bigdaveyl

The EVO LTE was likely one of the weakest LTE devices on the Sprint lineup. HTC made big improvements with the M7, the M8 and M9 are even better. However, if you want the best LTE reception, you probably want to look at LG, at least with the current list of devices. 

Unfortunately that is the case.  Wife still has hers and is somewhat happy with it. 

We are on Ting and unfortunately, with the FEC debacle, I moved to a GSM phone.

 

I live in Brighton near 12 corners.  I've been up for an upgrade for a 4-5 months now.  I have an HTC One M7 and my wife has a Galaxy S4.  The last year or so, she consistently gets LTE when I am standing/sitting feet away do not.  We ran some errands in Henrietta yesterday so I did some "tests".  I had both phones on me and a few times she had LTE and I didn't.  Once was outside Home Depot on Jefferson.

 

A few questions...

 

Is this an issue with the HTC One compared to other phones?  I have updated all the software, PRLs, etc. 

 

Spark...is that something working now in Rochester?  

 

I've been android the last few phones but I'm looking at possibly moving to an iPhone once their new phone is announced next month (I'm hoping the base model moves from 16 to 32GB since my One is 32GB)  Have people fared well with a consistent LTE connection in the city/east side with iPhones?  

 

Well, don't HTC phones have weaker antennas or that has been my experience with the EVO 4g LTE (model before the M7).

What might help is a more modern phone that supports Sprint's 3 main LTE bands now.  The M7 only supports one.  I had a LG Volt that did well in the area.  I do not know if the iphone currently (or will support) supports that.

Haven't  been able to map for quite awhile here on Sprint...

Rochester Telephone became Frontier then the cellular branch becam Bell Atlantic Mobile then Verizon Wireless.

 

It became so difficult to keep the billing correct on my legacy Frontier plan that I switched to Sprint.

 

After I graduated from RIT in 1983, I took a job with my current employer.  At my suggestion, the owner now has a Sprint tower on the roof that pays for the campus utilities. :-)

 

I turned down an interview with Kodak shortly after accepting the job and my many Kodak friends thought I was nuts.  Only 2 still work for Kodak today.

 

I believe that Kodak developed the imager/sensor technology that started the digital camera revolution.  They made a strategic misjudgement of how fast the market would change that was fatal.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastman_Kodak#Shift_to_digital

Yeah, I didn't quite remember the lineage, but know that the local phone company (whatever they were called at the time) built towers that ended up as VZW towers. 

Kodak is definitely a poster child for epic failure.

I always wonder what it would have been like if they actually had gotten into digital photography/printing/software earlier and gave it the investments it needed.  There are a couple of guys that attend our LUGOR meetings that worked in the Digital Movie group and some of the stuff they were doing was cutting edge at the time but the higher ups never continued development of the projects.

Kodak still has large swaths of tape in warehouses, I believe before they stopped manufacturing they over produced and stored enough for what they considered to be 100 years of sales. The film I'm talking about is the expensive stuff previously (and sometimes still, though increasingly not) used in movies. I don't think they'll probably get the chance to sell most of it, though. Kodak had a pretty terrible time with the advent of digital imagery in general, and their huge film stock is just another ironic piece of "imagery" illustrating their failure to predict the influence of digital cameras.

 

I know a lot of people who were laid off from Kodak, and I even know one or two past executives of the company. Once upon a time, it was the bee's knee's to work there. Excellent pay, great benefits, and job security (so they thought) were the order of the day. It is only in today's world that the "image" of the word Kodak is turning from sour to nostalgic, in my opinion. The layoffs ruined a lot of people's lives. Like Josh said above me, I highly recommend a visit to the George Eastman house if you're in the area, it's a very neat place.

 

In terms of cellular service, I'm just glad at this point we have Band 41. I wish Sprint would take steps to improve network capacity, but I also understand that the market is not a priority for them, or for most others. While something of a hub in upstate NY, we are neither the only city, nor significant on a national scale. In addition to capacity, 800 is badly needed to improve coverage indoors. Until some of these things come to fruition, Sprint in Rochester will be mediocre at best. Better than the other carriers in lots of places, horrible in others, and par in general seems to be what we are going to get.

 

The other notable issue is the areas surrounding Rochester still have no LTE. Whether or not this is because of backhaul, or lack of interest, this causes the customer experience to suffer. Rochester has a lot of bedroom communities, where people live away from the city and work in it. There are a lot of commuters here. I think Sprint's image in the area would be strongly improved if people had LTE in most of the places they spend their time, even if they aren't actively using it. As it stands, those who have VZW can go home and they have LTE, just like they did at work. If they go to the grocery store in their town and want to look something up, they know their wireless service will be fast and reliable. Many Sprint customers can only count on that if they work AND live in a high traffic area, because that seems to be Sprint's focus. And while it makes good sense to upgrade and pay attention to those areas, in the Rochester market broader LTE coverage is also important.

