S4GRU

Yes. But it will cause the capacity of the new 1xA carrier to drop if it is full of devices that are not 1xA capable. Robert

They are upgrading the microwave in many instances. It's a case by case basis depending on capability/demand. Robert

Sprint has deployed 1xAdvanced on a lot of 1900MHz. According to a Samsung engineer I spoke with about a year ago, Sprint is not deploying 1xA on all NV 1900 carriers. At the time, he didn't understand why. But they appeared to be avoiding 1xA on lower usage sites and in rural areas, including a lot of GMO sites. He said that all throughout Chicago metro area, Sprint deployed 1xA on 1900MHz. But he knows around Freeport and Rochelle, they did not. It definitely has happened, but I do not know the full scope or status of it nationwide. Robert

Most Sprint sites will receive Band 26 LTE (LTE 800). And Band 41 will go on nearly every WiMax site and nearly every Sprint site in the Top 100 markets. Robert

Also, I don't understand this hatred or anger against executives. Someone has to do that job. And they aren't going to do it for $50,000. Someone who is responsible for a $10 Billion network and a $20 Billion five year upgrade needs to paid accordingly for how much they are responsible. They earn the money. The market decides what is fair compensation. Good for them. I think too often we can be bitter and angry about these people. There really are not that many of them. It's just not healthy to think like that. It's like drinking poison and waiting for the other person to die. I bet if we actually knew some of these people, we would feel really ashamed to say such things. Robert

Sprint's woes are much deeper than just Elfman and Azzi. Masa said it a few weeks ago when he basically claimed that Sprint execs accept no for an answer too easily. And that is across the board. Maybe the departure of these two executives will shake up the rest of Sprint upper management to do better and fight harder. Or maybe a lot more house cleaning is in order to change the Sprint culture of accepting their lot as last place wireless provider? I feel for Azzi and Elfman. The network has failed in many respects under their watch. However, their answers were largely accepted all around Sprint. I see no urgency or culture to fight back and get the best result as soon as possible. The issue is much larger than these two. Not only has Sprint had a culture of accepting their lot in life, but they have had their hands tied financially for so long. The solution to their problems a few years ago was money. Now that they have access to money, they don't even know what to do next. They probably did the best they could with what they had for the past few years. But now their minds need to grow much bigger. Triage of the current network failures is not enough. No more crisis network management. The new network heads need to be in front of network problems before they happen, or at least as they happen in the worst case. They need to be pushing technologies out ahead of their competitors. They need to be aggressive. And if they need more money to do it, they need to be able to go back and fight Sprint execs and Masa himself to do it. They cannot take no for an answer. They need to be a scrappy fighter. And that is probably a task much larger than Elfman and Azzi can do right now. They are battle hardened and too narrow focused based on the chains they have had on for years. They have been too close to the problem. Probably a little PTSD. These are real people and we should have sympathy for them, to the extent that you can for total strangers. They aren't bad guys. They didn't do bad things to Sprint or the network. Their hands were tied. But they are not the best people moving forward. Sprint needs the best people to get moving forward. However, Masa gave them six months to get out of the funk they had the previous years to see if they were going to rise to the new challenges and the new fight. He didn't feel that they had it in them based on what they demonstrated. What they would need to be successful. I'm positive and optimistic about these changes for the future. Masa is no loser. If Sprint fails on his watch, it won't because he was OK with being told no and was willing to accept the status quo. It will be because he fought the good fight and it just wasn't enough. Well, Sprint hasn't fought for a very long time. And 90% of its problem right now is it doesn't know how to fight. Masayoshi Son has decided he knows how to box. He's donning the gloves and now it's time to train people how to throw some punches. Robert

green back

Yes, that would be good. But if the rural area is not in reach of any other band, CA will not help any. I suppose there are rural reas that have both B25 and B26, but no B41. In these instances, it could be good to do CA between the one B25 and one B26 carrier. That would push throughout speeds. However, I would guess that in the places where that would be helpful, Sprint probably wouldn't want to spend the money and efforts for those areas. And it probably would be just as easy just to add B41 to those rural sites. I like the idea. But I'm not sure that Sprint will think there is a pay off there to do B25/B26 CA in select rural areas. I'd do it , though. But I'm a dork like that. Robert

Sprint is working to have Band 26 only used when no other Band is available. A fallback band. So when it will be used most often, it will not be in range of any other band, really. So it will not provide much value for Band 26 to be aggregated with anything else. Sprint's best bet is to make Band 41 ubiquitous, use beamforming for coverage, and then use B41 for speed and capacity. I guess using CA to bolster B25 by tieing it to B41 makes sense to some degree. However, a B25 device that would work with CA in B41 would also already support B41, and it wouldn't need B25 when B41 was within range. So this may make sense for AT&T, where their wider channel band is lower frequency spectrum, as it will allow a portion of traffic to load off some of the burden off their low frequency spectrum. For Sprint, CA will be best utilized by B41, and aggregating several B41 carriers together. Pushing throughput speeds ahead of their competitors. Robert

