irev210

http://s4gru.com/index.php?/topic/262-sprint-tries-to-eat-metropcs/page__view__findpost__p__2848 Also, on a side note - isn't it cheaper to deploy larger carriers? Instead of having to buy four line cards and more radios, if you can deploy wider channels, less infrastructure costs, no? 5x5 or 20x20, who cares about top speed... but if you have to spend, say 10k per line card x 4 line cards or 10k for just one 20x20 line card (or maybe a small premium) - plus the electric costs - it makes way more sense to just throw out giant fat pipes. Clearwire always seems to harp on the capex and opex benefits of fat pipes.

No, not even AT&T is projecting 160 million. Sprint was planning on 120 million pops, att was planning on 150 million pops.

12k is out the window. I think 5k is an optimistic number, but at least reachable.

I think Sprint has done an absolutely fantastic job with its prepaid arm. From an operational perspective, MetroPCS would slot in nicely with its other prepaid segments (boost, virgin, assurance). Prepaid or postpaid, it's how you operate the service and Sprint definitely has best-in-class prepaid metrics. The fact that the handsets are already compatible make it very easy, from an operational perspective, to integrate. AWS could have been sold off, PCS either added or sold, and you just get the incremental revenue. If the "loyal" nextel postpaid subscribers are any indicator, it doesn't matter prepaid or postpaid - if it's not a well run operation, you are going to get churn. For the overall market though, doesn't it seem like Leap is a better fit for Sprint? T-Mobile needs the customers to stay competitive. For a healthy big four, Leap to Sprint, MetroPCS to T-Mobile made the most sense.

Just to play the devils advocate here - to be fair, this is what the customer would experience. Testing Verizon 4G LTE in Boston right after it formally launched, I was greeted with great coverage. Frankly, Sprint shouldn't have launched the markets. They should have gotten to the point where coverage was good enough to not drop off, scan, and hopefully reconnect. I am much more pleased with their "we are working on it but you can use it while we work on it" method. They "launched" those first markets because they didn't want to disappoint investors. I think that was the wrong thing to do. For the nerds that don't hover on s4gru, they feel like Sprint's LTE is inferior based on the experience they get in a launched market and faux 4G LTE maps. The million dollar question is - how is sprint going to finish 12000 sites by the end of the year? I've been scratching my head on this for a while. It seems like a best case scenario is about 5000 sites. I wish I knew what was holding back NV progress. It seems like samsung has their groove on in Chicago but the other markets are still just limping along. Do you think we are going to see a spike in production with AL and Ericsson like we did Samsung? Or is it going to be a slow ramp?

Sprint's whole mantra of "under promise, over deliver" has really gone out the door. I am glad they are just letting people connect to towers in Boston while not formally "launching". It prevents situations like this.

Hopefully with such a big phone they can optimize antennas! I can't wait to get one.

Thx for the help guys. I've never not had EVDO, so it was confusing Hopefully the 1x in downtown Boston has something to do with them messing with LTE.

This makes more sense. Stock rom, so I only can go off the debug menu.

Any idea why Sprint would be using AT&T's A block for EVDO? Uploaded a pic in first post.

EVDO Engineering screen, EVO 4G LTE.

I have never seen Sprint use channel 28 for EVDO. Usually it's 450 or 675 or something. Anyone know the story on channel 28?

This seems to be a iPhone <---> sprint problem, not a sprint 3G problem. I hope they fix it, it seems annoying.

Apparently that's not working for people. It's pretty interesting to see so many issues (not a ton, but definitely a substantial amount with the same exact problem).

I am wondering if this is an iOS6 problem or iPhone 5 problem but that sounds about right - getting stuck on 1x (O)

So I've seen a few people having data connectivity issues with the new iPhone 5 on Sprint. The issue seems to be pretty bad. Often times uploads will time out, other times the phone will appear to get stuck on 1x and won't flip back to 3G, toggling airplane mode doesn't seem to fix it either. The sprint forums seem to have a few threads on this, one guy even got two replacement iPhones from apple without fixing the problem. It definitely seems to be a iPhone <--> Sprint issue (not a defective handset issue) and nobody knows how to fix it. Has anyone on s4gru seen this?

I've done that on my EVO 4G LTE and it just displayed no bars, period.

Sprint + Alltel would have been great. It's really too bad. At any rate, Robert and AJ will love this: http://www.bloomberg.com/video/sprint-liquidity-doesn-t-fix-company-moffett-says-vGbPOGMwTleVu56hYiEYnw.html He is at it again. He continues to sound as stupid as ever. It's sad.

Imagine holding a flashlight and pointing the light at the wall. Why doesn't it light up the floor? If you stood back far enough you could light up both the floor and the wall - but at the same time, the spot you are lighting up wouldn't be as bright. Sprint's towers are configured to cover specific areas. The antenna at south station is designed to cover a certain area. While I am sure the RF engineers could have put up a tower near south station that would have covered you across the channel, that wouldn't have met the needs of Sprint's build-out requirements. Basically, to cover both south station and the area you are in, they needed more than one tower. Basically, that area is not serviced by the same tower. The reason why the tower sucks across the channel is because it hasn't been upgraded to network vision. Think of it this way - once that tower is upgraded, you will have solid coverage in both places (like you do now) AND proper 3G and 4G speeds.

For other iphone users - how do you access those menus?

Yup - it should be fantastic for when they do TD-LTE overlay. I always like to look on the bright side.

Boston's WiMAX coverage isn't all that dense. For example, 10 out of the 11 wimax towers in downtown boston just overlay on Sprint's locations (the 11th is across the street from a sprint tower). Sprint's native coverage totals 17 towers. Despite having poorer propagation, clearwire built out downtown boston by just overlaying ~2/3rds of Sprint towers.

Newer releases of LTE. If you want a number like "5G" or "6G" - that's just marketing garbage. http://www.3gpp.org/Release-12

No major usage changes for me. Maybe use google talk a bit, but that's probably about it.

What I usually do is create an RSS feed on eBay for a new device I want. I scan the buy-it-now options and wait until some ding dong decides they want a "quick sale" and list a buy-it-now for an usually low price. Since getting LTE in Boston and seeing my EVO perform, well, poorly, I just picked up a brand new factory sealed mopho Q for 320 shipped. I am eager to test out a physical keyboard again, as well. One week after note II comes out, I bet you will be able to buy-it-now for ~400 shipped You can count on me buying a Note II off eBay for about 300-350 and selling my old phone for ~300. After fees, it's about a 75 dollar upgrade.