RAvirani

I'm with your first point. In Seattle, many macros already have 120 MHz of LTE on air. M-MIMO antennas are going to be a sidegrade at best as far as capacity is concerned. I think the eventual goal is to run 60 MHz NR, 40 MHz NR/LTE DSS and 20 MHz LTE simultaneously.

M-MIMO equipment has a 120 MHz bandwidth limit. That has to be split between LTE and NR.

I haven't really set up bulk logging/high-level usage stats on that particular part of the site. How about I record usage for the next week or two and give you a good usage estimate then?

LTE > HSPA+ (4G) > HSPA (4G) > WCDMA/UMTS (3G/4G).

Leaked maps could be a big issue. I'm also curious if map markets are rendered individually on the client side or if they're rendered as tiles on the server side. If they're done client-side, performance with large maps (e.g. the NV sites map or Clear sites map) will be terrible. Can you link me to one of these maps?

As Google is turning fusiontables down soon, I've been looking for ways to preserve our maps. Playing around with the Google Maps API, it looks like it's possible to take data from a MySQL table and display it in the form of pins on a Google Map via PHP. This is virtually identical to what fusiontables did. If map usage stays low enough to be covered by the free tier, this is something I could look into doing on a bigger scale. If anyone else has other ideas for fusiontables alternatives, share them here. The shutdown date is approaching quickly.

Not having L800 will prevent the combined company from dedicating all of their 600 spectrum to NR in many markets. Running 600 RRHs in NR+LTE split mode reduces the maximum Tx/Rx diversity to 2x2 for both air interfaces. This is a big hit to lowband 5G performance.

I'm going to have to agree here. No hostility, but I always find it incredibly difficult to understand mattp's posts.

I think it's unfortunate that the combined company is divesting 800. Having 5x5 L800 and 5x5 L700 would probably allow the combined company to use their 600 holdings exclusively for NR. Additionally, Sprint could add 800 radios to T-Mobile's new 600 equipment without an antenna swap. A diplexer+RRH is all they would need.

Mini macros for L2500?

There's plenty of CA where I'm at. L2500+L2500+L2500 as well as L1900+L2500+L2500. No 1900 intraband CA because we have a single 15x15 carrier, but I'm definitely not complaining about that.

Carrier aggregation is live when T-Mobile roaming on certain sites. I'm not sure about international roaming...

Correct. Post merger, MOCN will be implemented the other way (i.e. so T-Mobile users can access Sprint's RAN). This will be a stopgap solution until the networks are fully merged and integrated. After that, there will be no need for MOCN anymore.

^ This. This is correct.

This is incorrect. MOCN is used when providers are sharing one RAN and have separate network cores. This what T-Mobile has done to allow LTE roaming. MOCN is not the long-term plan post merger. MOCN will only be used temporarily in order to allow New T-Mobile users to connect to both the Sprint and T-Mobile's RANs while retaining connections to their respective core networks (where the HSS/billing/account and other servers reside). Post-merger T-Mobile will upgrade their EPC's capacity such that it will be able to handle the increased traffic formerly Sprint users will bring. Then, via OTA updates and backend merging of customer data, they will move devices/accounts over to the New T-Mobile core network.

For those curious about the antenna specifications, here are their model numbers and links to their spec sheets. RFS Celwave APXVBBLL15X-43-C-I20: http://81.3.15.2/WebSearchECat/datasheets/pdf/?q=APXVBBLL15X_43-C-I20 Commscope NNVV-65C-R4: https://www.commscope.com/catalog/antennas/pdf/part/92966|49723|50693/NNVV-65C-R4.pdf @lilotimz feel free to add these links to the original post! Also, both antennas are used in all vendor regions. The Commscope antenna is used where possible due to its better performance, whereas the RFS antenna is used where there are size limitations.

Merger Time

An unmanaged switch just provides more physical ethernet paths through which your devices can connect. It doesn't offer IP routing, NAT, QoS, or any other capabilities.

Source?

T-Mobile needs this merger a lot more then Sprint here. I'm hoping they don't mess the network up here if it goes through. There are a lot of places where Sprint and T-Mobile have sites within 100 feet of each other, but the Sprint site provides significantly better coverage. I'm hoping those don't get decommissioned.

T-Mobile's network is awfully congested in Seattle. And terribly optimized. It baffles me that with at least 1.5-2x the sites Sprint has, T-Mobile can’t provide an experience as consistent as Sprint's.

Definitely cellular equipment. Not Sprint's, though.

You are correct.

I was under the impression that integration was effectively complete. If that's not the case then yes, that could cause delays.

Not substantially. Other than possibly playing with TM parameters due to the fact L750 is a 10x10 carrier, there is little to no extra work to be done.