Verizon's AWS data upgrade - DNA compatible? - HTC Droid DNA

I saw a blog via Blinkfeed today saying the Galaxy S4 would support Verizon's new AWS data band.
Will our DNA be able to use it?
Sent from my HTC DNA

That's a big no
Sent from my HTC6435LVW using Tapatalk 2

is the LTE radio in the DNA restricted to just the 750 MHz frequency? Because the DNA antenna can hear 1900mhz and 2100 MHz, which is the AWS frequencies.

verizon stated the S4 is the first device to support the new spectrum so no previous phone will get it and even the S4 will need a software update first

I hope the frequency change will improve the signal's ability to penetrate into buildings where I work. My service is magnificent, except for at work. There, it is positively dreadful.
Sadly, looks like it's a moot point anyway, til I upgrade to my next device.
Sent from my HTC DNA

Right now Verizon runs on 750 mhz which which is very good at penetrating buildings. The new freq they are moving to is 1.9 ghz and 2.1 ghz which will not penetrate objects as well or travel as far through open space. The higher the frequency the bigger impact objects, trees, and distance have on your connection. But higher frequency also allows for more throughput so look for better LTE speeds
Sent from my HTC6435LVW using Tapatalk 4 Beta

Aww shux
HTC DNA
---------- Post added at 02:40 PM ---------- Previous post was at 02:39 PM ----------
Should have bought the gs4 aye?
HTC DNA

I'm wondering what Big Red and HTC will have in store for us in about 6 months.
Til then (thanks to this development community), I am quite happy with this phone.
I hope that Newt, Z, Nit, Vin, Micro, Joel, and all the other great devs here stick around for a while.
Sent from my HTC DNA

Personally I think Verizon is crazy to be giving up 750 MHz spectrum to go with 1.9 ghz and 2.1 ghz spectrum. I think they're doing it because you can place more towers in closer proximity using higher frequencies than you can using 750 MHz. The signal traveling further in 750 MHz also causes you to interfere with yourself, so by going to higher frequencies they can place more towers, which enables them to distribute the bandwidth across multiple towers.
So look for higher speed capabilities, and also more consistent speeds. It should improve the reliability if they are in fact going to put up more towers. Just don't expect to get much better performance than ATT or TMobile inside, since these are similar frequencies to what they run on.

jodell22 said:
Personally I think Verizon is crazy to be giving up 750 MHz spectrum to go with 1.9 ghz and 2.1 ghz spectrum. I think they're doing it because you can place more towers in closer proximity using higher frequencies than you can using 750 MHz. The signal traveling further in 750 MHz also causes you to interfere with yourself, so by going to higher frequencies they can place more towers, which enables them to distribute the bandwidth across multiple towers.
So look for higher speed capabilities, and also more consistent speeds. It should improve the reliability if they are in fact going to put up more towers. Just don't expect to get much better performance than ATT or TMobile inside, since these are similar frequencies to what they run on.
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Click to collapse
They're not "giving up" anything. The AWS bands will be an overlay in congested areas.

They're giving up frequencies in the 700 MHz band that they acquired in 2008 in an auction. I'm not saying they are doing away with 700 MHz altogether, but they are giving up channels in the 700 MHz band. Hopefully the hand off between their "AWS" and LTE network (aws just being the license name of the frequencies) will be more seamless than the hand off from 3g to LTE. Otherwise we will have 3g, LTE, and "AWS" that our phones will search for and need to jump between. Every time you enter a building you'll drop AWS, try to get LTE, may or may not get LTE, then drop to 3g...

