Official Tmobile-Sprint merger discussion thread

[dewbertdc]

Looks like the Shentel deal is finally closed. 
 

https://www.lightreading.com/5g/shentel-finishes-sale-of-wireless-biz-to-t-mobile/d/d-id/770617

[Paynefanbro]

14 hours ago, Dkoellerwx said:

Sprint B41 and T-Mobile B41 are still operating in tandem here. T-Mobile has 40Mhz of n41 on air, plus 2x20Mhz of B41. Sprint still has 2x20Mhz of B41 on air as well.

Any reason why T-Mobile hasn't increased n41 beyond 40MHz in your area? Are there any squatters preventing them from expanding? In NYC we started at 40MHz n41 but are now at 80MHz after T-Mobile reduced Sprint from three 20MHz Band 41 carriers on macros down to a single 20MHz carrier and on small cells they reduced it from one or two 20MHz carriers down to a single 10MHz carrier.

[Dkoellerwx]

2 hours ago, Paynefanbro said:

Any reason why T-Mobile hasn't increased n41 beyond 40MHz in your area? Are there any squatters preventing them from expanding?

I've been asking that question for months. As far as I'm aware, there shouldn't be anything preventing them from widening it to at least 60Mhz, as that is what Sprint had on air before the merger. It seems like they have the appropriate amount of spectrum here, so I don't know what the hold up is.

[Mr.Nuke]

3 hours ago, Paynefanbro said:

Any reason why T-Mobile hasn't increased n41 beyond 40MHz in your area? Are there any squatters preventing them from expanding

T-Mobile has the entire BRS/EBS spectrum in Omaha so that isn't the issue.

[mdob07]

Has anyone seen the Sprint network shut down in a given area yet? In Louisville today I tried in a couple different spots to force B25 or B26 with the band selector app and for B25 it tried to connect to AT&T and for B26 it tried to connect to Verizon. I'm not sure if this is temporary or not. I am on the T-Mobile side so its possible it's just T-Mobile connections being blocked on the Sprint sites. I'll fire up an old Sprint phone when I get home and see if I can connect to Sprint or not. 

[Jeff68005]

Just received by snail mail notice of Sprint CDMA and lower LTE bring terminated January 1st.  Letter specified my HTC One M8 and  Katana phone.  Local T-Mobile store offered T-Mobiile SIM for the HTC  M8 befrore I switched fully to T-Mobile. and again after I fully switched.

I made the choice a few days later to trade the HTC One M8 in exchange to Samsung A32 5G for "free" (2 year lease/ lease payment credits)

[PedroDaGr8]

50 minutes ago, mdob07 said:

Has anyone seen the Sprint network shut down in a given area yet? In Louisville today I tried in a couple different spots to force B25 or B26 with the band selector app and for B25 it tried to connect to AT&T and for B26 it tried to connect to Verizon. I'm not sure if this is temporary or not. I am on the T-Mobile side so its possible it's just T-Mobile connections being blocked on the Sprint sites. I'll fire up an old Sprint phone when I get home and see if I can connect to Sprint or not. 

Yes, a few towers here have been shutdown. Namely the main tower in downtown Kirkland. 

[Jeff68005]

Trying toi deal with an issue, the local T-mobile folk totally locked my primary cell phone.  It's useless for the night.  Now I have to go to a Samsung dealer and have them unlock it.

[comintel]

Just now, Jeff68005 said:

Trying toi deal with an issue, the local T-mobile folk totally locked my primary cell phone.  It's useless for the night.  Now I have been to go to a Samsung dealer and have them unlock it.

Do you have McAfee installed?  It can lock phones on a sim change.

[Jeff68005]

On 7/1/2021 at 8:34 PM, comintel said:

Do you have McAfee installed?  It can lock phones on a sim change.

Yes.  I was just have an issue until they played with it.  No Sim change done and they refused to change the SIM.

On 7/1/2021 at 6:45 PM, PedroDaGr8 said:

Yes, a few towers here have been shutdown. Namely the main tower in downtown Kirkland. 

My problem child  is south of me and not a closer tower you would think services me.

[comintel]

1 minute ago, Jeff68005 said:

Yes.  I was just have an issue until they played with it.  No Sim change done and they refused to change the SIM.

Many people who have McAfee installed are having this happen when they try to TNX.