They are the same maximum speed. 37.5Mbps. But the average B26 speed will be higher than B25 because there are a lot less B26 devices out there. But B41 is fastest of all. Robert

Good news for you folks down in Colorado Springs. 30+ Band 26 LTE sites accepted there over the past few days. Band 25 and Band 26 blanket most of the Springs now. Folks with Triband phones should be quite happy with the coverage there. The Premier Sponsor B26 map has been updated to show all the locations. Robert

Very uncommon. As it would have to be a Sprint employee outside of their network management. Not many Sprint logo'd fleet vehicles out there. Robert

There aren't really Sprint trucks. Sprint has outsourced its network maintenance to Ericsson. You most likely see Ericsson trucks going around to Sprint sites. Robert

Especially as outsourced Network Management. Bring back the good workers as Sprint employees and fund them appropriately! Robert

If this is the source of your frustration, then I can tell you the grass is not greener elsewhere. AT&T reps still tell people that their HSPA+ only device supports LTE. And there are Verizon reps that will tell people their Uniband LTE device supports both VZW LTE bands. It is a symptom of the age, not the provider. The bottom line is you know the truth. The Nexus 5 is Spark capable. It was built that way. However, it is still waiting on the update to enable it. There are things you can do that will kind of help you use Spark Band 41 until the update comes out. If these things are just too much for you to bear, we understand. You can go to another provider. We won't even ask you to stay with Sprint. That's not the purpose of this site. But we don't host Sprint complaints either. Robert

Sprint reserves the right to throttle video streaming on all bands, but we have seen no evidence of them even doing that yet. Based on internal discussions, it is a future network control that will be added and used at specific sites/sectors when performance crosses a certain threshold and video streaming specifically is impacting performance at that location. They are still working out specifics on the network side to implement it. But it will be on all bands, and used as necessary. Since Band 41 (TD-LTE) has much more capacity, it will likely be less affected than other bands. However, it is likely to be common on Band 25 sites that are experiencing congestion. Robert via Samsung Note 8.0 using Tapatalk Pro

1. I have never heard of this issue before. I'm not sure why you would want CM on an N5. But I'll let someone else try to answer this question for you. 2. You can take a Google Play purchased N5 to AT&T or Tmo now. No update required. The coming update is to enable Sprint's Band 41 on it. The device is fully unlocked now. And even a Sprint purchased N5 should allow you to put in a Sprint card from another provider in it and it should work. But it won't alleviate you from having to satisfy your Sprint contract for the device, should there be one remaining. However, you cannot take a Tmo purchased N5 and activate it on Sprint. I blame Legere for that one. Because I like to blame him. 3. The Nexus 5 comes with no Sprint bloatware, whatsoever. No matter if you buy it from Sprint or Google. Robert

I'm not sure what nTelos has been promising. But Sprint has never promised LTE coverage in nTelos areas. The only exception is when you get a confused customer service rep who thinks Sprint is bringing LTE everywhere and doesn't understand partner providers. I can understand if nTelos' lack of LTE doesn't meet your needs. You probably should go to AT&T or another provider of your choosing if nTelos will not give you specific build out information for your area where you can plan appropriately. Robert

Some minor changes have been made for readability/understandability over the past few weeks. You should keep current with the posting guidelines and take a moment to read them again. Robert

Based on other Triband device numbers, the N5 is a B26 anomaly. The M8 should be just fine in B26. I have only heard a few B26 N5 reports so far, and nothing suggests that it is unusually strong as their FCC OET reports outline. It could just be an insignificant outlier. Robert

Updated today, adding Josh as a moderator. Please join me in welcoming macinjosh to the Moderation Team! Robert

In Band 25, this new HTC M8 looks like it may be slightly more powerful than the N5. 24.42 vs. 23.7 In Band 26, the N5 looks much better than the HTC M8. 18.59 vs. 23.2 In Band 41, the HTC M8 looks like it may be slightly better than the N5. 21.65 vs. 21.2 Of course, real world results may vary. But the M8 looks promising. Especially in Band 25. I'm expecting it to be competitive with the N5, except in B26. But B26 is less important since it has a propagation advantage. Robert

Please do not open up multiple threads asking the same question. It violates our posting guidelines. Please read them here: http://s4gru.com/index.php?/topic/1197-s4gru-posting-guidelines-aka-the-rulez/ Robert via Samsung Note 8.0 using Tapatalk Pro

I have gone though all the donations today and logged them. I didn't see one for you. Please message me your PayPal email address or the PayPal transaction ID. Thanks. Robert via Samsung Note 8.0 using Tapatalk Pro