ericchen

For the most part, you should get LTE everywhere you get EV-DO, down to about 1 bar, when it will kick back to 3G--provided the 3G is coming from the same tower... if you watch your engineering screen, it's amazing just how many towers your phone flips through as it is moving around--a LOT more than you think!

 

Since the LTE is only on selected towers, that explains why you can kick back to 3G and not get back onto 4G right away until you are really close to the 4G tower again -- chances are your phone is already scanning around other 3G only towers that do not have the 4G yet, and the 3G/4G are coming from different sites.

 

That is weird about Silverdale/Bremerton though... looking at Sensorly, it looks like even though there is a good bit of mapping, noone has yet "found" the LTE tower -- there are no "full strength" areas yet, which pop up right close to the towers... something tells me they have LTE up on just a couple towers that are way up on the highest hills--which would explain why the overall 4G signals are weak in the area, and also why you probably don't kick back to 4G as fast as you should--since the stronger site is 3G only and your phone locks onto that once you lose LTE.

 

I won't be able to get up that way for a while--but it would be interesting if someone in the area could do a drive and "find" and map which sites are actually putting the LTE into the area... from the maps it doesn't look like any of the sites downtown proper are doing it -- even the "tower farm" in Silverdale by the freeway doesn't appear to be in a "strongest" LTE area (I've always thought that was funny -- apparently the carriers didn't want to co-locate and the city actually allowed them to each build rather large monopoles when they could have all been crammed on 1 or 2... there's 4 or 5 lol)

No need to drive around and "find" LTE towers as they come live. If you donate, the member's section has maps that are updated weekly with new live LTE sites as well as maps of all of the sites to be updated under Network Vision.

I was heading south towards Downtown, so just before the exit to the U-district.

So I assume you mean between the exits for NE 45th/50th and NE 65th.

LTE rollout is fast! 4G is fast! Everything is fast!

It's not fast enough. More LTE in Seattle proper and the Eastside please.

LTE in Tacoma!! Got these results while on Ruston Way by the Lobster Shop

Usually it's a good idea to wait until the speedtest is over and then screenshot so you have the upload and download speeds.

LTE is covered way more than sensorly is stating I tested it all night here are some results. I am off Redmond way as we speak and getting LTE at my apparment.

Nice, I'm seeing a little more on Sensorly now from that Redmond tower - I assume you went around and mapped it out a little bit?

Gotta make sure the country club folk get their LTE.

 

Though...if that's what they're trying to do, they really need to shift their focus north to Bellevue/Kirkland/Redmond.

 

Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk 2

Agreed, let's get the Eastside up and running.

There's another small blip of purple on the Sensorly map near the tower that is active in Kent, WA. Probably the same tower being picked up by someone around the area.

There's a similar smudge just southwest of SR167/Kent Des Moines Road. It looks grey, not purple, but there it is...

Yeah I see that too. Interesting that it's showing up as gray and not a shade of purple.

Could anyone shed some insight on what that may mean?

That's not unusual. If the backhaul upgrade was completed over six months ago, it will not show up.

 

Robert via Nexus 7 with Tapatalk HD

I see. Thanks for the clarification.

I thought number represent how many upgrade there are at the tower..

 

for example, 2 could mean 2 data speed upgrade, or (1 data upgrade, 1 data speed upgrade), etc

What's interesting is that the site lists data capacity and voice capacity upgrades. No data speed upgrades.

So we can confirm that the tower in the middle marked "2" is an LTE tower.. after rush hour, correct?

Can't confirm that it's on LTE 24/7 but it was definitely running some speedy LTE as I sat outside it last night at 2AM doing some speed tests.

That site is right across from a high school at the top of a hilly area. As you leave the area and head downhill, the signal degrades pretty quickly until it's gone at the bottom of the hill. The map of the area on Sensorly is pretty much the signal strength I was getting.

Getting these speeds sitting in my car right next to the LTE tower in Kent. Pretty solid!

Is the 4G working in this area or just for some parts of the day?