Joski1624

Wow, that's almost the lowest frequency possible.  Anything below 2496 MHz is something else entirely.  Cleveland had a WiMAX carrier on 2508.5MHz, but the channel was only 10MHz wide.

32 minutes ago, JonnygATL said:

That's really interesting. I think I understand why though. 

Why the phone boot looped,  trying band toggling or something else?

Ever since the massive B41 coverage overhaul for Cleveland, OH market back in December, they haven't kept up with adding B41 new coverage from sites that have been live for over a month.

If you've got a rooted phone, you might try toggling the CDMA bands (class 1 is 1900 and class 10 is 1x800) in a app like network signal guru to see if one or the other is better for you.  Some phones also have this ability through the data menu, but my experience with that method was nearly disastrous.  The phone I tried toggling BC 10 on got stuck in a boot loop.  The only way I could stop it was airplane mode as soon as it booted into android (before the radio became active) and reenabling  BC 10.

In my experience handoffs from LTE to CDMA are almost always accompanied by interruptions in whatever I'm streaming, so I don't see how a handoff from LTE to CDMA would work unless some kind of call waiting function is built in on the network side to prevent a dropped call.   I think it would be super annoying to the average user who would expect it to be a consistent flawless operation, and doesn't understand nor care about any technical challenges and limitations.

On 2/10/2018 at 6:44 PM, centermedic said:

Thats odd. In my experience, the Essential holds onto 800 like a death grip. It is actually frustrating at times.

With my local site offline, the nearest site is over 6 miles away.  I live in a low spot and terrain blocks in most directions, so even the best of the best probably wouldn't hold onto B26 in those conditions.  1x800 was very weak, about -108 to -110 dBm.  That's close to the minimum usable threshold, so a couple of dB made a huge difference.  In general, the PH-1 still worked the best on 1x800 and LTE 800.  I was already fed up anyway, so even the nearly par 800MHz performance wasn't acceptable to me.  Granted my LG Nexus phones aren't much better.  My el-cheapo Motorola E2 is what opened my eyes ?

On 1/13/2018 at 2:28 PM, swintec said:

Honestly I do not think they did that intentionally.  It appears they have no clue how to deal with the radio, hence why they finally posted a position for someone to come on board and do modem / radio work several months ago when complaints started piling up.  I have visions of them just throwing the radio in and calling it good without any tweaks what so ever because nobody had any idea what they were doing.

Some have theorized that the radio power levels are simply set to low and need to be adjusted.  I do not really know but i am really starting to hate this device (not as much as the bolt but close).

I ended up returning the Essential because of the disappointing RF performance.  When adjustments were made at my local site when B41 was just being brought online, there were periods when the site was shut down.  At those times, my other phones were at least holding 1x800 solid from a neighboring site (Nexus 5X most of the time).  However, the Essential was frequently losing 1x800.  That was the last straw for me.

7 hours ago, danlodish345 said:

 And what app are you using again 2 map coverage because I may want to try it.
Sent from my Pixel 2 XL using Tapatalk
 

It's the title of the thread ?

2 hours ago, ingenium said:

Can you get access to an Android phone for an hour to drive around? If you change the logging interval to every second from the default of every 5 seconds, you'll get 2000 data points really quickly.

 

It might be worth getting a phone on FreedomPop if you want to continue using CellMapper. You can get a cheap Android phone for $20 and there's no monthly cost of service if you disable all the auto top ups and downgrade to the free plan. 1GB/month free with friends maxed out, throttled to 1 Mbps. So it's perfect for a logging device. One of their Motorola devices and the Kyocera Hydro Icon both support band locking too, which helps with hunting.

 

Getting the phone through them puts you on Sprint service. If you order just the SIM (they often have deals for $1 or $0.01 for the SIM) then you're on AT&T. AT&T's free tier maxes out at 700 MB/month

 

Sent from my Pixel 2 XL using Tapatalk

 

 

 

 

I use a Moto E2 via FreedomPop and cellmapper on it..  It does band locking (B25/26/41) without the need for root.  You just need the MSL which FreedomPop provides when you order the phone.    I think for the hydro, while I believe B26 and 41 can be toggled, the only recourse for B25 is disabling the band scan for B25.  That'll initially work until the network decides to plop you on B25.  I also use a Kyocera hydro for the same purpose ?

