T-Mobile LTE & Network Discussion V2

[EvanA]

Looks like T-Mobile's coverage map is going to get a little more LTE coverage this year: http://www.fiercewireless.com/story/t-mobile-well-cover-30m-40m-new-pops-year/2016-03-03?utm_medium=rss&utm_source=feedly&utm_campaign=rss

They're referring to retail footprint, not coverage. There are only 321 million people (estimated) in the US.

[Maverick]

That would be fantastic news for DT in regards to Comcast buying out t-mobileus.

 

And could turn out the better for everyone all around in the US mobile wireless market.

[Paynefanbro]

That title was very click-baity

 

Sent from my Nexus 6 using Tapatalk

[bigsnake49]

That would be fantastic news for DT in regards to Comcast buying out t-mobileus.

 

And could turn out the better for everyone all around in the US mobile wireless market.

 

Wishful thinking! T-Mobile is way too expensive. It probably carries a 30% premium from people speculating that it will be acquired. 

[dnicekid]

I don't see Comcast and Tmo

I think Comcast and sprint could happen. They were in talks before, but now sprints network is much better which would make Comcast feel a lot better

[bigsnake49]

I don't see Comcast and Tmo

I think Comcast and sprint could happen. They were in talks before, but now sprints network is much better which would make Comcast feel a lot better

 

Sprint will be available much cheaper than T-Mobile. Comcast would do Sprint a great favor if they go involved in the 600MHz auction. The only problem with Comcast getting in bed with Sprint would be that it would force Dish to get in bed with T-Mobile.

Edited March 4, 2016 by bigsnake49

[dnicekid]

Sprint will be available much cheaper than T-Mobile. Comcast would do Sprint a great favor if they go involved in the 600MHz auction. The only problem with Comcast getting in bed with Sprint would be that it would force Dish to get in bed with T-Mobile.

With tmos pricing along with a package deal with dish would put pressure on att. A carefully priced package deal with sprint/Comcast would def be a much bigger problem for all others.

Whoever Comcast buys its a problem for others.

 

 

 

 

Very true, Comcast and sprint with all of Comcast wifi spots with their 600 purchase and sprints spectrum .... We might not like it but it creates a serious threat to att AND vzw immediately.

Dish would have to jump with Tmo.. Where is vzw after all this???

That would be interesting!!!!!

[nexgencpu]

Sprint will be available much cheaper than T-Mobile. Comcast would do Sprint a great favor if they go involved in the 600MHz auction. The only problem with Comcast getting in bed with Sprint would be that it would force Dish to get in bed with T-Mobile.

600Mhz would bring nothing new to the table. I understand Tmobile's position on needing some more spectrum, but again, 600Mhz for Sprint is a waste of time and money.

 

Unless its a sizable chunk (20Mhz+ acquired nationally) I just dont see the cost+benefit of it for Sprint.

 

Explain to me how this would be better than Sprint's current nationwide 800Mhz, which by the time 600Mhz is deployable (2019-2020) Sprint would be able to refarm 1x to LTE.

[mozamcrew]

600Mhz would bring nothing new to the table. I understand Tmobile's position on needing some more spectrum, but again, 600Mhz for Sprint is a waste of time and money.

 

Unless its a sizable chunk (20Mhz+ acquired nationally) I just dont see the cost+benefit of it for Sprint.

 

Explain to me how this would be better than Sprint's current nationwide 800Mhz, which by the time 600Mhz is deployable (2019-2020) Sprint would be able to refarm 1x to LTE.

 

I don't see the point of refarming the single 1x carrier in 800 to LTE. It's just not going to provide that much bandwidth. I guess in markets where you have enough 800 Mhz spectrum to do a 5x5 and a 3x3 of LTE 800, then it might be worth it. But if I were Sprint, I would completely eliminate CDMA in PCS and have a very dense network before I thought about removing the single 1x800 carrier. Voice and SMS continuity are important too.

[nexgencpu]

I don't see the point of refarming the single 1x carrier in 800 to LTE. It's just not going to provide that much bandwidth. I guess in markets where you have enough 800 Mhz spectrum to do a 5x5 and a 3x3 of LTE 800, then it might be worth it. But if I were Sprint, I would completely eliminate CDMA in PCS and have a very dense network before I thought about removing the single 1x800 carrier. Voice and SMS continuity are important too.