In a lot of cases the store employees are doing factory resets to recover, whioch however loses the prior contents unless backed up.

 

Edited July 2, 2021 by comintel

[iansltx]

4 hours ago, mdob07 said:

Has anyone seen the Sprint network shut down in a given area yet? In Louisville today I tried in a couple different spots to force B25 or B26 with the band selector app and for B25 it tried to connect to AT&T and for B26 it tried to connect to Verizon. I'm not sure if this is temporary or not. I am on the T-Mobile side so its possible it's just T-Mobile connections being blocked on the Sprint sites. I'll fire up an old Sprint phone when I get home and see if I can connect to Sprint or not. 

I saw that here awhile back, but a reboot or two got me access to 25/26 again. Maybe it's offline for real now, but not sure why they'd do that in areas that aren't direly spectrum constrained ahead of the shutdown in a year.

[Jeff68005]

On 7/1/2021 at 8:40 PM, comintel said:

Many people who have McAfee installed are having this happen when they try to TNX.

In a lot of cases the store employees are doing factory resets to recover, whioch however loses the prior contents unless backed up.

 

I went to T-Mobile office at Shadowlake in Papillion, NE about 11:00 AM Friday July 2nd.

After three hours with them getting varying results, my Galaxy X32 5G, the store techs decided to do a warranty exchange for $20.00 fee.  I will be with a partial working phone for a week or so.

Edited July 4, 2021 by Jeff68005
Typos

[The_Chemist]

On 6/30/2021 at 9:05 PM, Dkoellerwx said:

Sprint B41 and T-Mobile B41 are still operating in tandem here. T-Mobile has 40Mhz of n41 on air, plus 2x20Mhz of B41. Sprint still has 2x20Mhz of B41 on air as well. However, anywhere there is Sprint B41, there is generally also a T-Mobile signal so I haven't seen Sprint B41 except in rare cases for a long time. 

Couple questions for you... which device are you using, and what SIM configuration? I'm guessing you're still using a "Sprint" SIM (TNA)? That's what it sounds like.

Was there no T-Mobile signal in the area you pick up Sprint B41? Usually if there is any T-Mobile signal, a TNA or TNX device will prefer that over Sprint. When you were connected to the Sprint B41, did you notice which PLMN was displayed, did it say Sprint Keep on SCP? 

I can't think of any reason for the network behavior that you described, particularly the weird PLMN. If they were converting the cell site to T-Mobile, the signal would go away completely. Sprint B41 won't magically become T-Mobile, they have to swap out the equipment. 

I'm receiving band 41 in the Harrisburg PA (Swatara Township) area as a T-Mobile customer. 

The Sprint bands are still run by a third party here (I'm thinking Shentel).

Band 41, 25 & 26 just lit up a few weeks ago in this area for T-Mobile. 

This totally messed my signal up at my residence. I used to get great T-Mobile reception, now my phone (a factory unlocked Samsung Galaxy Note 20 Ultra) locks onto band 41 and won't switch back over to the better T-Mobile bands available at my residence (71, 66, 12, 4, n71 etc...).

The download on B41 is good, but the upload can be as slow as 0.01 Mbps which totally messes up VoLTE phone calls. 

The only way to regain T-Mobile frequency bands is to either put the phone in the microwave (not on of course) to act as a Faraday Cage, or move out of the area, then back in. Usually, I end up back on B41 within 5 minutes again anyway. 

I think the control channel programming logic is all screwed up. I should be on the best usable band for phone calls. 

Before Sprint bands lit up, if my phone were idling on a poor signal band, it would switch to B12, N71 or N71 when a phone call came in. 

This nemesis B41 stays locked onto my phone at even -129 dBm. The only way to get rid of it is to put the phone in the microwave, at which point it will switch to a T-MOBILE band and remain there for the rest of the phone call. 

I really wish they'd get this fixed or give me a femtocell so I can at least make reliable phone calls. My WiFi is spotty. 

Customer service is actually worse than Verizon and that's saying something. I know more than the level 2 "experts". It's so frustrating!!!

On 6/30/2021 at 9:29 PM, Dkoellerwx said:

It's odd then that you were connecting to Sprint B41. It must be a keep site, and your signal must be weak enough on T-Mobile that your phone was finding the B41 preferable even though it was Sprint. Did you ever see any of the other Sprint bands or just B41? Hopefully it will be converted sooner rather than later so your experience can improve.

