GoWireless

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Tmobile's service without a subsidy apples to apples with Sprint is $70 a month vs the $79.99 plan that includes q subsidy or if you aren't an idiot the same $70 a month through the employee referral program anyone can use.

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Sorry, but this is not an Apples to Apples comparison because $70 on TMO includes unlimited talk. The same publicly available plan on Sprint costs $110 which is significantly more! 900 minutes is $100, also more.

As for "special" pricing like EPRP... Fist of all, not everyone knows about it and second, I believe what's available to the public now is $80 for 1000 minutes + $10 magic data fee = $90 which is $20 more than T-Mobile, which is about the average subsidy out there. Plus, this doesn't count any workplace, association or other discounts a person may have on T-Mobile.

T-Mobile's device is still both network and carrier locked. You still owe the company money after cancelling service. No, it isn't different.

It IS different because with T-Mobile you get the benefit of the subsidy (which with T-Mobile now means a lower wireless plan cost in lieu of a device subsidy/lower device cost) regardless of where you buy the device, which applies specifically to a device like the one the OP is talking about (i.e. a device not purchased from the carrier). With the other three wireless companies however, the ONLY way to receive the benefit of a subsidy or equivalnet is to buy the device from the carrier. So yes, it is different; with T-Mobile's new pricing scheme the subscriber has more flexibility in choosing from where they get their device without losing out on the subsidy (or equivalent thereof).

Also, T-Mobile has changed their policy recently whereby they will under certain circumstances unlock the device even before it is fully paid for: http://www.tmonews.com/2013/05/t-mobile-updates-sim-unlock-policy-to-allow-exceptions-for-international-travelers/

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Also, the Sprint version is subsidized, so I would argue that Sprint users have it the best when it comes to carrier dev support. Other carriers require you to buy "Developer Edition" devices or these Google edition unsubsidized devices to get official unlocked bootloaders, (even T-Mobile now!) but not Sprint!

Actually this argument doesn't apply to T-Mobile anymore since under their new pricing model they no longer subsidize devices and in return they've lowered the price of their plans. Therefore, it does you no harm with them to buy a device from someone else and use on their network (your "benefit" is the lower price of the plan in lieu of device subsidy). So given that they are GSM, under this new model, they are probably the most third party purchase friendly carrier because you get the benefit of the lower priced plan regardless of where you bought the device, plus you are not bound to a contract like with other carriers.

I have the HTC EVO V 3d 4G .... Is that a WIMAX only phone ???

As gonowhere noted, the EVO 3D is a CDMA/WiMax phone only. Clearwire was going to build a full 4G WiMax network in Hampton Roads (like they did in Richmond and most other large cities) which Sprint uses also but Hampton Roads was one of the last markets they got to and they ran out of money while only completing a small portion of the network. Since Clear has no customers in this area since they never officially launched service, the network is mainly used by Sprint users. Since Sprint now has its own 4G network, it wouldn't surprise me if they decided to shut down Clear's WiMax network. They are never going to complete it anyway. So... you may need a new phone if you want 4G. The good news is though that you should have considerably more coverage with Sprint's 4G LTE than with WiMax because the LTE network is much more widely deployed and supposedly being expanded.

I'm not sure if it was Wimax or LTE .... but it was 4G .... the phone was going in and out .. from 3g to 4g ... but this was only resently that I was getting 4g .... I can't believe I was working off an old system . I had been in that area many times ... and only had 3g ... then one day ... someone flipped a switch ... and I had 4g ...... Are you saying this is an old system that Sprint turned on .... then turned it back off ?

I bought the phone from Radio Shack ...a year ago .... no one in the store told me ... Sprint didn't have 4g ... And I thought I was upgrading myself !!! now I get a taste of 4g .... and they take it away ...

It all depends on which phone you have, there are three different models:

HTC EVO 3D

HTC EVO 4G

HTC EVO 4G LTE

Which of these is yours?

I had LTE service earlier today in the Greenbrier area of Chesapeake as well in Norfolk near Monticello and 21st street. I am connected now to LTE in the Oceanview area although the signal is always very weak in this area.

See my EDIT above. He may have been talking about the old WiMax network that was up in portions of downtown Norfolk. I think there was also a tower broadcasting WiMax up in NN too. Sprint/Clearwire may have shut that down.

I have a HTC EVO 4G ... for several months I have had 4G in Norfolk ... Ghent area .... and Newport News.. Jefferson to Aberdeen..

NOW NOTHING .... the phone will scan ... say its scanning .... connect .... check IP Address .... then says ... turning OFF ...

the PRI is 1.56-144 .... the PRL is 61009

How do you check the CDMA switch on this phone ?? Where is it located at in the set-up ?? I did a phone update awhile back .. but 4G was still working after update ... I do real estate ... and take alot of pictures with phone ... and email them back to the office .... sometimes 30 to 50 pictures at a time .... 3G takes 5 to 10 minutes to go though .... I have really gotton use to the 4G ..... 50 pictures in less than 20 seconds !!!!

