Sprint Details Shift To LTE 183
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by
Soulskill
from the anticipating-iphone-data-hogs dept.
from the anticipating-iphone-data-hogs dept.
New submitter jmeboi writes "Engadget reports that Sprint has announced a rollover from WiMAX to LTE for its 4G needs. The company is 'converting its 1900MHz holdings and LightSquared's 1600MHz spectrum ("pending FCC approval") to LTE,' and also re-purposing the section of 800MHz spectrum that was set aside for the defunct iDEN push-to-talk network. 'The company plans for a rapid deployment of this new 4G, with the first LTE markets and handsets to hit in mid-2012 with the full rollout mostly completed by 2013. Current subscribers signed up for WiMAX plans won't have to worry, as their devices will continue to be supported throughout 2012.'"
uhh... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:uhh... (Score:5, Insightful)
Intentional Balkanization = detrimental to consume (Score:2)
I wrote a comment a few days ago here [slashdot.org] about the intentional balkanization in the USA and Canada, where a network owns "spectrum" and handsets work only on that network frequencies.
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Assuming this isn't a troll, you might be unfamiliar with the English-language term "Balkanize" [merriam-webster.com].
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Your also in a country smaller then the state of Virginia with less population.
What works for a small country does not necessarily work for a very large one.
US pop 300m+ / Size 9.8m sq Km.
Bulgaria pop 7.3m / size 111k sq Km.
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I meant Balkanization [wikipedia.org] as a geo-political term meaning fragmenting an area.
That the Balkans is more advanced in mobile phones proves my point: the USA with all its might are not up to smaller countries because there are no common standards, and companies are allowed to monopolize frequencies AND control the handsets as well.
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+1 Funny
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"it's pretty clear that [GSM] is superior to [CDMA and GSM with incompatible client devices for the two networks and customers locked in to one or the other depending on what phone they bought]."
parsed that for you
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WiMax is not CDMA.
Re:uhh... (Score:4, Informative)
lawl.. GSM better than CMDA...
CDMA uses 1/3 to 1/10th the power of GSM, all the while having better range, more resilient to interference, signal bouncing can actually improve signal strength, tower hand-off rarely results in dropped calls, and supports more customers per tower by several factors. oh, and they're easier to setup because they all use the same frequency, so you don't have to check with any other tower operators.
I guess GSM is cheaper to implement.. so it's clearly better.
Re:uhh... (Score:4, Insightful)
None of that matters if you like to travel. Or if you like to actually own a phone and can swap out SIM cards to change phone numbers and carriers quickly.
Or if you like fast 3G (EVDO vs UMTS/HSPDA).
So CDMA is technically better, in theory but in practice its a lot of lock-in and slow ass 3G. There's more to deciding which is better than just tech specs on a piece of paper, but this being slashdot, we have the "TECHNICALLY CORRECT IS THE BEST KIND OF CORRECT" crowd.
No you are just confusing things (Score:4, Insightful)
Saying GSM is "better" than CDMA implies a technical benefit, that the standard itself is superior. That is not the case. GSM is much more widely adopted than CDMA. Now that is a very legit reason to use it. But let's not confuse "widely adopted" with "better".
As to what is best for you to use, well that is up to the individual.
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OFDM, which LTE uses, is better still, which is why everyone is moving to it.
But, the OP appears confused, since they compared GSM with CDMA, which is apples to oranges. They apparently meant to compare either GSM with CDMAone, or UMTS with CDMA2000. Or maybe TDMA with CDMA. It's not clear.
Better for *users*, not better technology (Score:2)
If you read the posting that asserted that "GSM is superior", the author started out by saying "regardless of the technical merits", which makes it very clear that he's not saying that the standard itself is superior. He's saying that because GSM is much much more widely adopted than CDMA, it makes it better for the user, because you can actually use it almost everywhere (and in general, you get more choice of carriers in places that have choices.)
CDMA's radio technology may have been better than GSM's, f
You're confusing standards and technology. (Score:4, Insightful)
CDMA is a multiplexing/multiple access technique. GSM is a standard (and a rather old one at that). UMTS/HSPA, though they use SIM cards and were developed by the same standards body as, and somewhat backwards compatible with, GSM, they are not GSM. GSM is a 2G standard like cdmaOne. UMTS is a 3G standard like CDMA2000 (the actual standard that Sprint and Verizon use).
Good thing someone actually recognized the technical merit of CDMA though, because UMTS/HSPA ditched the TDMA scheme used in GSM for a CDMA-based scheme.
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"None of that matters if you like to travel."
That right there is probably the main reason for GSM being "better". I forgot to include that along with the "cheaper" part.
