This misinformed article is getting a lot of Sprint bashing in the comments

[The Dave]

To only promise 6 to 8 Mbps sets low expectations but I can tell you already that I get more than that on LTE in a lot of places. If they start lowering their promises they can likely exceed expectations and make a killer return in the mobile industry.Sent from my Nexus 5

So far, the lowest speed I have found has been 10.91 Mbps down with my Sprint LTE. This was inside a metal building with a -118 dBm fringe signal. I have added about a dozen 22-33 Mbps speed tests from Sensorly in the St Augustine area. I say that Sprint is rocking it in the under promise and over deliver department.

[Ascertion]

A Google engineer said that the data up/down icons in the status bar drain the battery and increase CPU load, so I don't see why the spinning Spark icon wouldn't do the same.

The data icons adds another layer on AOSP styled status bar and stacking layers does increase CPU load (not by much, but if you stack enough layers it can cause noticeable slowdown.) Even with the data in and out the user sees no difference in battery with data in and out icons showing. The Spark icon is an entire new entry, not stacking on top of another layer so it shouldn't touch battery at all.

 

Sent from my Nexus 5

 

 

[Paynefanbro]

The thing is, these aren't the speeds that people are getting when they confirm that they are on Band 41 via engineering screens. These so called non-scientific tests seem to be on PCS LTE and people are confused and thinking that they are on Band 41.

[Deval]

I'll add my two cents.

 

I actually applaud the use of a single Spark logo, regardless of what band of LTE a user is connected to.

 

The average consumer experience is better if you think about it. A user sees a Spark logo, and knows they are on LTE, abet Turbo, or good ol' LTE.

 

In this day and age of LTE being ubiquitous across the board, having differentiators is huge. 

[digiblur]

A Google engineer said that the data up/down icons in the status bar drain the battery and increase CPU load, so I don't see why the spinning Spark icon wouldn't do the same.

I have noticed no difference in battery decrease even with the Internet speed meter reporting the data rate in my status bar.

[Terrell352]

My home internet connection is going from 36 down and 5 up on cox to 60 down and 12 up on cox on Dec 10th for no additional charge. I don't even care about 4G at my home anymore(not that when it finally comes I won't be excited) but 4G LTE or at least usable 3G when im driving to stream music or at stores that I go to like Walmart would be nice. I cant use data at 3 of the 4 walmarts in my city at all. Why doesn't Walmart have Wifi when Publix and Winn Dixie does? Granted they have slow wifi at about 1 mbps but thats enough to at least look for coupons or deals online.

[Terrell352]

I think he largely missed the point. The worst result I saw was 1mbps down, he states frequently below 4mbps. At 1mbps I can happily stream 720p video, have a HD chat on skype etc, oh and not pay $10 per GB. All mobile networks will show speed fluctuations with demand, rather than just running speed tests did he at any point actually try and use the phone. I understand the metrics are useful to compare X provider with Y provider but they need to be put into context which in this case means stating that even at its slowest it is still enough to perform most common tasks you are going to perform that would require a decent amount of bandwidth. 80mbps elsewhere will just empty your wallet faster, and for what? So a webpage loads no faster because it is constrained by the SOC in the phone? A pdf might take an extra few seconds to load. Yes downloading an entire HD movie would take longer but if it was say 6GB, I'll take the wait and no huge bill thanks

 

The points above regarding the spark icon make perfect sense however! I think Sprint do need to be careful not risk associating a new brand image needlessly and inaccurately with slower performance. 

I would like to see proof of this 1mbps HD streaming because I have tried this and there is plenty of buffer to go along with streaming at 1 mbps in true 720p HD. 2 mbps minimum I could see that. I can cap data true my wifi so I know the limits of trying to watch HD shows on 1mbps. If you let it buffer for 5 or so minutes then maybe you could get continuous playback.

[Paynefanbro]

My home internet connection is going from 36 down and 5 up on cox to 60 down and 12 up on cox on Dec 10th for no additional charge. I don't even care about 4G at my home anymore(not that when it finally comes I won't be excited) but 4G LTE or at least usable 3G when im driving to stream music or at stores that I go to like Walmart would be nice. I cant use data at 3 of the 4 walmarts in my city at all. Why doesn't Walmart have Wifi when Publix and Winn Dixie does? Granted they have slow wifi at about 1 mbps but thats enough to at least look for coupons or deals online.

Optimum did this to me a few months ago. I had 50/8 and they upgraded me to 101/35 for free. That's honestly why I think they are the best ISP ever! They upgraded everyone for free. Basic tier people which was 15/2 got upgraded to 15/5. But in basic tier, I averaged 20/5

[Terrell352]

Optimum did this to me a few months ago. I had 50/8 and they upgraded me to 101/35 for free. That's honestly why I think they are the best ISP ever! They upgraded everyone for free. Basic tier people which was 15/2 got upgraded to 15/5. But in basic tier, I averaged 20/5

cox ultimate is going from 60 to up to 130 down and 20 up

 

Sent from my LG-LS980 using Tapatalk

 

 

[digiblur]

cox ultimate is going from 60 to up to 130 down and 20 up

 

Sent from my LG-LS980 using Tapatalk

People are insane that pay for that...

