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Gentlemen,
I have been testing the evo for 19 days now and it is the greatest device. My situation is when I do a speedtest I get uploads of 1.2M and downloads of 400kbs in Tampa, Fl. My friends Touch gets about 2M which is unacceptable compare to the evo. On top of this I have a great deal offer from Tmobile as a loyal customer for 1500 talk mins, unlimited data and unlimited text messaging on 2 lines for 119$ for 2 Slides. I am very temped.
What do you guys think?
Please help
BTW, The evo may become useless in about a year if the pressence of LTE takes over Wimax (My biggest concern) I can always sell my slides because they are GSM, but not the evo
if you are that concerned about the quality of your data service in your area you can always go to the development thread that explains how to use Verizon's network while still on sprint for better service in some troubled areas. This does not require rooting or violating your warranty in anyway and is returnable to default via merely updating your prl.
procompmreman said:
if you are that concerned about the quality of your data service in your area you can always go to the development thread that explains how to use Verizon's network while still on sprint for better service in some troubled areas. This does not require rooting or violating your warranty in anyway and is returnable to default via merely updating your prl.
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Click to collapse
Does that REALLY work? I find it hard to believe that you can get on Verizon's 3G with a PRL hack...
It does actually work, i tested it, but i live in good sprint area. Honestly i had t-mobile, make sure you reading "even more plus" not "even more" pricing i got screwed like that. for my 2 lines with unlimited everything it costs about 180$, make sure you're looking at the contract service or the phone will cost 400$.
Also t-mobile is good in the city only. outside of that you have edge. The evo is also a much better device than the mytouch slide. Also don't worry about LTE, if push comes to shove in a year you can cancel for 100 - 115$ (depending on how many months you have on your contract). Also, i wouldn't even bother with Verizon, their Customer Service is fail and so is their software.
I live in a great Sprint area too but I'd be curious to see if the ****ty speeds I'm getting on my EVO are hardware related or something else... I get about HALF the data speed, sometimes a THIRD, of what I get on my Touch Pro 2...
riverajuan said:
Gentlemen,
I have been testing the evo for 19 days now and it is the greatest device. My situation is when I do a speedtest I get uploads of 1.2M and downloads of 400kbs in Tampa, Fl. My friends Touch gets about 2M which is unacceptable compare to the evo. On top of this I have a great deal offer from Tmobile as a loyal customer for 1500 talk mins, unlimited data and unlimited text messaging on 2 lines for 119$ for 2 Slides. I am very temped.
What do you guys think?
Please help
BTW, The evo may become useless in about a year if the pressence of LTE takes over Wimax (My biggest concern) I can always sell my slides because they are GSM, but not the evo
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Does he have the original myTouch?
Besides that, the Slide doesn't have a huge screen.. so you really should play with it to see if you like it.. I would take the Customer Retention offer honestly, it's a great deal per month (less than what Sprint costs) especially with HSPA+ being backwards compatible with all regular HSPA phones (like the Slide).
I'm not sure of what the PRL hack is doing, but if you're constantly roaming on Verizon and using more than 300MB for more than a few months Sprint will close your account out eventually.
I have been a tmobile customer for 8 years, and never had a problem and when I did. they were quickly responsible to the point were they will replace anything I needed at no cost to me with no questions ask. I don't know Sprint.
Also just about everything I have tried in the evo is literally available i the touch.
riverajuan said:
I have been a tmobile customer for 8 years, and never had a problem and when I did. they were quickly responsible to the point were they will replace anything I needed at no cost to me with no questions ask. I don't know Sprint.
Also just about everything I have tried in the evo is literally available i the touch.
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Click to collapse
Vastly inferior hardware though.
Why, and when I root and Froyo comes along it should be no problem
600MHz OMAP processor versus 1GHz Snapdragon... 320x480 screen... and my buddy has one and it looks like a cheap toy.
Evo!
I just went through the decision between sprint and the evo and tmobile and the slide. I wad on the customer loyalty unlimited plan with 2 G1's, after hearing the specs on the my touch slide, I had to go with the evo. The slides 480x320 screen looks horrible compared to the 800x480 screen on the evo.add in the 1ghz procrssor on the evo vs the 600mhz on the slide and it's a no brainer. I have 4g, and it rocks (get 3000k dl and 100ms ping routinely in San Antonio). Also, you don't have to worry about wimax going away! It is an established service for local computer networking (home internet service). And they just keep adding towers. It's gonna be around way after your 2 year contact is up, guaranteed!
riverajuan said:
Why, and when I root and Froyo comes along it should be no problem
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Because the Slide has a smaller screen, graphics render easily on it even with the slower processor. But, higher specs aren't the end all. The Slide has nearly no lag at all. It's more than adequate. The newer Evo's have a washed out screen too..
WiMAX coverage will always be spottier and smaller than HSPA+ coverage and T-Mobile is cheaper for you. If you want to upgrade to something better later this year you can sell your Slides to make up the difference of buying a new phone at MSRP.
Clear wire had stated they will continue wimax until 2012 or longer and wimax 2 is better than lte currently
Sent from my PC36100 using XDA App
That is exactly what I'm talking about, I can always sell the slide, but I can not sale the evo because is only available to sprint so I will be stock with a brick. There will always be better phones and I have nothing against the evo.
By the way can I tether with the slide after rooting the device?
I love Sprint. I always have. For what I use them for, which is primarily internet, they are the fastest. Great prices, great phones (now at least) and the fastest 3g, and though not in my area, now 4g. Plus my laptop now has 4g built in, though I'm sure you need Clear for that and not Sprint. But I digress. I don't like ATT nor do I like Verizon. I used to have T Mobile under my brother's old employee plan and though I didn't have too many problems with them their coverage was still not as good as Sprint's. However, they do have HSPA+ and they always get the newest Android phones. Plus, HSPA+ is in my area. Now, my contract is up in October some time so i'd wait till then most likely but what is everyone's opinion? Since Verizon DSL sucks ass and I work from home I need an internet connection and some 4g WiMax would be real nice when DSL kicks out on me (besides, my 3Mbps connection I pay for only yields 1.73 Mbps at the most so WiMax would be faster anyway). So the question is, especially to those who have WiMax right now and, preferably, those who have tried TMo's HSPA+ network, if WiMax is not in my area by October 2011, do I stay with Sprint and just go month to month or upgrade my phone or whatnot or do I jump ship to Tmo and get instant, multiple mobile megabit (say that three times fast) gratification?
I'm sure most of you will say Sprint and generally I would too. Especially with the unlimited mobile to mobile regardless of carrier and since my girlfriend has Sprint, Sprint is the most attractive option. But is HSPA+ right now, LTE in the future and the prospect of the coolest Android phones (and most importantly, dev phones) first worth it or is Sprint and their blazing (hey, King of Prussia, PA, after the first or second WiMax firmware update, had speeds of 7+Mbps!) fast WiMax network (which will be more mature than the others by the time they are widespread) worth waiting for? Even after Sprint gets WiMax over here, is it worth keeping or should I switch? Such a hard decision that I have 9 months to make
Unless Sprint comes out with a bad a$$ phone (and I mean really bad a$$), I'm probably going to jump ship and go to t-mobile or verizon once my contract is up.
Pocket posted, just not sure how...
chuckhriczko said:
I love Sprint. I always have. For what I use them for, which is primarily internet, they are the fastest. Great prices, great phones (now at least) and the fastest 3g, and though not in my area, now 4g. Plus my laptop now has 4g built in, though I'm sure you need Clear for that and not Sprint. But I digress. I don't like ATT nor do I like Verizon. I used to have T Mobile under my brother's old employee plan and though I didn't have too many problems with them their coverage was still not as good as Sprint's. However, they do have HSPA+ and they always get the newest Android phones. Plus, HSPA+ is in my area. Now, my contract is up in October some time so i'd wait till then most likely but what is everyone's opinion? Since Verizon DSL sucks ass and I work from home I need an internet connection and some 4g WiMax would be real nice when DSL kicks out on me (besides, my 3Mbps connection I pay for only yields 1.73 Mbps at the most so WiMax would be faster anyway). So the question is, especially to those who have WiMax right now and, preferably, those who have tried TMo's HSPA+ network, if WiMax is not in my area by October 2011, do I stay with Sprint and just go month to month or upgrade my phone or whatnot or do I jump ship to Tmo and get instant, multiple mobile megabit (say that three times fast) gratification?
I'm sure most of you will say Sprint and generally I would too. Especially with the unlimited mobile to mobile regardless of carrier and since my girlfriend has Sprint, Sprint is the most attractive option. But is HSPA+ right now, LTE in the future and the prospect of the coolest Android phones (and most importantly, dev phones) first worth it or is Sprint and their blazing (hey, King of Prussia, PA, after the first or second WiMax firmware update, had speeds of 7+Mbps!) fast WiMax network (which will be more mature than the others by the time they are widespread) worth waiting for? Even after Sprint gets WiMax over here, is it worth keeping or should I switch? Such a hard decision that I have 9 months to make
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I left T-Mobile to come to Sprint for exactly the opposite reasons you're thinking about going.
