lordsutch

Via PhoneScoop: "Sprint is prepared to demonstrate new wireless networking technology at an event in Silicon Valley today. The demonstration will show how Sprint plans to use its 2.5GHz spectrum holdings to deliver even faster mobile broadband, reports The Wall Street Journal. Citing sources familiar with Sprint's plans, both the networking technology and handsets that can use it will be available to consumers soon."
 
More at the link: http://www.phonescoop.com/articles/article.php?a=13124
 
My guess is that this is about carrier aggregation or some other LTE Advanced features (multicast/broadcast, maybe?).

My sense of things on Sprint (as a 10+ year customer who's spent a bit of time in marginal areas) is as long as you're not parked on roaming service most of the time, and staying under the limits, occasional months where your off-network usage exceeds on-network won't be an issue.

But if you pull a Robert and move to the boonies, and then rack up hundreds of minutes of roaming a month for several straight months with virtually no on-network usage, they'll eventually cancel your service. Of course, if you move outside of native coverage they'll usually release you from your contract to avoid these issues in the first place.

Don't forget there is also the early upgrade promo (which was on the website for a week or so, but then disappeared when One Up appeared), which may or may not just be the same price as paying the ETF.

And it's not just cell phones.

 

Comcast doesnt make me call Motorola, or pay extra, when my modem or cable box break. I go into the comcast service center, and they give me a new unit, at no cost.

 

Toyota doesn't make me call Samsung or Speaker Inc (whoever makes the speakers) when my radio system fails when Im in warranty. They deal with it.

 

Dell didn't make me call Nvidea when my graphics card broke in the first year.

 

A subsidized phone is no different.

With Comcast, you're renting the box or modem from them. If you go and buy your own modem, or buy and hook up a TiVo, and it breaks, Comcast says "sorry, it's not our problem" or "you should've paid to rent it from us, sucker."

Toyota and Dell sold you a whole system. If you'd bought the nVidia card yourself, or stuck your own radio in the car, and it breaks, their reaction would be "sorry, it's not our problem" or "sure, we'll fix it for $$$."

A subsidized phone is no different. If you buy something with a coupon or discount, the person discounting the product has no additional obligation to engage in warranty service on your behalf. (Buy a TV from Walmart and ask them to repair it, and see how far that goes.) You bought a Samsung or HTC or LG phone; Sprint gave you a substantial discount, but ultimately it's still a Samsung/HTC/LG phone.

koiulpoi: Maybe your device or SIM isn't provisioned at all for LTE. You probably need to call customer service and have it reprovisioned, or at the very least (if you have an inactive Sprint device) try swapping it out and back in online.

Looks nice! The only issue I've noticed is that LTE seems to be shown twice: https://www.dropbox.com/s/ynlz0vmjq5gryko/Screenshot_2013-10-23-16-01-06.png

It'd probably be more useful if the right-hand box showed the 1X voice strength (or on GSM/UMTS the equivalent converted from asu) and was labeled appropriately.

Does anyone know if there is a way to report coverage issues to Shentel or Sprint? I recently got rid of my Note II due to inability to make/receive phone calls or send text messages anywhere in the Harrisburg/York area but there are still a few areas where I get no service that I feel are well enough populated that they shouldn't be lacking service (near 1700 S Market St, Mechanicsburg, PA for example).

You can tweet @sprintcare although I'm not sure it makes a huge difference.

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Maybe a stupid question, but can someone enlighten me as to where I can find a map of Sprint towers (something more than what is on the Sprint site that approximates the location)? I can't seem to find what I'm looking for and I would love to know more precise locations of towers that I could drive by and see if any progress is being made.

 

I'm located in Longwood and have noticed a much more constant LTE service as of late, as well as my commute through Orlando.

 

Very excited to see some of the speeds I've seen.

Short answer: become a sponsor and you can see all of Sprint's native sites, including those in the Orlando market.

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I'm guessing Google called all the major tech sites and reminded them that they are under an NDA because they have review units on hand already. Plus everything about the device has basically been leaked already except a. the actual release date and b. what channels the N5 will be sold through.

I'd congratulate lordsutch on being the only person who picked the Ole Miss upset of LSU, but he's a Hotty Toddy homer

And you'll note I didn't have very many points on that happening! But, Hotty Toddy nonetheless!

And just when I thought we finally got to the easier part of the schedule, Mizzou is now 7-0 and probably will be 10-0 when they hit Oxford in a month...

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Signed up Monday night and the MiFi was in my hands via SmartPost this afternoon. Haven't really gotten much of a chance to play with it but it definitely picks up LTE here (presumably band 25) at my office-away-from-the-office in Warner Robins.