Latest versions of LTE standard's allow smaller chunks of Spectrum to be used, so in theory once CDMA is decommissioned they could potentially use this small slither to deliver VoLTE.

[mozamcrew]

Latest versions of LTE standard's allow smaller chunks of Spectrum to be used, so in theory once CDMA is decommissioned they could potentially use this small slither to deliver VoLTE.

 

I totally get that you could deploy a 1.4Mhz LTE carrier, but when you look at the coverage benefits of that single 1x800 for voice and SMS, versus the tiny amount of capacity it would provide if converted to LTE, you might as well hold onto that last 1x800 until CDMA is pretty much completely gone from the pool of phones. 

[nexgencpu]

I totally get that you could deploy a 1.4Mhz LTE carrier, but when you look at the coverage benefits of that single 1x800 for voice and SMS, versus the tiny amount of capacity it would provide if converted to LTE, you might as well hold onto that last 1x800 until CDMA is pretty much completely gone from the pool of phones.

 

Hence why I mentioned 2020..

[Overstew]

Is there a way to sort by markets that were recently added to 1H 2016 in RootMetrics?  The old layout had the specific date it was posted so sorting the new releases with the old ones was a lot easier.  I'm sure they are purposely omitting that information due to the outcry that their data is "out-dated." 

[bigsnake49]

600Mhz would bring nothing new to the table. I understand Tmobile's position on needing some more spectrum, but again, 600Mhz for Sprint is a waste of time and money.

 

Unless its a sizable chunk (20Mhz+ acquired nationally) I just dont see the cost+benefit of it for Sprint.

 

Explain to me how this would be better than Sprint's current nationwide 800Mhz, which by the time 600Mhz is deployable (2019-2020) Sprint would be able to refarm 1x to LTE.

 

No everyone of us lives in downtown San Fransisco or Manhattan. A lot of us live in the suburbs with NIMBYs. Plus there is no tall buildings around and the towers are spaced for 850 AMPS. We could hardly get 1x and EVDO signal inside our homes and we only get weak LTE outside. So we are hoping that 600 will finally allow us to get LTE on our couches. We'd love to get signal inside the buildings we we work. So yes we need 600 MHz for coverage although a 10x10 nationwide chunk does wonders for capacity. We advocated that Sprint get the 700MHz A block instead of T-Mobile. Hell we'd be satisfied if some way, somehow Sprint extended its 7MHzx7MHz to 10x10. So yes Sprint acquiring lower spectrum would be great.

[mozamcrew]

Hence why I mentioned 2020..

 

I missed the 2020 part apparently... but I think the CDMA sunset will take longer than everyone thinks. We are just now seeing Sprint deploy second carriers in markets where they have 15x15 of A-F PCS spectrum, so they are using about 10x10 still for CDMA. In a couple more years, they will probably get it down to 5x5 for CDMA as the LTE network gets more dense and more traffic moves off of CDMA. They probably won't be able to completely purge CDMA out of PCS until 2021-2023 at the earliest, a good 2-3 years after they get ubiquitous VoLTE support on new devices. But there will be a benefit of doing that, because they will be able to to 4x4 MIMO on PCS LTE once they complete that move. Whereas I don't think there is a similar benefit to removing that last 1x800 carrier, correct me if I'm wrong. So that last 1x800 carrier will certainly linger on even longer, maybe until almost 2030 just because the benefits of dropping that last carrier are so small, whereas the coverage benefits of keeping that one carrier alive are pretty big. 

 

I also think CDMA will stay in phones longer because there will be little reason to drop it from the phone. You are already seeing the price premium that Qualcomm can charge for CDMA drop. It will eventually disappear almost entirely, and once that is the case there will be little reason to drop CDMA support to save money. Plus I think people that live in rural areas, or other areas with marginal coverage, will appreciate having that support. It will be a value add for Qualcomm, rather than a premium product.