Ehem *adjusts pedestal*
T-Mobile does have HSPA+ but it is far slower than Sprint's Wimax. Granted, you don't have Wimax yet, but when you do and you're getting less than half the speed on HSPA+ you'll understand why it was worth the wait.
Secondly, Sprint introduced the Evo in June of last year, not in January like everyone else did. The result? T-Mobile got the Moto Cliq (gag), ATT got... ... ...something and Verizon got another sequel to the Droid series. What did Sprint get 6 months later? The freaking Evo, a phone that's still a top of the line device even now. Can't say that about the CES releases from last year from the other 3.
T-Mobile does NOT get the newest and greatest Android phones. Keep in mind that the Galaxy S series went to every carrier, we got the Epic and T-Mob got the Vibrant. T-Mob got ripped off. The G2 seems like a nice device but I owned one and let me tell you something, the Evo kicks that things ass twice (twice because the G2 has two pieces...meaning 2 asses that must be kicked). The MyTouch 4g seemed nice, but it runs Expresso, not sense, which means it gets less attention than Sense will. They started Android with the G1, but Verizon and Sprint have the best Android phones (and coverage) to date. Since everyone hates Verizon because they're so damned expensive, Sprint is the clear winner when it comes to Android and service.
T-Mobile, ATT and Verizon seem like attractive choices because they're pumping out phones with new technology and things like that, but keep in mind that in the 6 months until Sprint releases their phone of the year, that technology is only going to get better...and that's what we'll be getting.
Patience, I jumped ship (yeah, paid the early termination fee and everything) from T-Mobile for a reason. They suck, their phones are AT BEST the top of the mid-range class and their "4g" is 2nd rate.
AbsolutZeroGI said:
I left T-Mobile to come to Sprint for exactly the opposite reasons you're thinking about going.
Ehem *adjusts pedestal*
T-Mobile does have HSPA+ but it is far slower than Sprint's Wimax. Granted, you don't have Wimax yet, but when you do and you're getting less than half the speed on HSPA+ you'll understand why it was worth the wait.
Secondly, Sprint introduced the Evo in June of last year, not in January like everyone else did. The result? T-Mobile got the Moto Cliq (gag), ATT got... ... ...something and Verizon got another sequel to the Droid series. What did Sprint get 6 months later? The freaking Evo, a phone that's still a top of the line device even now. Can't say that about the CES releases from last year from the other 3.
T-Mobile does NOT get the newest and greatest Android phones. Keep in mind that the Galaxy S series went to every carrier, we got the Epic and T-Mob got the Vibrant. T-Mob got ripped off. The G2 seems like a nice device but I owned one and let me tell you something, the Evo kicks that things ass twice (twice because the G2 has two pieces...meaning 2 asses that must be kicked). The MyTouch 4g seemed nice, but it runs Expresso, not sense, which means it gets less attention than Sense will. They started Android with the G1, but Verizon and Sprint have the best Android phones (and coverage) to date. Since everyone hates Verizon because they're so damned expensive, Sprint is the clear winner when it comes to Android and service.
T-Mobile, ATT and Verizon seem like attractive choices because they're pumping out phones with new technology and things like that, but keep in mind that in the 6 months until Sprint releases their phone of the year, that technology is only going to get better...and that's what we'll be getting.
Patience, I jumped ship (yeah, paid the early termination fee and everything) from T-Mobile for a reason. They suck, their phones are AT BEST the top of the mid-range class and their "4g" is 2nd rate.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thank god i dont have to write it up that well!
Sent from my PC36100 using XDA App
I also just jumped ship from t-mobile. They were expensive, coverage wasn't great and the customer service was heading down hill fast. I agree with the above post...they dont get top of the line phones, they get medium phones for teeny boppers. I had the vibrant, the g2 felt flimsy. I was going to get the mytouch 4g but it didn't blue me away either so I paid the etf and got the hell out
One thing to keep in mind is that T-Mobile is planning to upgrade 2/3's of their HSPA+ network to 42 Mbps. They are claiming real world download speeds of 25 Mbps. IMO, nothing beats getting a off contract, unlocked Nexus 1/S and paying something like $5-10 for unlimited data. They do however throttle after 5 GB, so something to keep in mind.
metalfan78 said:
I also just jumped ship from t-mobile. They were expensive, coverage wasn't great and the customer service was heading down hill fast. I agree with the above post...they dont get top of the line phones, they get medium phones for teeny boppers. I had the vibrant, the g2 felt flimsy. I was going to get the mytouch 4g but it didn't blue me away either so I paid the etf and got the hell out
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Click to collapse
G2, MYT4G, Nexus S - all top of the line phones when they were released. Not sure what you are talking about.
For me personally there is no better carrier in my area. (Baltimore) and that is the most important factor for me. I have friends on BigRed and TMob and when they come to my house and were hanging out in the basement, they can't ever get a signal while I always have 3-4 bars in my house. Plus wherever I am I have great Wimax coverage when I want to use it....avg 7-8 mbps. And there is no comparison of the price factor so I dont even need to discuss that. Im on a family plan (Wife has a EVO too) and noone else can compare to the value of what im paying, so I could care less about what others are doing. Sprints on top of the game in this area.
new phones are coming ,they have 2
I want to see what the Evo 2 looks like, and not that cheese mini Evo
swaze said:
For me personally there is no better carrier in my area. (Baltimore) and that is the most important factor for me. I have friends on BigRed and TMob and when they come to my house and were hanging out in the basement, they can't ever get a signal while I always have 3-4 bars in my house. Plus wherever I am I have great Wimax coverage when I want to use it....avg 7-8 mbps. And there is no comparison of the price factor so I dont even need to discuss that. Im on a family plan (Wife has a EVO too) and noone else can compare to the value of what im paying, so I could care less about what others are doing. Sprints on top of the game in this area.
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Click to collapse
No comparison? $39.99 500 minutes + $6-7 for Web2go data, Google Voice for texting, and buy a unlocked Nexus S outright. It IS a very specific and limited choice but a great one.
Award Tour said:
No comparison? $39.99 500 minutes + $6-7 for Web2go data, Google Voice for texting, and buy a unlocked Nexus S outright. It IS a very specific and limited choice but a great one.
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Click to collapse
Good for YOU perhaps, not me or my wife.
Award Tour said:
No comparison? $39.99 500 minutes + $6-7 for Web2go data, Google Voice for texting, and buy a unlocked Nexus S outright. It IS a very specific and limited choice but a great one.
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Click to collapse
LMAO 500 minutes?!? have two teenage daughters who both text +6000 texts a month plus gab on the phone when not texting. I had Tmobile for the same type plan but without data on two out of three lines I was paying $30 more a month than I am now with sprint. And they said I was on my own when T-mobile pushed a bad update on my cliq that bricked it, even when I had insurance. I was left without a phone, sprint wouldnt do that either.
Sprint is building in a positive direction. T-Mobile isn't too bad but there service is extremely spotty. Verizon & At&t both shot themselves in the heart by locking into iPhone's.
Verizon won't hold the top spot for long with the addition of the iPhone. It really destroys customer service and Apple will limit what other smartphones they can carrier.
T-Mobile actually isn't too bad phone-wise or plan-wise but there service coverage is just tooo spotty. I believe T-Mobile and Sprint will be fighting for the top spot in the industry soon (Or might have a union planned). Reason being, they got the HD2 then Sprint says "Ohh Ohh look at me, checkmate, we've got the Evo!!"
AT&T = lost cause. I hope there cable tv can help them survive. They have too many devices and pretty much nothing that stands out. They were the last to come to the 4G party and won't be up to par anyway.
Now we have little old Sprint. I've been a customer for over 10 years. There customer service has grown leaps and bounds over the past year or so and they have proved they want to be industry leaders. They were the first to 4G, they were the first in the US to upgrade a device to Froyo, and come February 7th they will be the first CDMA carrier with a WP7 Device (And it'll be an HTC Device too). And even with the tiny $10 addon (that I've had for 6 months anyway), I'm still $20-$30 lower than I would be for the exact same thing at any other carrier.
Long live Sprint!!
Award Tour said:
No comparison? $39.99 500 minutes + $6-7 for Web2go data, Google Voice for texting, and buy a unlocked Nexus S outright. It IS a very specific and limited choice but a great one.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's a good bachelor plan.
