4G? How about 3G!

I laugh at folks who jump to t mobile for unlimited data. Here's a warning don't data roam if you do they only give you 50mb after that no more data roaming till next billing cycle. I spent 5 hours before I was back in tmo coverage and data. All I did this morning was check tapatalk Facebook and gmail and pow I got shut down that's crazy stuff.

Sent from my Nexus 4 using Xparent Cyan Tapatalk 2
 
I laugh at folks who jump to t mobile for unlimited data. Here's a warning don't data roam if you do they only give you 50mb after that no more data roaming till next billing cycle. I spent 5 hours before I was back in tmo coverage and data. All I did this morning was check tapatalk Facebook and gmail and pow I got shut down that's crazy stuff.

Sent from my Nexus 4 using Xparent Cyan Tapatalk 2

Most carriers don't allow data roaming as unlimited just FYI. It costs them money to pay the other network for your usage.

Sent from my Sprint S3 using AC forums.
 
No issue with my vzw account in unlimited there and never been slowed down or parked
Most carriers don't allow data roaming as unlimited just FYI. It costs them money to pay the other network for your usage.

Sent from my Sprint S3 using AC forums.



Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Xparent Cyan Tapatalk 2
 
No issue with my vzw account in unlimited there and never been slowed down or parked



Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Xparent Cyan Tapatalk 2

Then why are you in the T-Mobile thread? Trolling?
 
Because I still have my nexus 4 on tmo but there service is crap and all need my vzw to use it
Then why are you in the T-Mobile thread? Trolling?



Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Xparent Cyan Tapatalk 2
 
Well in Chicago if by a slim chance u don't got lte we have 800 voice coverage and updated 3g so yo speeds will be around 1-2 mb

Sent from my Sprint Galaxy Nexus rockin 4.2.2 using Tapatalk 2

Sprint sucks in the whole state of Hawaii in terms of speed. Lucky if we reach 100kb DL on 3G . Wimax here tops out about 5-6 MB DL Also
Sprint took away my yearly gold
Member (10 year plus customer) upgrade. Took the discount off of my second line of service. Increased the cost of insurance on my phone.
No 4G LTE in sight per S4GRU.
I currently pay almost 160 dollars a month with a 24% Corporate discount here for their simply family plan.
On my sisters phone with Hspa+ 42 here in Hawaii on T mobile
I've seen 30+ MB dl and 10+
MB upload. Plus the tmobile signals penetrates better into buildings from what I see. My coworkers tmobile phone(s3) have better signal strength than the nextel
Phones we use at work with the
Iden 800mhz frequency. Plus, once I am in side of of a building wimax is useless. And drains my battery in hours. I am so embarrassed to say I have Sprint. Pretty much everyone here knows Sprint service is bad. I stuck with sprint because of the unlimited data and what I thought was better value?
If on March 24th
Tmobile offers their $80 dollar unlimited talk/text/500mb tethering family plan +(from here it is ala carte) I will choose +$20(unlimited data no cap my line) +$10(10GB capped wife's line) plus I'll get a 15% discount to boot equals much
Better value for me I will jump ship. Plus I like the option of having a GSM phone over a CDMA phone.
Maybe Sprint will have better data speeds and pricing in the future?
Who knows.? I might come back?
But all I am trying to say is YMWV..
I dunno why this above poster is trying so hard to push Sprint?
We don't all live in Chicago?
If he was in living Hawaii?
I bet no I am sure he wouldn't have nice things to say about Sprint regarding their network at the moment.

Sent from my Coconut Wireless
 
Last edited:
All this information is great that I am reading on this thread. Giving me a better image as to what I am dealing with on Solavei. I have seen some post on blogs and news sites T-mobile is going to have LTE soon, but no one seems to know where?... Anyone else have any news source on that?
 
Pick one (or mix and match):

Android Central - Las Vegas and Kansas City to launch end of March (next 12 days), 100 million people by mid-2013.

PCmag.com - New York City, March 26th, 200 million people by the end of 2013.

