Trip

It seems really big to me, but I have to admit I'm considering it.  The dual screen thing seems moderately interesting.  I'd be interested in trying it out. 

EDIT:  But Best Buy has the G8X on sale right now at a very sensible price.  It's comparable in size to my G6, versus the V60 which, having looked at the dimensions, seems enormous by comparison.  My G6 is already at the very top end of what would fit in my hand.  If I got the V60, it'd be solely for the ability to use 5G, which I don't really need other than for tracking purposes--and right now, I think it's pretty safe to assume that a site with 600 MHz LTE on T-Mobile or a Massive MIMO antenna on Sprint is running 5G without having to prove it that way.

- Trip

Q&A: 

Assuming 4/1 closing, 180 days to negotiate addendum to agreement, then if they can't agree, 60 days for T-Mobile to exercise purchase option, then 60 days for Shentel to exercise purchase option.  Could negotiate something outside the agreement, as we know.

Shentel Boost/Virgin is excluded from Dish sale.  Any Dish arrangement does not touch Shentel right now.

Shentel penetration (pre-nTelos) was mid-20%.  Some subsets of historic areas are "approaching 50%."  Goal is to get to 20% market share when expansion areas are included.  Would hope that is easier with T-Mobile brand.  Asked to speculate on T-Mobile's share in Shentel areas, estimates it's half of Shentel's penetration.

Asked about Richmond sliver, don't expect much growth here until 2021, and from just before Q&A, noted cap ex is mostly at maintenance level.

Call is over.

- Trip

On the Shentel call:  "Very preliminary discussions" are all they've had.  They expect them to ramp up over the coming weeks.

- Trip

Shentel has posted their 4Q results, and there's a slide (page 7) in the presentation reiterating the three options.  That implies to me that they have not reached an agreement with T-Mobile.

https://investor.shentel.com/static-files/130ca6df-6deb-4f91-bdf0-aa2cfbdbff2c

- Trip

12 minutes ago, bigsnake49 said:

Just remember that T-Mobile and Sprit are colocated on a lot of sites or the sites are very close. They will only use 11,000 of Sprint sites to host T-Mobile equipment for either capacity or coverage.

Indeed.  I did an analysis along those lines nearly two years ago:

Just for kicks, I pulled up Spotsylvania County again, and now there are more sites total (25).  Of those, 12 are co-located.  One of the Sprint sites is a DAS antenna that is in the shadow of a new T-Mobile macro.  Two T-Mobile sites are not co-located with Sprint, while nine of the Sprint/Shentel sites are not co-located with T-Mobile.

Because it exposes site locations, I've put a map link in the old DC thread in the Interactive Map forum. 

- Trip

5 minutes ago, bigsnake49 said:

Thanks, my interpretation of that screenshot is that you are roaming on T-Mobile band 2 in your area which then presents itself as band 25 to Sprint roamers through MFBI. So yes the MFBI part is done but the actual hosting of the Sprint spectrum by T-Mobile has not been done. There is a little bit of work involved, even if it ends up being mostly software configuration, such as setting the filters at different points depending on the additional Sprint licenses. So this has to be done for each license area separately. 

It's a US Cellular phone.  It had been roaming directly on T-Mobile B2, so I tried to force it onto Sprint by locking out the T-Mobile bands, and up came T-Mobile B25.  If I'd been roaming via Sprint, I'd have expected to see the 311490 PLMN.  (I'm not sure I understood your post correctly.)

But yes, ultimately they'll have to put the Sprint spectrum up on the T-Mobile towers.  That's definitely not done yet.  But the MFBI does appear to be done, at least around here.

- Trip

3 hours ago, bigsnake49 said:

2. I am thinking that adding band 25 spectrum capability to all 65,000 T-Mobile sites so that they can take advantage of the combined spectrum holdings is a software task that can be done remotely. They will need to turn on MFBI for Band 2/25 compatibility. So this should happen rather quickly.

This might already have been done. 

The screenshot:

https://imgur.com/a/W6wxVTd

- Trip

The FCC certifications are designed to deal with RF exposure/output and determine if the device is safe to use.  While a lower EIRP from the phone could indicate reduced RF performance, that's not necessarily the case.

I need to figure out if other phones have a feature like LG's "Knock On" and contemplate those as I look at new devices.

- Trip

4 hours ago, bigsnake49 said:

For people worried about Shentel with respect to this merger, I found an old article from when the merger was first proposed:

"Specifically, the analysts at Macquarie Research wrote that the proposed Sprint and T-Mobile merger “could lead to one of several positive outcomes: 1) New T-Mobile could buy Shentel’s wireless business; 2) Shentel could buy T-Mobile’s subs in its footprint at 75% of their value with financing help from New T-Mobile (if needed); or 3) T-Mobile would have to turn off the competing network; with this, Shentel would get rid of a competitor and gain access to T-Mobile’s spectrum. For the right deal, including the purchase of T-Mobile’s subs, we expect management could take leverage up to 4.5x.”"

https://www.fiercewireless.com/wireless/shentel-carrier-at-crossroads-sprint-and-t-mobile-merger

I'm familiar with that article.  It's Option #1 that worries me.

- Trip

Is there any way of determining what a phone's RF performance is short of buying it?  I always see specs on battery life and processor performance, but never RF performance.  I ask because I know my LG G6, for example, has far worse RF performance than the Moto E5 Plays even on the same network.  Given how much time I spend in rural areas, I really need to make sure my next phone is a better performer in weak signal conditions.

- Trip

1 hour ago, bigsnake49 said:

I am anxiously waiting to see how expertly the new management team handles the proper blending of macro and small cells. I know that in my area Sprint decommissioned some macro sites and replaced them with small cells and Magic Boxes.