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>Or if you like to actually own a phone and can swap out SIM cards to change phone numbers and carriers quickly.
CDMA has a perfectly good standard called R-UIM that's a superset of GSM SIM, and an optional subset of USIM, that serves the exact same purpose. Unfortunately, Sprint and Verizon never bothered to support it. Elsewhere in the world, CDMA phones and networks are as mutually interoperable and carrier-agnostic as GSM phones.
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Of course there are other kinds of "better", coward. GSM's better because you can use it in more places, and have more choice of carriers, and have more choice of phones that support it, so you can find one that does a better job of what you want, and in many cases you can get it cheaper because of competition and economies of scale. Those are all different issues from whether the radio usage is technically better. And you may notice that Verizon, the main CDMA carrier, is switching to LTE for 4G, so app
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Range and ultimate power requirements are a function of the frequency not necessarily the protocol being used.
CDMA is spread spectrum which makes it more resistant to interference than GSM. However due to the signal-to-noise ratio being influenced by the number of people using the band, CDMA does require more power to operate during peak usage times. On the other hand, GSM uses time division for multiple users on the same frequency and frequency division to spread the load which allows it to use less power
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"CDMA does require more power to operate during peak usage times."
depends on if you're talking about the radio or the processing. CDMA is very process intensive, but the radio is very low.
CDMA phone Power: 0.001watt-1watt(avg 0.2watt) Practical Range Limit: 75KM(no logical limit) - Noise almost doesn't matter and is moderately influenced by structures.
CDMA tower: Peak Radio power: 15watt
GSM phone Power: 0.01watt-3watt(avg 1watt) Range: 60KM max(timing limitation of TDMA) - Range is heavily influenced by no
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^^^ What he said. When Qualcomm introduced CDMA in the early 90s, it was about as close as you could get to black magic. Engineers from Nokia or Ericsson went on record officially calling it a fraud, and ultimately had to eat their words a couple of years later when they were proven wrong.
The coolest thing about CDMA is that you can literally do things like throw down a low-power cell in the middle of a congested area (like a mall, university, stadium, etc), add it to the network, and watch the congestion j
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"it's pretty clear that [GSM] is superior to [CDMA and GSM with incompatible client devices for the two networks and customers locked in to one or the other depending on what phone they bought]."
parsed that for you
sorry for being redundant
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Re:uhh... (Score:4, Insightful)
This is what happens when you let the free market decide on standards with geographical monopolies. This is why a particular protocol is mandated with spectrum sales in most of the world. Irrespective of the relative technical merits of GSM versus CDMA, it's pretty clear that GSM is superior to CDMA and GSM with incompatible client devices for the two networks and customers locked in to one or the other depending on what phone they bought. It appears that the USA didn't learn from this mistake the first time around...
That's so right. I really like the ability to pay 20Euros a month and roam anywhere within the EU without paying any roaming charges since all my calls/texts are included in the flat fee no matter where I am in the EU. Add in a data plan and I don't have to worry about data charges while I roam either.
Different markets evolve differently - for 90% of the US phone use the incompatibility is a non-issue - they have a phone that works wherever they go. They get a flat price no matter where they roam in an area roughly as big as the EU. With the advent of "free" mobile to mobile and nights and weekends even the minute caps are largely a non-issue. Nor do I have to worry if I call a cell phone form a land line - no extra charge their either.
While what we have is different than what you have, it's not inherently better or worse - just different and an adaptation to our market characteristics.
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While what we have is different than what you have, it's not inherently better or worse - just different and an adaptation to our market characteristics.
the USA is inherently worse, because when we purchase a phone, we are bound to a particular carrier. not only do we have contracts and locked phones, but we also have incompatible networks. that means that once a carrier nabs a user with the latest shiny new phone, they are locked. that's an incentive to spend a lot on advertising that shiny new phone and spend very little on things like improving their infrastructure and customer service.
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LTE is derived from CDMA technologies, not GSM.
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CDMA wiped the floor with GSM. The original TDMA/GSM is only used for voice today. TDMA/GSM is pathetic because you allocate exclusive bandwidth to a phone even if it's never used. It's still tolerated for voice because voice uses so little bandwidth, but it's completely unsuitable for data. That's why the CDMA carriers rolled out 3G years before the GSM carriers. The CDMA carriers just cranked up the bandwidth of their voice hardware (which is why you cann
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Re:uhh... (Score:4, Informative)
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I wouldn't worry too much about it. The WiMax network will probably hang around for a LONG time, long after your phone's obsolete and you're on the 3rd contract since.
