Network Vision and Repeaters - When will repeaters be upgraded?

[mrjeff]

There are some hilly canyon type areas near me that are served by repeaters.  In my area, they are apparently manufactured by a company called Juni and are at the moment serving only 3G.  I'm curious - Is there a general timeline of when these may be updated by Sprint?  FWIW, they don't appear on the maps in the sponsored area.

[belusnecropolis]

This is an interesting question! May I ask what region you are in?

 

I would like to research this topic more as well. I see that Juni made a WiMAX repeater, they make enterprise and home versions. I wonder if this is a company along the lines of Wilson or similar products? Sweet, if nothing else mrjeff you piqued my interest in the 'what happens between macros' type cell technology, again. I would like to learn how this and other technologies are used to supplement service on a wider scale, what areas, and how it is implemented. While home use is always handy and all that, I would like to see or hear the bigger companies i.e. Sprint usage for these.

I must also admit I would like to see one in action and maybe add some to my epic picture collection. I have an itch for unique technologies that are not widespread or in the open, or that help serve people in hard to reach geographical places. This is just a sweet topic I would like to see more of. To the internets! 

(For reference)
http://juniamerica.com/

/My poor homework is gonna punch me right in the Sunday evening, good thing it is just probowl tomorrow

[S4GRU]

There are some hilly canyon type areas near me that are served by repeaters. In my area, they are apparently manufactured by a company called Juni and are at the moment serving only 3G. I'm curious - Is there a general timeline of when these may be updated by Sprint? FWIW, they don't appear on the maps in the sponsored area.

There are many repeaters on our maps. Are you certain these are Sprint corporate repeaters?

 

As for when, we have only seen one repeater show up with a NV upgrade. And that was in Cheyenne, Wyoming. We have no timeline when they will be upgraded in general. And for 3G, they won't need to be upgraded, as they just repeat the signals they receive, regardless of what the equipment looks like on the initial transmit side.

 

However, for LTE, they would likely need to have their equipment upgraded if it doesn't support the G band. Which was not even a band when most of these repeaters were manufactured.

 

It's possible that many of these repeaters out there will get removed when CDMA 800 and LTE 800 are deployed fully. Probably a good portion, more than half, may be well covered with 800MHz signals making them not necessary.

 

At best, I would say repeaters will be the lowest priority at Network Vision, and at worst they may not upgrade them at all, just counting on 800MHz fixing the problem.

 

Robert via Samsung Note 8.0 using Tapatalk Pro

 

[mrjeff]

This is an interesting question! May I ask what region you are in?

 

I would like to research this topic more as well. I see that Juni made a WiMAX repeater, they make enterprise and home versions. I wonder if this is a company along the lines of Wilson or similar products? Sweet, if nothing else mrjeff you piqued my interest in the 'what happens between macros' type cell technology, again. I would like to learn how this and other technologies are used to supplement service on a wider scale, what areas, and how it is implemented. While home use is always handy and all that, I would like to see or hear the bigger companies i.e. Sprint usage for these.

 

I must also admit I would like to see one in action and maybe add some to my epic picture collection. I have an itch for unique technologies that are not widespread or in the open, or that help serve people in hard to reach geographical places. This is just a sweet topic I would like to see more of. To the internets! 

 

(For reference)

http://juniamerica.com/

 

/My poor homework is gonna punch me right in the Sunday evening, good thing it is just probowl tomorrow

 

 

FWIW, I got most my information from this currently unavailable sprint forum message (still on google cache tho).  You can view it here.

 

Some pictures of these guys are available in this thread here.   They are spread out constantly through out the canyon on many of the turns.

[belusnecropolis]

Neat! I was unaware of these being in service. I honestly figured something like this was used mostly locally, maybe public-private for service in underserved areas or some such. Simple assumption is all. This is really cool. Thanks for the info guys, I am totally looking forward to finding more some day.

[Destroyallcubes]

Curiously , What do some of these Repeater sites look like?

[mrjeff]

Curiously , What do some of these Repeater sites look like?

 

pictures can be found here:  click me

[Destroyallcubes]

Hmm I have seen some things like those. The ones are I have seen are omni directional antennas , but Never been able to tell the carrier. How efficient are they?

[JossMan]

Pictures of a Sprint repeater site in LA, California neighborhood known as "Kirkwood Bowl" in Hollywood Hills. Figured I would post them in this topic since some nice folks don't like reading the whole thread lol.  Not my pictures credits go to Laurel323 from the community.sprint.com forum.