Anyone that used Sprint WiMAX can tell you how bad higher frequencies penetrate buildings.

fr4nk1yn said:
Anyone that used Sprint WiMAX can tell you how bad higher frequencies penetrate buildings.
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Click to collapse
They sucked.... Hard
Sent from my HTC6435LVW using xda app-developers app

BBEgo said:
I hope the frequency change will improve the signal's ability to penetrate into buildings where I work. My service is magnificent, except for at work. There, it is positively dreadful.
Sadly, looks like it's a moot point anyway, til I upgrade to my next device.
Sent from my HTC DNA
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Xenoproctologist said:
They're not "giving up" anything. The AWS bands will be an overlay in congested areas.
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Click to collapse
GOD I hope they don't drop the 700 series down the road. I went with them strictly for the building penetration (I work in a hospital). T-mobile would give me zero signal indoors.
I can't see them giving it up completely until at least 2 years after they stop making phones those radios.

jodell22 said:
They're giving up frequencies in the 700 MHz band that they acquired in 2008 in an auction. I'm not saying they are doing away with 700 MHz altogether, but they are giving up channels in the 700 MHz band. Hopefully the hand off between their "AWS" and LTE network (aws just being the license name of the frequencies) will be more seamless than the hand off from 3g to LTE. Otherwise we will have 3g, LTE, and "AWS" that our phones will search for and need to jump between. Every time you enter a building you'll drop AWS, try to get LTE, may or may not get LTE, then drop to 3g...
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Click to collapse
They're giving up lower A and B block licenses that they never did anything with anyway, due to the antenna design issues. Their existing 700mhz footprint will be entirely unaffected.
I have to assume that cross-band LTE handoff is much more robust than failover to 3g. It has to be, if they're expecting to use this network as the basis of VoLTE.

Its all in how its handed off. If you think about it as going between 2.4 ghz and 5.8 ghz on a router using the same technology just different frequency the handoff isn't smooth at all. Time will tell.
Sent from my HTC6435LVW using Tapatalk 4 Beta

So jodell..your saying that the DNA does have the proper radio?what can of speed can we expect?
I'm glad I have hung to my unlimited

I'm not saying we have the right radio, I'm just saying we have the right antenna. Our antenna is tuned for the right frequency, but whether or not our radio can demodulate LTE at those frequencies is a whole different story. I don't know enough about cellular wireless technology to tell you for sure.
Also, I believe other carriers are already running close to 2ghz LTE networks, so I would expect to see speeds similar to theirs. I think ATT, TMobile, and Sprint are all licensed for LTE at around 1.7 ghz - 2.1 ghz
Personally I wouldn't buy the first phone capable of running between the two different bands until it's proven itself. And I hope our phone isn't capable of running in the new bands.

Anyone know if our phone is capable of doing this? Verizon just rolled it out in Seattle (where I'm at) and my friend on his Note 3 had to go into his "Service Mode" and enable it manually but is getting 78megs down and 26 megs up (first test in a congested area). Here's a link to the article he had to read in order to enable it: http://forums.androidcentral.com/ve...enable-band-4-aws-sm-n900v-requires-root.html
After doing some searching it looks like we're SOL. Can anyone confirm? It's been a while since the last post in this thread so I am assuming things may have changed since this last post.

Bsanborn said:
Anyone know if our phone is capable of doing this? Verizon just rolled it out in Seattle (where I'm at) and my friend on his Note 3 had to go into his "Service Mode" and enable it manually but is getting 78megs down and 26 megs up (first test in a congested area). Here's a link to the article he had to read in order to enable it: http://forums.androidcentral.com/ve...enable-band-4-aws-sm-n900v-requires-root.html
After doing some searching it looks like we're SOL. Can anyone confirm? It's been a while since the last post in this thread so I am assuming things may have changed since this last post.
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Click to collapse
http://androidcommunity.com/verizon...206/?utm_medium=referral&utm_source=pulsenews