Gigaom.com - The company expects that its LTE infrastructure will provide service ?in the vast majority of the top 50 markets and 20 MHz service in 75 percent of the top 25 markets.?
 
One thing that I don't understand about T-Mobile. I live in a well populated area in eastern NC. T-Mobile service here is not 4G, and as a matter of fact, it isn't even 3G! Yet they have 4G posters all over the store. I asked the employees there when they were going to get 4G, and their response is "we're still looking for 3G". I just don't understand.

It's because tmobile advertises nationally so that poster you saw is advertising for their company as a whole not just in your area. If their not good in that area then go with someone else till they upgrade your area. Now that the merger with metro pcs has gone through its going to get better. Plus I read that due to tmobile having hspa+ speeds of over 30mbps in some areas whenever your in an area that has lte and your signal reverts back to hspa+ you'll be dropping from a speed of around 40-50mbps theoretical speed down to about 20-30mbps. As oppose to Sprint or verizon which is drop from 20-40mbps down to evdo speeds of 1-2mbps. Tmobile has a real chance of being top dog with this option.

Sent from the Beast that is Galaxy Note 2
 
Service carrier you choose is based on where you live. Even in the same city there are areas where there is a preferred carrier over another. I lived where Verizon and Sprint was poor and AT&T & T-Mobile was great. Now I live where T-Mobile and Verizon are good and AT&T and Sprint are not. Overall if you want to pay the premium price Verizon is more consistent servicing with AT&T being second. Sprint and T-Mobile are still upgrading their networks from 2G and might not be best in your city. For example, in Denver T-Mobile HSPA+ works great for me and they are upgrading to LTE here, but Sprint data is slow and LTE won't be available for a few months.

FYI, best place to get real data is opensignal.com since the data comes from a crowd source application instead of the carrier's projections for the next 4 years.
 
If you live in a major metropolitan area (or on an island) the 7UP* network may be for you.

7UP is the soccer mom network - their target market is families so they tend to focus on low-cost plans and don't have has many phone choices in general or high-end phones in particular. The carrier focuses on technology that's, "good enough" for folks who want something that "just works" and don't want all the fancy or expensive options. They are slow to update their technology which can be good and bad. I jumped off the 7UP bandwagon because all the other carriers already had 3G and when I asked them about when their 3G network would be coming they kept trying to sign me up for their "high-speed data plan" instead (EDGE) . The good part about being last is that they can wait for all the dust to settle and select the best option available (HSPA+) instead rushing into the market and having to make a decision based on the best information available at the time then having to do a slow and expensive u-turn later (WiMax).

They're in a unique position because they are the smallest of the national carriers but their owner (Deutsche Telekom) has the resources to change that - they just choose not to. I think a lot of that has to do with a German company not understanding their American customers. Americans are a mobile people. Yes, we do have some folks who live their entire lives in New York or Chicago, but in general we like to use our cars to go to the beach or ski or meet up with the family for some Thanksgiving turkey and we expect to have phone service here, there and everywhere in-between. Germany has a few small villages, but a lot of Germans don't even own cars. That means that the practice of only having towers in metro areas and not paying other carriers for a roaming agreement is a much better idea in Germany than in the US. There are many other examples of this, but I'm already getting a little long.

Frustrated that putting an Inselaffe in a pink dress wasn't enough to turn the tide in the US market and facing huge costs for an LTE upgrade, DT cut-off 7UP (they stopped investing in infrastructure and told them that they were on their own financially) tried selling 7UP and nearly succeeded with AT&T until the feds put a stop to it. The failed deal did leave DT with a bunch of cash and spectrum though. Both the windfall from AT&T and the message that the US gub'mint wouldn't allow a larger carrier to buy 7UP resulted in a change of heart from DT - they announced plans to upgrade to an LTE network, announced all their plans would be value plans (phone sold separately) and put the Inselaffe in a skin-tight leather outfit and made her ride a motorcycle!

