Theot

So the band 41 issue seems to be working again. But the signal was still pretty weak. However after my previous post I found a way to disable the individual LTE bands and I've been running around GR using just band 25 with great results.

It might not have anything to do with you, they might still be messing with the site.

 

The site at Michigan + Plymouth had B41 live and working for a while, then they shut it off for a few days, and then brought it back online. I know that's not the same as your situation, but if they're switching backhaul over and forget to turn B41 off, (or just doing some other work) I could see something like that happening.

 

You should call it into Sprint, just so they have it logged.

I tweeted sprintcare, they said they have alerted the network team.  so hopefully they can turn it off till its fixed. 

So the last 2 days at work my G3 will not pull any data on band 41, I've tried prl and profile updates, reboots, etc. It will briefly snag band 26 with 3-5 bars (85-95 dBm) and I can then do things but then it switches to band 41 to which I'm only pulling 1 bar usually (105-110 dBm) and then, no data. For the past week before yesterday I was pulling 20+ mbps down on 41 even with 1 bar. But this is the 2nd day in a row I cannot get data on b41. I'm in GR near Plymouth & Michigan.

Anybody else seeing this?

Found B41 and did a speed test at Plainfield and Leonard in Grand Rapids.

 

I got the G3 a month ago. I've been picking up B41 at Michigan and Plymouth for a week now. It's only 1-2 bars but I'm getting it and most of the time I'm getting over 20 mbs down at around -110db which is impressive.

Bought signal check pro so I can keep an eye on it too!

That's fair -- and normally I would have agreed with this. I have a brand new triband device, and have experienced the same thing on all bands for months and months.

 

It's literally only since yesterday, that LTE appeared to be working for me at Woodland (I pulled down 30mbps at the "Woodland Tower", over by 29th and Breton. I pulled 4mbps down outside Woodland Mall proper).

 

And for what it's worth, I got those speeds on B25. So even with your Note 2, you should be able to see some of that speed improvement, if you head over there now.

 

Inside the mall is probably still a deadzone, but the parking lot should at least be usable now.

Good to know. And just for the record those issues I was having at the malls were in the parking lot so I'll have to check it out.

For instance, the site by 29th and Breton now has real backhaul. Today, I pulled down 30mbps off of B25. It's the only Sprint site in West Michigan I've *ever* seen faster than 12mbps, on any band. And that site is not unloaded -- it's Sunday afternoon, and that site is intended to cover all of Woodland Mall.

 

That's double the speed of AT&T's 10x10 B17 in that same location

I may need to go get a tri band phone to try out for a couple weeks and see if it makes enough of a difference to stay.

Your free to do that, and it may solve some of your problems. (site density is somewhat better, site placement is *much* better).

 

But AT&T is slowing down a bit here too. We're a B17-only market, and AT&T has halted a lot of upgrade work, so while AT&T has more capacity than Sprint here, it's not tons more by any means.

 

I *really* hate to say this, but Verizon is easily the best option here at the moment. You get triple the speeds of everyone else, along with the more+better coverage. Verizon's really doing some crazy good engineering work in Grand Rapids.

 

For example, they built a brand new tower in Grandville, just a half a mile away from the old site (next to Steak and Shake, that Sprint / AT&T / Metro CDMA all run on), just so that AWS would propagate properly up to the new suburbs south of the hill behind Rivertown Mall.

 

That's crazy attention to detail, that I was certain no carrier had noticed or would ever notice. But Verizon finally did, and did something about it. I don't particularly like the company in any way, but I'm impressed by that attention to detail.

I hear ya, really want to know the status on the north side of Wyoming area before I commit to an upgrade to a tri-band (S3 as of the moment). Switched jobs and took a huge pay cut for more time with the family. Worth it of course, but was no were near the premium member minimum. And with all the towers upgraded to 1900 LTE had no reason to remain just a lowly old member

Still on my note 2, but only have usable LTE in maybe 3 spots around GR where I need it and it's not super reliable. And I don't count sprints 3G as usable for much. My contract is up December 28, right now I think I'm going to AT&T prepaid with a moto G unless things change drastically with sprint very soon which I doubt.

Eh, it's not worth the hassle. This was just a theoretical situation. I only personally know 4/10 framily members. Hopefully, someone leaves.