Same happens to me. T-Mobile SIM connecting to a Sprint B41. Never switches back to T-Mo even at -129 dBm. All screwed up. 

[Dkoellerwx]

6 hours ago, The_Chemist said:

The only way to regain T-Mobile frequency bands is to either put the phone in the microwave (not on of course) to act as a Faraday Cage, or move out of the area, then back in. Usually, I end up back on B41 within 5 minutes again anyway. 

This isn't an ideal solution, but download the Samsung Band Selector app. I posted instructions on how to use it earlier in this thread, not too long ago. You can set your phone to only look for B2, B4, B12, B66, and B71 which will lock out the Sprint signal. 

[Jeff68005]

23 minutes ago, Dkoellerwx said:

This isn't an ideal solution, but download the Samsung Band Selector app. I posted instructions on how to use it earlier in this thread, not too long ago. You can set your phone to only look for B2, B4, B12, B66, and B71 which will lock out the Sprint signal. 

Maybe it is me, but I wish Samsung Band Selector had a way to deselect all Band Selector choices.  Goal is to be in same mode a most Samsung phone users.

[jporter12]

On 6/30/2021 at 10:26 PM, Dkoellerwx said:

Cellmapper has a layer for the 312250 PLMN. Evidently it's been around for a while although I just realized it last week.

Well, I'll have to lock to B25 or something to map some of them in my area!  We have so much n41 and T-Mobile B41 that locking to B41 would be pointless!

[Cardsfan96]

I was at my cities freedom fest tonight which was presented (sponsored) by T-Mobile. They had a booth there and a COW site. During the concert T-Mobile became pretty much unusable for a period of time even with the COW. Does anyone know what these cows broadcast? Are they b66 only?

[Trip]

When I'm out locating 312250 sites, I lock a T-Mobile phone on Band 26.  Then the only thing it can possibly connect to is Sprint.  T-Mobile has their Band 2 operations running MFBI as Band 25, so that option isn't great either.  I sometimes manually adjust my Band 26 lock to include Band 25 near a site that I suspect is a 312250 site but which is B25-only.  I've located a few of those.

- Trip

[dkyeager]

16 hours ago, Jeff68005 said:

Maybe it is me, but I wish Samsung Band Selector had a way to deselect all Band Selector choices.  Goal is to be in same mode a most Samsung phone users.

Two presets for only T-Mobile and Sprint bands would be nice

The merger of the two networks is like Covid -- every few weeks something changes.  Therefor having maximum flexibility with selecting bands is idea [until T-Mobile puts Sprint out of its misery]. 

Rather than torturing us at this point, I wish T-Mobile would concentrate on a limited number of markets and get the T-Mobile side finished up in those markets and move to the next set of markets.  Basically just leave the band 26 and 1x800 up for the remaining local and traveling Sprint users.

 

Of course it can be said T-Mobile is working on the engine of a car moving 80MPH.

[The_Chemist]

17 hours ago, Dkoellerwx said:

This isn't an ideal solution, but download the Samsung Band Selector app. I posted instructions on how to use it earlier in this thread, not too long ago. You can set your phone to only look for B2, B4, B12, B66, and B71 which will lock out the Sprint signal. 

I did download that app last night. I saw mention of it earlier in this thread. It solved (...put a bandaid on...) the issue temporarily.  Found out that I had to reboot to make it stick. Thanks!

[DerekKY1980]

On 6/30/2021 at 10:41 PM, Dkoellerwx said:

Ah, didn't know that. It's possible the site was broadcasting the keep PLMN, but it didn't show in SCP without the alternate ID setting turned on (under preferences and general).

I turned this on the other night     I got connected to b41 again a few mins ago  SCP  read 310260  which i believe is T-Mo PLMN  but again it disconnected a few secs later.

[The_Chemist]

1 hour ago, DerekKY1980 said:

I turned this on the other night     I got connected to b41 again a few mins ago  SCP  read 310260  which i believe is T-Mo PLMN  but again it disconnected a few secs later.

[The_Chemist]

Just now, The_Chemist said:

Latches on to Sprint and only sees Sprint as neighbor cells. Completely ignores all the available good signal from T-Mo. 

[The_Chemist]

With the Samsung Band Select app in the same exact location, this is what I can get in my house.