Sent from my PC36100 using XDA App
chuckhriczko said:
I love Sprint. I always have. For what I use them for, which is primarily internet, they are the fastest. Great prices, great phones (now at least) and the fastest 3g, and though not in my area, now 4g. Plus my laptop now has 4g built in, though I'm sure you need Clear for that and not Sprint. But I digress. I don't like ATT nor do I like Verizon. I used to have T Mobile under my brother's old employee plan and though I didn't have too many problems with them their coverage was still not as good as Sprint's. However, they do have HSPA+ and they always get the newest Android phones. Plus, HSPA+ is in my area. Now, my contract is up in October some time so i'd wait till then most likely but what is everyone's opinion? Since Verizon DSL sucks ass and I work from home I need an internet connection and some 4g WiMax would be real nice when DSL kicks out on me (besides, my 3Mbps connection I pay for only yields 1.73 Mbps at the most so WiMax would be faster anyway). So the question is, especially to those who have WiMax right now and, preferably, those who have tried TMo's HSPA+ network, if WiMax is not in my area by October 2011, do I stay with Sprint and just go month to month or upgrade my phone or whatnot or do I jump ship to Tmo and get instant, multiple mobile megabit (say that three times fast) gratification?
I'm sure most of you will say Sprint and generally I would too. Especially with the unlimited mobile to mobile regardless of carrier and since my girlfriend has Sprint, Sprint is the most attractive option. But is HSPA+ right now, LTE in the future and the prospect of the coolest Android phones (and most importantly, dev phones) first worth it or is Sprint and their blazing (hey, King of Prussia, PA, after the first or second WiMax firmware update, had speeds of 7+Mbps!) fast WiMax network (which will be more mature than the others by the time they are widespread) worth waiting for? Even after Sprint gets WiMax over here, is it worth keeping or should I switch? Such a hard decision that I have 9 months to make
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Here's my comments to this:
HSPA+ on T-mobile? Cool. Except for the fact that my friend has a G2 with it and I can download apps from the market faster on Sprint's 3g than he can on HSPA+
T-mobile gets the best phones? Not really. And there's no indication they will be getting any of the CES talked phones anytime soon.
I think you're considering leaving Sprint at the wrong time.
Things are looking up. They're adding new customers for the first time in years.
They are getting real good phones that are comparable or better than the other carriers. [The Epic and Evo were considered the "best phones in the world" last year, for example]
Sprint is hands down the cheapest.
Their network coverage is second only to Verizon, and allows for free roaming on Verizon as well.
WiMax will come to your area, eventually.
I'm telling you right now though, HSPA+ is slow.
Sprint's 3g is better.
And no, I don't care about some study taken in the perfect settings, I care about reality.
HSPA+ on T-mobile with full bars is slower than Sprint's 3g with half bars.
I did the test myself.
Award Tour said:
G2, MYT4G, Nexus S - all top of the line phones when they were released. Not sure what you are talking about.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I was referring to the crappy design of the g2(hinge), the nexus is top dog, but its a samsung and no sd card slot (wtf?) and the mt4g is great, but I was thinking about support and tmo's lack of timely upgrades. They are more geared towards the younger crowd and not towards tech heads...just my opinion
TMartin03 said:
Now we have little old Sprint. I've been a customer for over 10 years. There customer service has grown leaps and bounds over the past year or so and they have proved they want to be industry leaders. They were the first to 4G, they were the first in the US to upgrade a device to Froyo, and come February 7th they will be the first CDMA carrier with a WP7 Device (And it'll be an HTC Device too). And even with the tiny $10 addon (that I've had for 6 months anyway), I'm still $20-$30 lower than I would be for the exact same thing at any other carrier.
Long live Sprint!!
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Click to collapse
I too have been a long time sprint customer; you hit it spot on with this post.
Sent on the go from my HTC EVO
I just came from tmob as well. I for one was pleased with their coverage and service.... for the most part. I had the N1 and damn near cried when I had to hand it over to the Sprint guy for the buy back.
However, I was getting really tired of dropping calls with my wife. That's a local coverage thing but it didn't seem to matter where she or I was, we would get disconnected a lot. We had also started to go over on our minutes which was getting rather pricey.
The last nail in the coffin was when the wife's BB9700 took a crap on her just 1 month after the warranty expired.... big surprise right?
We looked at the Vibrant. Meh. Still on 2.1 (my wife is not into modding her phone or anything so rooted roms don't count for her).
We looked at the G2. Even the tmob salesman said that the hinge mechanism was a piece of crap and didn't recommend the phone.
We looked at the Mytouch 4G. Meh. Running that horrible espresso overlay and you lose the search button for that "Genius" button that couldn't even tell me where the nearest McDonald's was.
So we went to check out Sprint. I always knew that the EVO was one of the top notch pieces of hardware out there and I'm not about to pay the retarded rates that Verizon charges.
So far, very happy with the phone. It's still not my Sexy Nexy but I've got almost all of the same stuff going on it now.
So far, mostly happy with Sprint. No BS when I call with questions. Absolutely no BS when I took my wife's EVO in because the power button wouldn't click. Still worked, just wouldn't click... They replaced it on the spot.... not the button, the whole damn phone. Coverage in my area is so-so. That's to be expected where I live though.
My biggest beef with Sprint is that I can't use data while I'm using voice. That sucks but it isn't a deal breaker.
So, to the OP, I would take a long hard look at how the two carriers compare around the time that you are looking to switch. Then I would look at the hardware available at the time. Then I would make the choice.
T-Mobile has ****-tastic service in Chicago, they blow monkey balls here. The worst building penetration, good luck getting calls in an Basement Office on T-Mobile, or inside skyscrapers. And just random dropped calls daily. I had T-Mo for 3yrs on a few different phones, and all had the same crap service. I traded in my EVO for the Nexus-S at Christmas, ( I am a cell phone addict always upgrading ) anyways, and a week later came running back to Sprint and my EVO. Nexus-S was a cool phone, just not on T-Mo.
6 months I have been on Sprint has been fantastic. Sprint in Chicago is near perfect, never a dropped call, but like once a month maybe, and I get full bars in the Sears Tower, and in Basements. Plus their monthly plan is right there with T-Mo, very good pricing, much cheaper than ATT and Verizon.
And wait until this Summer, when the best smart phone on the market comes out = EVO 2, you will be pissed your on T-Mo.
Bottom Line; yes stick with Sprint. Sprint is the best deal right now, but to me the EVO line is all they got going, which is all I care about anyways, but not many other cool phones on Sprint, the Epic 4G = epic fail, and some other dog pile phones they try to pawn off. Would be cool to see Sprint get the iPhone just to help them get more sales and a better name.
I have been getting more and more frustrated with sprint and today, actually right now the best buy rep is setting up my account with tmobile. Speak with your wallets folks.
Sent from my cm7 Evo 4G!
I know that some topics touched upon this a briefly but I wanted to know from the experts what they think. I'm about to purchase the international Note because of the better processor it has but it doesn't have LTE. Is LTE worth it to get the AT&T version? I'm on a tier plan so... does it even matter?
My choices are get the international version now without LTE or wait for the AT&T version with slower processor but with LTE.
It's such a hard decision...why can't the AT&T have better processor and this wouldn't even matter then, I would just get the AT&T version.
So... I guess it boils down to if one wants either faster processor or faster data speed. Which one would I benefit more from?
ckyllr said:
I know that some topics touched upon this a briefly but I wanted to know from the experts what they think. I'm about to purchase the international Note because of the better processor it has but it doesn't have LTE. Is LTE worth it to get the AT&T version? I'm on a tier plan so... does it even matter?
My choices are get the international version now without LTE or wait for the AT&T version with slower processor but with LTE.
It's such a hard decision...why can't the AT&T have better processor and this wouldn't even matter then, I would just get the AT&T version.
So... I guess it boils down to if one wants either faster processor or faster data speed. Which one would I benefit more from?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I would suggest reading my thread over in the general forum about buying subsidized vs unlocked devices. There's a lot more at play than LTE or processor used. But in the end it's your money!
Thanks for the link Jade Eyed Wolf. I thought you looked familiar... you were always in the galaxy tab forums...haha... just like me. I agree with 100% about buying unlocked phones but they are always higher price. Since, I don't have a choice in carriers, I'm always sort of locked to AT&T so I don't mind signing up a contract with them.
Anyway, back to topic for me is the trade off here... processor speed vs data speed... what benefits you more?
By the way, that's what happened to me.. I had the AT&T galaxy tab.. couldn't use it as a phone so I flashed to custom rom to use it and then had to switch to tier plan since I couldn't use my grandfathered unlimited plan. I wish I could have not done that but it's too late to reverse it. I figured out how to change my IMEI number but damage has already been done. Should have kept my unlimited plan.
I am in the same boat. For me to get the international version I would need to get the iPhone on contract and sell it via eBay and hope not to get scammed. Then buy the international version with that money. I would also have to worry about any type of defects requiring an exchange or repair. I heard its a pain to deal with. With Samsung products its hard to have confidence that something wont go wrong with the device.