 

On a closing note, I do think this is a good place to live. There is excellent food, unique culture, and at least a little bit of opportunity still to be had here. Try and enjoy it while it lasts and who knows, it just might.

IIRC, "Rochester Telephone" had set up cell towers way back when in the area.  Eventually, I think these got sold to VZW, so they had a head start in the area.

I too have been having some issues.  Looks like I can map fine, but the maps themselves won't update.

Is sprint still doing any more 3g upgrades. The 3g coverage is quite good now. Just wondering if there finished, or will the 3g improve even more?

It is my possibly incorrect understanding that most/all of the towers that have LTE now are already upgraded.

There are probably some towers in the outlying areas that need to be upgraded.  I have noticed with my new phone that has a better LTE antenna that most of the city/main suburbs are mostly covered.

I got a new phone, and have been seeing Band 41 pop up along the Lake Ontario State Parkway and 390

I like my LTE network signal strong -- but not like "eww!" strong.

 

AJ

Well played

Well, think of it this way. Do you have WiFi at home? If so, not a big deal. If you have LTE on your most travelled routes and places where you use data without WiFi, that's what matters more. Can't fret over one site in an almost complete market. 

This ^^^

I have WiFi at home and at work, so having consistent LTE is not a deal killer

See what I mean? Coverage is definitely there, there's bits and pieces not done and definitely plenty of dead spots but there's LTE.

Yes, I can attest to it being spotty and I don't think all sites have been deployed/optimized yet.  For example, I don't think the main tower I connect to at the Paddy Hill Fire Dept. (1766 Latta Rd.) has been fully updated.  But, the one at Greece Police HQ has been updated, but it seems like the signal is pointed west, which I can understand - you can see the two towers depending where you are.

But, it also depends on your device as well.  My EVO 4g LTE is notorious for it's bad LTE antenna, so I can understand why it may be spotty for me personally.

I think they have been playing games with the network the last 12 hours or more.  I keep jumping between ehrpd and evdo.

Is Rochester ny done? Still no 4g west greece

I think there is still one tower in Greece that needs to be updated.  The one up on Paddy Hill, behind the fire station.

It's the one I connect to most often when I am around my home. 

The large tower at the Greece Police HQ is already transmitting LTE.

I see 4glte in hilton....I remember reading a member in here waiting 4it.....nothing still in the west side of greece..cant wait

Good.  I know they are playing with their systems based on the issues I've been having with 3G/4G connectivity. 

Sounds like full 3G/4G services were down but 1x is available, near both my house (greece) and my office (brighton). 

Thank you for your feedback.  I did send you a report while I was on WiFi just for completeness.

 

I will forward this response onto Ting along with the screenshot.

 

Thanks for pointing me in the right direction.

I called Ting and actually got someone that didn't say "just put it in CDMA mode."

She had seen the same issues with the S3 not to long ago.  They suspended and re-enabled the device then did the normal resets. 

Since we did that and nothing happened. Still no 3G/4G icons.

She had the idea to go check on the status of the towers.  Checked both home and work for me and said that the 3G/4G services were down in the area but 1x was available for at least the last 24 hours or more.

Maybe that would explain why I was able to get LTE/CDMA mode working in Ithaca yesterday but as I got closer to home it was not working any more.

That's probably it, so you're good there..

 

 

It does not turn the radios off, it just doesn't route data through the mobile connection (and yours doesn't work anyway). But I don't think I need a report from you; this is an issue you need to contact Ting about. SignalCheck seems to be working fine.

 

 

I don't recall you mentioning that before. That would be key to mention to Ting; your phone must not be provisioned properly, or is not allowed on the LTE network. eHRPD is used for handoff from LTE. Putting your phone's radio in a mode that does not enable LTE will also disable eHRPD.

 

-Mike

Thank you for your feedback.  I did send you a report while I was on WiFi just for completeness.

I will forward this response onto Ting along with the screenshot.

Thanks for pointing me in the right direction.

I couldn't find any reports from you; if you didn't have a data connection, it would not have been able to send anyway.

 

I don't have my EVO LTE handy at the moment, but I know there is a "Use Mobile Data" toggle in the settings somewhere.. make sure that is enabled.

 

Otherwise, it seems like your phone is not fully activated or programmed for data, and you should contact Ting. I'm not sure what needs to be changed to make it work on Ting instead of Sprint, but it sounds like it's not authenticating on EV-DO. Seems like the app is accurately reporting your situation; when I take my EVO off my account, it will show accurate signal strength but "Unregistered", and no data will flow.

 

-Mike

I'm not seeing it anwhere obvious in the settings other than at the top, where it says "Mobile Data" and it is turned on and everything is checked that should be checked in there is. 

Should I connect to my wifi to send you the report, but doesn't that shut the radios off?  (I get inactive vs. unregistered).

