schmidtj

I moved to TMobile two weeks ago. Service has been exemplary at my home. Cell one block away -95db signal usually 3 to 4 iPhone bars. Today I noticed the signal was much weaker. -110db 2 iPhone bars. I don’t see any crews at the cell site so I’m wondering if this is a temporary outage or did the cell get shut down. Is there any way to determine this? What’s weird also the cell I’m connecting to now is a mile away (versus a city block) and my Apple Watch still gets two dots signal strength. Does this sound reasonable for a 30 foot cell that far away which is LTE band 2 and 66 capable. With the exception of the watch I’ve been using cellmapper.net to determine the cells I’m using based on PCI numbers.

My wife and my CPAP machines have ATT 4G to phone home daily. Not sure ATT even knows our names. Does ATT consider me a customer? Probably applies to many IoT devices.

So my mystery continues. Tnx.

Once again I am throwing myself at the mercy of those more knowledgeable that I here on S4GRU. I mentioned in a previous post that I switched to T-Mobile very recently and using my iPhone I can see I'm on a PCI unaccounted for in Cellmapper and I'm getting a very good signal and speeds so my curiosity is getting the better of me. So today I did a little walking tour of the neighborhood and determined the mystery PCI has a radius of about 1 city block. Too big for a Femtocell I think. Well at the area of highest signal strength (full bars) I found one if these on top of a street light. Might this be my mystery device? There is no apparent data connection just power.

Dear Network Experts, Will a nearby 3G/4G Femtocell override a more distant 5G Macrocell assuming the Femtocell presents a stronger signal? Thanks, J

Is there a way to tell if my iPhone is on macrocell or femtocell? I recently switched to T-Mobile and the PCI I’m connected to at home doesn’t match any of the local macro cells as reported by cellmapper. The PCI i connect to is for about a 1 block radius which seems large for a femtocell. Also the upload speeds I sometime get are much higher than any broadband plans around here offer which leads me to think it’s not a femtocell as well. So maybe a small cell? I drove around the neighborhood this morning and noted the PCIs and except for the block around my home all are accounted for in cellmapper. Any insight appreciated. The actual PCI is 313 and wonder if that precludes a femtocell as well?

I'm just north/northwest of Chicago as in we border Chicago. On Sprint I was delighted to get 5Mb/1Mb on SpeedTest. I've had a grandfathered 200 MB/Mo freebee T-Mobile plan on our iPad so I knew the speeds were potentially decent. I ported 4 lines over yesterday I've attached a typical SpeedTest screen shot. Basically I'm not disappointed. The fact that the cost is substantially less doesn't hurt either. J

You get a premium now for free. I upgraded on an iPhone and Caller ID did not work. I uninstalled it, rebooted the iPhone, reinstalled the app and Caller ID works nice now.

How far things have come. Back in the early days of cellular I had a brick phone by Motorola and cells were scarce. Knowing where the nearest cell was located would sometimes make the difference of wether or not you could get a signal. I thought of creating a list of sites kind of like the precursor of our ultimate map. This was the time of Computer Bulletin Boards as the Public internet did not yet exist. I posted a message requesting location reports on a popular Chicago BBS (Gene Plantz was the Sysop). Later that day I got a curt message from Gene requesting I remove my message. It seems he felt (or was told) the list could potentially be used by terrorists to target the infant cellular I infrastructure. I suppose it could but that never crossed my mind. How much things have changed since then. At least in China.

Green, White, Blue http://Www.nddons.org

And for that I thank you. J

Is it possible to determine if this is a TMobile Cell Tower? My son and wife live 1 block from here (Niles IL just north of Chicago). They are on my Sprint plan and get very poor signal strength. I am hoping this might be their future TMobile tower. I figure it isn't Sprint for the above reason, Verizon has a chain of small cells atop wooden poles along the adjacent roadway US14 the closest being 1 block from this tower so it wouldn't make sense it's one of theirs. That leaves ATT and I don't have access to anyone with ATT service to do a signal check. Looking at Rootmetrics I don't see this as a ATT high signal area. So (fingers crossed) I'm hoping it might be a TMobile Cell. Can anyone give me some insight into who's this might be? For those in the area it's on the Notre Dame HS property adjacent to their athletic field. My Alma Mater but I didn't spend much time on that field outside of gym class. Thanks, J

July 24th The “Call Screener Plus” App becomes free.

I get 10mbs at home. When I experimented with TM on my iPhone eSIM I would get 40mbs. For the last month or three with one bar I would on occasion get 40mbs on Sprint. I just chalked it up to having such a weak Sprint signal I would roam over to TM. What I don't know is if being in Chicagoland would TM be set up as a Sprint roaming partner.

Thank you. I thought it might work the way I wanted because on at least one occasion I purchased a new iPhone direct from Apple. Before it arrived I displayed the phone in my sprint and it showed the new phone while the old phone still worked.