So is it worth it?
ckyllr said:
Thanks for the link Jade Eyed Wolf. I thought you looked familiar... you were always in the galaxy tab forums...haha... just like me. I agree with 100% about buying unlocked phones but they are always higher price. Since, I don't have a choice in carriers, I'm always sort of locked to AT&T so I don't mind signing up a contract with them.
Anyway, back to topic for me is the trade off here... processor speed vs data speed... what benefits you more?
By the way, that's what happened to me.. I had the AT&T galaxy tab.. couldn't use it as a phone so I flashed to custom rom to use it and then had to switch to tier plan since I couldn't use my grandfathered unlimited plan. I wish I could have not done that but it's too late to reverse it. I figured out how to change my IMEI number but damage has already been done. Should have kept my unlimited plan.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The bigger my name becomes on XDA, the better! I may not be a developer (yet), but that doesn't mean I won't help people when and where I can!
Actually, I think there's still a loophole where if you can get your hands on an original 1st generation iPhone, you can register it with an unlimited data account, and once you have that you can go back to using whatever "appropriate" unlimited data plan you need! I would Google that!
Also, even if I were in your shoes, I would still buy unlocked anyway for things like absence of carrier bloat and AT&T's specific hardware customization's (you'll have WAY better community support and development if you get the international version).
Anyway, on the topic of data speed vs processor speed, here's my logic:
With regard to mobile data, you said you're on a tiered data plan. So that means you have (I'm assuming) 4GB of data per month before you start running into $10/GB territory. Another user in another thread argued that the bandwidth doesn't affect how much actual data they were actually using in a given period, just how quickly they were getting to their content.
Theoretically, I can see the point of this argument. However, unless you're extremely data-conscious of your usage, being on LTE will make it VERY easy to go through a LOT of data very quickly. Streaming HD video and music, downloading big files, pictures, tethering, etc.
Personally I think that LTE on a tiered plan is a complete waste. I have used the slow car/fast car analogy before, but I think a more appropriate analogy would be like comparing a car to a full sized tractor trailer, both going the same speed. Both can carry 4GB of stuff in one trip. The car might be just about filled up to the brim at 4GB, but it gets the job done. If you need to spend a little extra to make another trip, ok fine.
On the other hand, with the truck, you're still paying for that same 4GB of stuff, but it's only taking up a small little corner of its trailer, with all that wasted capacity just being empty air. Oh you can still use it up to capacity, but you'll pay through the nose for it, even though the truck is still making that one trip.
Hence, as it is, LTE is a complete waste, unless they start offering like 250GB/month tiered plans, or something similar to what you'd pay for cable or FiOS or DSL (because the speeds are basically on par with those now).
Now, as for CPU performance, I can't speak for the S3 chipset based on any personal experience, because I haven't really had any. I can, however, say that the Exynos chip is a BEAST! Especially for things like 3D gaming and HD video. Seriously. It'll chew through high bitrate 1080p like is was nothing!
Either way though, your mileage may vary.
I would still recommend getting unlocked for all the reasons mentioned in the other thread.
Depends on what you use you phone for. Processor or data? Gaming, multitasking, video editing etc the processor is key. If you are streaming, browsing, tethering, etc then LTE.
Without unlimited data, LTE could be expensive if you say screw wifi, my LTE is faster so I won't use wifi. I have unlimited but have not gone over 2.5 GB because wifi is everywhere. LTE is indeed fast and the signal penetration is better. With my GNote on hspa+ I do not find myself wishing for LTE again because of wifi everywhere.
The processor difference with the SGSII and skyrocket was minimal. With a 1.4 GHz exynos and a HD screen, it will be interesting to see if the snapdragon can keep up with the demands of the GNote vs the SGSII.
Of course if you are up for an upgrade it is an easier decision. I know many people are pushing unlocked etc on this issue but in reality 95% of people are going for what is less expensive period. The only time the unlocked versus locked matters is if you are buying with ATT off contract.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I727 using XDA App
planoman said:
Of course if you are up for an upgrade it is an easier decision. I know many people are pushing unlocked etc on this issue but in reality 95% of people are going for what is less expensive period. The only time the unlocked versus locked matters is if you are buying with ATT off contract.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Exactly... I'm very price conscience and if AT&T did offer the Note for say $199 (highly unlikely..more like $299)...then the price between this and uncontract note is like $400 to $500 (closer to $500 since the price has been steadily going up in the last few days! yikes... better buy soon if I want the uncontract Note) and that makes a big difference especially if you were going to stay with AT&T regardless.
Or like the earlier poster said that you could get the iphone 4 or 4S to sell it and say it to recoup some of the cost for the international Note....hmmm...decisions decisions... I am leaning towards the international Note since I don't stream much and I'm on a tier plan so... that extra processor speed for games and HD movie watching can come in handy.
Regardless... thanks everyone for chiming in. I will make a decision by end of the day.... (Luckily I locked a Note on Amazon for $698 which hasn't shipped yet but can cancel anytime.)
i will trade my intl note for att note when it comes out in case anyone is interested.
If money were not an object, I would prefer the better processor just because the screen is so large.
ckyllr said:
Exactly... I'm very price conscience and if AT&T did offer the Note for say $199 (highly unlikely..more like $299)...then the price between this and uncontract note is like $400 to $500 (closer to $500 since the price has been steadily going up in the last few days! yikes... better buy soon if I want the uncontract Note) and that makes a big difference especially if you were going to stay with AT&T regardless.
Or like the earlier poster said that you could get the iphone 4 or 4S to sell it and say it to recoup some of the cost for the international Note....hmmm...decisions decisions... I am leaning towards the international Note since I don't stream much and I'm on a tier plan so... that extra processor speed for games and HD movie watching can come in handy.
Regardless... thanks everyone for chiming in. I will make a decision by end of the day.... (Luckily I locked a Note on Amazon for $698 which hasn't shipped yet but can cancel anytime.)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So do you think it is worth going through the trouble of importing the note and selling the iPhone?
I also think battery life is going to be a huge deal here as well. They did not increase the battery size for lte, that was disappointing. We could be looking at quite adifference in battery life with lte. I don't want another phone that is tethered to a charger like my current inspire.
Corriewf said:
So do you think it is worth going through the trouble of importing the note and selling the iPhone?
I also think battery life is going to be a huge deal here as well. They did not increase the battery size for lte, that was disappointing. We could be looking at quite adifference in battery life with lte. I don't want another phone that is tethered to a charger like my current inspire.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I will say that the APQ8060 is more power efficient in general than Exynos, before you factor in whatever LTE connectivity will cost your battery life.
I had and returned a Rogers galaxy s2 lte (same as skyrocket). It was not as smooth as my note. And you have to take into account that the note has 3 times as many pixels to push out compared to gs2.
Also, I had the captivate, which is Rogers/att's version of original galaxy s. While there was and still is decent dev support, it paled in comparison to the international version.
Sent from my GT-N7000
Corriewf said:
So do you think it is worth going through the trouble of importing the note and selling the iPhone?
I also think battery life is going to be a huge deal here as well. They did not increase the battery size for lte, that was disappointing. We could be looking at quite adifference in battery life with lte. I don't want another phone that is tethered to a charger like my current inspire.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No good thing in life comes for free. If you want something good, you have to work to get it!
Buying/selling an iPhone as a means of obtaining something more desired may be a hassle to some, but well worth the reward to others.
I suppose the degree of work one decides to go through to get what they want is an indicator of sorts for how lazy/apathetic they are. Like an AT&T iPhone. If you don't want to jump through any hoops to get one unlocked, and you just don't care enough about possibly making it better, then it's well suited to you. As for an unlocked Android, sure it may not be perfect right our of the box, but with a little bit of effort and care, it can potentially be even more perfect than the iPhone! It's all about what you're willing to work for.
American consumers are (mostly) too lazy and/or apathetic when it comes to our demands, our expectations, and what we're willing to do to meet those. That's why our subsidized devices suck compared to the rest of the world. That's why our rate plans are gouging us through the eyeballs for every little thing. Because not enough of us care to push back against the giants when they start screwing us over, because that'd be too much of a "hassle." We'd rather just roll over and put up with the higher costs for less service.
Buy hey, we get cheaper phones up front! They may not be as good, sure, but they're cheaper today!
Yeah we may be making up for the overall cost later on, but hey, they're cheaper today!
Sure, the carrier is loading CIQ, and other bloat onto my device that I can't (easily) remove... But it's cheaper!
I know I'm paying $80 or $100 or even more than that a month, when I really could be getting the same, or better level of service for ~$40 a month instead... BUT I GOT MY PHONE FOR SO MUCH LESS!!!!
*sigh* This sucks...
It is about your needs, about your pockets ($$$$) and about your local conditions.
Are you a bandwidth fanatic and are able to pay for it, or do you want a faster processor and 21 MBPS is enough for you?
Do not expect that your carrier gives you LTE for the same price as 3G.
Usually they ask more, much more for LTE speeds.