 

 

 

 

 

[markjcc]

Those dont need to be upgraded as they take the weak signal and repeat it stronger with some amplifiers i assume

[S4GRU]

Those dont need to be upgraded as they take the weak signal and repeat it stronger with some amplifiers i assume

They may have to repeat new bands/blocks that were not in use at time of manufacture. The PCS G Block was not a licensed block in the PCS band then. Also, it may be useful now to repeat the SMR band too. And maybe even Band 41 in some places. To handle these new technologies/bands, they would likely need new equipment.

 

Robert via Samsung Note 8.0 using Tapatalk Pro

 

 

[Destroyallcubes]

I remember reading in Tyler the cost per site was around $20,000 for a full boild. How much would redoing one of these cost? I

[lilotimz]

I remember reading in Tyler the cost per site was around $20,000 for a full boild. How much would redoing one of these cost? I

 

$20,000-$30,000 is the typical valuation for an existing site conversion. A new full build costs somewhere in the ballpark of $150,000-$200,000. 

[Destroyallcubes]

$20,000-$30,000 is the typical valuation for an existing site conversion. A new full build costs somewhere in the ballpark of $150,000-$200,000. 

I can't remember where I found it, But i might of said just for the equipment, not backhaul/man hours. I don't think they had any New NV sites, just upgrades form existing sites. I do not see them adding any for a little bit. But they will need to build or set up something like this in the next year or two in a few locations. Hopefully just spend the money and set up 2 or so macro sites. But one of these would not be a bad thing in the locations where They are building huge shopping centers. But do you think A repeater set like this would cost over 10k?

[markjcc]

I can't remember where I found it, But i might of said just for the equipment, not backhaul/man hours. I don't think they had any New NV sites, just upgrades form existing sites. I do not see them adding any for a little bit. But they will need to build or set up something like this in the next year or two in a few locations. Hopefully just spend the money and set up 2 or so macro sites. But one of these would not be a bad thing in the locations where They are building huge shopping centers. But do you think A repeater set like this would cost over 10k?

Strange though why they would use repeaters for the whole community in that area..

wont stuff like E911 wont work unless you state your location

[Destroyallcubes]

Strange though why they would use repeaters for the whole community in that area..

wont stuff like E911 wont work unless you state your location

Well It is a cheaper way to offer service though. I know a few areas where I am at could benefit from these, mainly low volume areas, but In certain spots they just need one Or two Macro Towers for the entire county. But The 150-200k persite would make it too expensive. I know 800 Should help. But it sounds like you need a macro site, not repeaters.

[markjcc]

Well It is a cheaper way to offer service though. I know a few areas where I am at could benefit from these, mainly low volume areas, but In certain spots they just need one Or two Macro Towers for the entire county. But The 150-200k persite would make it too expensive. I know 800 Should help. But it sounds like you need a macro site, not repeaters.

They could just upgrade that site that is getting served from the repeater and upgrade the repeater to like 800SMR like what the big boss man in yellow said

[S4GRU]

Repeaters are great for canyons. Places technically served by a macro cell, but the signal is being blocked by physical obstruction...like canyon walls. In a canyon, you could climb the wall and actually get a macro cell signal. The repeater just fills in the canyon shadows with a usable signal.

 

As far as 911 calls, it wouldn't be extremely helpful to triangulate off a repeater as likely the device will not see any other signals...hence the reason for the repeater. But they will be able to triangulate on the repeater and know to start focusing on the area that the repeater serves. The same problem exists on sites that have only one site for many miles. Can't triangulate in that instance either.

 

Also, as far as 911, is it better to not have a repeater at all and have no signal and cannot call 911 to begin with? Or is it better to be able to call 911 and they will have to provide the location themselves for help? I prefer the latter.

 

Robert via Samsung Note 8.0 using Tapatalk Pro

 

 

[mrjeff]

Those dont need to be upgraded as they take the weak signal and repeat it stronger with some amplifiers i assume

 

On the Sprint site, the user said that Juni support told him that the repeaters are connected by fiber to either a base station or the closest  tower.  

 

If this is true - I'd think the base station/tower could directly tell the repeater what signal to broadcast.  Is it possible these these antenna's are all broadcasting there signals independently rather than just taking a weak signal and amplifying it and that the processing of data/calls is just done off site at the base station/tower that these are all connected to?