Given the old analog AMPS network took until what, 2008? to be killed, and the installed base of mobile and fixed WiMax stations, there's probably at least a decade of WiMax coverage.
Heck, the old CDMA phones will probably work as well for a long time coming purely due to installed base.
And at the very least, you'd probably have 3G service.
The
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Clearwire has an investment in WiMax, not Sprint, and Sprint is really tired of Clearwire stabbing its largest shareholder in the back by trying to sell the WiMax service cheaper than Sprint can. Why do you think Sprint signed with LightSquared for LTE? When Sprint moves away from Clearwire, they'll probably end up in bankruptcy with the network being shutdown or piecemeal sold.
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Depends on the manufacturer.
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So my new Evo Shift 4G will no longer have WiMAX/4G capability after 2012? Unlike some people, I don't buy new phones every 2 years...
You won't be required to upgrade. 3G will still work just fine, it's just that you will lose 4G connectivity.
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Taxpayers don't buy cellphones for blacks, you moron. And don't forget that up until fifty year ago, we were siccing dogs on protesters fighting for civil rights. Seventy years ago, we were just stringing up blacks from trees. And don't forget that today, we have morons like you.
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Sprint's WiMAX service is provided primarily by Clear's network. Clear is also looking to overlay their network with LTE, but Clear has stated that they will continue to support WiMAX for M2M and stationary devices even after they roll out LTE. All they need is cash flow and as long as Sprint needs to support WiMAX handsets (at least until 2014), they will have some guaranteed revenue.
Of course, what Clear should be doing is looking at Open Range right now. Open Range filed bankruptcy today and is lookin
And nothing of value was lost (Score:4, Insightful)
LTE should work much better, and it will align with the rest of the industry.
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How is your general Sprint coverage here? It used to be fairly spotty.
Personally, I miss the old AT&T Wireless TDMA days, as far as voice traffic is concerned. TDMA had the best voice quality. It was super-fantastic. People asked me if I was on a landline all the time, even if I was talking inside the house, in a valley, under enormous trees.
-l
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inside the house, in a valley, under enormous trees
How big is your house?
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It's not all that big, but it contains an extra-dimensional space, which in turn contains New Zealand.
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The root of Sprint's thrashing problem is the RIL programming that prevents simultaneous wimax and CDMA (EVDO or 1xRTT) data sessions. Now, when a Sprint phone attempts to connect to Wimax, it first terminates any live data session (EVDO or 1xRTT) before it even tries to authenticate to Clear. Likewise, if the wimax connection fails (or is failing), the phone will first fully terminate the wimax session before it even tries to establish a CDMA data connection.
What Sprint really needs to do is give us an opt
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Cheers from Sweden (Score:2)
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No, you haven't. (Score:2)
We've had 4G here now for over a year. (Real 4G, not the 3G+ that I heard some providers in the US has been marketing as "4G")
No you haven't. "Real" 4G as defined by the ITU doesn't actually exist yet. You may have LTE networks, but they're Rel 8 or Rel 9 stuff. As far as LTE goes, only LTE-Advanced is "real" 4G, and the standards for LTE-Advanced haven't even been finalized yet, let alone any commercial products available that support it.
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i live in silicon valley, supposedly the heart of technical innovation and home to 7.5m people, and i rarely get over 1MB/s and we have a 2GB cap. that's when it works at all.
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Nexus S 4G User. (Score:2)
Despite this meaning that I will have to buy a new phone in 2013 or lose 4g access, I'm still very happy with it.
Sprint is by far the cheapest cellular provider so I have no intentions of switching. This means that my next phone will have faster and more reliable internet. It's worth needing to buy a new phone as far as I'm concerned.
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I assume you're a fan of mobile data. Sprint is by far not the cheapest cellular provider. For cheapest, look into Virgin Mobile's [virginmobileusa.com] $40/mo "unlimited" data and texting and T-Mobile's newest offering: "unlimited" 4G prepaid for $30/mo [pcmag.com].
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Sprint owns Virgin Mobile, not that this detracts from your point about T-Mobile's plan.
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Wow, four of the five (thus far) replies to my post have said that Virgin is a branch of Sprint. So what? Boost is also! But each sets its own prices and policies. Sprint's postpaid is $80/mo for Everything Data. Virgin Mobile is $40/mo. Now tell me why I should care that Virgin is a Sprint subsidiary. Way to miss the forest for the trees.
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Hopefully you would be grandfathered in if they raised the rates.... hopefully.
Is PTT officially dead? (Score:2)
I knew they were no longer pushing (sorry) the iDEN PTT network in their ads, but have they actually turned it off?
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Sprint/Nextel's iDEN network is scheduled to be phased out in 2013.
