3G speeds on Virgin Mobile...

[HondaCop]

Ever since I came from Sprint's EVO to Virgin Mobile with the Optimus V, I have noticed abysmal 3G speeds. I read somewhere else about some people experiencing the same problems and having it solved by calling VM and asking them to provision their phones for "android 3g". What's the truth to this? Anyone here experienced this?

- My name is HondaCop and I approve this message.

 

[whyaphoenix]

delete

 

[Helgaiden]

as far as I read, Virgin Mobile piggybacks off Sprints network. so to have higher priority for sprint customers. virgin mobile internet is throttled to a slightly slower speed. all my speed tests for my Virgin Mobile 3G give me between 1 and 2.2 Mb/s dependin on signal strength.

its definately fast enough for mobile browsing. and "good enough" for tethering when i need to use my laptop in a pinch. I have NO complaints for 25 bucks a month. I just worry they will slow it down to dial up speeds if I go over a ridiculous amount like my friends T-mobile phone. they throttle you to worse than dial up speeds if you either A. Tether, or B, use more than 3GB in a billing cycle (one month)

Someone on another forum did some experimenting and found the point at which they began throttling to be around 10gb. He called in and the rep told him 10gb afterwards. Maybe it varies though.

 

[whyaphoenix]

delete

 

[Helgaiden]

that was for Virgin. Its generally not suggested to abuse this though as the more prevalent it gets, the more restrictions will get put on it. Especially since virgin is having a little trouble putting their finger on certain limits. If you keep up with their broadband2go service, you'll see how unlimited for $40 came and went in the blink of an eye. They seem to still be finding their footing in the new smartphone and data intensive society, but what can you expect when you launch hotspots and smartphones right?

As for T-Mobile, i can see how 3gb works for them. Fastest speeds ive seen my Optimus V get was something like 1.8 megabits down and 878 megabits up. This is what average 3g speeds im use to are coming from Verizon (which i left back in november) on my Eris, but i switched my Eris over to MetroPCS and that was cool for 4 months but them 1x (2g) speeds started to bring me down so i had to find an alternative to hold me over until Metro expands their 4g coverage in my area and they release better Android LTE phone (their current one is pretty nice though but has its drawbacks). Metro 4g is nowhere near as fast as Verizon 4g though both are LTE. Metro gets like 5-7megabits down at best. But like i was saying about t-mobile...my little brother has a T-Mobile Motorola Defy. On 3g in my house i saw speeds of up to 4.1megabits down and 1.8megabits up. WTH? Did a little research and they use something called HSPDA and HSUPA which are like 3.5g-ish as far as speed is concerned. Being that fast you're bound to go through it faster, thus the lower cap right?

 

[awardblvr]

3G Virgin Mobil MiFi - getting WORSE

Just to let everyone know... Almost daily use of Virgin Mobil MiFi on a bus going between Fremont, CA, to Sunnyvale, right through the heart of "Silicon Valley"

Virgin has whittled the speed WAY down... I use < 500 Mb per month for the past year. Actually around 250 Mb.

In the Morning (6:30) I connect and get a reasonable speed -400 K.

In the afternoons, around 5 PM, It will connect to Virgin's servers, but it will NOT go past that. AT ANY SPEED.

Lately, when I do get through in the afternoon (around 50%) the speed is down to around 100 K at best. And very frequent latency of several seconds.

So... Looks like virgin is throttling users severely (I have a $40 unlimited plan).

SO... they are in the process of loosing a customer.

I bought the Sprint Overdrive 3G/4G today and, at my HOME (in the boonies of San Leandro) I got the 4G connection and got 2.8 Mbps (128 ms latency) (dslreports.com/tools)

So... I have a month to test out the Sprint and see if there are any problems / bad zones. I AM HOPEFUL.) Yeah, $60/month. is a bit steep, BUT... if it works reliably... then I can get 2 extra hours of connected time per day if I need it.

 

[JerryScript]

Just to let everyone know... Almost daily use of Virgin Mobil MiFi on a bus going between Fremont, CA, to Sunnyvale, right through the heart of "Silicon Valley"

Virgin has whittled the speed WAY down... I use < 500 Mb per month for the past year. Actually around 250 Mb.

In the Morning (6:30) I connect and get a reasonable speed -400 K.

In the afternoons, around 5 PM, It will connect to Virgin's servers, but it will NOT go past that. AT ANY SPEED.

Lately, when I do get through in the afternoon (around 50%) the speed is down to around 100 K at best. And very frequent latency of several seconds.

So... Looks like virgin is throttling users severely (I have a $40 unlimited plan).

SO... they are in the process of loosing a customer.

