Is the 8mbps speed limit a problem?

whitenack

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I am considering switching to Cricket. I have a family plan, and cricket has the best price for all of us plus we would have more data (would not have to share).

The only drawback, if you call it that, compared to what I have now is no hotspot tethering (which I don't ever use) and the 8mbps speed limit on data. My current provider (Ting...which I love and will hate to leave) uses the Sprint network which has gotten much better over the years in my area and download speeds are around 20mbps. If it were my home service, this would be an issue, since I do a lot of stuff at the same time (a couple of streaming services, surfing the webs, data transfers, etc.), so 8mbps would probably not be enough. However, I'm not sure how much speed I need just for my phone.

I obviously noticed the slow speed back with Sprint only offered 3G in my area, but that was really slow (less than 0.5mbps?) But once the speed gets up over 3-4mbps, is there really that much of a difference?
 

Almeuit

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Depends what you do on your phone. Most streams (video and such) will work fine on 8 Mbps.
 

whitenack

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Right. I'm not a very heavy user because I've always had to watch my data use. I don't stream video over mobile. Mostly I just surf the web, email, stream music on occasion, etc. I'm guessing pages will load just as fast? The bottleneck would be my devices ability to draw what is downloaded?
 

Almeuit

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Right. I'm not a very heavy user because I've always had to watch my data use. I don't stream video over mobile. Mostly I just surf the web, email, stream music on occasion, etc. I'm guessing pages will load just as fast? The bottleneck would be my devices ability to draw what is downloaded?

With those tasks on 8 Mbps you won't run into any issues or notice anything different really.
 

whitenack

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Thanks for the link Scooger.

Thanks for the replies... I think you all are right, I don't think I will notice any change by switching. Thanks again!
 

Channan

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8Mbps is plenty fast enough for pretty much anything you'd need on a phone. Downloads will be slower (obviously), but browsing the web, email, video chat, streaming audio and video, etc. will all work perfectly fine with 8Mbps.
 

cgardnervt

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I set my in laws up on Cricket 2 years and they have never really had any issues on the LTE network. They use social networking and videos as well. I'd say 8 megs down is plenty for the average user.
 

Premium1

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I set my in laws up on Cricket 2 years and they have never really had any issues on the LTE network. They use social networking and videos as well. I'd say 8 megs down is plenty for the average user.

I just set my parents up (finally got a smart phone) and they have no issues. I also bought one to test out, and don't have any issues for what I use it for (social, media, videos, etc). Plus for the money saved compared to verizon it is a no brainer. One thing, if you want att but worried about the 8mb/s you could also look into go phone. A little more than cricket but you get uncapped LTE speeds.
 

anon(9898026)

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Switched my daughter's Verizon line to cricket and she loves it. Hasn't had any complaints with the speeds or coverage and it saves me money.

Posted via the Android Central App
 

Xenon_Quasar

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Please do not entertain the thought of switching to cricket unless youre okay with paying for data that you most likely will not be able to use. For some odd reason i can only get full bars when im in a walmart (there are two literally right down the street) but when im at my residents ,it moves between 1 and 3 which means their towers aren't very good. I'll be switching soon because i can barely process 480p videos during the day but at around midnight (when pretty much me & everyone else would be sleep) is when everything seems fine (data wise) i shouldnt have to wait until midnight to be able to use data that im paying for on a consistent basis .
 

telrod11

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Please do not entertain the thought of switching to cricket unless youre okay with paying for data that you most likely will not be able to use. For some odd reason i can only get full bars when im in a walmart (there are two literally right down the street) but when im at my residents ,it moves between 1 and 3 which means their towers aren't very good. I'll be switching soon because i can barely process 480p videos during the day but at around midnight (when pretty much me & everyone else would be sleep) is when everything seems fine (data wise) i shouldnt have to wait until midnight to be able to use data that im paying for on a consistent basis .

Did you have AT&T before your switch?

I have had nothing but good service with them since they are using AT&T as the backbone.
 

cellomj

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Please do not entertain the thought of switching to cricket unless youre okay with paying for data that you most likely will not be able to use. For some odd reason i can only get full bars when im in a walmart (there are two literally right down the street) but when im at my residents ,it moves between 1 and 3 which means their towers aren't very good. I'll be switching soon because i can barely process 480p videos during the day but at around midnight (when pretty much me & everyone else would be sleep) is when everything seems fine (data wise) i shouldnt have to wait until midnight to be able to use data that im paying for on a consistent basis .
Careful with this "advice." Just because Xenon has had a mediocre experience doesn't mean everyone has. I've got my whole family on Cricket since February and have never had an issue with the coverage. In fact, I've had a better data coverage (I actually got data) with cricket over t-mobile when it comes to travel outside the city. I was on t-mobile for 2 years. Coverage in my home area (SLC) is comparable between the two, but basement/building penetration is better on Cricket.
 
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I am considering switching to Cricket. I have a family plan, and cricket has the best price for all of us plus we would have more data (would not have to share).

The only drawback, if you call it that, compared to what I have now is no hotspot tethering (which I don't ever use) and the 8mbps speed limit on data. My current provider (Ting...which I love and will hate to leave) uses the Sprint network which has gotten much better over the years in my area and download speeds are around 20mbps. If it were my home service, this would be an issue, since I do a lot of stuff at the same time (a couple of streaming services, surfing the webs, data transfers, etc.), so 8mbps would probably not be enough. However, I'm not sure how much speed I need just for my phone.

I obviously noticed the slow speed back with Sprint only offered 3G in my area, but that was really slow (less than 0.5mbps?) But once the speed gets up over 3-4mbps, is there really that much of a difference?

8mbps is fine to stream anything on a cell phone.

Cricket is not an MVNO, they are owned by and operate on the ATT network. Wherever you get att service , you will get cricket
 

mikey1273

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I was on sprint and boost for 10 years and switched to Cricket in October. On Boost which uses sprints network I only got 5mbps at best and I had coverage issues when I traveled out of town sometimes and often when hiking and camping I would not have any service. With Cricket I have had service everywhere so far and speeds tested over 8mbps at times. Always speeds as good as sprint/boost was and better in most areas for me. I work in IT and not had any speed issues with the data. 8 should be plenty for most uses.
 

cgardnervt

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I setup my in-laws on Cricket a few years back! In face we just set them up with brand new Moto G4's for Christmas. While setting them up their speeds where great I thought. We have att postpaid and I see no signal issues between the 2 other than the speed diff on a sped test. Movies and what not load up just fine for them as well.
 

whitenack

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Just updating everyone...I was the OP. I have been really pleased with the service. The only time I notice any trouble is when I am in a large group (like at a stadium or arena) and I don't get good service while the games are going on. Otherwise, I like the plan and the coverage.
 

Almeuit

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Just updating everyone...I was the OP. I have been really pleased with the service. The only time I notice any trouble is when I am in a large group (like at a stadium or arena) and I don't get good service while the games are going on. Otherwise, I like the plan and the coverage.

Most networks struggle at stadiums so this isn't too specific to Cricket :).
 

mikey1273

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Most networks struggle at stadiums so this isn't too specific to Cricket :).
Yeah there are just too many people in the same area on same cell towers tweeting and posting to facebook for any network to keep up in that situation.


We ported my sister over the other day from str8 talk, she had and old 3G CDMA zte device so the speed and the LG Escape 3 she picked out at the Cricket store are leaps better than what she had.