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Paynefanbro

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Everything posted by Paynefanbro

  1. Paynefanbro
    NextWave is complaining about interference from T-Mobile's network again. It's super annoying considering the area where T-Mobile operates a full 150MHz of BRS/EBS shrank significantly in late 2023. In a place as dense as NYC, have two operators with such split holdings of this band doesn't make sense. Interference seems nearly inevitable. Next Wave has only submitted permits for 22 sites so far, they honestly should just sell. https://www.lightreading.com/5g/redzone-nextwave-also-complain-of-interference-from-t-mobile-s-5g
  2. Paynefanbro
    Yeah they definitely have 160MHz live but no idea if SCP reports properly. I only have Cellmapper on my Android device and only map AT&T and T-Mobile at the moment. Also no standalone on Verizon here.
  3. Paynefanbro
    There's a permit for a new 47 story building at 205 Montague St in Downtown Brooklyn. The problem is that T-Mobile eNB 48352 is on the building next door and this new building will block two out of 3 sectors of the site. For reference, the new building will be roughly as tall as 16 Court St which is right across the street. This site is the primary site covering Cadman Plaza so I wonder what the plan is. Will they just try to change sector placement, move to a different building, or will this just speed up the conversion of the Sprint site at 25 Monroe Place?
  4. Paynefanbro
    I'm confused. The screenshot in the post shows a 90MHz secondary carrier and a 20MHz n25 carrier, not a third 10MHz n41 carrier.
  5. Paynefanbro
    Mapped a bit of Perth Amboy since it seemed undermapped on Cellmapper. There are no Sprint conversions in the city however I did map a new build and one older site that had never been mapped before. The part that stood out to me while mapping the city is T-Mobile's site density in comparison to AT&T specifically since those are the two networks that I map. T-Mobile has 10 sites within city limits in comparison to AT&T's 4 sites. AT&T still performs great there thanks to their combo of C-band and DoD spectrum. I got max speeds of about 650Mbps right under a site but those speeds quickly drop off the farther you go from the site. In some parts of the city I couldn't get any more than ~40Mbps on AT&T because I was at the edge of the C-band cell and I'm certain most of the throughput was coming from the lowband I was aggregating with. T-Mobile on the other hand couldn't get the peak speeds that AT&T had because of NextWave encumbering them. They only have 40+40 n41 but had much more consistent 300-400Mbps speeds virtually everywhere I went and a much stronger signal. The only area where they struggled in terms of speed was around Five Corners where T-Mobile has a site on top of the Perth Amboy National Bank Building but it hasn't been upgraded just yet. They only have n71 and n25 on that site. I got speeds of about 150-200Mbps under that site which isn't bad but it's also the busiest area of the city so they definitely could use the capacity.
  6. Paynefanbro
    T-Mobile eliminated the 10MHz Band 41 carrier in Suffolk County and is now running 150MHz n41. Here's a screenshot of the 50MHz second carrier. I'm guessing it'll make its way west toward NYC in the coming weeks.
  7. Paynefanbro
    Following up on this. I just went up to City Island and it looks like T-Mobile is giving them the Broad Channel treatment by adding a bunch of small cells throughout the island. I mapped three new ones today bringing them to a total of seven small cells. It's still not a replacement for actual macros though. They need to join Verizon and AT&T in adding at least one more site closer to the north end of the island. Also snapped a pic of the upgraded site: — — — — — I mapped a recently upgraded site in Cobble Hill earlier and noticed that the gNB IDs for n41 and n25/71 are separated by two. Maybe it's a sneak peak into the numbering scheme going forward? gNB ID 1089448 is n41 and 1089450 is n25/71. Maybe n66 or n77 will be given 1089449.
  8. Paynefanbro
    New AT&T speed record for me. I encountered an AT&T site with upgraded backhaul in Crown Heights. I'm certain I can hit 1Gbps on this site off-peak.
  9. Paynefanbro
    Dish marks 5G drive test milestone, validating its network speeds https://www.fiercewireless.com/5g/dish-marks-5g-drive-test-milestone And yet barely anyone can use it. That's probably the only reason why they're able to meet these network speed milestones.
  10. Paynefanbro
    T-Mobile finally got a permit to decommission their old Band 66 site at 1 Carlton Ave across the street from the Brooklyn Navy Yard. It hasn't been active for a few months now so it's no surprise really. https://maps.app.goo.gl/mKapEnxkPdJuRLC96 Curious to see if they'll join move to another building or if they content with just not having a site in that area. — — — — — For the folks that travel on the Grand Central Parkway, T-Mobile finally upgraded the site on top of Creedmoor Psychiatric Center, finally filling in that gap of weaker n41 coverage on the highway. I was wondering when they would get to this one. Really felt like it was never going to happen. — — — — — T-Mobile's only site on City Island also got upgraded just in time for the spring crowds. I haven't actually seen the site or been there to map but I was in Sands Point last weekend and noticed that I connected to a new Band 12 eNB that shared PCIs with the City Island site in an area where I used to connect to that weird old split sector Band 66 antenna.