[Paynefanbro]

No everyone of us lives in downtown San Fransisco or Manhattan. A lot of us live in the suburbs with NIMBYs. Plus there is no tall buildings around and the towers are spaced for 850 AMPS. We could hardly get 1x and EVDO signal inside our homes and we only get weak LTE outside. So we are hoping that 600 will finally allow us to get LTE on our couches. We'd love to get signal inside the buildings we we work. So yes we need 600 MHz for coverage although a 10x10 nationwide chunk does wonders for capacity. We advocated that Sprint get the 700MHz A block instead of T-Mobile. Hell we'd be satisfied if some way, somehow Sprint extended its 7MHzx7MHz to 10x10. So yes Sprint acquiring lower spectrum would be great.

 

 

I understand your struggle but at the same time I think you underestimate how difficult deployment in downtown areas of large cities are. Just because there is a site 2 blocks away with 800MHz doesn't mean I'm getting a signal at my desk.

[tyroned3222]

does tmo support multi band CA, aren't their antennae/rrh limited to legacy builds?

 

Sent from my SM-G928P using Tapatalk

[markjcc]

Congestion?

 

http://imgur.com/pFf1MjE

http://i.imgur.com/QVaq2fl.png

[bigsnake49]

I missed the 2020 part apparently... but I think the CDMA sunset will take longer than everyone thinks. We are just now seeing Sprint deploy second carriers in markets where they have 15x15 of A-F PCS spectrum, so they are using about 10x10 still for CDMA. In a couple more years, they will probably get it down to 5x5 for CDMA as the LTE network gets more dense and more traffic moves off of CDMA. They probably won't be able to completely purge CDMA out of PCS until 2021-2023 at the earliest, a good 2-3 years after they get ubiquitous VoLTE support on new devices. But there will be a benefit of doing that, because they will be able to to 4x4 MIMO on PCS LTE once they complete that move. Whereas I don't think there is a similar benefit to removing that last 1x800 carrier, correct me if I'm wrong. So that last 1x800 carrier will certainly linger on even longer, maybe until almost 2030 just because the benefits of dropping that last carrier are so small, whereas the coverage benefits of keeping that one carrier alive are pretty big. 

 

I also think CDMA will stay in phones longer because there will be little reason to drop it from the phone. You are already seeing the price premium that Qualcomm can charge for CDMA drop. It will eventually disappear almost entirely, and once that is the case there will be little reason to drop CDMA support to save money. Plus I think people that live in rural areas, or other areas with marginal coverage, will appreciate having that support. It will be a value add for Qualcomm, rather than a premium product.

 

 

CDMA will be phased out when both Sprint and its roaming partners have densified their networks enough to so that VOLTE coverage is equal or better than CDMA coverage. Of course they might be M2M contracts that also come into consideration.

[anthony.spina97]

Congestion?

 

http://imgur.com/pFf1MjE

http://i.imgur.com/QVaq2fl.png

I didn't think it was possible to have that high of an upload speed?

 

-Anthony

[SeanK_]

I didn't think it was possible to have that high of an upload speed?

 

-Anthony

Its possible. I've seen this few times myself.

[Deval]

No everyone of us lives in downtown San Fransisco or Manhattan. A lot of us live in the suburbs with NIMBYs. Plus there is no tall buildings around and the towers are spaced for 850 AMPS. We could hardly get 1x and EVDO signal inside our homes and we only get weak LTE outside. So we are hoping that 600 will finally allow us to get LTE on our couches. We'd love to get signal inside the buildings we we work. So yes we need 600 MHz for coverage although a 10x10 nationwide chunk does wonders for capacity. We advocated that Sprint get the 700MHz A block instead of T-Mobile. Hell we'd be satisfied if some way, somehow Sprint extended its 7MHzx7MHz to 10x10. So yes Sprint acquiring lower spectrum would be great.

 

Those neighborhoods would be prime locations for small cells.

[bigsnake49]

Those neighborhoods would be prime locations for small cells.

 

The classical thinking is that small cells are for urban and not suburban settings. Additionally, large buildings, malls, package stores, department stores might benefit.

[Deval]

The classical thinking is that small cells are for urban and not suburban settings. Additionally, large buildings, malls, package stores, department stores might benefit.

 

I know but a lot of classical thinking could go out the window with NGN.

[NYC126]

http://www.jdpower.com/press-releases/2016-us-wireless-network-quality-performance-study-volume-1

 

The jdpower network study is out, and Verizon is king in every region.