I looked up the processor specs, and the modem is capable of 2XCA (actually 2x10 MHz, so it probably wouldn't be much use on B41).  It's about what I would expect for a phone in that price range.  https://www.qualcomm.com/products/MSM8937

19 minutes ago, dnicekid said:

i have mixed feelings about what I am saying but I think 600 is waaaaaay overrated. Yes it helps with coverage but it is clear the future is automated. Cars, refrigerators,phones, tablets Alexa and so forth. For this massive amount of data that will only continue to grow where does 600 fit if it has capacity setbacks? With cable in the mix the future will be small cell located at every street light/corner. 

I think Tmo mistake may have been to purchase the 600, they are clearly going for coverage to get themselves the same credibility as att/vzw. 

This may be a long term mistake as everyone is moving up.  Or it may work out for them long term, short term I don’t see any benefit of 600 with everyone racing to get 5g out. Maybe I am missing something 

I agree about the overrating.  My thought has been all along that density will be more the answer than wrestling away spectrum from someone every decade.  More density means spreading the load out more.  I think Sprint's 2.5 spectrum is more suited for small cells.  The range is limited enough that it gives a place like a neighborhood in a macro site dead spot good service without being overloaded.  Small cells don't need to cover several square miles.

Well Praise the Lord!  The "LTE Plus".coverage issues for the Cleveland market have been mostly resolved.  They forgot to add the new B41 coverage in Geauga county.  Then again, it has only been continuously live for less than a week.   It looks like the Toledo market may have been thinned on B41, but my hunch is that it needed it.

It doesn't look like anything was done in west PA to account for any of the B41 live sites around Erie, Meadville and State College.  It may be that an official launch hasn't occurred yet.

The  transition of 600 MHz spectrum is starting to happen here.  The first bought out of 4 stations, WUAB, shut down their RF-28 transmitter on Monday and is now channel sharing with WOIO on high VHF

For now they still have a translator in Akron on channel 24 until WEAO kicks them off.

6 hours ago, S4GRU said:

Yeah, unfortunately GMOs will not run 800MHz.  However, Sprint is now planning to fast track GMO to full build conversions since the Tmo breakup.  So the end is nigh for the GMO.

This is certainly promising.  Other markets like the seemingly forgotten West PA market now have 800MHz sites that have been found by S4GRU members.

I still can't figure out how to "follow" anything in the protected threads.  If it's a public thread then I have no problem following.

I just see this as part of a push and pull between a free enterprise capitalistic economy and the government not letting it get out of control.  For example, letting cellular carriers put up 100' poles in a local Akron Ohio area neighborhood made people who live and work in the area quite upset.  I (and ingenium) spoke to a small business owner who was not happy with the 100' tall pole Sprint small cell right in front of their auto care business.  Neither one of us argued her  point despite our excitement about finding the Sprint small cells. I certainly understood her situation as I'd probably be mad too, even if it is Sprint..  Stuff like this kicked off a wave with cities in Northeast Ohio  starting  to pass  zoning restrictions to limit the height of these things while also allow the cellular industry to continue their deployment work.

So as far as net neutrality goes, similar forces are at work.  It's this time that the capitalistic side is pushing back on the government.  Apparently it is now perceived by the now FCC top dogs as having too much government control over this avenue.  Like it or not, people voted in an administration who is more business friendly.

For some light reading, here's a link to the post that contains these small cells that I mentioned. 

http://s4gru.com/forums/topic/6612-cleveland-market-nv-20-spreadsheetmap-and-discussion/?do=findComment&comment=494147

Per site rules, it is only allowed to be in the premier section, sorry.