What happens to ClearWire? (Score:2)
Sprint's WiMax network is provided by ClearWire. ClearWire is trying to switch to LTE, is already running trials, and is seeking funding. It's not clear to me what exactly Sprint is doing...are they going to pay ClearWire to upgrade to LTE? Or are they abandoning their relationship with ClearWire?
I'm a recently-added ClearWire customer, and I have a 2-year contract to be on WiMax. If Sprint puts together their own LTE network, ClearWire will be dead. As a doornail.
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Sprint is abandoning Clearwire for LightSquared-deployed LTE.
I don't think "rollover of WiMax" is accurate. (Score:2)
They may stop pushing WiMax, but the article makes no mention of repurposing the 2500Mhz band that spring/clearwire use for WiMax. The only thing I've seen about anything being turned off is their legacy iDEN equipment, the spectrum for which they will use for LTE rollouts. I haven't seen any indication that Sprint plans to turn off their 2500Mhz WiMax, or deploy LTE on that spectrum.
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Answer is simple, see their stock price... http://www.google.com/finance?q=NASDAQ%3ACLWR [google.com]
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I'm pretty sure that's your device. I have a WiMax-only device, and it switches quickly as long as I'm in a city with coverage. Of course, there's no coverage at all between cities.
V.90 (Score:4, Funny)
So it looks like X2 and K56flex have a new challenger...
Now all carriers are going to LTE... (Score:2, Interesting)
I'm dreaming of a future where the USA will be like the rest of the world, where we'll be able to buy an unlocked phone, and use it on any carrier we chose. I'm currentl
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So what this means essentially, is that Sprint and Verizon plan on continuing to be dicks, even though there's no technical limitation that would prevent the same
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It is a limitation on the CDMA. Even CDMA phones are not interchangeable due to the radio frequencies that are being used by Verizon vs Sprint. Hence no taking your Galaxy S2 you got on sprint and using it on Verizon. They cannot accept a unlocked GSM phone because it is incompatible with their networks.
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Untrue. Sprint's phones are 100% frequency-compatible with Verizon's, and vice-versa. Sprint phones roam on Verizon every day. Sprint just refuses to allow anybody to use phones they didn't sell, because it enables Sprint to be the middleman and wholesaler for every single Sprint phone sold and pocket the profit. When Sprint sells an Evo 3D for $199 to somebody, their real "loss" is less than a hundred dollars compared to what they paid for it. When somebody buys a full-priced Evo 3D to replace his broken p
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I wonder if it is a limitation of CDMA that makes it overly complicated. I know for a fact that both AT&T and T-Mobile are more than happy to sell me a SIM card when I walk in with an unlocked phone, and judging from the fine print on Apple's page, it seems it might be more of a technical limitation of CDMA, instead of the carriers not wanting to sell service to someone.
At least from what I understand from the Wikipedia page for the Universal Integrated Circuit Card) [wikipedia.org], a UICC can support GSM, UMTS, and cdmaONE/CDMA2000, so, at least in theory, it sounds as if a single phone could support both GSM/UMTS and cdmaONE/CDMA2000 networks. Whether a given cdmaONE/CDMA2000 network provider will let you sign up with an unlocked phone, and give you a UICC for their network, is another matter. At least according to the Wikipedia page for the Removable User Identity Module [wikipedia.org], they're in
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On other phones, it's only a limitation in firmware programming for the baseband chipset; on BlackBerries for example, you'll notice that Sprint and VZW use the exact same models. On the 4S it's strictly a limitation put in place by Apple mandated by the carriers, the 4S's are now (physically) identical for all carriers with the implementa
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Carriers aren't the only ones.... look at lightsquared's homepage..look at the partners (as lightsquared says they do wholesale only)
Cellular South
Sprint
NetTalk
ClearTalk
Sharp
and the one I found surprising and don't recall reading about.. Best Buy Connect.. provided by Best Buy. They do 3G and 4G access: http://www.bestbuy.com/site/Computers+Promotions/regularCat%3Apcmcat214600050004/pcmcat214600050004.c?id=pcmcat214600050004&DCMP=rdr0002322 [bestbuy.com]
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oh, and the thing that gets me is Best Buy must be using WiMax via clear right now or something, because a Oct 9th 2011 press release on lightsquared's website states:
As LightSquared awaits FCC approval to launch the nation’s first wholesale-only integrated 4G-LTE wireless broadband and satellite network, we’ve been busy signing agreements with 17 partners across the country eager to offer their customers world-class wireless service at a fraction of the cost of building their own networks.