  11. Paynefanbro
    When I'm near the mini-macros performance is fine. They're pretty much like high powered small cells so they do have a place in the network. However in some areas T-Mobile has been using them instead of normal macros which introduces a ton of problems. They have terrible range, most can't cover more than a block, they're often 2x2MIMO as opposed to 4x4MIMO+ that you get on traditional macros, they take forever to upgrade because antenna manufacturers typically have trouble getting the newest technologies in a smaller form factor (at least initially), and more often than not they're 2-sector because they get installed on the facade at the corner of a building so they only provide coverage in two directions. A bunch of us in this thread have found some mini-macro sites that have been upgraded to NR but they are few and far between. The majority of them are still LTE only, some with Band 2/66 only and others with Band 2/12/66. The good news is, T-Mobile seems to be reevaluating their usefulness and decommissioning or converting them to full macros where possible. A good example of this is T-Mobile eNB 40003 which I posted a while back. Instead of just upgrading the small antennas, they moved to the roof of the building, installed regular antennas, and installed a third sector which has boosted coverage significantly.
  12. Paynefanbro
    Looks like T-Mobile learned their lesson and is starting to wipe out those mini-macro sites with the antennas on the facade of buildings. Two permits in late February alone. These sites have already been turned off, the antennas just haven't been removed yet. The areas they are in are better served by the full macros/Sprint conversions in the area so it's nothing lost. The two sites are at: 515 Madison Ave, New York, NY 10022 222 Park Ave S, New York, NY 10003 Also recently mapped a new T-Mobile site (non-conversion) in Manhattan at 810 Broadway, New York, NY 10003. Looks like it was first mapped last November. This site replace one that used to be on 797 Broadway before that building got demolished.
  13. Paynefanbro
    This one is weird because I wasn't able to find an antenna permit for it. I only found it because we had it on our keep site map and there was a gNB that matched the coverage pattern of the site. Confirmed it's existence with roadview. Sprint eNB 253661 -> T-Mobile gNB 1370628 Located at 40.77956781042574, -73.89963351976638 Site is gig+ — — — — — T-Mobile gNB 1343755/6 | eNB 879752/3 is a Sprint conversion in Hoboken. Located at: 40.75217759916991, -74.0298680462198 Also a gig+ site — — — — — Also got my fastest speed on AT&T's network yet a couple of days back. AT&T eNB 115379
  14. Paynefanbro
    I've seen it running on Sprint keep sites but not on T-Mobile sites. That's super interesting!
  15. Paynefanbro
    A bit of an embarrassing moment for AT&T this afternoon when I went into an indoor garage in Alphabet City and saw this in the status bar. Instead of spending money on a million small cells to fill in gaps in their outdoor coverage where their macros barely reach, they should just add more macros like their competitors do and it'll help both outdoors and indoors.
  16. Paynefanbro
    Nope they're not using it but it could be used for n26 or Band 26. I still don't think T-Mobile will keep it though. The radios that they have deployed don't so far don't support Band 26 or n26. Really only Dish is prepared to deploy n26 immediately. T-Mobile might just decide to hold onto the spectrum if no one buys it and then sell it to Dish years down the line. I still think the best deal for T-Mobile would be a swap where T-Mobile would give Dish a steep discount on the spectrum in exchange for a single 600MHz block in key markets. For example T-Mobile's lease of Dish's 600MHz D-block in NYC expires pretty soon and T-Mobile will fall back down to 15MHz n71 here without it. I have no doubt that this has already been offered to Dish but Dish is rightfully wary about handing their competitor an advantage like that. Realistically almost any swap would end with T-Mobile benefitting more than Dish. Dish doesn't *need* T-Mobile's 800MHz but it would've been a nice-to-have for the little gains in capacity.
  17. Paynefanbro
    Technically they have to *attempt* to sell it but they aren't obligated to take any offer less than the $3.5 billion purchase price that Dish agreed to. Meaning if no one offers at least that much for the spectrum T-Mobile gets to keep it. I'm doubtful that T-Mobile is going to keep it though. Burns & McDonnell already said last year that they wanted the spectrum for private wireless networks. https://www.fiercewireless.com/wireless/dish-isnt-only-one-interested-t-mobiles-800-mhz-spectrum
  18. Paynefanbro
    The goal of this petition as I understand it was to force T-Mobile to divest some amount of spectrum (likely C-band) in order to receive their winnings and AT&T absolutely failed in that regard. Sure they delayed the assignment of spectrum, but they delayed the assignment in areas where they still haven't built out any C-band. T-Mobile still maintains first-mover advantage on midband in these areas even if for a shorter amount of time. In my opinion T-Mobile won insomuch as they got every license that they won and the only divestiture was 20MHz of AWS/PCS spectrum in two counties in Hawaii where T-Mobile already outnumbers Verizon and AT&T in spectrum by over 2:1. That's gotta sting for AT&T especially. Now they have to reckon with people's speeds doubling overnight and TMHI suddenly becoming a reality in tons more localities.