[richy]

I would like to see proof of this 1mbps HD streaming because I have tried this and there is plenty of buffer to go along with streaming at 1 mbps in true 720p HD. 2 mbps minimum I could see that. I can cap data true my wifi so I know the limits of trying to watch HD shows on 1mbps. If you let it buffer for 5 or so minutes then maybe you could get continuous playback.

 

Sure no problemo To make this fair I used the absolute worst file I could find for encoding that I had close to hand. It is shot on a cheap camera setup ($1300?) underwater with a shedload of movement and sunlight play across a pattern. Short of getting drunk and trying to film indcars from a helicopter this is as bad as it will get so I am not trying to throw the test by using a static test card lol

 

I stuck it into handbrake, set it to 720p and 1mbps and had it deblock a little. The end result is ok at 1mbps but muddy. This is a basic freeware h264 encoder, netflix et al have considerably better encoders and far more experience than I at using them. Frankly, if they cannot do better than that they should give me the company!

 

You experience with streaming at ~1-1.5mbps will depend significantly on the service you are using. Sure I grant you it will not be bluray quality, but it should be viewable. If you have buffering then that is down to the choice made by the provider, do they choose to drop the resolution if they know your link is slow or do they drop the quality. They can setup their transcoder \ streaming server pretty much any way they like, some services will drop the quality, some the resolution, some will drop frames and some will just buffer. 

 

link to 1mbps 720p24 h264 video file.

http://www.filedropper.com/honu

[Terrell352]

People are insane that pay for that...

at cox its going to be $100 flat for 130 mbps down. Thats not a bad price

[Terrell352]

Wouldnt call it quiet hd but younhave made me more of a believer. Well played richy well played.

Sure no problemo To make this fair I used the absolute worst file I could find for encoding that I had close to hand. It is shot on a cheap camera setup ($1300?) underwater with a shedload of movement and sunlight play across a pattern. Short of getting drunk and trying to film indcars from a helicopter this is as bad as it will get so I am not trying to throw the test by using a static test card lol

 

I stuck it into handbrake, set it to 720p and 1mbps and had it deblock a little. The end result is ok at 1mbps but muddy. This is a basic freeware h264 encoder, netflix et al have considerably better encoders and far more experience than I at using them. Frankly, if they cannot do better than that they should give me the company!

 

You experience with streaming at ~1-1.5mbps will depend significantly on the service you are using. Sure I grant you it will not be bluray quality, but it should be viewable. If you have buffering then that is down to the choice made by the provider, do they choose to drop the resolution if they know your link is slow or do they drop the quality. They can setup their transcoder \ streaming server pretty much any way they like, some services will drop the quality, some the resolution, some will drop frames and some will just buffer.

 

link to 1mbps 720p24 h264 video file.

http://www.filedropper.com/honu

[digiblur]

at cox its going to be $100 flat for 130 mbps down. Thats not a bad price

I hate the idea of having to pay $60 for the 25 I don't really need. $100 a month for Internet is retarded.

[Nickel]

I hate the idea of having to pay $60 for the 25 I don't really need. $100 a month for Internet is retarded.

This kind of post is like the bat signal for AJ's e-penis comments.

[The Dave]

I was able to stream Netflix over Sprint 3G while at work whenever the Comcast business class internet was down. I know that average speeds aren't going to be much over 1-1.5 Mbps steady while streaming. I never had any buffering problems then, so I know 720p video can definitely be fine over 1mbps.

 

And all of you are lucky. My Comcast internet is 25 Mbps down/6 up and it costs about $85/month with taxes and fees if you don't also subscribe to cable service. This doesn't include the $11/month to rent a modem. Kinda ridiculous when I was able to buy a brand new Motorola cable modem on eBay for $46.

 

Back on topic. I still think the always on icon is being over zealous right now. Perhaps when "Spark" is at a 60-80% completion rate, but as of right now it is only a half dozen markets with islands of band 41 and band 26 not online currently. Right now it will just do Sprint more harm than good. They made such a grand claim to the speed and capacity of their new "Spark" network and right now "reporters" are connecting to vanilla PCS and proclaiming Sprint as making yet another empty promise.

[mellimel2212]

And to the person downloading a 6GB movie over cellular:

OK and?? If they are paying the bill they have the right. Everybody can't and don't have home internet access so the phone is the next best thing.

 

Sent from my T-Mobile LG Escape running 4.1.2 using Tapatalk 2 (Central n ohio Austin IL)

 

 

[WiWavelength]

OK and?? If they are paying the bill they have the right. Everybody can't and don't have home internet access so the phone is the next best thing.

 

And that is precisely a reason why unlimited data is not sustainable -- because po' people want to use it as their only broadband connection and download/stream like the rich folk' do.