Related

How is the reception on the Lumia 800

The reason is I ask is because when the 900 comes to the US im debating on getting an unlocked version on Tmobile or switching to AT&T for the Lumia 900. The reason for the switch to AT&T is because of the iphone 4S users at my job can pull 3G in areas where I dont get reception at all. What gives? A guy that I work with gave up his Titan that he loved for a 4S just because he can pull 3G in areas his Titan cant where I work. I feel thats fair enough. So im wondering why the iphone can pull 3G in areas the Titan cant on the same service and wondering will the Lumia 900 give me the same reception service as the iphone S? Not sure if anybody is in the position to test this out.
I found the reception to be great my wife has a Mozart on same network as my lumia and I still have a couple of bars of 3g when she has lost all signal, is in underground shops.
Sent from my Lumia 800 using XDA Windows Phone 7 App
that sounds good. hopefully when i get the lumia it works everywhere my co workers 4s works. I wonder why it varies between devices on the same network? KI hear that the 4s has a dual antenna and it depends on what material the phone is made out of. Is this true?
937dytboi said:
that sounds good. hopefully when i get the lumia it works everywhere my co workers 4s works. I wonder why it varies between devices on the same network? KI hear that the 4s has a dual antenna and it depends on what material the phone is made out of. Is this true?
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No it's not true.
The fact is, Lumia 800 in theory supports 3g quad band (850,900,1900,2100 mhz) BUT only 900/1900/2100 are supported in current firmware releases.
You are getting signal from 1900 towers, an iphone 4s is getting signal also from 850 towers.
Titan, depending on version, may be in the same situation.
Lumia 900 will be, as HD7S, in an opposite situation: 850/900/1900, so it will work well in North and latin america and will not get good 3g signal in europe\asia\africa
You can get a good picture of the situation here
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_UMTS_networks
and here
http://www.cellularmaps.com/att_850_1900.shtml
Does the frequency determine if u can get reception in hard to get places such as all concrete/block building or in heavily insulated basements. At my job its hard for anybody to get a good reception but it's rare for anyone to get 3g besides these guys that have high end smartphones
Sent from my Venue Pro using XDA Windows Phone 7 App
937dytboi said:
Does the frequency determine if u can get reception in hard to get places such as all concrete/block building or in heavily insulated basements. At my job its hard for anybody to get a good reception but it's rare for anyone to get 3g besides these guys that have high end smartphones
Sent from my Venue Pro using XDA Windows Phone 7 App
Click to expand...
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Quality of reception is determined by several factors:
1) Build quality of phone antenna and radio software
2) Distance from signaling tower. Different frequencies usually have different towers. Different hardware\software on the phone support different frequencies.
Of course good phones have good antennas (and lumia for example has a very good one), but if you read my links you will discover that in US you have a real mess in 3g umts phone frequencies comparing to the rest of the world and even between companies.
For example:
- T-mobile: 1700+2100
- At&t: 850+1900
- Verizon: totally different technology until they migrate to lte, however 1700 (that's the reason of manufacturers releasing few phones on this network and usually long after initial availability).
Mexico: 850 only
Latin america: like at&t, 850+1900
Australia: 850+2100
Rest of the world (europe, asia, oceania, africa, brazil): mainly 2100
So, antenna is important, frequency (and distance from tower) is even more important.
fshqbizfs said:
Quality of reception is determined by several factors:
1) Build quality of phone antenna and radio software
2) Distance from signaling tower. Different frequencies usually have different towers. Different hardware\software on the phone support different frequencies.
Of course good phones have good antennas (and lumia for example has a very good one), but if you read my links you will discover that in US you have a real mess in 3g umts phone frequencies comparing to the rest of the world and even between companies.
For example:
- T-mobile: 1700+2100
- At&t: 850+1900
- Verizon: totally different technology until they migrate to lte, however 1700 (that's the reason of manufacturers releasing few phones on this network and usually long after initial availability).
Mexico: 850 only
Latin america: like at&t, 850+1900
Australia: 850+2100
Rest of the world (europe, asia, oceania, africa, brazil): mainly 2100
So, antenna is important, frequency (and distance from tower) is even more important.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Cool thanks for the help, you really broke it down for me. As long as I hyave a good antenna in my phone, something better than this DVP on Tmobile in the Us, im good. Tmobile sucks in my area and im regretting getting their service. When I had ATT a few years back I didnt have much of a problem.
I just want something that can give me reception quality as close to the 4S in my area.

Sprint LTE speculation...

