S4GRU

Thrifty Nickel Robert via Kindle Fire using Forum Runner

To be clear, like Scott says above, Network Vision will bring a significant 3G performance improvement to most markets. Most of Sprint's 3G woes are caused by backhaul. Network Vision 3G backhaul is brought up to 4G standards and will more than serve the most severe 3G needs for a long time. The only places that Network Vision will not be able to help 3G performance is at sites that have the maximum amount of EVDO carriers already installed for the amount of spectrum available and they are already over capacity. But this is not even 5% of sites in this condition. This is mostly around sports venues and really high capacity areas. These types of places will need microcells and DAS systems to relieve the burden off the macrocell. Robert via Kindle Fire using Forum Runner

by Robert Herron Sprint 4G Rollout Updates Thursday, June 28, 2012 - 7:50 AM MDT The next market in our Network Vision/LTE deployment schedule update series is...Central Jersey. The Central Jersey market has yet to be announced by Sprint, but is expected to be announced in the near future. Perhaps around the time of the first market launches on July 15th? Sprint's Network Vision OEM Alcatel/Lucent initially deployed to the Central Jersey market quite early, starting work back in November 2011 at a site in Branchburg. AlcaLu later established their 4G LTE FIT (field testing) areas around the Marlboro/Freehold areas at the beginning of 2012. There are already 20 sites in this area with live Network Vision upgrades...both 3G and 4G LTE. And work is just about to begin in other parts of the market in the next 30 to 45 days. Network Vision Sites in the Central Jersey market. 14 sites are complete in the market around Marlboro/Freehold. All of these broadcasting Sprint LTE, and some of them have been reported as not being blocked at this time. Market Launch and Remaining Schedule It was Sprint's original plan to launch markets when they reached 50% of sites converted to Network Vision. However, in recently seen correspondence, Sprint has decided to move up launches sooner than 50% completion in many instances. This is likely to maintain a Mid 2012 launch in markets that have already been announced. However, in an unannounced market like Central Jersey, we don't know if they will resume pushing back market launches to 50%, or if they will now settle on a 40% completion to be the new normal for market launches. If Sprint waits for 50% completion to launch the Central Jersey market, it would make the launch around the middle of December (should they stay on schedule). That being said, if Sprint should launch around mid November (as we suspect), then the market would be well under 50% complete. This doesn't sound like enough, but it would provide pretty good coverage. A little known item is not even Verizon launches on all sites in a market initially. Usually less than 50%, then filling in with more and more sites every few months. Anticipated Sites Complete at Market Launch. According to the Network Vision schedules that S4GRU has reviewed, if Sprint launched the market in November, these are the anticipated sites that would have LTE complete at that time. This would provide fairly good LTE coverage over many parts of the market. At market launch, some areas will be well covered with LTE, and others may be kind of spotty. However, more sites will come online every week until the whole market is complete. And even with one or two bars of LTE signal on your device, you will still get speeds that are double to triple that of well performing 3G EVDO in most instances. And speaking of 3G EVDO, Sprint is reporting that most of the Network Vision sites around Marlboro have both 3G EVDO and 4G LTE complete. It is not known at this time if the new sites that start coming online will have both 4G and 3G complete at the same time. But we are keeping our fingers crossed. The bottom line... We currently do not have a date that Sprint will formally "launch" the Central Jersey market. We believe they are targeting a launch month of November based on our review of the schedule. Sprint's Network Vision schedule for this market currently has almost 15 Network Vision sites complete. Alcatel/Lucent is plotting continual progress from here with production increasing up to a rate of almost 50 sites per month. S4GRU has poured over the schedule in this market and sees a February 2013 completion date. In our estimation of the schedule, AlcaLu can certainly finish this market timely. Photo of New Brunswick provided courtesy of Wikimedia Commons. NOTE: S4GRU Sponsor Members can track regular updates of Network Vision sites completed nationwide. Completed sites are shown in an interactive Google Maps interface. Information about sponsorship can be found here: S4GRU Sponsorship

