brochaz.d

Had occasion to be in a Sprint store (Austin, TX) yesterday and found a couple of extremely apologetic CSR's to go with the ones I had talked to on the #2Talk line on Wednesday. The folks who have to meet the public are seriously concerned about the company's 'policy' of overstating the progress in rolling out 4G LTE. I also find it more than curious that the rollout here in our city, the home of AMD, Samsung, Intel, and IBM facilities and allegedly a tech-savvy place, is so slow in getting the latest and best. For Sprint to continue to push the Samsung GS3 as brazenly as they are doing while their front-line people have to field complaints about signal strength, etc., is ridiculous. Too, the rollout here seems to be from the more affluent to the less affluent areas of Travis County; the major exception being a 'bedroom' community named Dripping Springs! It is a conundrum wrapped in an enigma as to how Sprint/Ericsson makes the decisions about where to start and where to go next. I'm not sorry about pushing the button on purchasing an SGS3, as its faster operation almost makes up for the sacrifice of available signal strength. We actually have to have an Airave device in our home now, just to get acceptable strength level on 3G! Fortunately the WiFi makes up for that lack, but we can't get apps to download via WiFi, which puzzles everyone from Sprint techies to the local in-store CSR's. I don't regret having Sprint as my carrier, but their perpetual habit of stubbing their toes and getting ahead of themselves for what appear to be solely marketing gambits is way past frustrating. Thanks. I feel better now!

Not to change the direction of the conversation, but does anyone have thoughts about the relative cost/benefit ratio of the S3 16Gb/32Gb vs. loading up the microSD side? It appears that for about the same amount of money, I can upgrade both my handsets (which I'm going to do anyway) to an S3 16 Gb w/64 Gb microSD vs. S3 32Gb w/ 16 Gb microSD card. Thoughts, suggestions (as long as it doesn't involve actual Sprint emplyees)? TIA

Looks like it might be about time to pull the trigger on upgrading my phone(s) to SG3, since the Mopac tower isn't all that far from where I live. The progress is really encouraging, and, once again, S4GRU is ahead of the 'official' Sprint verbage.

Checking the Sprint 'official' map of coverage is notoriously useless, in my experience. Sprint would seem to be less than forthcoming about its significant accomplishments, and appears to be working hard to minimize expectations. Maybe that's a good idea; like saying "It will be at least two weeks before we can get to you", when there's the likelihood of whatever you need being done in the next day or two. Lower expectations often lead to lower pressure and fewer gripes when the expectations don't materialize. HOWEVER, I am waiting for Sprint to turn on the service in the Austin area before I invest in a new phone for my wife, and some idea of a time-frame for launch would really benefit their sales, if others are like I am. Just sayin'.