So, we've all seen Big Red's LTE capabilities and it's extremely impressive. Anybody care to speculate on what Sprint's LTE will be like, considering the much higher frequency it will initially be running on? Think about penetration (no homo), range, speed, and the never-ending rumor of potential bandwidth caps/throttling.
Speed, no clue. Penetration obviously won't be anywhere near as good until they get it on the iden frequency. 1900 seems only a pinch less sucky than Clear's current frequency to me.
If I understand right the iden frequency is 800mhz? I thought sprint was only going to use this for voice calls?
brownhornet said:
Speed, no clue. Penetration obviously won't be anywhere near as good until they get it on the iden frequency. 1900 seems only a pinch less sucky than Clear's current frequency to me.
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The penetration will be the same as 3g as the 1900 is what it uses in most places not as good as 800 but alot better than 2500
Sent from my SPH-D710 using xda premium
Sprint had commitments for iden till 2012, this year, they can shut off the nextel iden network and roll out LTE on the 800mhz frequency this year and likely will do so with that new hybrid box they have been working on. This won't go in all at once, they will roll it out in stages by city and will likely take two years to get it mostly out and another 5+ to hit 95% of market coverage converted.
Nanan00 said:
Sprint had commitments for iden till 2012, this year, they can shut off the nextel iden network and roll out LTE on the 800mhz frequency this year and likely will do so with that new hybrid box they have been working on. This won't go in all at once, they will roll it out in stages by city and will likely take two years to get it mostly out and another 5+ to hit 95% of market coverage converted.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I thought that sprint is going to use the 800 mhz band for voice only?
http://s4gru.com/index.php?/topic/32-network-vision-explained/
I believe 1.9 will be used for LTE, CDMA Voice / Data
800 will be used for CDMA Voice / Data and in the future possibly LTE.
IAmSixNine said:
http://s4gru.com/index.php?/topic/32-network-vision-explained/
I believe 1.9 will be used for LTE, CDMA Voice / Data
800 will be used for CDMA Voice / Data and in the future possibly LTE.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Nice!
Beat me to posting that site...S4GRU.com is by far the most indepth and best resource for all things Sprint network related right now.
DarkManX4lf said:
I thought that sprint is going to use the 800 mhz band for voice only?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
From what I was told, Sprint is building boxes that can push LTE and CDMA on 800 and 1900. How Sprint actually allocates the bandwidth I have no clue but it looks like they are leaving it open for any combination of the two, my guess would be that it depends on load.
Nanan00 said:
From what I was told, Sprint is building boxes that can push LTE and CDMA on 800 and 1900. How Sprint actually allocates the bandwidth I have no clue but it looks like they are leaving it open for any combination of the two, my guess would be that it depends on load.
Click to expand...
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From what I was told its going to be dependent on the tower location what freq will be used ... In Areas where towers are closer like major metro areas they will use 1900 in more rural areas the will use 800 because the signal will travel further and you can cover more with less towers...but the hardware is going to have all the same in every tower....as redundant backup also....
Sent from my SPH-D710 using xda premium
Epix4G said:
The penetration will be the same as 3g as the 1900 is what it uses in most places not as good as 800 but alot better than 2500
Sent from my SPH-D710 using xda premium
Click to expand...
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Signal wise it should be roughly the same but from what some of the LTE testing has shown is that the performance degrades much more with LTE than it does with EVDO over the signal.
http://s4gru.com/index.php?/topic/5...coming-800-band/page__view__findpost__p__7857
Epix4G said:
From what I was told its going to be dependent on the tower location what freq will be used ... In Areas where towers are closer like major metro areas they will use 1900 in more rural areas the will use 800 because the signal will travel further and you can cover more with less towers...but the hardware is going to have all the same in every tower....as redundant backup also....
Sent from my SPH-D710 using xda premium
Click to expand...
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Actually, when it comes to metro areas, places like a big city with a large down town district, 800mzh overlay with the 1.9 is the ultimate solution.
800 will penetrate deeper into the buildings and overall give a better in building coverage. So densly populated areas would be a great candidate for both 800mhz and 1.9mhz.
Also there is only so much spectrum that each carrier owns in a given location. So if loading is an issue, they can offload some of the usage to the 800mhz spectrum if or when necessary.
Whatever happened with the rumored upgrade to EVDO Rev B?
mike.r.olson said:
Whatever happened with the rumored upgrade to EVDO Rev B?
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was never anything but a rumor at the least. mainly b/c of the fact that the phones supported it.
Sprint will be doing do-advanced though more likely as they have at least talked about that.
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IAmSixNine said:
Actually, when it comes to metro areas, places like a big city with a large down town district, 800mzh overlay with the 1.9 is the ultimate solution.
800 will penetrate deeper into the buildings and overall give a better in building coverage. So densly populated areas would be a great candidate for both 800mhz and 1.9mhz.
Also there is only so much spectrum that each carrier owns in a given location. So if loading is an issue, they can offload some of the usage to the 800mhz spectrum if or when necessary.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sprint has very little Spectrum in 800MHz compared to the others.....If I were to guess any off loading will be to Clears 2.5GHz which is supposed to have over 5k sites up by next June if i remember correctly...
MOST off loading will be from 3G to 4G more than anything though....hence the smith mirco deal they signed...

