Sprint to join Rural Operators Roaming Hub (CCA and RRPP thread)

[Paynefanbro]

I believe they're up to 27 rural carriers (here & here), many of whom nobody's heard of. USCC is the elephant in the room.

I knew that, I mean what carriers have started LTE roaming. But I guess they are talking about the EVDO roaming portion having started in November.

[dnicekid]

Us cellular could be sleeping with Tmo....

After all the Tmo promises for this year it wouldn't surprise me if thats the carrier....

However, I think the Tmo boss would have hinted at it by now

[lilotimz]

Us cellular could be sleeping with Tmo....

After all the Tmo promises for this year it wouldn't surprise me if thats the carrier....

However, I think the Tmo boss would have hinted at it by now

If tmobile was going to get a major roaming partner like USCC they would've been parading the fact that USCC is announcing a major lte roaming partner soon and that they will be too.

[dnicekid]

Are we sure it's sprint?

[anthony.spina97]

Are we sure it's sprint?

Who else could it be?

 

-Anthony

[Paynefanbro]

It's either Sprint or T-Mobile. My money is on Sprint though.

[lilotimz]

Are we sure it's sprint?

I'd put big money on sprint but they can also do one with tmobile. These rural partners don't have to be exclusive. They sprint RRPP and CCA netamerica Alliance is meant to be inclusive and welcomes everyone to roam with each other.

[dkyeager]

Any updates on when we can roam with RRPP and CCA given the right phone? (nexus 5, 6 and LG Flex 2 I believe)  I am hoping it is when the start shipping the LG Flex 2.

[KD8JBF]

Any updates on when we can roam with RRPP and CCA given the right phone? (nexus 5, 6 and LG Flex 2 I believe)  I am hoping it is when the start shipping the LG Flex 2.

 

I'm curious of the same...I will be switching phones when this happens...

[S4GRU]

Any updates on when we can roam with RRPP and CCA given the right phone? (nexus 5, 6 and LG Flex 2 I believe) I am hoping it is when the start shipping the LG Flex 2.

No updates.

[WiWavelength]

Any updates on when we can roam with RRPP and CCA given the right phone? (nexus 5, 6 and LG Flex 2 I believe)

 

The Nexus 5 supports band 17, not band 12.

 

AJ

[caspar347]

The Nexus 5 supports band 17, not band 12.

 

AJ

It at least supports 4 and 5.

 

Do any RRPP carriers use 17? I can't remember.

[WiWavelength]

Do any RRPP carriers use 17? I can't remember.

 

No.  Band 17 is effectively AT&T's creation.

 

AJ

[caspar347]

No.  Band 17 is effectively AT&T's creation.

 

AJ

Ahh. That seems like something that could backfire once LTE roaming is a thing among more carriers.

[gnoj]

Ahh. That seems like something that could backfire once LTE roaming is a thing among more carriers.

Nope. AT&T is currently applying MFBI across their network in order to provide compatibility for both B12 & B17 devices.

 

The current deadline for the completion of MFBI deployment is September 30, subject to an extension of up to 6 months if warranted. After this date, the roll-out of branded B12 devices will begin (deprecating B17 entirely within 2 years), existing non-branded B12 devices will immediately be permitted to access the network, and LTE roaming agreements may be announced and/or begin to go into effect.

[jeffcarp]

The CCA website has a coverage map that shows nearly the entire state of Iowa covered. If USCC isn't in the CCA whose coverage are they representing?

[Conan Kudo]

The CCA website has a coverage map that shows nearly the entire state of Iowa covered. If USCC isn't in the CCA whose coverage are they representing?

T-Mobile affiliate iWireless is a member of the CCA. Its coverage is represented in the CCA coverage map.

[lou99/maximus1987]

T-Mobile affiliate iWireless is a member of the CCA. Its coverage is represented in the CCA coverage map.

What's tmobile's long term plan for iwireless?

[jeffcarp]

T-Mobile affiliate iWireless is a member of the CCA. Its coverage is represented in the CCA coverage map.

Oh, so maybe I don't understand this deal then. So does the Sprint CCA partnership not include all of the CCA members?