 

 

Vince

If it's going to cost them $55 a month anyway they might as well get on their own plan.

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I hope this happens.

 

The pricing doesnt make sense when compared to tablets which are more powerful, have more expensive screens, bigger batteries...and cost significantly less.

Exactly what I've been saying since Google put out the nexus 7 for $250. Then the galaxy nexus dropped to around $300 a couple of months before the nexus 4 came out and now the nexus 5, both the 4 & 5 are very capable smartphones for under $350. Some would say, more capable even than the bloated phones Samsung and others put out.

It will have to happen with subsidies going away. People are not going to want to buy new phones yearly otherwise. I won't.

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Does anybody know what the EasyPay plan payments are for a 32gb iPhone 5s? I have a friend that is interested in joining my Framily but wants to know the phone pricing first. Can't find it anyplace online and chat says you have to go into a store. Called the store and the guy who answered said you have to come in to get the pricing. Grrr. Why does sprint make this so hard?

I'm not sure what size memory it was for but I actually looked at it 2 days ago when I was in store for my wife. I think it's the most expensive phone on easy pay. $28 a month which may have been for a 16gb. Wasn't worth upgrading her from the 5 for me.

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So I talked to a sprint store last week. I was told you can't do an upgrade on easy pay without moving to a framily plan which is what I've read here I believe. Yesterday while in a different sprint store getting my wife's phone fixed I asked the rep if I could upgrade with easy pay without moving to the framily plan and she said they changed that policy last week and that you can now. Anybody else heard this?

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Well i love the fact i have a opt out clause in my contract with sprint lol. my 2 lines that i wanted to get rid of they talked me into keeping them with 2 tab 3's and 5$ per month on each for the stupid 25 megs of data. I told them about the subsidy's going away and she was so sure it would never happen in full that she noted my account that if they do away with them i can opt out free of my 2 5$ plans and keep my Tabs

 

1 question. I have the phone on wifi and data turned off BUT 25 Megs is what? i mean how much internet get used when you check your e-mail or look up a phone number if you are on data? i know it can vary on how good a connection you have but i was just wondering is the 25 Megs used up in 1 check of a e-mail or what?

 

I also called back and had them check my account and to make sure the account services Manager did note the account and it is noted lol

Lucky you did that.

25 megs is a few pictures depending on the resolution.

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There are half a dozen different local ISP's who would bend over backwards to get Sprint backhaul in West Michigan. I know most of them personally.

 

If it's in Grand Rapids (for instance, the only downtown site), not only would all those other local ISP's jump in, but I personally could get 100x100 dedicated backhaul on that site within 48 hours.

 

But Sprint doesn't work that way. As far as I can tell, they just buy everything from AT&T, and ignore everyone else. (We tried to get them to use local backkhaul. Not even necessarily from me, just to use *anyone* local. They weren't interested).

Have you asked since softbank bought them or tried going farther up the food chain?

Good grief, no wonder they are lacking then. If I was AT&T I wouldn't give them a decent back haul either to keep them in their place.

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I'm stuck between a rock and a hard place.  I'm on a plan with my brother-in-law now, 5 lines, been on it for a year.  If we add the sister-in-law and her 3 lines, I'm guessing the sis and I will save cash.  However because the bro and I split the base plan and his mom's line, but I pay my 2 line charges it doesn't split evenly.  Long story short he won't save anything, I will, but he won't.  So I can't see him wanting to do it.

I thought about breaking out into my own plan basically forcing him to but for $30 a month its probably not good for family relations lol.

Sprint site spacing is so atrocious in Grand Rapids. They inherited the network there from iPCS. It will take a Triband LTE phone to get usable service in this market, in my opinion. If you stay with the Note 2, you will always have a subpar experience there.

 

Being able to use CDMA on 800MHz now and LTE on 800MHz soon is the only chance for sanity in a market like Grand Rapids. You need to switch to Triband or find another provider.

 

Robert via Samsung Note 8.0 using Tapatalk Pro

Thanks for the response.  That's the way I've been leaning is to try the G2 for a few days and see if it makes a difference and if so great.  If not, well then I will switch.  Is Triband active in GR then?