LTE Frequencies

Simple question: why is Sprint starting to roll out one spectrum of LTE now, and then changing it to a different one later (2013 and on)? Why not start off with the superior one that penetrates walls better to begin with? Any advantages to the frequency currently being built up?
Sent from my PC36100 using XDA
They're starting on 1900 then adding 800 not replacing 1900. Both will be used LTE in 2013. Also they can't use 800 till Iden is off it. IDEN on 800 won't be dead till 2013. Sprint is decommissioning iden towers now in preparation for the shutdown. They are trying to migrate people over to sprint direct connect which uses the cdma network for direct connect.
Sent from my Nexus S 4G using Tapatalk 2
---------- Post added at 06:50 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:46 PM ----------
This site is the best for sprint LTE info...
http://s4gru.com/
okay, this will be fun to try and explain. first of all, my source is this:
http://www.hightechforum.org/low-versus-high-radio-spectrum/ and logic
Data is sent through wavelengths across different frequencies. Basically, the higher the frequency the higher the capacity and the lower the frequency the higher the coverage.
Sprint's WiMax runs on 2500 MHz, which explains the crappy coverage. Verizon has great LTE coverage because it runs on 700 MHz. The reason Sprint went with the higher frequency was probably to meet the demands of an "unlimited data" community because it would have a much much greater capacity than the 700 MHz spectrum Verizons running. This is also why cell providers with much better coverage (ones near 1000 MHz) have to throttle so hard and limit the amount of data usage: because they have much lower capacities (bandwidth) to share with their consumers in those frequencies.
Of course, cell companies dont only use one band of the spectrum. They send it across one low and one high to accomodate both capacity and coverage (i believe Verizon uses 700 and 1400 MHz). What david279 said is correct, Sprint will use both 800 and 1900 MHz eventually, so its gonna have a great LTE network.
So to answer the original question, Sprint was probably confident to launch the 1900 MHz frequency by itself because it is a good medium. 700 and 2500 MHz are at the ends of the spectrum. The best speed results would be more towards the middle. Instead of having great coverage and LTE speeds as low as 1gb/s with the 800 MHz frequency, or poor coverage with WiMax speeds of ~3gb/s (about what i've gotten) with the 2500 MHz frequency, Sprint's settling with good coverage with LTE speeds of Xgb/s (higher than 3, for sure) with the 1900 MHz frequency with coverage later to be improved once the 800 MHz frequency is included
So be ready in 2014 to buy the EVO 4G LTE+, since our phones can't pick up the 800.
Sent from my blah blah blah blah
fachadick said:
So be ready in 2014 to buy the EVO 4G LTE+, since our phones can't pick up the 800.
Sent from my blah blah blah blah
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Could that be fixed by a software update, or is it strictly hardware related?
Sent from my PC36100 using XDA
PsiPhiDan said:
Could that be fixed by a software update, or is it strictly hardware related?
Sent from my PC36100 using XDA
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Strictly hardware. It's also one of the reasons lte roaming isn't in the cards.
Sent from my blah blah blah blah
Wow, very informative!
Sent from my PC36100 using XDA
Verizon only uses 700mhz for their LTE Network, Not 1400mhz. I believe 1400mhz is a government used band. Also, Sprint cant use 800mhz until the 3GPP and FCC clear that band for LTE use. On top of that Clearwire will be doing TD-LTE on 2500, which will have international roaming compadibility in europe, and yes Sprint did sign a deal with clearwire so they can use that band as well for their customers.
TD-LTE is LTE used on a spectrum that does not have a upload frenquency only download.
FDD-LTE is normal LTE used with a frenquency that has both download and upload.
Master_sk3 said:
Verizon only uses 700mhz for their LTE Network, Not 1400mhz. I believe 1400mhz is a government used band. Also, Sprint cant use 800mhz until the 3GPP and FCC clear that band for LTE use. On top of that Clearwire will be doing TD-LTE on 2500, which will have international roaming compadibility in europe, and yes Sprint did sign a deal with clearwire so they can use that band as well for their customers.
TD-LTE is LTE used on a spectrum that does not have a upload frenquency only download.
FDD-LTE is normal LTE used with a frenquency that has both download and upload.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
1400 MHz is allocated for WMTS (Wireless Medical Telemetry) as primary user, secondary is non-medical telemetry. 1400 MHz was military until 1999 when it was "sold off" to the highest bidder.
Radio has got to be one of the greatest discoveries of man. Up there with antibiotics, ya?
Sent from my PC36100 using XDA
typhoonikan said:
Radio has got to be one of the greatest discoveries of man. Up there with antibiotics, ya?
Sent from my PC36100 using XDA
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
And one of the greatest addictions as well. I own a fairly large (though shrinking) collection of all things radio.
Sent from my PC36100 using Tapatalk 2
No LTE roaming?
fachadick said:
Strictly hardware. It's also one of the reasons lte roaming isn't in the cards.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No LTE roaming? Does that mean the EVO 4G LTE can't make or receive roaming calls, or just that it won't use the LTE network for them?
While I'm asking newbie questions, I gather the switch to LTE doesn't make Sprint phones (except the iPhone & one Motorola phone) usable in foreign countries, even countries with LTE networks. Is there any way to make it work overseas (without major surgery)?.
I'm probably going to get this phone when I upgrade, but it would be nice to be able to use it when I travel. International functionality is the only reason I'm still slightly tempted by the iPhone. Well, that and the boffo camera software on the iPhone.
typhoonikan said:
Radio has got to be one of the greatest discoveries of man. Up there with antibiotics, ya?
Sent from my PC36100 using XDA
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well except for the radiation lol
jdcrutch said:
No LTE roaming? Does that mean the EVO 4G LTE can't make or receive roaming calls, or just that it won't use the LTE network for them?
While I'm asking newbie questions, I gather the switch to LTE doesn't make Sprint phones (except the iPhone & one Motorola phone) usable in foreign countries, even countries with LTE networks. Is there any way to make it work overseas (without major surgery)?.
I'm probably going to get this phone when I upgrade, but it would be nice to be able to use it when I travel. International functionality is the only reason I'm still slightly tempted by the iPhone. Well, that and the boffo camera software on the iPhone.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
only the lte is limited to the sprint network. you can still use the phone in countries that use the same cdma network as sprint. plug in the country you'll be going to in that link - if it says cdma, you're probably ok. But if international roaming is important to you, this probaly isn't the phone to get (depending on where you go, anyway).
CDMA HSDPA and LTE
How can ATT use LTE Band V2,17,4 Etc. which is 700, 1700, 1900 if other carriers are using those bands. I don't see anybody updating the Wikipedia from day to day with who has what. I see that the Chinese manufacturers are not producing phones for the US carriers except for a few high end phones like the Oneplus One. Is something going on that only Samsung seems to care about, producing a phone with 6 Bands or are the manufactures just waiting for the dust to settle? Don't you agree that a user who buys their phone wants to be able to switch carriers if they move, allowing for more freedom, or what ever reason, should have a phone that handles multiple frequencies. Most of the newer models coming out of china are set for TD SCDMA in their county only and have eliminated WCDMA altogether in those phones. Shopping around is much more difficult because allot of these vendors say little about signal compatibility on the web sites selling these phones.