Some
LightSquared vs. GPS (Score:2)
Don't count your chickens before they're hatched. Several senators, congressmen, the FAA, and the DoD are against LightSquared.
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They're not against LightSquared, but the frequencies that were assigned for Lightsquare for their LTE to Satellite system. The assigned frequencies for the Satellite links were right next to the frequencies used for GPS and they want to be quite agressive in using those frequencies. This causes bleed over into the neighboring frequncies, which can normally be filtered out, but GPS works differently than most other comms systems and the signals it recieves are weak.
If Sprint is having LightSquared inst
Sprint Coverage Getting Worse (Score:2)
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I live in Huntsville, AL and our sprint coverage has actually been getting worse.
If coverage for you is really that bad, you can try seeing if Sprint will give you an Airave (femtocell). Some customers with poor reception have gotten them for free.
Lightsquared and the FCC (Score:2)
The FCC sold of spectrum to Lightsquared without understanding its effect on GPS receivers. The entire aviation fleet would need to have upgraded instrumentation if LightSquared deploys in their spectrum, which was not intended for terrestrial use. There's a good chance GPS, which is now essentially safety critical, is going to win.
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The FCC sold of spectrum to Lightsquared without understanding its effect on GPS receivers.
Well, sort of. They originally sold the spectrum to LightSquared for use in a satellite-based service, which would have been ok. Then LightSquared changed their plans, and got permission from the FCC to use the spectrum for a terrestrial-based network (which the FCC stupidly OK'ed, not realizing the consquences).
Our curent situation is a direct consequence of the inverse-square law. For a broadcasting satellite, everyone is (for practical purposes) equally far away, and receives a nice low-power signal t
Just in Time for iPhone 5 (Score:2, Funny)
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Well, if that were to happen, and Sprint hasn't said it would, but if it were, your phone would continue to work fine for calls and 3G data. I agree though that this is a little awkward....I was going to be upgrading my phone soon, but now I think I'll be waiting longer to see what happens with LTE models rather than another WiMax one as WiMax buildouts seem to have stalled, and I'll want better network coverage for 4G with my next phone.
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You, my friend, need to re-evaluate your expectations. This isn't 1999 anymore. Sorry to rain on your parade, but it's time to put on your big-boy pants and return to reality.
kthxbye
So I should no longer expect durability? Quality? I guess my generation really is the pinnacle of human evolution.
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Nope, there is no such thing as an iPhone that works woth 4G, on the market or announced. The Sprint iPhone 4S is a strictly 3G device, just like the Verizon, AT&T, and unlocked iPhone 4S.
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The iPhone is still only 3G and their 3G network isn't going anywhere.
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The networks that support the iPhone can barely deal with the IP traffic bandwidth of 3G radio access. They will need more cells and more IP networking connectivity on the ground before they can deal with 4G radio access.
There are 150,000 2G cell sites in the US that only have T1 ground backhaul (1.5 Mbps). To actually accommodate 3G, they need to be brought up 10 Mbps to 50 Mbps (frac or whole DS3). 4G cells need 40-80 Mbps backhaul (multiple DS3s or other technology).
While Internet access is cheap, loc
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It will do HSPA+ 14.4, but that's supposedly only marginally faster than 3G speeds (I haven't done more than read an article or two about it).
One would theorize that when Apple finally makes a 4G device, it will be LTE (which is what Verizon and AT&T are already deploying) and not WiMAX (which is what Sprint deployed and will probably abandon by 2014). So, best that Sprint at least have
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It isn't going to happen overnight. By the time they have any kind of respectable LTE coverage there will be a half dozen phones that blow the Prime out of the water. Which is both sad and exciting.
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They charge that same 10 bucks for all smart phones now, not just 4g.
Does europe have some magical fairy technology? (Score:2)
This article is about Sprint rolling out an LTE network, and in case you didn't know, LTE is basically state-of-the-art in mobile access technologies. Of standards on the horizon, only LTE-Advanced is superior, but the standards for it aren't even finalized. There won't be any LTE-Advanced products for a few years.
The US carriers have been lagging europe and asia for a while, but they can catch up very quickly with LTE rollouts since there really isn't anything better than LTE right now. And once LTE-Advanc
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That's not a "Wimax" problem, it's a "Sprint's implementation of dual-network interfaces on their phones sucks, and Clear's Wimax deployment sucks even more" problem. Wimax isn't a single "thing" -- it's a bag of capabilities, some of which are optional for carriers to implement. Clear just did a shit job, and Sprint didn't do much to help. Make no mistake -- LTE can suck every bit as badly as Sprint/Clear Wimax does today, and properly-deployed Wimax can be as good (or better) than LTE. LTE's real advantag