lordsutch

Sprint's WiFi Calling Page recently got an update (3/8/2016).

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That's an interesting delineation between 2016 devices and "Legacy" devices.

There was probably a small change in the FCC regulations to put carrier-provided VoIP solutions on the same playing field as third-party VoIP solutions that never had to comply with "airplane mode" or the geographic licensing scheme for voice communications.

Reading between the lines, Sprint isn't going to bother to update the carrier software on older phones (particularly those that are likely to be EOLed soon) to allow these features but 2016 models will support it since Sprint plans to market and support them into 2017.

Can the Galaxy S7/S7 Edge support VoLTE at a later time? Is it just a matter of a software update or FCC filing or something like that, or is it simply not capable?

VoLTE support on current (and future) generation flagship devices should just be a matter of software/baseband support and any necessary filings with the FCC, since these devices already support VoLTE on other carriers.

Whether Sprint will go to the trouble of enabling the support on devices not initially advertised with the feature is another question. See, for example, the seeming lack of LTE roaming support as yet on the Nexus 6, 5X, and 6P, which should only be a minimal change, far simpler than enabling VoLTE relatively speaking.

It makes sense for C Spire and Sprint to both work together and concentrate on their strengths. C Spire never really got much traction in Memphis, which has always been an AT&T stronghold going back to the BellSouth Mobility days. And Sprint has always been weak in the ex-affiliate areas of Mississippi. So let C Spire do its thing in the rural areas with Sprint's spectrum supplementing what they have already, and let Sprint do what it historically does best in an urban market like Memphis.

It might be MediaTek in the VZW/Sprint S6s instead of either VIA or Qualcomm; see the bottom of this AnandTech piece:

http://www.anandtech.com/show/9057/mediatek-at-mwc-2015-a72-already-in-silicon

There's apparently some sort of deal between Samsung and MediaTek: http://www.gsmarena.com/mediatek_reportedly_scored_an_order_from_samsung-news-11431.php

Might I actually be able to retire my Airave in a formerly-iDEN-covered, insecure, undisclosed location in central Georgia, before the mighty SouthernLINC builds RRPP coverage there? Woot!

My sheer guess is that this is largely a marketing-driven decision, and not in a bad way either: Sprint doesn't want another flood of articles from top tech sites like Engadget and Ars complaining about spotty coverage in major markets where LTE isn't fully lit up, much as they experienced two years ago due to Clearwire's uneven.coverage in launch markets. Sprint needs this launch to go well to justify NV to its skittish investors, which means they need a comparable, mostly-solid network to already-launched AT&T and Verizon in these markets before they flip the "reserved" switch. I wouldn't be surprised if they wait to flip markets on until the contractors have already headed to the next market on the list, at least until after the first wave is done. After the launch markets are live for a first month or so and the reviews are all out there, I expect Sprint to be less worried and let sites in lower-tier markets be live from the day they're done.

I don't understand why the carriers don't take advantage of this option. Sprint is already going to do it with data starting this year, so they may as well go all in to mitigate network traffic. This will be a reasonable option once VoLTE is instituted and the LTE pipeline starts to fill up.

Like jpkjeff says, I think WiFi offloading is probably coming but the carriers want better reliability; Republic Wireless customers probably will tolerate dropped calls and hard handoff problems, but I'd imagine Sprint and Verizon want the technology to get to the point where soft handoffs can work reliably before committing to it. Getting to an all-IP telephony network is probably the major step necessary; once the call is just IP data it's "just" a packet delivery problem.

I am puzzled. How did you determine that the consensus was negative? The article states that the EVO 4G LTE supports SVDO. And the table four posts above yours lists all of the simultaneous transmission possibilities.AJ

I think some of the confusion is that in previous threads before these tests came out, and based on the parts involved (specifically the MSM8960), everyone was saying that only the Viper, which like some VZW phones has 2 distinct chips with CDMA radios on each, was likely to have simultaneous voice + data on 2/3G (in addition to simultaneous voice + LTE data) and Sprint was unlikely to put much effort into getting future phones to have that feature.

The problem, from my perspective as a smart phone consumer, is that anyone buying a phone and apps for Windows Phone has to be at least slightly concerned that this will be just the latest Kin or Zune fiasco - a product that is expensively rolled out, underperforms in the marketplace, and then is shelved in favor of the Next, Non-Backward-Compatible Big Idea from Redmond. That Nokia (S80 -> Maemo -> Meego -> WP7) is the lead player doesn't inspire much confidence either.

Plus I honestly don't see the space for another smart phone OS in the market. Apple has the halo phone market sewn up, Android is the flashy alternative for those who don't do Apple, and RIM has its declining corporate base for those who don't do Apple or Android.

I think if Sprint and Verizon were seriously thinking of moving away from subsidies, they'd be introducing SIMs now across the lineup - as-is, Verizon is only using them on LTE and (if the rumors are to be believed) Sprint isn't even going to deploy SIMs at all for now.

Given that, and that at the end of the LTE rollouts none of the Big 4 US carriers will be operating in the same bands with the same standards for 2-3G and 4G (AT&T on UMTS/GSM 850/1900 + LTE 700, Verizon on CDMA 850/1900 + LTE 700, Sprint on CDMA 1900/ESMR + LTE 1900/ESMR/2500, T-Mobile on GSM 1900 + UMTS AWS/1900 + LTE somewhere else) - meaning interoperable phones will be a beast to make (Apple, for example, is having enough fun just trying to get the iPhone to run on the top 3's 3G - they still haven't tackled AWS, even though it's pretty common around the world among newer entrants - and only have LTE running on 700, only used in North America so far, despite being committed to a "world" product) - the subsidy model can't go away anytime soon, even if arguably it should.

In theory similar frequencies should work with similar-length antennas, so ESMR and the traditional North American cellular blocks at 850 (and GSM 800) can share an antenna; similarly, everything on 1900 A-H blocks (CDMA, GSM, LTE bands 4 & 25) should work with the same antenna. It's "just" a matter of tuning the radios to the right frequencies. The main problem for Sprint is getting the equipment makers to support the bands that the top networks aren't using, to cut down on development time and costs.

The sports team naming, at least, is due to not wanting to take a side in the Minneapolis-St. Paul municipal rivalry; same reason why I-35 splits into "W" and "E" rather than one "side" getting I-35 and the other getting I-235 or something. A bit like the "Texas Rangers" being halfway between Dallas and Fort Worth.

(Pleasantly) surprised Memphis is getting in on the action so early, especially after getting passed by during the WiMAX rollout. SEC fans in particular should be very happy if they get Oxford and Starkville done before fall comes around.