The "LTE Plus" coverage in my market, Cleveland, is still way off.  It's mostly understated.  Cuyahoga County is especially bad.  On the flip side, the Eastern part of Mahoning county is overstated in portions east of Youngstown.

  New B41 has been still showing  up from time to time.  I found one  new live from a site off of Brookpark Rd. Just east of I-71 a couple weeks ago.  And the maps and spreadsheet have been continually updated.   A vast majority of sites in the Cleveland metro area now have B41, but one would never know that on Sprint's coverage map.

http://s4gru.com/index.php?/topic/6612-cleveland-market-nv-20-spreadsheetmap-and-discussion/

You've got to have some takers by now.

I'm quite pleased at how the Sprint network is performing in the Cleveland Market, but it was a LONG time coming.  It has only been within the last month that most sites in the primary IBEZ now have all sectors live with B26.  Average signal strength has improved with B26,  but most dead zones without B26 still are dead zones with B26.  I think it's really a testament to Sprint's network rebuild that B25 LTE worked as well as it did in the absence of B26.  Sprint's decision years ago to put the brakes on rural site 8T8R deployment has still left me without B41 even though it came really close, but speeds are still plenty fast enough for me on B25 and 26.  I think the rural 8T8R build-out here was a stupid idea despite my happiness to see it deployed.  From a spreadsheet manager standpoint, I hate trying to match these (cheaper) B41 mini macros that have been deployed over the last year, but fortunately over 60% of our sites already have 8T8R equipment installed.  The last two most recent B41 sites I've found live have been 8T8R, so I'm glad to see that at least both are still being used now.  It's my dream that mini macros will cease to be used here in favor of the 8T8R stuff.

Years ago when my parents had a mobile broadband router (3G), they somehow managed to rack up a ton of roaming usage one month.  I  then changed it to home only and they never had another problem.  The letter basically says cut it out or your service will be dropped.  Fortunately they got a warning first before a letter of termination of service.

The strange thing here is that Cleveland on what I believe is the "typical" B26 EARFCN which is 8763, and I've also been told that 3x3 is here to stay until further notice.  Our CDMA Channel is different being at 526.  In our secondary IBEZ zone, 1x800 was initially 476 and was changed to 526 when B26 launched.

Do you know if the carrier size is 3 or 5 MHz?  Its 3 MHz in the Cleveland market IBEZ zones.  B26 went live here back in the spring. Many sites within 20 miles or so of the Lake have the 0F northerly sector shut off.  In some cases only one sector is live at a particular site.  The strange thing is that many sites along the lakeshore have 0F active.  Maybe it's to test interference to Canada without a potential network interruption if sectors need to be shut off?

On 9/16/2017 at 0:11 PM, jthawks said:

So I'm in  the L.A area an coverage is good. Speeds ok.  Almost got 30 on band 25. It's 10x10 here so that helps.  Seen allot of small cells but can't tell if it's sprint or not.  Haven't had band 26 yet.  Also phone stays on 800 voice awhile.  Anyways that's my input

All Sprint small cells found in the Ohio markets have had their Cascade ID posted at the site, so it makes singling it out a lot easier.  They've all contained 90XS.  For instance, a cascade ID for a small cell found in a Cleveland, OH area suburb is CL90XSB19.  Obviously, the LA market prefix is different.  Also, the signal is quite strong standing next to those things.  I've achieved low -60s RSRP standing roughly 20 feet away from the pole.

3 hours ago, jthawks said:

So are the macro sites able to give their location?  Like I'll get a super strong signal but there bsl is almost a mile away. No where close to me .  So I guess my question is do we now if we are connected to a macro or small cell?  Also I'm off rodeo drive now in Beverly hills .  

Once upon a time, BSLs we're the actual site coordinates, but now a vast majority use what are called offsets.  Triangulation with the BSL coordinates of all sectors is the only way to narrow down the approximate location.

Also, BSLs are a CDMA technology feature.  Small cells are LTE only.  That's where site notes on SCP comes into play.

So what EARFCNs have shown up so far?

Mine is 39874