Download the Verizon PRL of choice, or edit one yourself. You will need a Verizon only PRL, not a Sprint PRL that allows Verizon 3G roaming. Because if you use a Sprint PRL, it will stay on Sprint and only allow Verizon roaming when there is no Sprint signal. I use this PRL as a Force Roam. Once you have your Verizon PRL, rename it TEST.prl and place it in the root directory of your SD card. Go into your GS3 dialer, enter ##DATA#. Go into View mode. Oddly, it is not available in Edit mode. Select PRL write. Press the PRL write button. It now writes the TEST PRL to your device and reboots. When you get back fully booted up, go into Settings > About Device > Status and verify the new PRL number is active. When you want to.return back to stock Sprint PRL...just do a PRL update and the newest stock Sprint PRL will be loaded. You can also keep several PRLs on your phone and just keep renaming the one you want to use TEST.prl and repeat the process outlined above. This PRL Write seems to be accessible only in the GS3. Although it works with the Galaxy Nexus and some other devices using the Any Cut app. One word of warning...when on a Verizon PRL, you wont see a roaming Icon. It can be easy to forget that you are off native and exceed 300MB in no time. I use NetMonitor so much that its not an issue for me. It will remind me. However, you can modify your PRL so that the Verizon PRL will always put a roaming Icon up. It just wont on its own. Robert via Kindle Fire using Forum Runner

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And a note pinned to it that says: "I've got your phone. Let's say we make a trade? You can have your phone if you give me the documents." Signed, Dan Hesse

drum brakes

Today I put my new GS-III through all the rigmarole. I installed a secondary Verizon/Alltel PRL for those times I need to 3G roam, that I can switch to on the fly from within the device. Whilst doing so, I noticed something unexpected. While sitting there in the Burger King drive thru, I decide to take the Verizon PRL out for a spin. I install while waiting for my turn to get to the window, the device reboots. I go into NetMonitor immediately, and it says "Carrier - Verizon" and "Network Type: eHRPD." However, it stayed on eHRPD about 45 seconds and then switched over to EVDO-Rev. A. When it switched to EVDO, the 3G icon disappeared for about 15 seconds and then came back on, indicating I was reconnected to data. I was surprised with this result. I wasn't ever expecting to be able to connect to eHRPD on Verizon. I drove out to a place that has no Sprint coverage, just Verizon coverage (north of Espanola, NM). Using my stock Sprint PRL 25004 that came with the GS-III, all I could get was roaming on Verizon 1xRTT on 850MHz. I do a quick Verizon PRL install, and voila...eHRPD again. I quickly run a speed test and get to about 2.3Mbps down. However, in the middle of the test, the 3G icon disappears and the download test stops and I get a network error. In about 15 seconds, the 3G icon comes back up and I am now connected to EVDO-Rev. A again on Verizon. Speed tests results are approx. 1Mbps on EVDO-A on the same exact tower. I cannot get eHRPD to come back up unless I reboot the phone or reinstall the Verizon PRL (which reboots the phone). Then I will have less than a minute of eHRPD. It does appear to be an active Verizon eHRPD connection because I can use it for a little bit while the 3G icon is active. But the moment it goes away, I'm dead in the water until the EVDO handshake is complete. So, it appears that Verizon will allow Sprint customers to connect to eHRPD, but there is something that happens in the authentication process after the fact, that revokes you from staying connected. Very interesting and unanticipated. Robert

Oh, well hello there! Thanks for welcoming me home!!! Seriously...I was afraid the UPS man may take my phone away since no one was home! Even sexy packaging... I had a Retro Chakka Khan moment, "Make me wanna love ya, wanna hold ya, wanna squeeze ya too."

flat line

Not quite. I got the email from UPS saying the package was on my front porch. So I drove home at lunch and snagged it. Robert

The WiMax network is completely separate from Sprint's 3G. They do not share sites, equipment, network, backhaul...nothing. If there was a slow down, it's a coincidence, or possibly caused by the fact that the 3G network was slowing down on its own and when WiMax turned on, it relieved some of that burden. Robert

Check out this article. It explains what is going on. It will be painful while they are in your neighborhood. But what gets left behind is a much better network then you have ever had from Sprint. Robert

I hope not. I hear I am on the warpath! j/k Robert

My guess at this point is Mid August. But we won't know for certain until they start turning on some LTE sites in BWI. So far, all the NV sites completed only have 3G active. I have a feeling that is going to change though this week. Robert