[Q] What is your best speed on Roger HSPA+ ?

I was wondering who on rogers is getting HSPA+ speeds over 5mbps. Theoretically the Motorola RAZR XT910 phone is an HSPA+ phone, which means speeds of up to 21mbps. I have a Droid 4 (XT894) and my best speed test was 5.6mbps down, which is pretty much the maximum speed for HSPA. On my phone, I'm running the ICS leak, so it doesn't display an HSPA+ icon, just an H icon (which is always in blue). I asked Rogers if there is something I need to enable on my account to enable HSPA+ speeds (I believe my phone supports up to 14.4mbps) and they said there was not anything. I just want to see what people's speeds are using the Rogers certified device.
I think we all have the same HSPA radio in the phone anyways, it's a Qualcomm MDM6600.
So what's your best speed on Rogers HSPA+ network? Please let me know what firmware (including version and if it's Rogers stock or LATAM, etc) you are on and your best download speed. Thanks!
You have the remember that the 14.4 mbps is the maximum theoretical throughput/speed that can be attained on HSPA+ . Since there are a fair number of people usually connected to any cell tower, you will not get the maximum speed. I've been getting roughly 5mbps down in most areas as well running LATAM ICS.
Yes, I know what you're saying, I find it just a little strange that it maxes out around the theoretical limit of HSPA... anyways, that's why I made the post
Thanks for your response
Sent from my XT894 running ICS
No prob. Besides ics should enable global mode allowing access to lte on xt910 however the freq supported is currently up for grabs here in canada and last time i checked rogers may be bidding for the freq band used by Verizon.
I dont think the XT910 has an LTE chip. Also, just for ref, I managed 6.5mbps on my n/w
Afaik its the same hardware with parts of the radio disabled according to carriers. If you have latam ics, you can do *#*#4636#*#* and you'll see that the phone can support wcdma and lte. I think it just needs the correct sim card and a network with acceptable freq to work.

