We'd figured that Sprint and partner Clearwire were going to have a devil of a time rolling out WiMAX this year in New York City; urban canyons are always tricky, of course, but their oddball 2500MHz spectrum allocation isn't the best at penetrating buildings and other structures, either. On that note, we'd been tipped earlier this week that a reader was seeing some weak WiMAX reception for the first time on his
EVO 4G near Coney Island (see a shot after the break), and now, we've been able to independently confirm it on one of our own units -- in saturated Midtown, no less -- though we weren't able to do much with it beyond get a notification that a "4G network is available." Clearly this isn't ready for primetime use, but it's a good sign that these guys have officially started lighting up a few cells here and there. 1080p streaming, anyone?
[Thanks, r0ckstar_23]
Update: We're getting tipped that folks are seeing some occasional 4G action in LA and San Francisco, so keep a close eye on those EVOs!
posted June 16th 2010 3:33PM
@Socalfrank
how long have u had the phone? when i first ran speed tests (upon release day) i was gettin slow speeds (3-500k).. as of the last weak ive been running tests a couple times a day and im averaging 1.8 megs down. Much happier lately! i hope you experience the same results... cuz its a beautiful phone and i love the Everything data 450 plan!
@benchase7
I got the phone on June 4 - Launch Day. My avg. speeds started out faster (800kbps) but when I called Sprint and they said that was slow and they issued a trouble ticket to check the tower near me...since then they "cleared it" and my speeds dropped in half. If this keeps up I'll be down to GPRS speeds soon.
Luckily I'm still in the 30 day remorse period...may try the Samsung Galaxy S.
@Socalfrank man.. That sucks. I just did two speed tests.. On on the Pre.. Another on the EVO. Pre was 1.2 ish down and EVO was 1.8 ish down. I'm happy with that, very happy. But I know your pain. Hope it sorts it's way out for you like it did for me.
Clear has deployed WiMax at Stanford and around Palo Alto, that is why people are seeing it in Mountain View. I get it in Menlo Park.
I have a WiMax USB adapter for Clear and get 7-8Mbps down and 1.1Mbs up load. They cap the adapter at 10M down and 1M up. The ping times are 60-80ms to other locations around my location because the traffic seems to be routed through Clear's network and hops onto the internet in Texas.
@boilerbots
eff me! That's awesome, Man! Lovin this WiMax stuff more and more on the daily. Starting to look promising! :)
I'm getting some 4G coverage in downtown LA... Tried it on 3rd and Hope and on 5th and Flower.
Drove around Los Angeles today while a friend was in town, I have an EVO and got my first signal when I picked them up in downtown L.A., speedtest clocked in at about 3.6 MPS down and 1 MPS up, next drove to Santa Monica for lunch and noticed that pretty much anywhere from the 405 to the coast had pretty good coverage for 4G, speeds were slower but signal was stronger, I am guessing more people were using it or something cause I had full signal, as compared to 2 bars of 4G coverage in downtown, but only got about 1.8 MBS down and .9 MBS up. Best results were when I was driving my guest to LAX on the 405 and had about 2 bars of 4G service while stuck in traffic because of an accident and clocked in at 4.5 MBS down and 1 MBS up (I hear the up is capped at 1 MBS). I was pretty impressed, my phone did get hot and actually reset itself at one point, but this happened when I very first switched the 4G on in downtown, after that it ran like a top. Can't wait for the official roll out in L.A.!
@bigkippa
you da man!
@benchase7 YOUR A BOSS :D
So no mention of the newly launched 802.16e Enhanced, which should be available by the end of the year, via software upgrade?
The specific enhancements to the 802.16e Mobile WiMAX standard include:
* Increased data uplink and downlink budgets that improve the performance of WiMAX devices operating at the outer edges of a WiMAX cell or enable the service provider to increase the coverage of a given cell;
* Up to 70 percent improved spectral efficiency and an associated potential doubling of peak data rates;
* New technologies for reducing signal interference both within cells and among cell sites;
* Improved frequency Reuse 1 deployment schemes
@Sin City ooo where did you hear about this?
I was at Stanford University (Which is about a 25-30 min drive from SF) last weekend and 4G was up and running the whole time I was there.
@FlareSama
Quite possibly in preparation for this conference: http://scpd.stanford.edu/wimax
Or they've just decided to light up the CLEAR WiMax Innovation Network for public use: http://developer.clear.com/innovation
I have no photographic evidence, but after reading this yesterday I turned on 4G and this morning I had the 4G notification on the top right while walking to the station. I live in Brooklyn!
It soon went away though.
Connecting pretty regularly in Boston.
http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1277/4709149042_f18061471e_b.jpg
http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1303/4709167856_88f320da90_b.jpg
I live in Plano Texas, Dallas is a city with 4g Coverage, like when im out i have a 4G signal but unforutnatly at my house i dont get 4g its only when im a bit North. i certainly hope sprint makes hundreds of towers all around the country to be the best that it can be :D
SPRINT THE NOW NETWORK :D
the 4G icon lit up for me on De La Cruz in Santa Clara (near San Jose, California). I looked in my wireless settings and under 4G it said "Connected to Sprint". I turned off my "Mobile network" which is 2G voice/3G data right? dunno. Anyway I opened my home page www.google.com/m and was able to do a search for mobile speed test, then the 4G dropped off before I could bring up the speed test page.
@theaussiepunk
hey it's connected again!
DSL Reports Mobile Speed test: 1370kbit/sec, 0.337s latency on a 1MB file
Speedtest.net Modesto, CA 2.15Mb/s down, 0.12Mb/s up, 344ms ping
Speedtest.net Wichita, KS 1.66Mb/s down, 0.07Mb/s up, 443ms ping
Speedtest.net Klamath Falls, OR 1.99Mb/s down, 0.23Mb/s up, 442ms ping
4G off, 3G back on
Speedtest.net Modesto, CA 1.35Mb/s down, 0.18Mb/s up, 343ms ping
Speedtest.net Klamath Falls, OR 1.02Mb/s down, 0.24Mb/s up, 377ms ping
I'm inside a 1 story building on De La Cruz in Santa Clara.
@theaussiepunk
4G is staying up!! Did a couple tests outside on the sidewalk
Speedtest.net Modesto, CA 2.35Mb/s down, 0.22Mb/s up, 345ms ping
Speedtest.net Klamath Falls, OR 1.85Mb/s down, 0.34Mb/s up, 410ms ping