So do you need LTE and can you pay for LTE?
And what about LTE coverage in your area? Not all areas have LTE coverage or they have LTE coverage but it is not good. And how crowded is your LTE area?
If your local LTE network has too many users, the speed is slow as 3G.
Mobile bandwidth is always a shared bandwidth you share with everyone in your area.
And do you need very very fast internet on the move? Or do you need very very fast Internet only at home? If you want it at home it is cheaper and more reliable to take very fast cable internet, not LTE.
If you have no high speed internet options except LTE, and you do not need it on the move, it is smarter to get a LTE/Wifi router that takes the LTE and gives it to your Note as Wifi. In that case it is better to take the Note international version even if you want to use LTE, because you are not moving.
If you are a pirate that is downloading blu-rays from the net and are able to pay a lte contract and are constantly moving to escape the FBI and there is good LTE coverage in your area, take the Note i717.
If you are going to use the net just to surf and/or you can not pay for an expensive LTE contract and/or the LTE coverage in your area sucks and/or you do not need high internet speed on the move, buy the international version.
In Korea they are pissed off because most can not pay for LTE contracts, have 3G, but Samsung will not sell the non-LTE Exynos version there.
So they have to buy the LTE version but do not use LTE.
For most people, the international version is better. Faster machine with fast internet. Who needs 100000 kbps on his phone, on the move?
Is your life so short that you can not wait 5 minutes for a download to finish?
And you never really reach those high LTE speeds, they are theoretical max speeds that you usually do not reach in real life on the internet of today.
Internet speed is based on the speed of the weakest link. So if your connection to the local link is very fast but between you and the computer you want to reach there is a slower link (the normal situation today), your maximum speed will be the speed of that slow link.
Some will buy the LTE version because they think like this they are more "future proof". In other words their Note will still be valuable in some years when everyone uses only LTE.
That is not a good idea. In some years, when everyone uses LTE, your Note will suck because of AMOLED burn in and because Smartphones will be 10 times faster then today. So do not expect to use the Note for too long.
I know it is a long answer, but there are many variables as you see.
LTE is a big deal to those of us who are grand fathered into unlimited data and pay the same $30 per months for LTE. It's really nice for streaming music at work.
Unlocked phones are always better. That's understandable.
However, for some, even if money is not an issue, it's simply a question of whether it's worth it.
You're paying $600 ~ 700 for the phone. Your monthly phone rate doesn't change drastically. It's not like your plan is going to drop by $30 a month for using an unlocked phone.
I can get either the Amaze 4G or the SGS2 for free on T-Mobile. Getting it unlocked would cost me at least 4 ~ 5 benjamins. No matter how you spin it, after 2 years, even after denying the insurance, it's still more expensive to purchase an unlocked version of these phones.
So unless if using a carrier unlocked phone results in my monthly bill being substantially lower, unlocked phones will always be more expensive within the USA.
Your rationale as posted in the other general section only applies to countries where companies only provide the service and customers must obtain their own cellphones. I don't see this ever changing in the USA.
Moral of the story? Buy an unlocked cellphone if and only if you are really into cellphones. If you're just a casual user but enjoy using smartphones, there is very little significant pragmatic difference between a carrier branded and unlocked cellphone for all practical purpose in your life.
Lastly, you said it yourself. Don't expect to use your Note for too long. Then why pay more money over X phones that a user keeps switching to? Doesn't make any good economic sense to me.
legion1911 said:
It is about your needs, about your pockets ($$$$) and about your local conditions.
Are you a bandwidth fanatic and are able to pay for it, or do you want a faster processor and 21 MBPS is enough for you?
Do not expect that your carrier gives you LTE for the same price as 3G.
Usually they ask more, much more for LTE speeds.
So do you need LTE and can you pay for LTE?
And what about LTE coverage in your area? Not all areas have LTE coverage or they have LTE coverage but it is not good. And how crowded is your LTE area?
If your local LTE network has too many users, the speed is slow as 3G.
Mobile bandwidth is always a shared bandwidth you share with everyone in your area.
And do you need very very fast internet on the move? Or do you need very very fast Internet only at home? If you want it at home it is cheaper and more reliable to take very fast cable internet, not LTE.
If you have no high speed internet options except LTE, and you do not need it on the move, it is smarter to get a LTE/Wifi router that takes the LTE and gives it to your Note as Wifi. In that case it is better to take the Note international version even if you want to use LTE, because you are not moving.
If you are a pirate that is downloading blu-rays from the net and are able to pay a lte contract and are constantly moving to escape the FBI and there is good LTE coverage in your area, take the Note i717.
If you are going to use the net just to surf and/or you can not pay for an expensive LTE contract and/or the LTE coverage in your area sucks and/or you do not need high internet speed on the move, buy the international version.
In Korea they are pissed off because most can not pay for LTE contracts, have 3G, but Samsung will not sell the non-LTE Exynos version there.
So they have to buy the LTE version but do not use LTE.
For most people, the international version is better. Faster machine with fast internet. Who needs 100000 kbps on his phone, on the move?
Is your life so short that you can not wait 5 minutes for a download to finish?
And you never really reach those high LTE speeds, they are theoretical max speeds that you usually do not reach in real life on the internet of today.
Internet speed is based on the speed of the weakest link. So if your connection to the local link is very fast but between you and the computer you want to reach there is a slower link (the normal situation today), your maximum speed will be the speed of that slow link.
Some will buy the LTE version because they think like this they are more "future proof". In other words their Note will still be valuable in some years when everyone uses only LTE.
That is not a good idea. In some years, when everyone uses LTE, your Note will suck because of AMOLED burn in and because Smartphones will be 10 times faster then today. So do not expect to use the Note for too long.
I know it is a long answer, but there are many variables as you see.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Jade Eyed Wolf said:
No good thing in life comes for free. If you want something good, you have to work to get it!
Buying/selling an iPhone as a means of obtaining something more desired may be a hassle to some, but well worth the reward to others.
I suppose the degree of work one decides to go through to get what they want is an indicator of sorts for how lazy/apathetic they are. Like an AT&T iPhone. If you don't want to jump through any hoops to get one unlocked, and you just don't care enough about possibly making it better, then it's well suited to you. As for an unlocked Android, sure it may not be perfect right our of the box, but with a little bit of effort and care, it can potentially be even more perfect than the iPhone! It's all about what you're willing to work for.
American consumers are (mostly) too lazy and/or apathetic when it comes to our demands, our expectations, and what we're willing to do to meet those. That's why our subsidized devices suck compared to the rest of the world. That's why our rate plans are gouging us through the eyeballs for every little thing. Because not enough of us care to push back against the giants when they start screwing us over, because that'd be too much of a "hassle." We'd rather just roll over and put up with the higher costs for less service.
Buy hey, we get cheaper phones up front! They may not be as good, sure, but they're cheaper today!
Yeah we may be making up for the overall cost later on, but hey, they're cheaper today!
Sure, the carrier is loading CIQ, and other bloat onto my device that I can't (easily) remove... But it's cheaper!
I know I'm paying $80 or $100 or even more than that a month, when I really could be getting the same, or better level of service for ~$40 a month instead... BUT I GOT MY PHONE FOR SO MUCH LESS!!!!
*sigh* This sucks...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What?!?! Maybe I need to sell what you're smoking and buy both versions. There is a difference between being lazy and being practical ok! I'm looking at leg work and fees to sell items. I'm also looking at a lack of warranty or one that is less practical. Its Samsung, their quality control is not great.
I should have also mentioned price as well. $199-$299 vs. $700 to $1000... Amazon just raised their price from $708 to $899 which I believe is retail. Obviously they don't have any in stock but that shows you that for some reason there is a greater demand for these right now.
I'm with AT&T for awhile so contract price or uncontract price means nothing to me. But at least I can get the iphone 4 (or 4s) and sell it to cover the difference above even though that would require more work on my part.
I think I'm going to take a chance and keep my order for the international Note.
Here are the reasons why:
1) I can have it now! versus whenever AT&T decides to release theirs.
2) Faster processor speed for my HD movies and games
3) Physical home button. I have the Captivate and I hate the capacitance buttons.
4) I don't need LTE speeds since I only use data to surf the web and email purposes since I don't stream movies or music. HSPA+ should suffice.
5) Bragging rights and showing off to friends before the AT&T version comes out since it will loose its appeal once it's available here in the states.
6) I can enjoy without bloatware crap and also faster updates as well. (My Captivate just got GB update...WTF? year and half later?)
7) Bigger dev community for custom roms and such and support from XDA.
8) This is speculations only but maybe better battery life? I hope AT&T and their LTE version will have sucky battery life and we can all laugh at their inferior Note.
The only thing I saw that was relevant was point 7).