I bought the Sprint Overdrive 3G/4G today and, at my HOME (in the boonies of San Leandro) I got the 4G connection and got 2.8 Mbps (128 ms latency) (dslreports.com/tools)

So... I have a month to test out the Sprint and see if there are any problems / bad zones. I AM HOPEFUL.) Yeah, $60/month. is a bit steep, BUT... if it works reliably... then I can get 2 extra hours of connected time per day if I need it.

What you are describing is NOT throttled speed, but network usage. At 6:30am, there is very little network usage (most people are asleep or just getting up), so you get fast speeds. 5pm is peak network usage time in most areas (3pm-7pm is generally the busiest times on most networks, thinks kids getting out of school, and parents on the way home), hence your issues with connecting.

This is not throttling! If you were throttled, you would experience the same reduced speeds all day long. The only fix for this issue is for VM to increase their network capabilities.

I have not spoken with VM's tech support myself, but if you search for this issue, you will find many posts from VM users who have spoken to VM tech support and were told they are upgrading the system. This is definitely a possible reason for the issues being reported, only time will tell.

If you want reliable, pay for it, if you want affordable, deal with it.

 

[ashton4life]

I just got the Optimus V 5 days ago so I've been slammed with the 3G outages since day one though tonight its running at 400-500 down and 350-400 up and I'm in Miami, Fl. I really hope they can get it closer to 1 mbps. I did notice that using Speed Tester app the needle tends to stick and jump alot as it goes up plus the latency is 300 + sometimes 999. The test results change when I test consecutively. There may still be issues. The Compatability ANDROID issues/changes/upgrades etc. that VM is having was advised to me the very first day I had 3G issues by the VM support rep and he seemed to know what he was saying. I guess all we can do is wait. I still have 2-3 weeks to return the phone so I'm patient and I also love the phone. Peace!

 

[bb6h22lude]

At my house i usually get 30-60 KB/s but when im right new to a tower i have gotten 340KB/s which i\s roughly 3mbps. other than that i usually get way under 1 mbps im looking forwared to the motorola triumph, lame name cool phone, looks like a droid x to me. instead of ti omap 1ghz it's got a second gen snapdragon @ 1ghz.512 mb 2gb or storage 5mp camera with led flash, front facing vga camera hdmi out the camera can do 720 p @ 30 fps better than my optimus v. it's also running vanilla android, 2.2 with some virgin bloatware. a 4.1 wvga (480x800 res) 4 touch capicative buttons .h/e you spell it i think it has a plastic screen though. got a question though. if a phone doesn't have gorilla glass does that mean it's plastic if it doesnt have gorilla glass? it's only .4" thick. probally going to be 200-350 dollars though. it's got the same cpu that's in the htc thunderbolt

 

[rockneo]

340kb does not equal 3mb

Sent from my Optimus V

 

[Black Jesus]

I have been tethering for the last several months and have been averaging about 15 GB a month and am seeing no throttling.

 

[lou61166]

I have been tethering for the last several months and have been averaging about 15 GB a month and am seeing no throttling.

Nothing like breaking the terms and screwing the rest of us,unless your bs on he amount of bandwith you claim.

 

[zedorda]

340kb does not equal 3mb

Sent from my Optimus V

Yes it is. You seem to be missing the difference between byte and bit. KB/s is kilobyte per second where as mbps is megabits per second. 1 byte = 8 bits so take 340x8=2720 pretty close to 3000. This is why alot of people don't really understand why a 3MB file doesn't transfer in 3 seconds over a 3mbps connection. A 3mbps connection is really a 0.375MB/s connection aka 375KB/s

P.S. I know the numbers are alittle off bc I didnt use the HEX conversion of 1024KB = 1MB but its close enough to make some sence.

 

[onecsguy]

What you are describing is NOT throttled speed, but network usage. At 6:30am, there is very little network usage (most people are asleep or just getting up), so you get fast speeds. 5pm is peak network usage time in most areas (3pm-7pm is generally the busiest times on most networks, thinks kids getting out of school, and parents on the way home), hence your issues with connecting.

This is not throttling! If you were throttled, you would experience the same reduced speeds all day long. The only fix for this issue is for VM to increase their network capabilities.

I have not spoken with VM's tech support myself, but if you search for this issue, you will find many posts from VM users who have spoken to VM tech support and were told they are upgrading the system. This is definitely a possible reason for the issues being reported, only time will tell.

If you want reliable, pay for it, if you want affordable, deal with it.

Virgin mobile doesn NOT have thier own towers, they contract with Sprint, Sprint does the 'throttling' non Sprint customers by providing Sprint customers with priority and letting virgin mobile customers and others have whats left over.

