LTE on Epic 4g?? - Epic 4G Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

Before we go into a hissyfit... I am well aware that Epic 4g uses WIMAX. I am with Sprint. My question is... has anyone ever notice that their Epic runs on 4g when in an LTE area? I live in Michigan and the only WiMax area is in Grand Rapids (west side of state). I was approaching Lansing from the east, and received 4g signal and 4g speeds of 3-4 Mbps and there is no WiMax within at least 50 miles. It was confirmed on my bill of the 4g usage. This has happened before to me in an entirely non-Sprint 4g area of Detroit. How did this happen? I am not complaining, but find it interesting. I NEVER get this speed anywhere on 3g... I rarely if ever get 1 Mbps... Any thoughts??

Rogue wimax tower?
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Detroit has WiMax on some towers, especially near the airport. So to answer your question, no this device does not utilize LTE. You just happened to find a random WiMax tower.

nikon120 said:
Detroit has WiMax on some towers, especially near the airport. So to answer your question, no this device does not utilize LTE. You just happened to find a random WiMax tower.
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Ok, that makes sense. I'm looking on the sprint site and it does not show wimax in the area, so the conclusion must be some sporatic 4g signals from towers. The website is just not up to date.

In bigger cities, it looks like Sprint implemented soaker sites, especially around heavily utilized airports. This was to test the system durability and etc.. These will disappear as they overhaul all towers in those cities to utilize the new bands for LTE.

Related

4G in Northern Colorado?

Anybody in Northern Colorado, or anywhere in Colorado, had success in getting some 4G coverage?
I just flashed to Baked Snack from cm6 to create a backup I can use while I'm in Vegas this weekend so I could test out 4G finally and was able to connect to 4G from my basement!
Ran some speed tests and performs better than the 3G here. I actually normally get 3G speeds in the 2000's at UNC which has a Sprint tower on one of the residence halls. At my house it's rather slow, the 826 download is 3G, the rest are 4G except the wifi.
Anybody have any luck in this area?
I am in fort Collins and have not managed to get 4G anywhere around here or in loveland. I am not really checking very often to tell you the truth. I hear there are areas in denver. Did you get 4g somewhere in northern colorado?
I've gotten pretty damn nice results with only 2 bars of 4G here in Orlando, Fl
Yes i live in Greeley, about 3 miles west of UNC and that's where I got those results from.
Ive never even bothered to turn it on before either until recently just to make sure the radio would work.
I'll keep it on during the day and let.you know how things are working.
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I guess I am just going to have to start randomly testing around here. I did not think it was in this area so I have not bothered even trying that much.
Try out Map Viewer on the market (Sensorly), you can see where other users are getting Wimax 4g in your area, you can also let it track where you're getting 4g. Also tracks GSM, CDMA, and wireless connections.
Some 4g in the downtown Denver area along I-25, US 6, up and down Alameda, Sheridan and Wadsworth.
Short Sprint outage in Greeley today = 4g coverage around 36 and 47th (the only area I have been in so far speeds as tested with Speedtest.net app = 1.5 down 800 up.
I've got 4G at home now. it has been off and on, but I've got it at home and at my office.
Denver Tech Center definitely gets it...haven't tried any other places.

[Q] Another 4G question.