I want to swap a iPhone 6S for an iPhone 7 on one of my existing lines. If I keep the 6S powered on and the 7 powered off and enter the proper IMEI and ICCID on the Sprint Activate screen for the iPhone 7 will the existing 6S remain active until I power on the 7 or will the 7 take over the 6S' phone number immediately? I'd like to stage the swap but don't want it to actually happen immediately. J

Silly me rather then ordering the SIM kit from Sprint due to ignorance on my part I obtained this on eBay. When I enter the ICCID into the Sprint Activate tool it says it's invalid. I see there are also cards with the same Part number that have a "A" instead of the "C" and wondered if that might be my problem because this site says the iPhone 7 needs an "A". https://www.sprint.com/content/dam/sprint/us/en/campaigns/byod/compatible-sims-2019/compatible-phones-sims.pdf I have subsequently ordered and am waiting on the official Sprint SIM Kit hoping I will have better results. I also wonder what validation Sprint does to determine a ICCID is valid or not.

I posted s entry on the General Forum but I think this is more appropriate. I purchased a used iPhone 7 for my son. It was formerly on the Verizon network. I believe the iPhone 7 for Verizon was unlocked from the get go. I researched and found (I think) the SIM I need is the SIMOLW506C. I grabbed one off eBay but didn't realize it was a "C" card (the letter in the big black dot on the SIM card (credit card size)). The Sprint site says I should use the "A" card. Trying to use the "C" card I get and "invalid ICCID" when trying to enter it into the Sprint Activate Phone wizard. Is this to be expected? Will just getting an "A" card (which I purchased on eBay but have not received as yet) solve my "Invalid ICCID" issue? In hindsight I suspect I should have ordered the SIM Kit direct from Sprint but that's always 20:20. So what do the different SIM Identifiers (A,B,C) mean for otherwise seemingly identical SIMs? Thanks. J

I just want to activate a used Iphone 7 on an existing line. Checking the Sprint site I have determined the SIM part number is SIMOLW506C. I have found that there is either a big letter A or C on the SIM credit card sized thing. The UPCs are identical. So what is the difference between a SIM with a Letter A and one with a Letter C? The Sprint site refers to these letters as SIM Identifiers. Thanks, J

As the OP I though I'd update this based on my first had experience. I removed the Cellular Watch Plan via the iPhone ->Watch->My Watch->Cellular->(i)->Remove Sprint Plan. When I checked MySprint the plan was gone. Just for grins I opened a chat to verify if in fact anything else needed to be done to remove the plan from my account and was assured the plan was gone. This is nice. Subsequently I came up with a reason to use cellular on the watch again and was able to re-add it from the same iPhone app. I was assigned a different billing number for the watch but that's not used for anything I would be interested in. So going forward I deduce it's possible to add and delete the Apple Watch cellular plan as needed and only pay for the days the plan is active it seems. This is all done without requiring Sprint's involvement. J

I can cancel my Apple Watch Data Plan from my iPhone but does that remove it from my account? Do I need to call Sprint to actually have it removed from my Account. Generic Apple documents says one may need to contact the carrier but nothing Sprint specific. Thanks, J

Thanks. Maybe a reason to convince spouse she needs a phone upgrade? J

Hello, Is Sprint limiting which iPhone models can use VoLTE? The reason I ask is my wife's iPhone 6s at iOS 12.1.1 does not support VoLTE but my iPhone XS-Max does. The only option for her in Settings->Cellular->LTE is On/Off. Is this intentional on the part of Sprint at this time? I'm in the Chicago Market. Everything on the Apple support site says iPhone 6s does have the capability of doing VoLTE. For testing here phone I turned off WiFi on her device and the Magic Box is also Off. As soon as I initiate a call from her Phone the LTE indicator in the Status Bar goes off on my phone it stays on. In Settings->General>About->Network hers shows Sprint 35.0 Any insight appreciated. J

With the recent iOS 12.1.1 my Sprint iPhone XS-Max now supports LTE Data+Voice but it uses the Macro Cell and not my MagicBox. I suspect it's because my MagicBox needs the firmware update but how do I get it updated? On the iPhone I turned off WiFi Calling and turned on LTE Data+Voice. For testing I also turned off WiFi totally on the iPhone. Settings General->About->IMS Status = Voice & SMS I have a decent WiFi signal but still feel WiFi calls are choppy and people on the other end say so also so I'd hope VoLTE would improve things. I'm in Chicago with I believe supports Sprint VoLTE. Sw Ver: 15.15.50.440a Does this need to be updated? How? Any insight appreciated. J

I’m in Chicagoland. Still on the old firmware. It use to hold on to a -118 B41 over a -110 B25. The next door neighbors trimmed their hedges which I believe was blocking the cell signal. I did a reset and B41 improved to -110 but after a day the MB switched to a -100 B25 and has need holding. I’m not touching it. Speeds are mediocre but consistent. Weird thing UL is 2x DL. J