[EvanA]

Oh, so maybe I don't understand this deal then. So does the Sprint CCA partnership not include all of the CCA members?

It does not at this point. The carriers in the RRPP are a subset of CCA carriers.

[Paynefanbro]

If Sprint accelerates the shift to VoLTE, we would see even GSM operators join the RRPP.

[utiz4321]

If Sprint accelerates the shift to VoLTE, we would see even GSM operators join the RRPP.

Is there any way to hand off calls from lte to cdma?

[Conan Kudo]

Is there any way to hand off calls from lte to cdma?

Not without some really messy breakages. Essentially, because the two systems use totally different core network platforms (as opposed to GSM/UMTS+LTE systems), making the two systems establish seamless voice handover is so technically challenging that it is not practical to make it work.

 

That said, some work was done two years ago to establish a prototype mechanism for it. It works by treating the CDMA network as an visitor network and using the roaming handover mechanism to transfer the call. By doing so, however, the call drops to the lowest common codec: PCM. So HD Voice and all the other stuff is gone. What's worse is that the prototype didn't work very well in testing, with extraordinarily high failure rates (>20-30% of all calls failed to transfer). In the end, the CDMA operators who were driving the development of the idea killed it because of the unacceptable quality. Verizon and KDDI went on to just roll out VoLTE without any form of interconnection with the CDMA network layer.

[EvanA]

Not without some really messy breakages. Essentially, because the two systems use totally different core network platforms (as opposed to GSM/UMTS+LTE systems), making the two systems establish seamless voice handover is so technically challenging that it is not practical to make it work.

 

That said, some work was done two years ago to establish a prototype mechanism for it. It works by treating the CDMA network as an visitor network and using the roaming handover mechanism to transfer the call. By doing so, however, the call drops to the lowest common codec: PCM. So HD Voice and all the other stuff is gone. What's worse is that the prototype didn't work very well in testing, with extraordinarily high failure rates (>20-30% of all calls failed to transfer). In the end, the CDMA operators who were driving the development of the idea killed it because of the unacceptable quality. Verizon and KDDI went on to just roll out VoLTE without any form of interconnection with the CDMA network layer.

According to the information we have about Sprint's VoLTE plan there will be VoLTE to CDMA handoff.

 

"The Sprint VoLTE network will be designed to hand off calls to the existing Sprint CDMA network, including HD Voice calls, via the EVRC-NW codec"

 

"VoLTE calls will not be given QoS Priority on LTE initially. Should LTE capacity constraints be experienced during a VoLTE call, the call will be handed over to the 1x network"

 

http://s4gru.com/index.php?/blog/1/entry-368-sprint-is-proceeding-with-a-volte-network-that-focuses-on-interoperability-with-domestic-and-international-volte-carriers/

[Conan Kudo]

According to the information we have about Sprint's VoLTE plan there will be VoLTE to CDMA handoff.

 

"The Sprint VoLTE network will be designed to hand off calls to the existing Sprint CDMA network, including HD Voice calls, via the EVRC-NW codec"

 

"VoLTE calls will not be given QoS Priority on LTE initially. Should LTE capacity constraints be experienced during a VoLTE call, the call will be handed over to the 1x network"

 

http://s4gru.com/index.php?/blog/1/entry-368-sprint-is-proceeding-with-a-volte-network-that-focuses-on-interoperability-with-domestic-and-international-volte-carriers/

At this time, that's not possible. I also find it extremely hard to believe that Sprint will be able to do it, especially when no one else has been able to get it to work (or wants to anymore). SRVCC does not support continuous transcoding, which is required for compatibility with EVRC codec family. The roaming mechanism could support it, but it would be EVRC encoding PCM, which doesn't afford any benefits except compressed bandwidth.

 

If it could be done without unacceptably high failure rates, I think Verizon, KDDI, and others would do it. Since it isn't, they don't want to touch it. It would degrade the quality of the network experience for customers, which they definitely don't want. It's already hard enough to keep customers from leaving to GSM/UMTS operators, they don't want to make it worse by impairing the quality of their voice systems even more.