Everything else seemed like self-justification rationale to me to have it now. Lawl.
ckyllr said:
I should have also mentioned price as well. $199-$299 vs. $700 to $1000... Amazon just raised their price from $708 to $899 which I believe is retail. Obviously they don't have any in stock but that shows you that for some reason there is a greater demand for these right now.
I'm with AT&T for awhile so contract price or uncontract price means nothing to me. But at least I can get the iphone 4 (or 4s) and sell it to cover the difference above even though that would require more work on my part.
I think I'm going to take a chance and keep my order for the international order.
Here are the reasons why:
1) I can have it now! versus whenever AT&T decides to release theirs.
2) Faster processor speed for my HD movies and games
3) Physical home button. I have the Captivate and I hate the capacitance buttons.
4) I don't need LTE speeds since I only use data to surf the web and email purposes since I don't stream movies or music. HSPA+ should suffice.
5) Bragging rights and showing off to friends before the AT&T version comes out since it will loose its appeal once it's available here in the states.
6) I can enjoy without bloatware crap and also faster updates as well. (My Captivate just got GB update...WTF? year and half later?)
7) Bigger dev community for custom roms and such and support from XDA.
8) This is speculations only but maybe better battery life? I hope AT&T and their LTE version will have sucky battery life and we can all laugh at their inferior Note.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I want to direct you to another thread that has some very good info
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1434845&page=12
It has some good links to Anandtech with CPU comparisons, that I will link below.
Keep in mind the comparisons were done with a GS2 clocked at 1.2ghz not 1.4ghz.
http://www.anandtech.com/show/4686/samsung-galaxy-s-2-international-review-the-best-redefined/14
http://www.anandtech.com/show/4686/samsung-galaxy-s-2-international-review-the-best-redefined/17
http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/505?vs=489
Hope this helps!
Update: After reading through one of the articles I saw this regarding the low triangle/geometry test scores for the Mali-400. "Luckily for ARM however, most mobile games aren't geometry bound - what we really need here is pixel processing power and that's something Mali-400 does deliver quite well."
So, its just about time to upgrade to upgrade my Sprint Phone (Evo). I got it coming up in May, unless something changes I might be going with the SG2, just looks great and it has capabilities for LTE as well as Wimax.
I just got a new job that lets me get a discount on T-Mobile, and I after looking at their plans, it would save me a few bucks (literally like 4). I have heard rumors that HSPA+ is slighly faster than Wimax but I never compared the two.
So HSPA+ faster than Wimax?
-----------------------------------------------
I use my phone 90% of the time as a router. My college blocks everything so I am always on tether. I just looked it up and used 16GB last month, and that seems to be the lower average. My point is that Sprint's unlimited truly means unlimited with no caps. T-Mobile throttles after 2GB or 5GB according to the plan. How much of a throttle? Is it significant?
It throttles you down to EDGE speeds, so 2g. Around 20kbps, which won't load a black and white smiley face on your screen for 20 seconds. If you're going to use more than 5GB's per month, stick with Sprint.
T-Mobile throttles at different tiers on different plans, from 100MB-5GB
Speeds on HSPA+ seem to be faster for me on T-Mobile than on Sprint in Portland, Oregon. That could be different for you, but T-Mobile's 42mbps HSPA+ Is closer to LTE than WiMax in my opinion.
In some areas T-Mobile also forcibly compresses all images pulled down in web pages regardless of your data usage and data plan. There is no way to turn this "feature" off.
Well first the SGS2 does not support Wimax and lte...no device does except for a hotspot...
Imho you will be better off not getting the SGS2 and instead using your upgrade on a truly new device that the hardware spec is not a year old almost. That is unless $ is a big factor and you don't want to spend $250ish on a device...
Sent from my PG86100 using xda premium
Did some research and found you are right. It is really disappointing because I had a Sprint tech and a Sprint sales rep tell me point blank that the SG2 was Wimax and LTE. Can't trust people nowadays.
Battery consumption is much better with HSPA+ vs LTE.
TheBDub said:
It throttles you down to EDGE speeds, so 2g. Around 20kbps, which won't load a black and white smiley face on your screen for 20 seconds. If you're going to use more than 5GB's per month, stick with Sprint.
T-Mobile throttles at different tiers on different plans, from 100MB-5GB
Speeds on HSPA+ seem to be faster for me on T-Mobile than on Sprint in Portland, Oregon. That could be different for you, but T-Mobile's 42mbps HSPA+ Is closer to LTE than WiMax in my opinion.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Goes to up to 10.
synaesthetic said:
In some areas T-Mobile also forcibly compresses all images pulled down in web pages regardless of your data usage and data plan. There is no way to turn this "feature" off.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
False.
iball8888 said:
Did some research and found you are right. It is really disappointing because I had a Sprint tech and a Sprint sales rep tell me point blank that the SG2 was Wimax and LTE. Can't trust people nowadays.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah no problem, didn't want u going out and buying a device being that misled...
It's a shame when that crap happens to ppl.
Sent from my PG86100 using xda premium
sgt. slaughter said:
Yeah no problem, didn't want u going out and buying a device being that misled...
It's a shame when that crap happens to ppl.
Sent from my PG86100 using xda premium
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I used to be a Sprint store technician, and when the Epic Touch had the Loss of Signal issue (which has long been fixed, officially), Sprint's Tech Support over the phone told me that I should have bought an iPhone because Android always breaks. Word for word. I was like, ok so give me an iPhone, I'll give back the Epic Touch. And they said no.
These days you have to fend for yourself unfortunately. Chances are, if you're an XDA user, you know more than a carrier's tech support.
chrischoi said:
False.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Explain. I suffered this issue for four months and had to switch to AT&T to avoid it.
To the OP. I tried switching to t-mobile twice because IMO they have better phones and prices. but both times I had to switch back. my story: i knew tmobile had the 5gb data cap on teh monthly 4g plan i wanted so I checked my sprint data usage for 5 months and noticed i am only using 2-3 gb a month. I figured great so i went and got the Htc amaze after 6 days by data usage was over 1.5 gb. I went to the store and asked them is it possible that the data reading on the phone and website could be wrong? my setup was the same on my sprint evo and my htc amaze so it wasn't a program that could have been using that much data so i returned the phone. 2 weeks later i went back to the store drooling over the amaze but knew i couldn't get it because i would go over the 5gb easy. I spoke with a rep and he said he uses data heavily and never goes over so i said ok ill try it again maybe it was the phone. this time around i didn't tether at all except for 5 min to test it out. hardly used Pandora and made sure my setup was the same as the evo. this time i gave it 10 days and i was already over 3gb. i was half ass using my phone and still i would have been over. I have searched about this called tmobile and haven't come up with a good reason why this phone was using so much data. a buddy of mine went to att and i told him that he would def go over but after a few days he said no man im good . at the end of the month he called *****ing that he went over the att cap which was even lower than tmobile. until the come up with a prepaid plan that gives 10gb i have to stay away. oh yea and when they throttle you the above comments are correct its edge speed and way to slow for anything but email and light web surfing.
iball8888 said:
I just looked it up and used 16GB last month, and that seems to be the lower average. My point is that Sprint's unlimited truly means unlimited with no caps. T-Mobile throttles after 2GB or 5GB according to the plan. How much of a throttle? Is it significant?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think this will be the main issue.
When I pass 5GB, I get throttled to EDGE (2G) speeds. For most purposes this is like running out of data. You're going to be stuck at 2GB or 5GB. Email is fine at EDGE speeds - anything else requires too much speed.
Stick with Sprint, as it seems the savings aren't really significant, anyway.
IMO Sprint sucks if you're not in a Wimax area and the Wimax isn't that great anyway.. Sprint's EVDO network is an absolute JOKE. I figured since I'm not covered by Wimax I'd switch my E4GT to Boost to save money, but Boost's(Sprint's) EVDO was nowhere near as fast as T-Mobile's 3G.. It really sucks because my E4GT is hands down the best phone I've ever used, but the internet is almost unusable it's so slow.. I'm putting it up for sale soon to switch back to T-Mobile.
Speeds really depend on where you live. I have spotty 4g in my area but never need it. at my house i have to use wifi but in most places i can stream Pandora without any buffering. everyone always talks about speed but as long as you can stream music and video without and buffering whats the issue? unless you are tethering to your pc and downloading torrents speeds over 250kps will stream just fine.
This is how Verizon does it:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rDxJoGv3FLA&feature=channel
Now that is throttling right there. They send me a new phone and it does the same. They have lied to me 3 times now, one that was just needed a reset, that I just needed a new phone and they don't throttle. I had only used 12GB and they do that. OK thats BS
itsjefflol said:
IMO Sprint sucks if you're not in a Wimax area and the Wimax isn't that great anyway.. Sprint's EVDO network is an absolute JOKE. I figured since I'm not covered by Wimax I'd switch my E4GT to Boost to save money, but Boost's(Sprint's) EVDO was nowhere near as fast as T-Mobile's 3G.. It really sucks because my E4GT is hands down the best phone I've ever used, but the internet is almost unusable it's so slow.. I'm putting it up for sale soon to switch back to T-Mobile.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Gonna be leaving right before the network takes a giant improvement with the network vision deployment set to be complete by end of next year....3G speeds 1-3Mbps....most all 3G coverage blanketed by LTE.....