Ironically, when DT wanted to sell 7UP there weren't many companies interested in acquiring a small, unprofitable carrier. Now that DT has laid out the cash for an upgrade a number of companies are interested in entering their space (Dish, Apple, Google, Amazon). I predict that the value plans will go over like a lead balloon (You're saying I can pay $20 a month MORE than an MVNO charges and STILL have to buy my phone separately? What a deal!), DT will be fleeing the Ami market finding a buyer acceptable to the feds this time and the Inselaffe will be forced to star in "art films" to support herself.

* For the young folk - The current advertising campaign, "UNcarrier" is a blatant reuse/copy/ripoff of 7UP's, "uncola" campaign (1975-early 80's). I reserve the right in my declining years to become easily confused by things that annoy me and will remain so until 7UP stops this silliness.
 
Tmobile has a real chance of being top dog with this option.

The things that are holding them back:

1. No roaming agreements with other carriers. Heck, even Solavei has roaming with AT&T. 7UP does not.
2. Their coverage outside of metro areas. This combined with the, "no roaming" policy creates a real deal-breaker for anyone who travels frequently or lives in a rural or suburban area.
3. Limited devices. Their focus on families means that most of their phones are mid to lower-tier phones. True, you can jailbreak a phone from AT&T or another GSM carrier but you won't be getting HSPA+ speeds with it.
4. The new value plans. Offering service without contracts puts them on the same tier as the MVNOs ONLY they want to charge a premium (about $20/mo. more) for being a name brand. You can either be the low-cost carrier (Republic Wireless, Page Plus) OR charge a little more to be the carrier with the most coverage and the best data speeds (Verizon). There's not a lot of room in the middle-bottom of the market. I expect the added annoyance of having to purchase phones separately will turn off consumers used to seeing phones and service bundled together.
5. Slow to adopt new technology. Last with 3G. Last with the iPhone. Last with LTE.

Things not holding them back:

1. Their network. Their HSPA+ network is the fastest 3G network - faster than some 4G networks in places.
2. Their pricing. As a nationwide carrier they're second only to Sprint.
 
I currently pay almost 160 dollars a month with a 24% Corporate discount here for their simply family plan.

The service issues you've described won't be fixed by the NV upgrade, but I'm curious about your rate. Have you tried Everything Plus?

Go here. Use Russ.S.McGuire@Sprint.com and 383.
 
True that is a old article lol.

Sent from my Sprint S3 using AC forums.
 
The things that are holding them back:

1. No roaming agreements with other carriers. Heck, even Solavei has roaming with AT&T. 7UP does not.
2. Their coverage outside of metro areas. This combined with the, "no roaming" policy creates a real deal-breaker for anyone who travels frequently or lives in a rural or suburban area.
3. Limited devices. Their focus on families means that most of their phones are mid to lower-tier phones. True, you can jailbreak a phone from AT&T or another GSM carrier but you won't be getting HSPA+ speeds with it.
4. The new value plans. Offering service without contracts puts them on the same tier as the MVNOs ONLY they want to charge a premium (about $20/mo. more) for being a name brand. You can either be the low-cost carrier (Republic Wireless, Page Plus) OR charge a little more to be the carrier with the most coverage and the best data speeds (Verizon). There's not a lot of room in the middle-bottom of the market. I expect the added annoyance of having to purchase phones separately will turn off consumers used to seeing phones and service bundled together.
5. Slow to adopt new technology. Last with 3G. Last with the iPhone. Last with LTE.

Things not holding them back:

1. Their network. Their HSPA+ network is the fastest 3G network - faster than some 4G networks in places.
2. Their pricing. As a nationwide carrier they're second only to Sprint.

Agree with you on all things except, T-Mobile does have a seven year roaming agreement with AT&T that came out of the failed merger. But, you only roam on their Edge network. HSPA+ is not 3G, but a form of 4G according to the International Cellular Standards Committee. The 3 and 4 simply stand for 3rd and 4th generation.
 
^^this. That old article has this same accurate information. Plus DT isn't spending money on tmo. If they did they would be refarming spectrum and wouldn't have lost so many customers to the iPhone.
 

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