Hello everyone, its been awhile since I've been in here.  the last month or so has been extremely frustrating with Sprint.  My Note 2 just decided to stop charging a week before christmas, so now I have a replacement phone.  Since getting this one I've had very poor call quality and a lot of dropped calls.  LTE in the Michigan & Fuller area has been up and down.  Sometimes it works well, sometimes it doesn't.  Sometimes its just not working at all and gives me only 3G.  Starting to feel like there is a reason Verizon and AT&T cost more, for another $20-$30 a month, I can actually rely on the network.  Is anybody else in GR having issues?  I got a text from Sprint yesterday saying they were nearly complete with their network upgrades in our area and that should give us significant service improvement.  Well if that's the case why is my service getting worse?

Anybody in GR near downtown having 4G data issues? I lost data about an hour ago. I'm still connected to 4G on my note 2 with full signal but i can't do any data. I flipped back to 3G and I have data. So not sure if it's my phone or the network.

Holland and grand Rapids are officially on the list now. Anyone notice any better coverage over the past few days?

 

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Nope, its still spotty from m6 & kzoo to the east and south. I'm towards Dutton and I get 4g at my house but it is slower than 3g. Otherwise downtown and all other areas of GR are normal around 8-12 mbps download speed for me on my note 2.

Sprint has brought up a cluster of NV 3G according to a source in the sponsor thread. The area is East of GR, West-> East Alto to Portland and South -> North Freeport -> Sheridan

 

This includes the I96 corridor from Portland to the M6, don't be surprised of you drop calls due to Legacy->NV or NV->Legacy handoff

 

But long term that is good right?

 

 

 

 

Ha ha, that would help wouldn't it?

 

 

Near downtown GR, Michigan and Fuller area.

 

 

OMG OMG OMG, i live on michigan and fuller you said that i turned off wifi and bam 4g

Yep and is decent speed when I was running speed tests today to. Enjoy man, I plan to every day at work now.

I have a solid 4-5 bars of LTE inside the building at work today. Getting about 10mb down and up. Very pleasantly surprised this morning. No more using wifi that blocks Gmail at work :-)

I have a solid 4-5 bars of LTE inside the building at work today. Getting about 10mb down and up. Very pleasantly surprised this morning. No more using wifi that blocks Gmail at work :-)

 

Where??

 

 

 

Sent from my note 2 using Tapatalk 2

 

 

 

 

Ha ha, that would help wouldn't it?

Near downtown GR, Michigan and Fuller area.

I have a solid 4-5 bars of LTE inside the building at work today. Getting about 10mb down and up. Very pleasantly surprised this morning. No more using wifi that blocks Gmail at work :-)

The tower in Byron Center is right behind the McDonalds in town. Is LTE enabled on your device?

 

Edit in: Your profile shows an EVO 3D which is a wimax phone, there is no wimax in Bryon Center

Figured that was the case. I have friends with wimax phones that don't understand the difference and are ticked they can't get LTE and that wimax is not being expanded when I explain it. I can't blame them either.

just came across this site trying to find information about the supposed new Sprint towers in Byron Center, MI. I work for a local lawn care company here in West MI and am feed up with how often I drop calls. I downloaded the Sensorly app last night, I'll run it today while I'm out in route. I live just south of the new Speedway in Byron Center and haven't been able to pick up the 4G signal at all. My daughters go to school & daycare by the McDonalds closer to Gezon Parkway on Byron Center Ave. I don't recall every picking up a 4G signal up there just the wifi signal from Starbucks is crazy strong because I can pick that up at the intersection. Is this tower on Byron Center Ave live now? If not, does anyone know when it will go live?

 

It was live when iwent through there on Tuesday. Was thefirst site live in West mi. What phone do you have? I get cell signal there (near Speedway) when I drive through the area, but it is on the edge of usable signal I would say.

 

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Yeah if he's not picking it up one of two things is going on. Either his LTE is disabled in the settings or he doesn't have an LTE phone.

What phone do you have tommy?

 

you are probably getting service from a very distant tower and are on the edge of its coverage area. If you donate and become a site member, you can see what towers have been upgraded.

Eh, that's alright. I think with the way it's going I'm going to switch to T mobile soon anyway since hspa+ is as fast or faster than sprints LTE. Sprint is literally slower than dial up speeds I had out in the country ten years ago in downtown GR most days. I can't even look up directions or a phone number unless I have 10 minutes to wait.