How would I know if I broke my 4G if its not in my area? I took a long road trip last month with 4G turned on and I don't think I ever saw it on. I was on the interstate the areas that should have had it. I'm planning on going to atlanta for thanksgiving and would like to fix it before then as my aunt is an iphone user. I think I can figure out how to fix it but I'd rather make sure its broken first.
Interstate? If you had given us more details on like a state location name, like CA or NV or NY, I can tell you that in 2011, Sprint will have 4g signal towers working in the western states of USA, and the eastern states like NY, Viriginia, and some others in the eastern part of USA have their signal on 4g towers already and have reported good 4g signals with their htc phones.
Acutally, yamaford, buddy...we got a long way to wait for 4g anyhow, look at this sprint coverage map on 3g, then look into the tabs on the right section of the map page, click on 4g connection with sprint devices, and u can see like Topeka has a big area around its capital for 4g service...and some others, but that's all I can think of about 4g atm, it will slowly continue to put up 4g signal towers until and after 2011.
http://coverage.sprint.com/IMPACT.jsp?ECID=vanity:coverage
The people with the 4g services have HTC Evo 4g, so your not gonna break your 4g at all, just make sure u keep it switched on or off to test around new areas. GL
I think my Question was taken the wrong way. I know the areas I drove through have 4G ( I85 Charlotte and Greensboro N.C.) but does it reach the HWY or what. I really don't understand where its transmitted from. same towers as 3G? The reason I ask about breaking it is that I have been a flashoholic from day one. I've had them all. Im on VirusROM now and I did find out that my keys are still there. Haven't checked the M.A.C. address yet.
4G Coverage Towers
Here is a link to check where the 4G towers actually are and what areas they specifically cover. Sprint does not own their own 4G towers. They teamed up with Clearwire to roll 4G out.

4G In Chicago

Anyone have connection problems with 4G in Chicago? I'm running Myn's 2.2 and connect to 4G and average 4.5 MBS. However my phone constantly switches back to 3G.
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luderbeck1 said:
Anyone have connection problems with 4G in Chicago? I'm running Myn's 2.2 and connect to 4G and average 4.5 MBS. However my phone constantly switches back to 3G.
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Ive been on 4G all night and this AM... No issues here.. I use it all the time.
It's on and off for me but that's on the road.
Swyped from my HTC EVO 4G via xda app
For chicago it really depends on where you are. Check out clearwire's website for coverage, they list where their towers are. This is what I have figured out, if there are not more than 2 towers around a building it will give you spotty coverage. If you are above the 25th to 30th floors your coverage will be hit or miss. If you are in the loop/financial district your coverage will be very hit or miss due to the size of the high rises general lack of towers. The best bet is if you know anyone with clearwire's 4g ask them. They will know where they best coverage is and where there is none.
For the suburbs, 4g is WAY better, it is seriously night and day. I think the lack of high rises make it easier for 1 tower to cover a larger area more consistantly. Also many of the metra routes and highways (290, 88, 294) have towers along them so usually 4g coverage if pretty good while commuting.

Is it true that there are only a few locations that have 4G for sprint?

