LTE 1900 band vs. upcoming 800 band

[nels0300]

Will the LTE 1900 band have the same building penetration issues as wimax, only slightly less since it's a slightly lower frequency? Is there more to building penetration ability than frequency?

 

I've learned that the upcoming LTE devices from Sprint don't support Sprint's eventual 800 band LTE. Like I've complained about in another thread, my EVO is tired and laggy and I'd like to get something a little snappier. Knowing that the first LTE devices are out of date right out of the box by not supporting the 800 band LTE, and my city won't have LTE for a while, I'm leaning towards getting a better wimax device used on craigslist and waiting to use my upgrade on a device that supports both 800 and 1900 LTE.

 

So who wants to sell me their Photon?

[NateC]

LTE at 1900 MHz should be much better penetration-wise than WiMax at 2500 MHz. To get an idea about the penetration, note that Sprint currently uses 1900 MHz for its EVDO (3G) data network.

 

800 MHz will be much better still, of course.

[lynyrd65]

The 1900 LTE should have slightly better signal strength than the 3G you already get. So if 3G in your buildings is an issue than LTE will have issues as well and likewise if your 3G reception is good your LTE reception will be good as well.

 

800 is an interesting animal. I really hope it helps as much as I want it too, that is having signal parity with the likes of Verizon but I have my doubts that it will be used for more than capacity. Even if it does help I doubt you will see it until some time infinitely far away in the future (being in the final rounds is freaking depressing).

[S4GRU]

Will the LTE 1900 band have the same building penetration issues as wimax, only slightly less since it's a slightly lower frequency? Is there more to building penetration ability than frequency?

 

I've learned that the upcoming LTE devices from Sprint don't support Sprint's eventual 800 band LTE. Like I've complained about in another thread, my EVO is tired and laggy and I'd like to get something a little snappier. Knowing that the first LTE devices are out of date right out of the box by not supporting the 800 band LTE, and my city won't have LTE for a while, I'm leaning towards getting a better wimax device used on craigslist and waiting to use my upgrade on a device that supports both 800 and 1900 LTE.

 

So who wants to sell me their Photon?

 

LTE 1900 will out perform WiMax 2500 in every way, except capacity. It will penetrate buildings better, it will be faster (not because LTE is faster than WiMax, but because of how this network is being deployed). Basically, everywhere you get 3G EVDO now, you will get LTE 1900. Eventually, when Sprint starts selling 800 LTE devices and the 800 LTE network is operating, that LTE service with Sprint will be far better in coverage and penetration than 3G EVDO at 1900 is now.

 

Robert

[ericdabbs]

OP let me put it to you this way....LTE at 2500 Mhz will reach farther than Wimax at 2500 Mhz alone. Wimax at 2500 Mhz has a threshold of around -85 dBm before it drops off hard while LTE at 2500 Mhz has a threshold of around -105 dBm which means LTE will have better in building penetration than Wimax. That alone tells you that LTE and Wimax at the same frequency is already better with LTE.

 

There is no doubt that even LTE at 1900 Mhz will have better in building penetration not only because it is lower frequency but Sprint is doing some little things such as putting the Radio Remote Units (RRUs) up high on the tower which will yield ~20% farther distance since you don't get the losses from the coax cables if the RRUs were set at the ground.

 

It is most likely that the first LTE phones will not have 800 Mhz LTE support since Sprint is still going through refarming of the 800 Mhz spectrum. If you wait until mid to late 2013 for phones, you might even get support for Clearwire's 2500 Mhz LTE bands. Luckily I can't upgrade until June 2013 which is just in time for the next phones which should support all 3 LTE bands at 800, 1900 and 2500 Mhz.

[strung]

OP let me put it to you this way....LTE at 2500 Mhz will reach farther than Wimax at 2500 Mhz alone. Wimax at 2500 Mhz has a threshold of around -85 dBm before it drops off hard while LTE at 2500 Mhz has a threshold of around -105 dBm which means LTE will have better in building penetration than Wimax. That alone tells you that LTE and Wimax at the same frequency is already better with LTE.