Check S4GRU.com for some details on the rollout schedule. This isn't the sprint.com/network crap that's shown this is completely different and involves backhaul changes from the ancient T1 based to microwave/fiber based...
Sent from my PG86100 using xda premium
T-mobile rocks over Sprint for data, coverage and price
flexte said:
To the OP. I tried switching to t-mobile twice because IMO they have better phones and prices. but both times I had to switch back. my story: i knew tmobile had the 5gb data cap on teh monthly 4g plan i wanted so I checked my sprint data usage for 5 months and noticed i am only using 2-3 gb a month. I figured great so i went and got the Htc amaze after 6 days by data usage was over 1.5 gb. I went to the store and asked them is it possible that the data reading on the phone and website could be wrong? my setup was the same on my sprint evo and my htc amaze so it wasn't a program that could have been using that much data so i returned the phone. 2 weeks later i went back to the store drooling over the amaze but knew i couldn't get it because i would go over the 5gb easy. I spoke with a rep and he said he uses data heavily and never goes over so i said ok ill try it again maybe it was the phone. this time around i didn't tether at all except for 5 min to test it out. hardly used Pandora and made sure my setup was the same as the evo. this time i gave it 10 days and i was already over 3gb. i was half ass using my phone and still i would have been over. I have searched about this called tmobile and haven't come up with a good reason why this phone was using so much data. a buddy of mine went to att and i told him that he would def go over but after a few days he said no man im good . at the end of the month he called *****ing that he went over the att cap which was even lower than tmobile. until the come up with a prepaid plan that gives 10gb i have to stay away. oh yea and when they throttle you the above comments are correct its edge speed and way to slow for anything but email and light web surfing.
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I picked up my HTC Amaze (a 42.2 mbps device) on T-mobile in early January, and I live in a California city that has T-mobile HSPA+ 42.2 mbps coverage, just to be clear. When I bought my Amaze, I had to re-up my contract and at the time, I was asked to choose between a 5GB plan per month ($25 on top of the monthly $40 value plan) and a 10GB plan per month ($50 + my $40 value plan). So for price, it is impossible to beat T-mobile for the service you get.
I use my Amaze daily to go online, download and upload large files (I am a graphic designer) and watch videos and stream music. For the last 5 months I've had my phone, I've come close to 5GB twice. That is with heavy usage and this last month having a nearly two hour Skype conversation with a friend of mine where I used 2GB in one sitting!!! I also use my phone with the free WiFi Hotspot feature that comes with the 5GB & 10GB data plan as my computer's internet provider. I don't have a physical cable in my house, just my Amaze.
As far as speed, my friends with iPhones on ALL 3 NETWORKS (Sprint, Verizon and AT&T) all get slower speeds than I do. I was challenged by them and shut them all up in contests against google searches, Siri vs Google Voice Search and Speedtest.net. I have also speedtested the nicer handsets by Samsung and HTC running on AT&T and matched or beat them in my city in a few places around town. Sprint's speed was not even on the radar, barely chugging at 1mbps usually. I pull over 12 mbps usually everywhere I go, with upload speeds from 5-8 mbps on average.
As far as data, I have never gone over my 5GB but see how others could, and I bet when T-mobile gets LTE Advance up and running I'll add in the extra 5 gigs.
The greater points I'm making are the following:
A) Sprint's network it a sham. Even when they finally get around to offering LTE in California, which will be who-knows-when, T-mobile will have switched on its LTE advanced release 10 network, with HSPA+ 42.2 mbps backup, nationally. If you're a Sprint user, jump ship now or when T-mobile lights it up in 2013.
B) It's pretty darn hard to use up 5 Gigs per month if your not a power user. I don't know how someone with the HTC Amaze and the Usage monitor that is part of T-mobile's apps and in the HTC phone itself can't determine what was eating up data. That just doesn't make sense. You can easily pinpoint what's using your data by using the included Usage setting on your phone. And if 5GB isn't enough, get 10! But that option does exist.
C) T-mobile may not offer unlimited data speed at 4G, but get a 10GB plan and you will fly over the speeds you get on Sprint and save money while doing it. You could pay one price on Sprint for 1.5 mbps download speed unlimited (SLOW), or you could pay the same, maybe a little less and get 10GB at 4G speeds on T-mobile... and then in 2013 enjoy them lighting up a national LTE advance network that will arguably be the speediest LTE network on the planet.
D) The HTC Amaze is one bad-ass MoFo of a phone.
That is all.
for me i switched from t-mobile to boost because of their lack of 3g/4g in my town on t-mobile i was always on edge it is very slow, i switched to boost and i have EvDO now, its not the best of the best but atleast i can open a website now without my screen timing out. :good:
Product F(RED) said:
I used to be a Sprint store technician, and when the Epic Touch had the Loss of Signal issue (which has long been fixed, officially), Sprint's Tech Support over the phone told me that I should have bought an iPhone because Android always breaks. Word for word. I was like, ok so give me an iPhone, I'll give back the Epic Touch. And they said no.
These days you have to fend for yourself unfortunately. Chances are, if you're an XDA user, you know more than a carrier's tech support.
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You know what, they did the same thing to my dad. There was a hardware issue with his OG evo (a great phone during its day) where the speaker was going too quiet. The sales guy basically was telling him how it's because it's an android phone, how much better iphone is, etc.
Honestly I think the reason they are doing this is because they literally bet their future on the iphone. They are guaranteed to be paying apple 16 billion dollars over the next 4 years, regardless of whether or not they actually sell that much money worth of iphones. You better believe that they are going to try their damndest to sell them.
Anyways, I'm thinking of ditching sprint for t-mobile myself. I live in phoenix, which has zero 4g coverage from sprint. Several years back they told me that they would be deploying wimax here shortly. Where are we now? Nowhere.
I called them earlier today to cancel one of my lines, and they kept asking me if I want to use it for a data card, or if I just wanted to hold on to it "just in case" etc. I told the lady that I am thinking of switching to t-mobile, gave her all of these reasons why, and she brings up the "unlimited data" talking point. I kind of chuckle under my breath, and then tell her that their 3g service is really slow, their 4g service barely compares to other carrier's 3g service, and finally, they don't even offer 4g in my area, which is the 6th largest city in the US. She then tells me that they are going to be offering it here soon, so I tell her that that's what they told me a few years ago.
Yeah there are "rumors" that phoenix is due early in their second rollout, however similar rumors kept surfacing about wimax coming to phoenix next an entire year after it finished rolling out everywhere else. Other smaller towns outside of the valley (and I mean like over 70 miles away) got it, but not in the valley area.
In any case, I am on my third "4g" phone, and still have not ever had 4g. Even if LTE came soon to my area, I'm not terribly excited about it, mainly because the LTE gnex has a quarter of the battery life of the HSPA version when both are actively using 4g. I don't care if LTE is 10% faster, it's a huge f*cking battery drain.
Anyways, I'm not a heavy data user, so 4g hasn't been a huge priority to me. What is annoying is how I have to fight sprint's billing department every other month because they always manage to screw up something on my bill and overcharge me. I've been dealing with this for the last 7 years and I am tired of it. Sprint sucks, 'nuff said.
I really want to jump off of sprint, but I am hesitant because I don't know if t-mobile's voice service is more spotty, because according to sensorly their coverage is about 80% of that of sprint in my area. However, t-mobile would save me $40 a month, and because of the company I work for, I will have the activation fee waived.
Sprint coverage is so spotty. According to the coverage map I'm suppose to get 4g in my neighborhood and I don't. 98% percent of the time I'm on slow 3g. With T-Mobile I'm on 4g everywhere I go and its a good feeling to pull out your phone and handle your business with ease and speed unlike sprint.
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I love the Epic. Love it. So much that even though I used the ET4G for a while, I went back to the Epic. The problem is that I don't love Sprint. For the 10+ years I've been a customer, I've watched the quality of their customer service and technical output decrease considerably. Living in New York City, I'm dealing with data speed slower than a dial-up modem. Sprint claims that they're over capacity in my neighborhood. For a carrier to make a claim like that in NYC is absolutely ludicrous. Nevermind that there are far more densely populated areas of the city with drastically better data speeds than I'm getting, one of the three significant mobile phone carriers should be ashamed to admit that they can't provide adequate service in New York City.
Now, let's suppose you could walk away from your Sprint contract free of charge and go to Verizon for slightly less than you're paying now. Additionally, imagine you've never used more than 2 gigs of data in a month (Sprint's data speeds make using more than 500 MB of 3G in a month impossible anyway) so the somewhat enigmatic lure of "unlimited data" means nothing to you.