I was in a sprint store and the woman turned off my 4g switch and told me to not use it because we don't have 4g in my city. She said we only have 3g (crappy towers at that). Is it possible only larger cities have 4g? I've even attempted to find maps of where the 3g towers were in my city to see if I could test the connectivity but there's nothing offered. I'm honestly not sure what to do.
Check out sprint.com they have a map that overlays all there locations with 3g and 4g and what not. short answer to your question is yes. 4g is pretty limited to major US cities and even then not the whole cities. Over time they should get more coverage but we'll see how switching to lte over WiMax plays out.
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I live in the US - Raleigh NC area, they have pretty decent coverage here. But seeing as I just got my phone and Sprint about 3 weeks ago I can't talk about travel at a distance. Stormglove is right, check out sprints web site.
There are like 3 towers with wimax in the whole state of Arizona but Phoenix is the 5th largest city in the nation... Go figure
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I live in Louisville, KY. Apparently there are like 2 WiMax towers here. Connection is pretty poor though, even within range of WiMax I can get repeated connects and disconnects.
I dont get how they can even advertise 4g for Sprint. The amount of towers they currently have deployed probably dont even cover 10% of the usa i bet. Theres 1 tower in my state i beleive and its not even on the sqme island as me :-( they should advertise it as such.. "sprint, slow ass 3g and 4g thats probably not even within distance of a IBM missel" cause there 4g is a fricken joke
Sent From My Epic Touch 3g
I get great 4g in NYC 5MB/sec (in my house which is practically a dead zone for ALL phones >_>{LUCKY ME!!!!}) and 10MB/sec+ outside my house. hopefully LTE shows better results for the rest of sprint users. =(
Epix4G said:
There are like 3 towers with wimax in the whole state of Arizona but Phoenix is the 5th largest city in the nation... Go figure
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Us Mexicans can't build there.. we are not allowed in Arizona... duh!
I would just test it. I live in Prescott, Arizona, and according to sprint.com there isn't a 4g tower for miles and miles. However, on average I get 3 bars of 4g n a connection speed of about 12 mbps. So I would just flip it on every now and then and see
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Well in the case of when i was in Gurnee Ill around thanksgiving they actually lost 4g.
Thanksgiving 2010 they had 4g while i was down there, Thanksgiving 2011 they no longer had 4g the week i was down there...
Strange...
i get 4g in philadelphia... although as i go about town i'd say reception is spotty at best. if i'm in a good spot 4g blazes. if i'm in a car or certain areas, it's nil.
on another note, i think wimax is more or less dead on the water? there will be no more or few towers invested in by sprint since they want to be on lte by 2013. i could be recalling this info inaccurately; also since they piggyback off clear's wimax that doesn't mean clear will cease expanding their market - but i'm not sure about any of this, so take this post as speculation.
The Odom Project said:
I would just test it. I live in Prescott, Arizona, and according to sprint.com there isn't a 4g tower for miles and miles. However, on average I get 3 bars of 4g n a connection speed of about 12 mbps. So I would just flip it on every now and then and see
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I love that area and try to get up to oak creek canyon at least 3 or 4 times a year in summer
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Just go to clear.com and check the coverage map to see tower locations for your area since sprint is using them for their 4g coverage
raj7065 said:
Just go to clear.com and check the coverage map to see tower locations for your area since sprint is using them for their 4g coverage
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I wonder how accurate that map is, as i supposedly have 4g.
But its sparatic at best...
Although i suppose sparatic means coverage in that area.
I would consider sprint's 4g more limited in market area's meaning most major markets but not all. Im just outside nashville, tn (not a major market) and its here & have been since june of 2010 but coverage is more spotty than anything. I work in a all glass building and its up and down like a roller coaster trying to get it to stay connected vs switching to 3g. In my home it wont even connect to 4g but not a big deal to me. Personally i would have done some research to see which area's its in b/c paying $10 for premium data isnt quite getting your money's worth in a non 4g area.
To the comment about not covering more than 10 percent of the country. It is probably a lot less than that even. But, since 80 percent of our country lives in urban environments it doesn't matter.
You won't get any type of 4G when your cruising down I-70 in BFE. But, it works fine in St. Louis or Kansas City. Even on a bigger carrier you have a similar problem.

Does Sprint's 4G LTE Rollout Upgrade 3G Networks?

Once Sprint officially rolls out 4G LTE, will their 3G signal and data speeds improve?
lathamc said:
Once Sprint officially rolls out 4G LTE, will their 3G signal and data speeds improve?
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I hope so they turned the switch to a few more markets.
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lathamc said:
Once Sprint officially rolls out 4G LTE, will their 3G signal and data speeds improve?
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That would totally depend on the market you're in.
The teams that are going around putting in the 4G upgrade are doing multiple things depending on the market.
For example, I asked this question specifically to a sprint tech the other day when purchasing my S3.
I live in Miramar/Pembroke Pines Florida (Just West of FtLauderdale).
Signal here is great in some spots (near I-75 or the turnpike) and almost non-existent anywhere else. Hell the other day I saw the nice little "Hey you're now roaming" message on my S3 (I never saw that on my Evo, though the signal was horrible).
The tech said that they are in fact upgrading EVERYTHING in my area, 3G, normal phone cellular and 4G LTE (they said the wimax would not be upgraded of course). It took them a minute to find the info as they had to look it up for my specific area to see what is and is not being upgraded.
She mentioned specifically that it wasn't just upgrading the current towers, but putting in more to improve coverage in areas such as Plantation, pembroke and Miramar specfically.
So my advice is to either wait and see what happens, or try to contact sprint and find out about your area.

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