 

Is this because of how WiMAX devices are provisioned to disconnect at -89 dBm or worse signal? Or something inherent to WiMAX?

[Steven800]

Is this because of how WiMAX devices are provisioned to disconnect at -89 dBm or worse signal? Or something inherent to WiMAX?

Yes because I know you can go into the settings on the evo or galaxy and change it to be like -110dBm but it will not be a blazing fast connection or will it be energy efficient.

Is this because of how WiMAX devices are provisioned to disconnect at -89 dBm or worse signal? Or something inherent to WiMAX?

[Steven800]

OMG i didnt mean to put that both times oops.

[Duffman]

Let's also not forget that the Network Vision towers have the radios up by the antennas rather than on the ground, meaning less loss and more power. (Right?)

[92EG8]

If you wait until mid to late 2013 for phones, you might even get support for Clearwire's 2500 Mhz LTE bands. Luckily I can't upgrade until June 2013 which is just in time for the next phones which should support all 3 LTE bands at 800, 1900 and 2500 Mhz.

Same here my upgrade won't be until Feb 2013 but I'm thinking about buying either the SGIII or HTC OneX off contract just to play around with. I have an evo 4G right now but its getting old fast.

 

Sent From My Evo 4G Amped Up On Verizon Tower Power!

[lynyrd65]

Yes because I know you can go into the settings on the evo or galaxy and change it to be like -110dBm but it will not be a blazing fast connection or will it be energy efficient.

 

I am sending this message over wimax at -89 dbm. I just noticed the Nexus can be edited to -110dbm as well. I think I may be the first to notice this possibility. I made a thread on it here. It increased my speeds by as much as 2x.

[Sgt. Slaughter]

 

LTE 1900 will out perform WiMax 2500 in every way, except capacity. It will penetrate buildings better, it will be faster (not because LTE is faster than WiMax, but because of how this network is being deployed). Basically, everywhere you get 3G EVDO now, you will get LTE 1900. Eventually, when Sprint starts selling 800 LTE devices and the 800 LTE network is operating, that LTE service with Sprint will be far better in coverage and penetration than 3G EVDO at 1900 is now.

 

Robert

 

Though didn't somewhere you or someone state the signal dropoff rate is more harsh for 1900MHz LTE then EVDO 3G according to the testing being done?...or something along those lines.

 

Sent from my PG86100 using Tapatalk

[S4GRU]

 

Though didn't somewhere you or someone state the signal dropoff rate is more harsh for 1900MHz LTE then EVDO 3G according to the testing being done?...or something along those lines.

 

Sent from my PG86100 using Tapatalk

 

Yes. I did. And its true. Signal should be the same for EVDO and LTE from the same site. However, EVDO performance is relatively steady across a degrading signal, whereas LTE performance degrades proportionally across the signal degradation.

 

At -101dBm, EVDO has lost 35% of its performance. At -101, LTE has lost 70% of its performance. At -106dBm, EVDO has lost 75% of its performance and LTE has lost 80%. So here you can see EVDO performance degradation is relatively flat compared to signal degradation up to -101dBm and then falls off a cliff and catches up with LTE around -106dBm.

 

But as far as WiMax goes, it is even sharper. WiMax loses 80% of its performance at -90dBm. And not only that, at 2500/2600MHz, the point away from the tower where you get a -90dBm is going to be so much closer than where you hit the -90dBm with EVDO/LTE on 1900.

 

When I look at the LTE testing data, I cannot help but smile. It will be heads and tails better than the best WiMax we ever had. Not because WiMax is inferior per se, it is mostly because how it is being deployed this time.

 

I do not have any 800 LTE field testing data, because they have not started testing 800 in the field yet. Otherwise I would have a permanent grin that couldn't be chiseled off my face, probably similar to John Elway's!

 

Robert - Posted from my E4GT with ICS using Forum Runner

[S4GRU]

This may be worth writing an article on and creating a graph.

 

Robert - Posted from my E4GT with ICS using Forum Runner

[NateC]

This may be worth writing an article on and creating a graph.

 

Robert - Posted from my E4GT with ICS using Forum Runner

 

I think that's a good idea.

[MacinJosh]

This may be worth writing an article on and creating a graph.