Would you walk or stick it out with Sprint?
Only for Droid 4
thats a whole lot of imagining.
i have the opposite experience. 8 yeasr sprint customer here and customer service now blows the old system out of the water. i havent gotten a foreign csr in a long time. i cant stand heavy indian accent on a tech support line. my data speeds are also good. i wont mention the fact that i live in the same city as their corp headquarters though. haha.
my only complaints are the lack of tons of phone choices. att and vzw are constantly rolling out new devices. cant someone throw sprint a bone here?
that and the loss of yearly upgrades, but none of the big carriers have that, so i guess its a non issue.
i think i will stay.
The company I work for was bought 6 months ago and I just learned I get a very decent discount on verizon, enough to make it come within $5 what I'm paying now for 2 epic 4gs on sprint (even though I still get 25% off sprint from my old work). The other limitations of verizon (only having 10 'unlimited' numbers, only 2gb of data per phone) don't really affect us at all. Combined our peak data usage in a given month was just over 1gb.
So that's a long way of saying...I'm in the same boat you're describing. Only thing keeping us around now is not wanting to burn another $400 for 2 contract price phones and of course the ETF from sprint. But my contract expires in december, so if the gs3 is on verizon first I'll almost certainly switch and bring my fiance a few months later when her contract is up. Sprint's data service is really bad in many places, even though I 'get' 4g in grand rapids and columbus, where I spend most of my time (its a good thing downtown grand rapids has 4g because the 3g data is unusable in my experience).
I get <100kbps consistently... no 4g ever, and coverage is even worse one town over where I visit my family.
But I somehow go through 8gbs of data every month so I guess I am stuck with sprint for a while. I plan on getting the galaxy note/journal the day its released.
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Restola said:
The company I work for was bought 6 months ago and I just learned I get a very decent discount on verizon, enough to make it come within $5 what I'm paying now for 2 epic 4gs on sprint (even though I still get 25% off sprint from my old work). The other limitations of verizon (only having 10 'unlimited' numbers, only 2gb of data per phone) don't really affect us at all. Combined our peak data usage in a given month was just over 1gb.
So that's a long way of saying...I'm in the same boat you're describing. Only thing keeping us around now is not wanting to burn another $400 for 2 contract price phones and of course the ETF from sprint. But my contract expires in december, so if the gs3 is on verizon first I'll almost certainly switch and bring my fiance a few months later when her contract is up. Sprint's data service is really bad in many places, even though I 'get' 4g in grand rapids and columbus, where I spend most of my time (its a good thing downtown grand rapids has 4g because the 3g data is unusable in my experience).
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That's exactly what's been holding me up. My wife and I don't really feel like dropping $400 on new phones right now. In addition, there will be certain desirable devices hitting the market a few months down the line, and it would be preferable to hold out for those instead. I'm able to get out of my Sprint contract because of the change they made to the way they bill family plans, but according to them, that option is only available to me until the end of this billing cycle. In theory, I should be able to get out of my contract on the basis of the pathetic data speeds available here but they'll lie until they're blue in the face to try to prevent me from doing that. Apart from the potential benefits of their new network whenever that actually hits the NYC market, I don't have a compelling reason to keep giving money to Sprint.
xopher.hunter said:
I get <100kbps consistently... no 4g ever, and coverage is even worse one town over where I visit my family.
But I somehow go through 8gbs of data every month so I guess I am stuck with sprint for a while. I plan on getting the galaxy note/journal the day its released.
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Same with me Christopher...
Except but I'm thinking about that evo man thing looks beast so far....
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iSaint said:
Same with me Christopher...
Except but I'm thinking about that evo man thing looks beast so far....
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Bigger is better. Lol
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the new devices always look great. the problem is that I'd have to run them on a Sprint network that gives me average downstream data speeds of 0.05 Mbps. What's the point? Maybe 15 months from now or so it'll be another story, but that's a long way (and a lot of months at $170/per) off.
I'm sticking it out. I'm going on 11 years with Sprint and I'm one of those folks that has never had a problem with their CS. I will admit that this is the longest I have ever sat on an upgrade due to a lack of phone options, but I understand they're undergoing changes right now, so I'll be patient. I still like- not love -my device now, and I get full bars of 4G where I live, so it could be worse.
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Been with Sprint for 10 years. What's kept me with Sprint is the price/value. Fortunately we get decent 3G here but no WiMax. My future brother in law works for Verizon and I told him I'd switch in August when my contracts are up if he can get me a similar monthly bill if it's clear Sprint isn't releasing LTE here anytime soon. Verizon has had LTE here since November. I'd prefer to stick with Sprint, but watching every other carrier here turn on 4G (even freaking US Cellular) has really soured me lately.
The data restrictions/throttling on other carriers are the biggest negative for me. I've been burning >15GB/month on the regular over 3G (no 4g within 400mi). I pay for unlimited, so I'll use it (all legit usage). The 2 and 5GB plans out there are just stupid as a whole IMO. Carriers nickel and dime customers to death.
What can I say, I stream music a lot. None of that used bandwidth is from tethering or downloading huge ass files via the phone.
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Don't you have roaming? Why would your speeds suck if you can roam on Verizon?
And if they still do, then why do you think switching would help?
Because I'm not roaming on Verizon, I'm always connected to Sprint. The data issue is the result of Sprint not being able to provide adequate bandwidth for their customers in this neighborhood.
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Last year was a much easier decision. I had been a Sprint customer for about a decade and was dealing with the decline of Sprint 3G data to less than dial-up speed and 4G coverage that was virtually non-existent for the areas where it mattered, home and work and in between. When Verizon offered unlimited 4G LTE the decision was clear. I negotiated with Sprint retention to lower the ETF to ~$75 and jumped ship. In comparison, I get Verizon LTE coverage everywhere I go, the throughput is significantly better than broadband DSL and the latency is optimal for latency sensitive applications like VOIP. I'm even paying a little less than I was paying Sprint. Now that the service issue is out of the way I'm waiting for great phones to appear on Verizon such as Galaxy Note II, Galaxy S III, etc. Samsung Epic 4G, except for maybe the limited DRAM, is a much better phone than the majority of phones on Verizon including my HTC Thunderbolt.
For me, it's a hard choice. I get 20% off Sprint through my work and 15% through Verizon, so even the cheapest plan from Version would be about $10 extra per month, and right now I'm saving as much as I can. Another thing is I do go over 4GB a month, but it depends. I actually checked my average the other day and it was literally 3.99 GB. Sprint data around here has gradually declined since the iPhone release, making it so even streaming low quality YouTube video is hit or miss (mostly miss). Hell even Pandora takes forever at times to load the next song, and if Pandora is having problems then jesus christ. There is no 4g availability around here, and they don't give us access to the wifi at work (boo). So right now I'll likely stay with Sprint, but my contract is up in June so we'll see then.
mi7chy said:
Last year was a much easier decision. I had been a Sprint customer for about a decade and was dealing with the decline of Sprint 3G data to less than dial-up speed and 4G coverage that was virtually non-existent for the areas where it mattered, home and work and in between. When Verizon offered unlimited 4G LTE the decision was clear.
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wow, they had an offer for unlimited data? and for how long are you able to get that? I would assume that's an introductory offer and eventually you get dropped down to a capped data plan.
I've noticed Sprint 3g speeds vary wildly depending on where I'm at. In my home (small town) I'll get 400-600k down which is good enough for light usage when away from wi-fi. In the nearby city I get around 1.0 - 1.5 mbps down which is really good enough for about anything I'd want to do on my phone while out and about.
However when I visit my family in Omaha (which is a pretty good size city) I get horrendous speeds (like 50kbps) which is just unusable. If I lived in this type of coverage I would have no choice but to switch.
rocket321 said:
I've noticed Sprint 3g speeds vary wildly depending on where I'm at. In my home (small town) I'll get 400-600k down which is good enough for light usage when away from wi-fi. In the nearby city I get around 1.0 - 1.5 mbps down which is really good enough for about anything I'd want to do on my phone while out and about.
However when I visit my family in Omaha (which is a pretty good size city) I get horrendous speeds (like 50kbps) which is just unusable. If I lived in this type of coverage I would have no choice but to switch.
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I'm in Omaha/Lincoln, and at my house in Omaha my coverage sucks.. But it's actually been getting better recently.. I still purchased roam control for that reason.
On the other hand, I get great speeds in Lincoln, and even 4G here on campus
I'm still debating on what I'll do when my contract is up in August. I may just wait around until a huge breakthrough in phone tech, or maybe I'll go for the SIII? I don't really want to switch carriers because my only discount is through Sprint.. Hopefully the network enhancements rock
Id choose tmo over verizon any day.
I'm not gonna bother saying why because from this point on I'm too lazy to rebuke the inevitable "but tmo...att...customer service....4g" lines
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