Currently 5 wireless (2 phones, 2 tablets, 1 MacBook) although I could fire up some more devices if I felt like it.  I'm guessing I have about 18 total IP devices plus my router that get regular use.  Encrypted MoCA between the rooms - once you go MoCA, you won't go back unless you tear out the walls and put in Cat 6 (which I think my landlord would frown on).

Now if only the SAYGO phone selection didn't suck, they might finally get within field goal range of an offering that people might actually find worthwhile.

Second Perry site (just south of downtown) is now live. I laid down some purple in Sensorly; I got pretty good performance at the fair on Friday, which is actually closer to the first site that went live. Also live is the site at the I-75/475 Bolingbrooke interchange north of Macon, although it seems to lack much range.

The Feagin Mill Middle School site in Warner Robins may also be live if network.sprint.com is to be believed.

Via https://twitter.com/autoprime4G/status/389643824655794176
 
"It's looking like Sprint will offer the Nexus 5 instead of CDMA users going through the Play Store. Still no signs of Verizon jumping in."

Not sure how this would work - maybe website and/or telesales exclusive? I can't imagine they would want to cannibalize G2 sales.

Yeah, 128 kbps is huge. A huge waste of time. If you like that, then you like CDMA1X. So, stop complaining.

I respectfully disagree. Most of the basic services people need traveling overseas on a smart phone when they're out of range of a Wi-Fi hotspot (access to email, light web browsing, maps and navigation, translation) should be fine at EDGE speeds. You can certainly do them at 1X on Sprint.

At least in some countries with crappy data offerings (Canada, for example) you'd pay a lot for a local SIM that does little more than what T-Mobile is offering gratis. Most of the EU countries are better due to the stronger competitive environment that everyone being on WCDMA/UMTS provides though, but if you're only there a few days getting a local SIM often isn't with the hassle.

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Best Buy also had a promotion where you would get a $50 gift card if you upgraded a phone before December 31 that you had to sign up for several months ago, in-store or online. So you may have signed up and forgotten you did it. Not sure if that stacks with any other gift card promos.

Alas my upgrade isn't due until January 1 and you can't do early upgrades/One Up through BB yet.

Anyone else notice that the "coverage for this device" is showing WiMAX rather than LTE? Oops!

I meant I tried to give Sensorly a chance with a fast wifi connection instead of over 3G to see if the maps loading slowly was from my end or the app itself, but it was just as slow and unresponsive over wifi to navigate the maps. I hate to say it, but the app is just truly bad now and unfortnately it is mostly do to OSM. It looks like a map program created for kindergarteners and it's about as useful as such.

As an OSMer myself I'm disappointed in this attitude. Personally I think Sensorly might have chosen a better tileset like Mapquest Open, but ultimately the map itself is as good as the community makes it, and if there's something missing or wrong you can report it or (better yet) help fix it at www.OpenStreetMap.org.

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My working assumption is that there were some software issues that delayed the launch. If I had to guess handoffs between the various LTE frequencies needed some tweaks, and the Clearwire acquisition may have also affected the default prioritization of 2500, requiring additional testing.

205 page user manual and not a single spec page. This is the LTE icon for anyone interested who doesn't want to bother downloading the entire manual.

 

http://s4gru.com/public/style_images/master/attachicon.gif 2013-10-08_07-12-40.png

I don't think that really shows off my LTE epeen enough to be seen in the next county. Plus it should be in lots of colors or have MichaelBaySplosions or something because tribandz! Now AT&T's, which looks like a recycled logo from a circa 2004 failed social networking site, is da bomb.

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I'm LordSutch75.

The Byron site may also be active today, if network.sprint.com is to be believed. It wasn't working Saturday (well, actually, I got handed off to it and then got dropped), but I'll try to test it tonight.

Edit 10/8: The Byron site is definitely live. Also a crew was out working on the tower on Feagin Mill near Houston Lake Road; it looked like they were hoisting up a preassembled bracket with the four RRUs and the antenna already attached. I'll try to swing back by on my way home this evening; alas my camera is at home today.

Or it could be leftover boilerplate from every other worldphone LTE device's label that nobody checked at the factory to be sure it was right. (Plus, Sprint doesn't have any 850, 900, 1800, or 2100 MHz licenses, contradicting what is stated on the label itself, so proofreading was hardly a key consideration when it was written.)  No way to be sure until it's activated and used.

Seems like a few more towers have gone live in Houston and Peach counties: I-75 at SR 96, 127 at Houston Lake, and the other Fort Valley site on 49 North. I may or may not have also picked up the Feagin Mill Middle School site yesterday.

I'm in Columbus today so I'll see about getting more of the accepted sites mapped on Sensorly.

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