The Sprint coverage sand speeds will Always be better than Virgin mobile for this reason

 

[michael2011]

Yes it is. You seem to be missing the difference between byte and bit. KB/s is kilobyte per second where as mbps is megabits per second. 1 byte = 8 bits so take 340x8=2720 pretty close to 3000. This is why alot of people don't really understand why a 3MB file doesn't transfer in 3 seconds over a 3mbps connection. A 3mbps connection is really a 0.375MB/s connection aka 375KB/s

P.S. I know the numbers are alittle off bc I didnt use the HEX conversion of 1024KB = 1MB but its close enough to make some sence.

it's megabytes per second not megabits, lol.
and 345kbps = .345mbps

here's part of a webpage if you need a refresher.

How many kb in a mb?



Technical... Bytes to KB:
OK the story is that 1KB is 1000 bytes. Not true, it's actually 1024 bytes but 1KB is close enough. (within 2.5 percent) there are 1000 KB (kilobytes) in 1 MB (megabyte) or 1,000,000 bytes. K is usually referring to hard memory or actual ram and usually referenced as 1k, 4k, 16, 32k, 64k and on up while KB refers to storage capacity which brings us to the 1.44mb floppy. As you probably figured out by now it will hold 1,440,000 bytes or about a million and half, not much considering the new hard drives are now in the GB range (Gigabytes which is thousands of MB):

1 GB = 1000MB
1MB = 1000KB
1 KB = 1000 bytes

 

[zedorda]

it's megabytes per second not megabits, lol.
and 345kbps = .345mbps

here's part of a webpage if you need a refresher.

How many kb in a mb?



Technical... Bytes to KB:
OK the story is that 1KB is 1000 bytes. Not true, it's actually 1024 bytes but 1KB is close enough. (within 2.5 percent) there are 1000 KB (kilobytes) in 1 MB (megabyte) or 1,000,000 bytes. K is usually referring to hard memory or actual ram and usually referenced as 1k, 4k, 16, 32k, 64k and on up while KB refers to storage capacity which brings us to the 1.44mb floppy. As you probably figured out by now it will hold 1,440,000 bytes or about a million and half, not much considering the new hard drives are now in the GB range (Gigabytes which is thousands of MB):

1 GB = 1000MB
1MB = 1000KB
1 KB = 1000 bytes

I am sorry u couldn't understand my post but read and maybe learn some of what I was talking about.

Quote from Dlsreports.com: Can you please explain kilobits vs. kilobytes? Optimum Online FAQ | DSLReports.com, ISP Information

It will make it easy if we all try to stick with the industry standard abbreviations.

Kilo-bytes per second = KB/s
Kilo-bits per second = kbps

Your browser reports speeds in kilobytes (or megabytes) per second when you're downloading or uploading data.

1 kbps = 1000 bps (bits per second)
1 KB/s = 1024 B/s (bytes per second)
1 KB/s = 8.192 kbps
1 kbps = .1221 KB/s

• KB/s to kbps
Take KB/s and multiply by 8.192
Example
100KB/s = 819.2kbps

• kbps to KB/s
Take kbps and divide by 8.192 (or multiply by .1221)
Example
1000kbps = 122KB/s


Your browser reports speeds in KB/s, so if you see 500KB in your browser, your speed is 4096 kbps or 4.096 Mbps (megabits per second).

 

[NerdyNugget]

At my house i usually get 30-60 KB/s but when im right new to a tower i have gotten 340KB/s which i\s roughly 3mbps. other than that i usually get way under 1 mbps im looking forwared to the motorola triumph, lame name cool phone, looks like a droid x to me. instead of ti omap 1ghz it's got a second gen snapdragon @ 1ghz.512 mb 2gb or storage 5mp camera with led flash, front facing vga camera hdmi out the camera can do 720 p @ 30 fps better than my optimus v. it's also running vanilla android, 2.2 with some virgin bloatware. a 4.1 wvga (480x800 res) 4 touch capicative buttons .h/e you spell it i think it has a plastic screen though. got a question though. if a phone doesn't have gorilla glass does that mean it's plastic if it doesnt have gorilla glass? it's only .4" thick. probally going to be 200-350 dollars though. it's got the same cpu that's in the htc thunderbolt

340kb =340kb, 3,124kb=3Mb

 

[MrJedi]

Fastest speed I have ever gotten on any Android device on the Sprint/Virgin EVDOrA network is 440kbps/.44mbps/55KB/s per the speed test app. Those speeds aren't useful for anything other than minimal browsing, email, 4sq, and twitter. I am in a WiFi spot 95% of the time so I hardly ever have the need to deal with 3G. If I didn't have WiFi at work I think I would change carriers. Verizon consistently has better 3G speeds in my area, which is sad considering I am about a mile away as the crow flies from Sprint HQ. Sprints network is overloaded where I live. Once they started carrying the Hero (and subsequent Android phones) the network has suffered a slow decline.

I have to say I am envious of anyone who gets 1mbps+ on 3G, because I never have.

 

[MidtownHD]

I get between 0.5-1.1mbps DOWN and around 300-500kbps UP in NYC