm out of the loop. I'm not used to that.

Robert,

Could I also ask u a question? The 37 meg bdw limit is that b/c of the tech Sprint uses? I know the other providers have access to 100 mb pipes at cell sites but I'm wondering if that's b/c it's GSM.

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Also, I could live with not much bdw 500 kbs would be more than perfect, even 200 kbs. I'm in a spot that's between 2 towers and i bounce like a ping pong. I can walk around my floor and alternate between 3g/LTE.

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Actually I agree with that. I have stuck it out this long. I have read on the BAW site about des moines that indicates that completion in DSM is scheduled for 90 days. I think my real frustration is that I work in the business of providing bdw for cell towers but since Sprint isn't going with my company I'm out of the loop. I'm not used to that.

Robert,

Could I also ask u a question? The 37 meg bdw limit is that b/c of the tech Sprint uses? I know the other providers have access to 100 mb pipes at cell sites but I'm wondering if that's b/c it's GSM.

 

37 meg per sector is because they are deploying a 5x5 configuration with the frequency. FDD LTE works that way. Verizon deploys a 10x10 configuration so each sector has 74 meg (37x2). when they deploy B26 it will also be a 5x5, so it will have its own 37 meg of bandwidth per sector. then when they deploy B41 it will be using TDD LTE and they will deploy in 20Mhz chunks, i believe the max bandwidth per sector on that is around 80 or 90 meg.

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Wow.....really? So having no service in a downtown area is MY problem? I know you get tired of people complaining on your site but c'mon it's been almost a year and a half.

 

Yes lots of problems during deployment, can't argue that at all but certainly other carriers have had their issues during deplo too. The thing is Sprint is doing a full rip and replace at 'most' sites which is far different than most carriers have done recently or if at all. You have to think of it as building a foundation. If the foundation sucks the beautiful big funky cool building on top doesn't mean much. Might be good for a while but eventually it will be falling down or having other huge issues. Also we can't be crazy to think that even though S is thinking and building for the future now too, yes all this equipment will need replaced someday too.

 

That all being said in general service is far better in Dsm than it used to be - bar none.  However there are often times that I can't connect to any data even though it says LTE and has good signal strength displayed or shown in the engr screen. I have to go into airplane leave off a bit then back on and it may or may not work then.  Not a big deal because I just don't use my phone that much - I know I'm one of the few in life anymore.  The most I do use are two or three apps and generally immediate connectivity doesn't make much diff for those (rss readers and a couple other things.)

 

My phone/voice has had almost no problems since NV has pretty much been done. Phone is great.  Although  don't use that too much either.  Both phone and data for me is downtown too.

 

I couldn't agree more with what you mean about downtown, but Dsm is certainly probably not their priority like some places.  I also can't go into big details but they have lost huge customers in Dsm over the past few years and that hurts.  I'm sure like any other business they have to weigh cost/benefit.  So if they can get their network upgraded and do much better as they get some of those big accounts back then they will push further upgrades down the road as monthly recurring charges build up around the Dsm metro and especially downtown.

 

I have a friend who left Sprint earlier last year and went to VZ,   I didn't change phones or carriers he did.  Every call now sounds worse.  So from my stand point he went from a flip on S to an Iphone on verizon,  so either the phone sucks or the service.  I don't think all is rosey over on the VZ system either.

 

Also you may or may not realize even though you and I have iPhone 5's with only LTE on B25 we get benefit by the B26 going live.  That allows some load balancing (maybe not today - I'm not sure on the back end system controlling that whether it's been deployed yet) by the System and thus will free bandwidth on the B25 stuff.  Just like getting the additional towers live with LTE downtown. Right now most of our phones will try to hold on to an LTE signal and not move over to the 3G towers.  Once those are live they really make a ton of difference for everyone.

 

I also have the advantage/disadvantage to have some 3G only data cards that can't be changed out.  They are working far better now in downtown than they used too.  With the backhaul being live at most sites and many phones moving to LTE that is freeing up the 3G side of the data game.

 

Nope, I don't work for Sprint.  I just enjoy the tehnology and this site.  There is some neat stuff being deployed and things to come in the future.  However it's not good for everyone depending on where they live or travel so you just have to decide on that. 

 

Just becareful talking shit about Sprint on here.  That is completely against the rules and this is a happy place for many of us so we can't and won't let it turn into a bad place   ;)     Just know we all face things and some can't hold it in, but on this site we have too.

 

Stick around and add some things to our discussions !  Consider becoming a Sponsor to help financially support the fun too   :tu:

 

Whew,  I might get kicked out for such a long post, I will hide for a little bit now  :ninja:

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Just curious what is happening technically to give me this recurring experience downtown. We've spent 3 or 4 weekends at various events all day at the Iowa Events Center. In general the LTE connection on my Nexus 5 gets bogged down and approaches unusable. If I switch the phone settings to 3G I usually end up with a usable experience. Is this just simply the difference in load of the 4G equipment vs the 3G?

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Just curious what is happening technically to give me this recurring experience downtown. We've spent 3 or 4 weekends at various events all day at the Iowa Events Center. In general the LTE connection on my Nexus 5 gets bogged down and approaches unusable. If I switch the phone settings to 3G I usually end up with a usable experience. Is this just simply the difference in load of the 4G equipment vs the 3G?

