Fierce has a poll posted... and is utilizing a bracket style contest to find out who their readers think is the most powerful person in the telecom industry. Between Marcelo and the pink clad Chihuahua of a man... I give it to Marcelo. I think the final winner should be Masa, it's is a name people know and will get to know more in the coming years worldwide. But for the current poll, it's an easy decision for me!
For Ericsson markets t-mobile uses what is known as AIR antenna units which have the radio unit integrated with the antenna. This type of setup significantly reduces signal loss from the radio to the antenna since they're both practically next to each other and not sepearated by coax jumper cables like that of a remote radio unit.
Basic Ericsson AIR21 setup
(Note typically there are 2 Ericsson AIR per sector)
Ericsson AIR21 + Band 12 700 mhz Equipment
Note the addition of a new low band 700 mhz capable antenna + Ericsson RRUS11 B12 (remote radio units) in addition to new TMA (tower mounted amplifiers) connected to the AIR antenna. The new Ericsson RRUS11 B12 + Antenna addition is for tmobiles band 12 700mhz (L700) deployment.
(Credit: tmo.rocks)
Credit for the photographs belong to whoever took it. You know who you are!
With the introduction of the new plans Sprint has announced. I told one of my friends about the $60 unlimited plan and she was shocked yet happy about it. She currently has T-Mobile and there has been times where my Sprint service has out performed her service even in the city with puling up information and out of town...well... you already know how that went. She was talking about switching and stuff but then she sent me a typical article bashing Sprint and I got irritated by it and I had to explain to her that Sprint is not bad at all. These articles are based on past experiences from 3+ years ago. I told her I'm pulling 60+ mbps on LTE but she's worried about Sprint being slow ( because of what she read). Guys give me some advice on persuading her to give Sprint a chance.
I feel like articles that are being posted is what keeps away customers. It makes no sense that T-Mobiles 2g network is not spoken about when they are in the news for changes to plans and such. But good ol Sprint makes changes and articles that get posted rips Sprint apart for filth.
http://ces.cnet.com/8301-35284_1-57616761/how-i-got-t-mobiles-ceo-kicked-out-of-at-ts-ces-party/
Roger Cheng @cnet appears to have had the most fun out of this, it kind of wrote the story for him I guess, so there is that. Also, just noticed the extra title Q, that is gonna drive some people nuts today. Top lel.
Am I the only one that likes to look at Verizon's coverage comparison tool. I think it gives a good idea of a carrier's generalized coverage as far as those cities that have been announced. However, it takes a while for it to get updated. I look at Verizon's map and think, no one will ever build an LTE network of that size. When I look at T-Mobile, I see a spotty, spread out network. AT&T is also spotty with a few highways covered here and there. Sprint seems to be more put together as in even if it is spotty, they are in blobs rather than random remote areas.
I've also found a few places that Sprint has coverage in but not Verizon such as in southern Texas.
Sprint has pretty much neglected our area. T-Mobile improved by leaps and bounds in this area when they acquired MetroPCS. Metro duplicated the Verizon network throughout Florida and had developed quite a following. Sprint's network actually went backwards in that they replaced some macro sites beach side with small cells + band 26. Not smart because small cells just don't have the coverage. Forced me to get an MB.
While I applaud all that work they have done lately, it was all borrowed money. Their debt load increased from all the capex spending. There's no magic in this. You spend money your network improves. You spend money you don't have, your debt increases.