Yikes.  They didn't do that around here.  That's really bad.

- Trip

17 hours ago, bigsnake49 said:

One thing that I did not address is the status of the MVNO agreement that Sprint has with Altice and the ongoing efforts of Sprint to deploy small cells on the cable plant networks of Comcast and Charter. I think that it would behoove T-Mobile to take a fresh look at that agreement. Now I know that T-Mobile's network in the NYC/Long Island area is much better than Sprint's so they might not need those small cells as much as Sprint did or might not need as many as Sprint did. It will be interesting to see T-Mobile's thinking vis a vis small cells. I am thinking that they probably think of of small cells as supplementary to the macro site network. Only where there is no other way to deploy a network (NIMBY regulations, no tall buildings around) should small cells replace macro sites.

All I will say is that around here, at least, some of Sprint's strand-mount gear is in areas where T-Mobile's service suffers from lack of macro sites. 

- Trip

1 hour ago, Tengen31 said:

I don't think that is a American phone since it doesn't show barely any of the bands used here

Sent from my SM-G975U1 using Tapatalk
 

Agreed, no Band 12 (T-Mobile, AT&T, US Cellular) or Band 13 (Verizon).  If it's aimed at the American market, I'm struggling to figure out who the target carrier is.

- Trip

29 minutes ago, bigsnake49 said:

Good ole Trip! From what I understand T-Mobile is not great in the Shentel area. This too will be resolved. They would be stupid to abrogate the agreement. They will look at each of these agreements as to what is best for the overall company. 

All I will say is what I've said all along--that I want Shentel to stay in charge in the region.  Otherwise, I don't care either way about the merger.  I know (but can't say) why T-Mobile's West Virginia and western Virginia coverage is so bad, and worry that would continue if Shentel is not left in charge.  They would take over the existing Shentel network, I have no doubt, but would they continue to upgrade things and expand at the pace Shentel does?  Based on past history, I can't say I'm confident.

Given that Shentel recently resumed expansion in the area they bought from Sprint in 2018, I'm assuming some agreement was reached, whatever that agreement is.  The question is what that agreement is.

- Trip

Okay, now I can go back to worrying about what will happen to Shentel.

- Trip

Looking good!

https://imgur.com/a/KczN0Zg

- Trip

https://www.fiercewireless.com/wireless/t-mobile-sprint-deal-faces-another-setback-analysts?utm_source=internal&utm_medium=rss

More analyst speculation, but interesting nonetheless.

- Trip

14 hours ago, belusnecropolis said:

The app has never let me log in to my account for some reason, I tried all the usual thing user @mdob07 mentioned.

I was tinkering with Cell Mapper a week or two ago, and discovered that if I had special characters in my password, like an exclamation point, it wouldn't let me log into the app.  When I used the website to change my password and remove the special characters (sticking with letters and numbers), I logged in without issue.

- Trip

https://www.fiercewireless.com/wireless/cowen-sees-court-blocking-t-mobile-sprint-deal

Key quote:  "The court set post-trial arguments for January 15, with each side having two hours to make their closing arguments. New Street expects the court will rule sometime between mid-February and mid-March."

- Trip

The G8X with the second screen definitely looks intriguing, but I feel like it'd be a gimmick that I would try out once or twice, then remove from my phone and never use again. 

I'm still on my G6 because there wasn't a Black Friday deal that looked sufficiently good to make me want to buy something new. 

- Trip

If the case runs 10 business days, that takes us to 12/20.  Then the judge has to write a decision--during the holidays.  I'd be shocked to see anything at all before January.

Then, as Flompholph says, they could appeal.

- Trip

There is no more than 18 MHz available in any given individual market in T-Band, much of which is non-contiguous and some of which is impaired.  It's only reserved in a handful of markets, and in many of those, is only 6 MHz.

New York:  18 MHz
Los Angeles:  6+6+6 MHz
Chicago:  12 MHz
Philadelphia:  12 MHz
Dallas:  6 MHz
Houston:  6 MHz
Miami:  6 MHz
San Francisco:  12 MHz
Washington, DC:  12 MHz
Pittsburgh:  6+6 MHz
Boston:  6+6 MHz

I'm not really sure what Congress was hoping to be able to sell in the first place.

- Trip

https://www.t-mobile.com/coverage/5g-coverage-map

- Trip

On 11/10/2019 at 7:17 AM, belusnecropolis said:

That is wild, you would think no service on Sprint would roam before Tmo since Sprint has always been liberal with the roaming versus Tmo. I had the opposite experience yesterday.

Just for kicks, I looked at a log copy from a few days ago.  Filtering on the 311490 PLMN, I have 193 rows total.  I have no rows for T-Mobile B71, but my LG G6 does not support Band 71.  I have 10 rows for T-Mobile B12, eight of which were in western Maryland near Frostburg.  The other two were momentary connections at the hospital near here and in New Jersey.

- Trip

21 hours ago, belusnecropolis said:

I don't know why everyone keeps spreading misinformation about these bands not aggregating, just like certain roaming bands being restricted, this is untrue. Y'all should stop.

The roaming restriction is based on first-hand experience.  I have roamed on T-Mobile 600 and 700 before in select locations, but in many areas, I have never connected to T-Mobile 600 or 700, even when the alternative has been no service, and sometimes even while my T-Mobile phone is connected to 600 or 700. 

My impression is that in places where 600 and 700 are not loaded, they allow such roaming.  In the places where it's under considerable demand, either due to high number of users or low density of sites, Sprint roaming appears restricted to AWS and PCS.

- Trip