Do you mean I am not authenticating to EHRPD instead of EVDO?  It seems if I shut off EHRP in ##DATA# it will fix the problem.

I did drive to a town 2 hours away for a job interview.  The phone, I swear, worked for a bit when I did ##72786# outside of ithaca.

The "Unregistered" means that the device is reporting that it isn't registered on the network.. i.e. the phone is not activated. If it is actually activated, and it's working fine, there is probably a bug in the device's radio software causing that to be displayed. Is that an EVO LTE? If you hit About > Send Diagnostics, perhaps it will give me some insight as to what the issue might be. You can also try making sure that mobile location services are enabled in the device's Settings menu; disabling that causes weird bugs that vary by device and ROM.

 

The "Click for map.." instead of an address is either due to no data connection to translate the location into a street address, or an Android bug which causes the geocoding background service to stop working. Rebooting your phone will fix that. (see here for details: http://www.bluelinepc.com/signalcheck/help/#bslstuck)

 

-Mike

Hello Mike,

Yes, this is an HTC EVO 4G LTE.

I completely went back to a clean stock, using the latest RUU executable from Sprint's site last night, just to make sure nothing was corrupted.  I completely wiped the phone using TWRP before I completed this step.

If I do a factory reset or ##72786#, it will show a 3G connection, go through Hands Free Activation and get a PRL.  Then the 3G symbol goes away and I cannot access anything through data.  I have WiFi off throughout the process.  Text and voice are fine - I can make and receive calls and texts.

Now the weird part:  If I go into settings and select "CDMA ONLY" I can get on the network.

I am from the Rochester, NY area, and I do know that they are aggressively rolling out and tweaking LTE here.  I am also a Ting user. 

My wife has the same phone and I do not think she is having any problems, or else I would hear about it! LOL

Could there be a glitch in the Matrix and should I call Ting or do you all think I have a hardware issue?  I did send diagnostics, under the username "bigdaveyl"

Yep. I saw that in Richmond, Ky last weekend. If you clicked the map it took you to the tower location (I believe) but no address. 

Any way to get "registered"  other than going into CDMA only mode?

Did you try a profile update?

 

Sent from my EVO using Tapatalk

Yes, did a profile and prl update. 

Hello all,

My phone isn't registering a data connection unless I do CDMA only. 

If I have LTE/CDMA mode on, I get this from signal check pro:

Does anyone have any ideas?

Going back to my off topic issues from the other day.  Has anyone seen this?

 

The EVO LTE is a decent device.  The biggest issue with it is that it will lose an LTE signal at the edge of service much sooner than other Band 25 devices.  It also is less likely to have indoor coverage, unless a 1/4-1/2 mile from a site.  And when you start to get back into LTE coverage, it will take longer to reconnect.  And since the signal is weaker, it is also typically slower than other Band 25 LTE devices.

 

Our members who know what to expect with the EVO LTE get along just fine.  But others start getting mad about the Sprint LTE network, when in reality the issue is the device.  In contrast, a Nexus 5 (the best RF performer) would have nearly double the square mileage of coverage in the Rochester area than an EVO LTE does.  And it will be faster and more usable indoors.

 

Robert

Yep, we are generally happy with the phone and it works well for our use case.  Thank you for the additional information.  It was just weird that if I turn off LTE, things work normally, when before I didn't have to do anything.  Things seem to be working as expected in Cyanogenmod, so it could be that stock could be a bit buggy. 

Maybe someday we'll get the Nexus 5

Understood.  As long as you know what to expect, then you will probably be able to cope.  However, if you pay full retail price and expect it to be equal to other LTE devices, you would sorely be disappointed.

 

Robert

I think I paid $250 (shipping included) for two phones the wife and I use.  The performance of the phone is a lot better than the old Gingerbread phones we were using, and at least we can use Android 4.x.  I was figuring with all the ugrades Sprint was doing 3G would become more usable (less people on it, more bandwidth to towers, better antenna, etc.). 

We both use WiFi at home and usually use other devices there as well since we have 30mbps up/5mbps down through Time Warner.  And we have WiFi at work as well, so that's a good chunk of our time anyways.

I looked at Senesorly and it looks like my office is right in the middie of an area with "weak" LTE signal (light purple) and I go to work through "weak" LTE signal.  Maybe the RF issues of the phone confuses it - it gets enough signal to switch off 3G, but not enough signal to latch on to 4G.

And who knows what Sprint is tweaking in the area to maximize coverage.  I've had times where I picked up a strong LTE signal one day, and the next day, nothing.

The EVO LTE is an awful device when it comes to RF performance.  Especially LTE RF performance.  You will always be frustrated with Sprint LTE using it.

 

Robert

Yeah that's what I heard, but we bought them second hand and use TIng because that's all we can afford at the moment.