SOMEONE TELL ME WHATS WRONG !! Help !

There's a Sprint corp. store over near the northwest corner of Greenbriar and Eden Way. You might wanna pop in there and see if they know something about this. If you find out anything, please let us know.

EDIT: wait, are you talking about LTE or the little WiMax network that was up in small parts of Norfolk and a couple of other places? If so, Sprint may have decided to shut that network down since it was never really up officially in Hamton Roads and the coverage on it was extremely limited.

Its a brand new HTC One and I know my way around the phone and settings and I tried updating the PRL. I went back to Best Buy but, the guy in the store said he get's very spotty 4G so I didn't push on it too hard.

How does your reception compare to the Sprint 4G LTE maps on Sensorly?

Whatever...

 

I'll just call it "THE Tidewater" instead. Or I can call it what all the tourists call the whole region, "Virginia Beach.".

 

Robert via Samsung Note II via Tapatalk

I meant no disrespect in my post, just trying to inform what the correct usage is as I have seen "the" used in front of the name on posts here before. Oh, and just so that people don't get confused, saying "THE Tidewater" is not proper usage either; it's just "Tidewater", as in "all of the folks in Tidewater [or Hampton Roads] have been waiting for some sort of Sprint 4G service for a long, long time..."

It's true that some out of towners call it "Virginia Beach", however the area extends all the way to Williamsburg (another "tourist" city), which is an hour away (or about an hour and a half drive with no traffic from the populated edge of Virginia Beach to the edge of Williamsburg).

As I mentioned once before, it's the largest metro area on the East Coast where Sprint didn't launch WiMax. Consequently, 3G speeds are very slow throughout the region.

Really? We have had lots of reports from the Hampton Roads. Are you using a LTE device? Is your LTE turned on? If both of these are a yea, I'd take your device in to a corporate store. You may have a problem with your device.

 

Robert via Nexus 7 with Tapatalk HD

Yeah, maybe his device really isn't capable or he has it set on CDMA only instead of CDMA/LTE or maybe he has an old PRL that he needs to update or maybe it's a bad device.

BTW, it's referred to as just "Hampton Roads", without the "the" .

The Canadian CDMA carriers for example have realized this years ago and I believe have all made the switch to UMTS (though they continue to support their CDMA networks to some degree).

At this stage in the game however, it is simply too late for Sprint to take this up. The narrow nature of 1x channels are a good, flexible voice solution for Sprint until VoLTE comes around. LTE is the future. The investment required doesn't make sense at this point.

 

 

So, wait, are you saying that I should hold out for a TD-LTE device or a TDe-penis device? I am confused.

 

AJ

Careful, if you keep changing your devices too often because the newer models always look sexier, you may get an STD-LTE.

Perhaps it is something Sprint can unlock upon request when travelling internationally to an area that uses those frequencies?

 

Robert via Nexus 7 with Tapatalk HD

Not likely. What is likely is that the device will come SIM locked like the HTC One is and you would need to call Sprint to request an unlock code for it. That would unlock all the available GSM/WCDMA functions on the phone for use overseas but there isn't a specific unlock code to unlock one particular band.

What about t the other bands used around the world? Or is it just 1900 and 2100?

 

Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk 2

As far as 3G is concerned, those are the only two bands available in the device. It does have quadband GSM, but the data is only 2G speeds, meaning it's not a viable solution for data on a smartphone but it'd do for voice. There are also some operators out there that are UMTS/WCDMA-only. If those rely heavily on UMTS 850, that means they wouldn't be a viable carrier for both voice and data to roam or use a foreign SIM on.

The device also doesn't have UMTS 900 but I would say it is less widely deployed compared to UMTS 850.

It is true that in many networks that have UMTS 850 also have UMTS 1900 or 2100 but the lower frequency's longer cell reach and better building penetration makes it the main band that carriers rely on in many places.

Verizon for example does not disable this band in their UMTS capable devices and neither did Sprint in those SIM possesing devices which supported it before LTE. UMTS/WCDMA 850/1900/2100 is a very common triband combination for US-based GSM capable devices. Not sure why Sprint has decided to buck that common functionality.

 

Its an enormous deal for those of us who spend time in europe, asia and south america.

Hmmmm... about that... you may want to check out the other thread I started... It looks like Sprint intentionally (and inexplicably) disabled UMTS 850 in the device. This could cause degraded performance of the device all over Central and South America (and Australia, Thailand, Israel, the Phillipines and other places). Right now, no idea why they did this.

Maybe the Sprint billing system is not compatible with UMTS/GSM roaming.