 

AJ

[S4GRU]

I hate the idea of having to pay $60 for the 25 I don't really need. $100 a month for Internet is retarded.

I pay $70/month for 100Mbps. It often runs up to 115-120Mbps. It only bogs down to 90-95Mbps at the worst.

 

However, I see no difference in performance between an Ethernet connection on my network running at 100Mbps, or a WiFi connection running at 40Mbps. None. Zero. Not even downloading. So your comment about not needing more makes a lot of sense.

 

And it makes sense if you think about it. Because the servers around the country/world that I am downloading from just aren't throwing out the data I'm using even at 40Mbps. Many people don't realize that our download speeds are limited to the speed of the weakest point in the connection to the distant server. And if the distant servers connection to the internet is only running 3-5Mbps, then it doesn't matter if we have 1Gbps internet service.

 

Good call, Digi. These speed increases being offered by cable companies is just to bring additional perceived value to better compete.

 

Robert via Samsung Note 8.0 using Tapatalk Pro

[mellimel2212]

And that is precisely a reason why unlimited data is not sustainable -- because po' people want to use it as their only broadband connection and download/stream like the rich folk' do.

 

AJ

 

Who poor? Some people houses or apts can't accept internet or maybe the person has other responsibilities other than that. I'm on T-Mobile now and DL at 20+ constantly even peak hours on guess what unlimited so your statement is flawed bro.

 

Sent from my T-Mobile LG Escape running 4.1.2 using Tapatalk 2 (Central n ohio Austin IL)

 

 

[WiWavelength]

I'm on T-Mobile now and DL at 20+ constantly even peak hours on guess what unlimited so your statement is flawed bro.

 

No, your understanding of "sustainable" is flawed. Talk to me in three years, especially as T-Mobile intends to steal millions of Sprint subs by then.

 

AJ

[richy]

People always want more for less, as technologies evolve (be it docsis or lte) companies have the option to sell the same for less or more for the same, it's a brave company that tells its shareholders it's going to intentionally drop ARPU! 

 

A far more common scenario is to double the speed for 'free', them the following year stick you with a 15% price increase and state "hey we're just really nice guys we gave you that free speed boost remember". And no, not being cynical, this is from actual real world experience in a cable company. This is an entirely intentional strategy.

 

I pay $70/month for 100Mbps. It often runs up to 115-120Mbps. It only bogs down to 90-95Mbps at the worst.

However, I see no difference in performance between an Ethernet connection on my network running at 100Mbps, or a WiFi connection running at 40Mbps. None. Zero. Not even downloading. So your comment about not needing more makes a lot of sense.

And it makes sense if you think about it. Because the servers around the country/world that I am downloading from just aren't throwing out the data I'm using even at 40Mbps. Many people don't realize that our download speeds are limited to the speed of the weakest point in the connection to the distant server. And if the distant servers connection to the internet is only running 3-5Mbps, then it doesn't matter if we have 1Gbps internet service.

Good call, Digi. These speed increases being offered by cable companies is just to bring additional perceived value to better compete.

Robert via Samsung Note 8.0 using Tapatalk Pro

[digiblur]

Good call, Digi. These speed increases being offered by cable companies is just to bring additional perceived value to better compete.

 

Robert via Samsung Note 8.0 using Tapatalk Pro

We have a gig at work and with typical browsing you don't notice it except when downloading a few large files. The only thing I could see is if you upload a lot of videos daily as the extra speed on upload would be nice. I will save my money, wait a little longer for uploads and enjoy spending that money/time on some pepperjack boudin balls instead.

 

The cable companies always push to gamers that they need the bigger connection when in reality online gaming would work fine on a 768/128 line.

[richy]

No, your understanding of "sustainable" is flawed. Talk to me in three years, especially as T-Mobile intends to steal millions of Sprint subs by then.

 

AJ

 

 

Oh hell no it won't In three years tmo's lte will most likely be crawling at 100kbps speeds. Tmo's lte here already slows from 20+mbps to 4-5mbps during the day. Personally for me thats fine, I use it mostly off peak, not as a substitute for home broadband and 4mbps is ample for anything I want to do. Given they have a stratergy which is proving popular (it seems so anyway) they are only going to lose speed. If they get some lower A block that might save them for a while but they will have to build that out AND wait for phones that use it (band 12?) to come to market, even more so given they tend to 'share' phone builds with at&t. 

In one respect this could mean we do end up with 4 strong carriers, maybe tmo and sprint grab loads of 600mhz, but long term sprint has a better chance than tmo, both in general and with respect to a set price data deal (they will just have to wrangle data, throttling, blocking types etc to keep it realistic).

[mellimel2212]

Well now I my speeds are almost 30mb during the day in Chicago so T-Mobile is OK where I am ymmv

 

Sent from my T-Mobile LG Escape running 4.1.2 using Tapatalk 2 (Central n ohio Austin IL)