I'd bet 4g you're connecting to a more distant tower and lower strength signal. Also, since band 26 isn't up yet for the most part you're not getting structure penetration quality.

 

Via 3g you're probably on better signal from a closer tower on a lower frequency with better structure penetration.

 

 

Sent from my SPH-L720T using Tapatalk

 

 

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Just curious what is happening technically to give me this recurring experience downtown. We've spent 3 or 4 weekends at various events all day at the Iowa Events Center. In general the LTE connection on my Nexus 5 gets bogged down and approaches unusable. If I switch the phone settings to 3G I usually end up with a usable experience. Is this just simply the difference in load of the 4G equipment vs the 3G?

 

read my last few posts in this thread replying to cerebasan, 37meg shared by hundreds of people on 4G = slow speeds. 3G is faster because most people have 4G phones and don't know you can put it back to 3G = usable speeds.

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Robert,

Could I also ask u a question? The 37 meg bdw limit is that b/c of the tech Sprint uses? I know the other providers have access to 100 mb pipes at cell sites but I'm wondering if that's b/c it's GSM.

 

Brad answered your question accurately. Tmo and AT&T have lots of 5MHz LTE carriers too out there, and they are also limited to 37.5Mbps. Maximum theoretical throughput speeds are set based on the width of the channel and the number of antennas being used (MIMO).

 

For Sprint, they can only do 5MHz LTE carriers in Band 25 and 26. But they can do 20MHz carriers in Band 41. And they can aggregate up to 3 of them together, pushing up to 180Mbps with just 2xMIMO. If they increase to 8xMIMO with appropriate backhaul, they can get over 1Gbps on Band 41.

 

Robert via Samsung Note 8.0 using Tapatalk Pro

 

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Just curious what is happening technically to give me this recurring experience downtown. We've spent 3 or 4 weekends at various events all day at the Iowa Events Center. In general the LTE connection on my Nexus 5 gets bogged down and approaches unusable. If I switch the phone settings to 3G I usually end up with a usable experience. Is this just simply the difference in load of the 4G equipment vs the 3G?

Since LTE is not really prevalent downtown, you have a weak LTE signal that's being shared by too many people. That's a recipe for poor performance. It will get better as the downtown area gets covered with Bands 25 & 26.

 

Robert via Samsung Note 8.0 using Tapatalk Pro

 

 

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How's everyone over at S4GRU? It's been a while since I've been on here! I guess I'm just spoiled by my constant LTE in Waukee now  :rasp:

 

 

Also, I could live with not much bdw 500 kbs would be more than perfect, even 200 kbs. I'm in a spot that's between 2 towers and i bounce like a ping pong. I can walk around my floor and alternate between 3g/LTE.

 

Same here at my house in far NW Urbandale. Bounces around just sitting in one spot sometimes.

 

 

 

On a positive note LTE is on at Hickman and Douglas and has been for a couple weeks.

Wait Hickman and Douglas? Look at a map, let's just say those don't intersect...

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Since LTE is not really prevalent downtown, you have a weak LTE signal that's being shared by too many people. That's a recipe for poor performance. It will get better as the downtown area gets covered with Bands 25 & 26.

 

Robert via Samsung Note 8.0 using Tapatalk Pro

I wish Sprint would hurry up and finish everything up in Iowa and just be done with it, perpetually in last place around here  :(. Any idea when we'll launch Robert?

Edited by sweyers
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I wish Sprint would hurry up and finish everything up in Iowa and just be done with it, perpetually in last place around here  :(. Any idea when we'll launch Robert?

 

Sprints work IS done is Iowa. Every single site has been converted to Samsung equipment. The entire hold up is on backhaul providers to deliver backhaul to sites in order to fire up LTE services. This is mostly out of Sprints hand.

 

Also don't even complain about being in last place considering the progress of your market. Several multi million pop top 50 metros still haven't even got the basic NV 3G upgrade or equipment installations. 

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I wish Sprint would hurry up and finish everything up in Iowa and just be done with it, perpetually in last place around here  :(. Any idea when we'll launch Robert?

Launch doesn't mean anything. Des Moines had enough coverage to launch last month. I'm all but certain it will launch in the next round.

 

BTW, Sprint/Samsung has moved faster in the Central Iowa market than almost any other. Your the envy of all the nation. Save maybe Omaha.

 

Robert

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Launch doesn't mean anything. Des Moines had enough coverage to launch last month. I'm all but certain it will launch in the next round.

 

BTW, Sprint/Samsung has moved faster in the Central Iowa market than almost any other. Your the envy of all the nation. Save maybe Omaha.

 

Robert

 

They have kicked some serious butt in Omaha.

 

Sent from my SPH-L720T using Tapatalk

 

 

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I wish Sprint would hurry up and finish everything up in Iowa and just be done with it, perpetually in last place around here  :(. Any idea when we'll launch Robert?

Your anger is misguided at this point and should be directed to mediacom.  As lilotimz said, every Sprint site in Central Iowa has been upgraded to the new NV equipment. At this point the limitation of a site being 4G or not is whether or not has fiber backhaul. Getting fiber to the site is the responsibility of the backhaul provider. 

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