 

Robert - Posted from my E4GT with ICS using Forum Runner

 

I think it's a great idea.

[Sgt. Slaughter]

Yes. I did. And its true. Signal should be the same for EVDO and LTE from the same site. However, EVDO performance is relatively steady across a degrading signal, whereas LTE performance degrades proportionally across the signal degradation.

 

At -101dBm, EVDO has lost 35% of its performance. At -101, LTE has lost 70% of its performance. At -106dBm, EVDO has lost 75% of its performance and LTE has lost 80%. So here you can see EVDO performance degradation is relatively flat compared to signal degradation up to -101dBm and then falls off a cliff and catches up with LTE around -106dBm.

 

But as far as WiMax goes, it is even sharper. WiMax loses 80% of its performance at -90dBm. And not only that, at 2500/2600MHz, the point away from the tower where you get a -90dBm is going to be so much closer than where you hit the -90dBm with EVDO/LTE on 1900.

 

When I look at the LTE testing data, I cannot help but smile. It will be heads and tails better than the best WiMax we ever had. Not because WiMax is inferior per se, it is mostly because how it is being deployed this time.

 

I do not have any 800 LTE field testing data, because they have not started testing 800 in the field yet. Otherwise I would have a permanent grin that couldn't be chiseled off my face, probably similar to John Elway's!

 

Robert - Posted from my E4GT with ICS using Forum Runner

 

gotcha makes sense...

And kinda like someone else posted about it interesting to do LTE on the 800 instead of EVDO RevB w/ Do-Advanced since the EVDO performance has shown to deteriorate less over the loss of signal when compared to LTE...Speed wise should be on par too no since RevB can reach peaks of like 14Mbps...no?

[pyroscott]

Yes. I did. And its true. Signal should be the same for EVDO and LTE from the same site. However, EVDO performance is relatively steady across a degrading signal, whereas LTE performance degrades proportionally across the signal degradation.

 

At -101dBm, EVDO has lost 35% of its performance. At -101, LTE has lost 70% of its performance. At -106dBm, EVDO has lost 75% of its performance and LTE has lost 80%. So here you can see EVDO performance degradation is relatively flat compared to signal degradation up to -101dBm and then falls off a cliff and catches up with LTE around -106dBm.

 

But as far as WiMax goes, it is even sharper. WiMax loses 80% of its performance at -90dBm. And not only that, at 2500/2600MHz, the point away from the tower where you get a -90dBm is going to be so much closer than where you hit the -90dBm with EVDO/LTE on 1900.

 

When I look at the LTE testing data, I cannot help but smile. It will be heads and tails better than the best WiMax we ever had. Not because WiMax is inferior per se, it is mostly because how it is being deployed this time.

 

I do not have any 800 LTE field testing data, because they have not started testing 800 in the field yet. Otherwise I would have a permanent grin that couldn't be chiseled off my face, probably similar to John Elway's!

 

Robert - Posted from my E4GT with ICS using Forum Runner

 

I'm wondering if the 800 MHz will have interference problems as it is spaced out for 1900 MHz propigation?

[S4GRU]

I'm wondering if the 800 MHz will have interference problems as it is spaced out for 1900 MHz propigation?

 

Typically, this can be handled with downtilt adjustment, however the 800 and 1900 share panels in Network Vision. I'm nearly certain this has been taken into consideration, I just don't have the answer how.

 

Robert

[IAmSixNine]

Great info Robert.

[twospirits]

This may be worth writing an article on and creating a graph.

 

Robert - Posted from my E4GT with ICS using Forum Runner

I would love to see that.

 

Speaking of bands, I'm curious, how would a world phone by Sprint fall into play with LTE? Could such an animal work?

 

TS

[pyroscott]

I would love to see that.

 

Speaking of bands, I'm curious, how would a world phone by Sprint fall into play with LTE? Could such an animal work?

 

TS

 

Spoiler alert. There may be an article in the works about that.

I'm sure I'm going to get flamed on the article though because some might say it can't work.

[twospirits]

ha, my Nostradamus powers told me to post that. Good to know that an article is coming.

 

 

TS