I'm afraid it is definitely not that. Sprint has offered international GSM roaming for many years now. Plus remember, Sprint only disabled UMTS 850, it still left UMTS 1900 and 2100 active in the device.

Sprint doesn't have any WCDMA roaming partners. All their roaming accords are CDMA 1X/EV-DO carriers. The advent of rural WCDMA carriers is a fairly recent phenomenon here in the US IIRC. Some GSM carriers are still, um, all GSM.

 

So, with no WCDMA carriers to roam on, and Sprint using CDMA in Canada, Sprint disables WCDMA to make sure GS4's don't end up on AT&T. That would be my best guess.

Not sure I buy this as a viable theory because:

-I doubt Sprint's GSM roaming agreements make a distinction between GSM and WCDMA, they just get billed as data by their partners, to which Sprint adds a hefty markup. In other words, i don't think with with most international GSM carriers Sprint has separate agreements for GSM and for WCDMA. Most GSM carriers are pushing as much of their networks to WCDMA anyway due to spectral efficiency issues.

-They did not disable WCDMA 1900 or 2100. Remember also that both AT&T and T-Mobile use WCDMA 1900.

-AT&T is not a factor anyway as Sprint always blocks out US GSM/WCDMA reception regardless of band.

Even though the Sprint Samsung Galaxy S4 passed the FCC with UMTS/WCDMA 850MHz, it appears that the band has been disabled for use domestically and internationally and the device will only support UMTS 1900/2100 outside the US. Anyone know why would Sprint do that?

p.s. I have a nagging suspicion that Sprint asked HTC to do the same on the One but for the life of me I can't figure out why Sprint would care. If anything, it may reduce their own potential roaming revenue.

Update: Sprint has announced that due to supply issues, they will not have S4 units available at stores on Saturday. No date given as to when the retail channels are expected to be stocked. They did announce that they expect to begin taking web and phone orders on Saturday but were vauge as to when those orders might ship.

Yeah, sprint hasn't ever had that right?

Sprint did have some GSM-capable, SIM removable devices prior to the LTE era. For example the HTC TP2 and the original Moto Photon.

 

 

That policy isnt terrible. I used AT&T for 8 years because I traveled a lot and wanted one phone I could use in europe and south america. Im glad sprint is finally waking up the idea that the world isnt just america.

Well, in Sprint's defense, it has occasionally in the past sold dual mode GSM/CDMA devices but naturally, there wasn't a large selection for Sprint as a carrier to choose from due to technical challenges in the past regarding dual mode equipment. So even if they wanted to be forward looking in this respect, they were still somewhat limited in what they could offer.

That said, it should be noted that with the exception of the iPhone, Sprint has always left the GSM side of the phone unlocked from the get-go for use outside North America on devices which supported removable SIMs. This is unlike AT&T for example who have historically been rather difficult to work with respect to unlocking devices.

However, it looks like from now on things may be changing some and you may need to contact Sprint in order to obtain an unlock code even for devices other than iPhones.

I'm curious is this phone unlocked by default?

If by "locked" you mean SIM-locked then yes, it is locked by default.

Is there a removable sim for a us?

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From as best as I can tell, yes, it will have a removable SIM.

Two things however: 1. As per usual Sprint MO, it probably won't accept SIMs of other US carriers besides Sprint and 2. If the HTC One is any indication then it will come SIM locked (though how much hassle, if any, will Sprint give you for providing an unlock code is unknown at this time. Most likely they will withhold providing an unlock code to brand new subscribers for a certain amount of time).

Are there any RF differences between the HTC One and the S4?

 

For example, according the the S4gru.com article, "if the HTC One is world roaming capable, it will most likely be limited to GSM 900/1800 and band 1 W-CDMA 2100+1900" Any information about the S4 like this?

According to Samsung's official specs: http://www.samsung.com/us/mobile/cell-phones/SPH-L720ZWASPR-specs , the S4 is quad band GSM and quad band UMTS/WCDMA capable, though I wouldn't be surprised if the latter is a typo and it's really just triband UMTS capable (850/1900/2100). In any case the device should be useable just about anywhere internationally though I would expect Sprint to have programmed the phone not to recognize any US (and possibly Canadian) SIMs as they usually do.

@JoeJoeJoe: OK, I see what you mean when you say that the calls are being billed by Google using their rates, though as an aside I do wonder what is Sprint's incentive to pass off intl calling revenue to Google. Hmmmm...?

BTW, yes, Google does have cheap international calling rates though localphone's rates still tend to be on average about half of what Google charges. That, coupled with their local numbers assignment which are diallable from multiple phones makes them very convenient to use regardless of carrier(s). I do have a google voice number also but for now I've decided not to integrate with Sprint. Maybe some day...