irev210

It's one of those "enterprise management" programs that you can't live without but can't tell anyone what it exactly does... I am pretty sure IBM invented them.

MS had mobile OS before apple or google. WP8 isn't bad - it's the lack of apps that hurts the platform and the slow hardware upgrades.

The market keeps improving but it's a rather large market (the entire state). I would recommend coming back to Sprint when you can get a phone that supports Sprint LTE on old nextel spectrum. That would be in about 9 months or so.

I would ride it out on VZN for another year. 2014 is looking much better in terms of LTE coverage on Sprint. In other news, I am rounding out a year waiting for Sprint to upgrade backhaul/turn on LTE on the site located on top of 180 Berkeley Street. After staring at a fancy antenna for the better part of a year, I am starting to lose patience. It's unique to sprint with no other carriers on the roof. As a result, Sprint actually has very different coverage pattern than some competitors (which is great).

This is a very fair point. I recently had the displeasure of using the T-Mobile PCS network in Boston and was very disappointed with the poor HSPA+ coverage on the PCS band. If I was a newbie to T-Mobile and hadn't used a AWS device, I might have the impression that T-Mobile coverage is horrible. It's going to be very interesting to see what Sprint does when customers start demanding that their phones be completely unlocked once their contract is up (even AT&T is willing to sim unlock devices once they are out of contract). Basically, out of the four major carriers, sprint will be the ONLY carrier selling completely locked down devices. As more phones come with more bands, I only seeing this become a bigger issue. Sprint's anti-consumer practice of simlocking devices will, at some point, backfire (either by new legislation or by consumer pressure). The next complaint will be people upset that X device doesn't work on Y network.

Agreed. DC-HSPA+ moving to LTE isn't going to change the user experience much - outside of lower latency and more total spectrum deployed.

Sprint's deployment speed has definitely picked up as of late. They are really moving. I wouldn't get discouraged about Sprint's deployment plan. They are getting faster, not slower. I have both Sprint and T-Mobile, so I can compare/contrast. Basically, there are places that Sprint is better and places that T-mobile is better. DC-HSPA+ is nice, but LTE is definitely superior, even if you experience slightly slower speeds the lower latency makes up for it. I would argue that from a users standpoint, both should offer very usable service on LTE. Instead of getting caught up in 8mbit vs. 10mbit, DC-HSPA+ vs. LTE, etc. I would focus on coverage and how the service actually works for you. Do the things you do on both providers and pick the one that works better.

They had problems with their IMS Core. It had nothing to do with the base stations.

Not sure - once I got the HTC One it stopped letting me swap online. Swapping from HTC one to EVO, or HTC One to GS4 etc all spits out an error message on sprint.com telling me to chat or call to change phones. No idea why - it used to work fantastic (with the exception of when I moved from a WiMAX device to an LTE device).

Just a comment on the convenience of swapping sims on their CDMA/LTE network. Now that sprint no longer allows me to swap ESN's online, changing phones has turned into a major headache. Obviously Sprint could have the capability to allow customers to swap SIMs (hence my reference to VZN). Comparing Sprint's LTE build-out to Verizon's is a different (but very interesting) discussion.

Yes, if you get sprint to unlock before you travel.

Strange. The verizon account I've messed arround with would allow you to swap SIMS and it would carry CDMA as well. Swap and done - on multiple phones/devices. Yup, no SIM, no 4G. 3G/voice works fine though. On Verizon it does CDMA as well, which is cool. Going from LTE to LTE doesn't let me switch online anymore. It sucks. Having to call/chat to change devices has become very annoying. I hope sprint allows customers to be 100% SIM based in the near future.

I thought I would state what most probably already know... but I tried it and sadly, you can't switch SIM cards between devices. The removable SIM only allows 4G to work. I tried switching SIM cards between a GS4 and HTC One on different accounts and everything works for a few minutes until it can't authenticate the SIM and blocks data. Bummer I hope that Sprint takes a friendlier stand to enable this feature moving forward. All new devices I've activated on my account now takes about 30 minutes for someone via chat to switch - it no longer allows me to enter the ESN online.

The HTC EVO 4G LTE is a lot less expensive - I think it offers a better value used over the GS3.

I was pretty disappointed when I read that Sprint's HD voice isn't even going to be compatible across current equipment vendors. Not calling someone in Ericsson territory, no HD voice for you!

That's assuming that no 1xRTT voice customer will ever be around. They are likely just trying to maximize what's going to be around for a while... which is a single 1x carrier. Why not monetize what your competitors don't want?

Couldn't agree more. I broke down and got a GS4 because I had to use an upgrade and figured it would be better to sell on eBay to recover costs to buy an unlocked One. I couldn't resist playing around with it - here are my thoughts: Best SAMOLED display yet, but the One display without a doubt is better. I am smitten with the 5 inch display but I REALLY like the 5" Droid DNA display. I really wish the One came in 5". Samsung still makes cheap feeling plastic phones. Compared to the HTC One or an iPhone, it just feels cheap. I dislike touchwiz a lot but I think that's because I am more used to the HTC or stock Nexus layout. I am used to that, so it just makes more "sense" to me. I really hate touchwiz. Having a microSD card slot is cool, i do like that feature. Overall, I feel like the HTC One is a premium experience (even though I dislike blinkfeed). I don't really like some of the button layout options on the One but overall, the phone is smoother, more responsive, and feels more optimized on the software side. On the hardware side, it's a no brainer - the One screams high-end while the GS4 is just like a GS3.

It is confusing. I should have said "data bandwidth" to be more clear. Throughput is defined as bandwidth but so is spectrum. Sorry about that.

Not same bandwidth. ODFMA vs. SC-FDMA. Same amount of spectrum, different amount of bandwidth.

I think the other part of the problem is the network just isn't that dense yet. When LTE first launched in Boston, I had no problems getting into the 20's. Now, similar to Verizon or AT&T, the LTE speeds are becoming inverted with the download speeds slower than the upload speeds. The nature of the beast. Overall, the service remains usable (arguably more so than verizon in many parts) where Sprint has 4G LTE - MUCH needed over their legacy 3G service that is an impressive 5-10kbps.

Yeah, it's integrated. My nexus 4 also has integrated wireless charger and the coverage on the exact same route has excellent coverage. I think it just has to do with T-Mobile putting one antenna on rooftops and not having a place to add an additional PCS antenna.

They are extremely similar. Having both, I actually preferred the wireless charging feature, water resistance, and larger 5" screen. The soft touch plastic was very well done.

You were 100% right. T-Mobile HSPA+ on PCS in Boston is spotty and inconsistent. I am not sure if it is the droid DNA, T-Mobile, or what... but there is a mismash of switching between no service, edge, and HSPA+ around the city. It stinks. I am not sure if they didn't add PCS to all of their towers, the coverage is different, or what... I will say, when I have HSPA+ on PCS downtown, the performance is good. Sucks otherwise. I don't recommend anyone using a PCS band only phone. So that was in my office downtown. Moving around the experience was horrible. Bottom line - don't get a PCS-only device on T-Mobile, even if you are in a T-Mobile refarmed PCS area.

I can confirm that T-Mobile PCS vs. AWS is very similar. I just got the droid DNA which only has PCS and signal is about -95dBm to -99dBm and I get 3-6mbit with a ping around 40ms. The Droid DNA is actually a very very cool phone. Robert, you would probably love it on Verizon.

Interesting to note that you don't have to prepay. On my T-Mobile account, it's autopay but prepay. I wonder why they don't make customers prepay? They could sign up with no credit and get a free month of service, over and over again?