  19. Paynefanbro
    Looks like T-Mobile added themselves to the DAS in my office in midtown. I noticed I had a much stronger signal than normal and confirmed the existence of a new LTE eNB but it has an older 5-digit numbering scheme. No 5G on the DAS but I'm glad to see them join anyway. Now I have full signal everywhere in the building. Speeds are fine at ~50Mbps which is slightly faster than what I get on the AT&T and Verizon DAS in here but pings are terrible at 100-200ms. I'm hoping it'll improve over time though as today is the first day it's active. — — — — — Edit: DAS turned off for about an hour for all carriers and came back. Now pings are 30-40ms with peak speeds over 100Mbps on T-Mobile. Edit 2: Looks like Band 2 is at 10MHz on the DAS as opposed to 15MHz on macros. Band 66 is at 20MHz though.
  20. Paynefanbro
    Impeccable timing https://www.t-mobile.com/news/network/5g-home-internet-puerto-rico
  21. Paynefanbro
    Just got back from Puerto Rico. I spent a lot of time going around the San Juan metro area, predominantly in Viejo San Juan, Santurce, Isla Verde, and a short stop in University Gardens. T-Mobile's network still performs as well today as it did when I last tested and in my opinion is the best on the island. n41 is still at 100MHz in most areas though I did record a few areas with only 80MHz. Yesterday the FCC announced that they're finally granting T-Mobile their Auction 108 winnings so we'll probably finally see that increase. They also have 15MHz of n25 and 15MHz of n25 and 15MHz n71. The fastest speed I recorded while there was 922 down and 120 up, presumably aggregating n41+n25 and potentially n71 as well but I wasn't able to confirm that. A couple of things I noticed about their network are that their is a ton of split-sector n25 deployed in San Juan, much like in the U.S. I even noticed some n41 sites that had 4 or more sectors. The weirdest being the site on top of SJU Airport where they have 6 n41 sectors each broadcasting 80MHz of n41. AT&T SIMs roam on LIberty's network but they still treat it as the home network. In my opinion they're the second best network in Puerto Rico. Liberty is still using the AT&T MCC-MNC code and is pretty much coasting on AT&T's network upgrades. They have 10MHz n5 virtually everywhere but I never saw my phone connect to any other 5G bands. Their saving grace was just how much spectrum they have to aggregate across midband and lowband. I'd see combos like 10MHz n5 + 20MHz B2 + 10MHz B66 + 10MHz Band 30 + 5MHz Band 2 and get upwards of 200Mbps. Coverage was slightly worse than T-Mobile in my experience, even indoors which is a surprise given T-Mobile usually struggles a bit indoors due to their macro density. Verizon is roaming on Claro in Puerto Rico just as they have been for years. No idea if there is 5G roaming because I was connected to LTE the entire time. Toggling 5G didn't do anything and both pings and speeds weren't great. Speeds were in the 20-40Mbps range consistently and pings over 200ms. For comparison T-Mobile's pings are in the teens and Liberty pings are in the 40's even when roaming using an AT&T SIM. Claro's network is ok in my experience with nothing really notable about it. — — — — — Here are some pics of sites that I took:
  22. Paynefanbro
    I noticed that on my Boost line. I ended up mapping some 2G on Cellmapper because of that lol. Looked like it would connect to T-Mobile 2G for a bit and then disconnect and show no signal. Thankfully it's back up and running.
  23. Paynefanbro
    Nationwide AT&T outage occurring right now affecting all of their brands, MVNOs, and even FirstNet. Although this kind of outage is rare, I bet Verizon and T-Mobile are both gonna try to use this to pull First Responders to their network or at least consider them for backup services. https://www.theverge.com/2024/2/22/24079910/att-network-outage-sos-mode
  24. Paynefanbro
    T-Mobile is willing to give up 20MHz of AWS,PCS, or BRS in Kauai and Maui to expedite assignment of their Auction 108 winnings. https://wireless2.fcc.gov/UlsEntry/attachments/attachmentViewRD.jsp?applType=search&fileKey=175210842&attachmentKey=21924918&attachmentInd=applAttach
  25. Paynefanbro
    Got my fastest n41 speed test ever on a pretty unassuming macro while driving on the Wilbur Cross Parkway in Woodbridge, CT on Friday. Was stuck in a bit of traffic and ran a speedtest and got nearly 2Gbps.
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