[Q] Unlocked SIII on Straight Talk - Not getting HSPA speeds

Hi, I hope this is the right place to post this. Recently I decided to order an unlocked S III from Tiger Direct and utilize prepaid service. I ordered a Straight Talk T-Mobile SIM and cut it down to micro size, inserted it, activated my account. The reason I went with this prepaid idea, is because I read many articles saying that T-Mobile aggressively expanded their HSPA+ network and the Washington DC region (where I live) was one of the areas. They also had a speed test where the HSPA+ averaged something like 12 Mbps while Verizon 3G was under 1.
However, I am receiving incredibly slow speeds, that at most times are as slow or slower than my Verizon 3G! Google Maps and Navigation are unusable now. Most of the time I see the E in the top bar which I assume is referring to EVDO. Only once, for probably a minute or less, did I see the H+ in the header bar, then it changed to H, then back to E.
I contacted ST via email and told them all my details and threatened to leave to try another prepaid service and they just responded with some canned email saying speeds depend on a number of parameters, blah, blah.
So I had a couple questions...
1) Is there anything different I can do to get the faster speeds? How come I do not get HSPA+?
2) If I went to prepaid T-Mobile, would I have faster speeds? Does T-Mobile allot their entire network to ST?
3) Any other ideas, or comments?
Thanks from a first time poster!
-Kevin
Of all the service operators I know give false info about their data services.
I am sure they are able to achieve 12Mbps, but this is done in an almost laboratory-like environment: a very specific firmware that only they have, a near a very specific base station, with a very specific type of data, and when nobody else is using the service.
So, are THEY (and only they) able to reach the advertised speeds? YES. But what they don't tell you is that it is a nominal speed, not the effective speed.
Your phone is fine, you have the best phone there is in the world, but there aren't any operators that make it justice.
Yeah often you have to take their speeds with a pinch of salt but i wouldn't expect that large a drop. F.E i would expect if they advertised 12 to get about 5
Simonetti2011 said:
Of all the service operators I know give false info about their data services.
I am sure they are able to achieve 12Mbps, but this is done in an almost laboratory-like environment: a very specific firmware that only they have, a near a very specific base station, with a very specific type of data, and when nobody else is using the service.
So, are THEY (and only they) able to reach the advertised speeds? YES. But what they don't tell you is that it is a nominal speed, not the effective speed.
Your phone is fine, you have the best phone there is in the world, but there aren't any operators that make it justice.
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Mrboxfacetramp13 said:
Yeah often you have to take their speeds with a pinch of salt but i wouldn't expect that large a drop. F.E i would expect if they advertised 12 to get about 5
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Thanks guys...I actually wouldn't trust any provider's claims ...I was actually referring to these tests I found which seemed unbiased: pcworld/article/253808/3g_and_4g_wireless_speed_showdown_which_networks_are_fastest_.html (can't post links yet)
images.pcworld/images/article/2012/04/wireless_washington_dc_slide2-11347959.jpg
"Washington, D.C.
Washington's results follow the New York City pattern: wins for T-Mobile in average 3G download speed (4.14 mbps) and upload speed (1.34 mbps), for AT&T in average 4G download speed (8.52 mbps), and for Verizon in average 4G upload speed (5.46 mbps).
Unlike our New York results, however, our Washington results show a relatively close finish in 4G download speeds among the top three contenders: only 3.16 mbps separates third-place T-Mobile from first-place AT&T. However, T-Mobile didn't keep pace with AT&T and Verizon in 4G upload speeds.
Our results for Washington also indicate that AT&T's 3G service in the area could use some work. The average 3G download rate of 1.58 mbps for the District of Columbia was AT&T's worst among the 13 cities in our study, and the gap of 2.56 mbps between that average and first-place T-Mobile's 4.14 mbps was the second-widest in our study."
And this one: pcmag/article2/0,2817,2405632,00.asp
pcmag/media/images/348427-fmn-chart-washdc-500.jpg
I am near Washington, D.C., a huge metro area, which is why I felt going with this prepaid service was a good idea. Why am I not getting these speeds?? I am getting ready to just pay the extra $15 for Tmobile's prepaid, where I would surely expect to get the HSPA+ coverage.
'E' is for Edge, which is an old GSM data mode. From what I understand, T-Mobile uses 1700 mhz. on 3g. I have heard there are certain cities that it will work in. As an example, las vegas I have seen mentioned as using 1900, but the better part of the country uses 1700 from my understanding.
The Galaxy S3 uses the folowing for 2/3g bands.
GSM 850 / 900 / 1800 / 1900 HSDPA 850 / 900 / 1900 / 2100
I found this on the internet. It appears they are EOL'ing Edge to get 1900 mhz spectrum for HSDPA.
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For the guy who keeps crying that he doesn't have 3G yet and that T-Mobile isn't speaking about their deployment, earlier this week T-Mobile just announced that they are almost 95% done with the refarming. No this does not mean that 95% of the 1900mhz areas are seeing 3G already. An informed posted this to clarify what 95% means
http://www.tmonews.com/2012/11/t-mobile-cto-neville-ray-says-hurricane-sandy-will-delay-some-1900mhz-hspa-deployments/
"95% refarm means that we have carved out the frequencies from the 2G layer and are ready to deploy the 1900Mhz UMTS. It needs to be understood that there are 37,000 sites being modified and it takes about a week to complete each site. There are thousands of crews around the country working tirelessly to install the new equipment, antennas cabinets and hybrid fiber optic from the ground to the top of the tower. This takes a lot of time and hard work. It is way more than just re-configuring the existing network."

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