Sprint News

Funny, Sprint-Nextel and Clear both seemed to let the WiMax rollout languish until Verizon started breathing down their necks a couple of months ago, now all of a sudden Sprint -Nextel and Clear announce approximately 20 new cities scheduled for rollout by the end of 2009. Too bad S-N squandered so much of their lead in 4G, and didn't hop to it until Verizon pushed the issue. Very weak performance on the part of Sprint-Nextel, in my opinion.

Also curious that they haven't even mentioned WiMax for Los Angeles or NYC. The two largest population centers in the US by far, and the two main seats of business and commerce in the US, and yet these two massive urban/metropolitan areas don't even merit a mention of a potential timetable for WiMax rollout there.

I'm glad Verizon set a fire under the butts of the lagging Sprint-Nextel & Clear. Too bad that when Verizon begins to make a move, they generally dominate within a few years. Can you recall even just a year ago that Sprint-Nextel was touting that they had at least a three-year lead on the competition with WiMax. And here it is less than a year after S-N's "look at us" press releases, and Verizon has successfully been running several LTE sites and has already completed their first cross-US LTE connections, and Verizon will effectively MATCH Sprint-Nextel and Clear's 4G population coverage sometime during 2010.

So please, all of you S-N honchos, don't expect your loyal customer base to high-five you for the recent announcenemt of WiMax rollout when you remained mute for almost a full year and squandered your lead. Same as you did with the purchase of Nextel, and same as you did with the rollout of Rev A and Qchat: You had it all in the palm of your hand, and you executed like a bunch of arrogant, rank amateurs and totally blew all three of the superb leads you had. Nothing personal here, but you'll get no kudos and no high-fives from me on this one.

  - Nxtl4me

I must have missed the announcement about NYC rollout; my error. Still, I have heard no mention of Los Angeles area rollout, has anyone?

Certainly they can't build out that fast, but (a) we all know that "pre-announcements" are a major tool of the free enterprise system to thwart the competition and (b) both S-N and Verizon are guilty of using this tactic in the case of 4G rollouts.

I stand by my opinion that S-N has squandered what they constantly referred to as "at least a two-year lead on the competition", and sometimes in the same sentence stated up to three or more years of lead. All you need do is look at all of the postings on BAW wherein members have asked many, many times why the WiMax rollout seemed to have stalled over the past year.

MDG:

Thanks for the numbers. It is indeed good to be optimistic. However, anyone that under-estimates Verizon will lose. I hope no one at S-N is optimistic enough that they are underestimating VZ.

    - Nxtl4me

I gotta post here to for a thought, from what I gather of knowledge about this speed stuff on wireless networks. A thought came to mind. Its not going to matter how fast a network is unless your phone is fast too. so until one gets a fast phone or a fast internet card and close to a tower or so many feet from the hub router or however it works the network with all the speed is useless as far as speed goes...just a thought.

I am also not happy that Sprint didn't have better plans to roll out 4G to NYC & Los Angeles areas first if not in by the end of 2009. San Fransicso should not be first in CA to have 4G. That would be another mistake by sprint in my opinion since Los Angeles would clearly have more business users on the network than SF, CA!!!

Thank you for your interest in Sprint "Bronze Expert". I understand the history you might have with Sprint. Sprint is continously making changes everywhere within the company. You have to forgive. Sprint has made excellent improvements. I'm a current Sprint customer saving $1,200 with the Palm Pre over caparable AT&T and Verizon plans. So give Sprint another try. You might find that it has changed from the years when you used to be a customer.

Thank you again for listening. Have a bless day.

Sprint needs to roll in new tech harder than this, or simply don't advertise till you have decent infrastructure up.  I called Sprint CSRs they had no idea about any california roll out dates for WiMax.  Don't tease me Sprint, it makes me want to drop service real quick; why? knowing nothing has improved in 3G in my area, and has been progressively getting worse to the point of less than 300kbps speeds is why.  Same thing happened to 2.5G.  Rarely anything gets better at Sprint.  Sprint just moves on before they fix current issues.

BTW (MDG) thanks for the info!!!

I definatelly love Sprint for their new tech, and open standards (devices).  I have been with them for nearly a decade, and even though their 3G has it's moments, I've just about had it.  Will cancel data next month.

Sprint, when they pull a move like this, I feels as if they are shooting themselves in the foot.  Investing a lot of money, not having service up and opening up doors for competition to swoop in and offer compelling prices on current tech and or improve on Sprint's tech by the time it's running.  I doubt they're all that worried.  I have never, and would really love to be able to, but never have been able to recommend Sprint to a family or friend.  No consitency, and lack of improvement, I'm not saying progress, improvement.  I'm sure WiMax will be ridiculously awesome when it rolls out, it just won't last.  They haven't even upgraded the single T1 connection to the local tower here since 2.5G days.  Guess how bad WiMax could get once people jump on?

/end rant

Indeed, I must agree, "Not a good start...."  I too am in the metro Atlanta area and since Aug. 10th, 2009 I have yet to experience the blazing speeds I expected with WIMAX.  Technical Support is indeed lacking, however in their defense, there's not much they can do when Sprint doesn't provide an adequate connection manager.  To date, Sprint Smart View is inadequately equipped to service the 3G/4G card.  Software dosn't support the cards' use with Vista 64-bit,  XP Service Packs 1 and 3, not to mention the glitches on anything equipped with an Intel processor.

After two days and countless hours of installing and uninstalling Smart View on three computers, and stll no 4G, I give up and will cancel the card..

I have been following the evolution of Wimax throughout the globe and am surprised how well received the platform has become considering the proclivity of ATT, VZ and Erickson to trash talk the IEEE 802.16 standard.  In summary what it boils down to is that if you don't have a ubiquitous 3G platform it is much more cost effective for any Telecom to leap directly into Wimax, and that is exactly what is happening around the world.  Most of the growth in Telecom is coming from the developing world, especially the BRIC countries and Wimax is and will continue to be the first line item on the menu de fare.  Sprint has an enviable hold on the Wimax RF spectrum in the US and that is another reason why ATT and VZ have opted for LTE.  Barring any economic catastrophe Sprint with its subsidary, Clearwire, will have most of the major metropolitan cities in the US covered with its Mobile Wimax (4G) platform by the end of next year.  

I just got the Franklin 4G card and am in Atlanta.. Being in downtown Atlanta and looking at the 4G coverage map I should be getting 4G connections..  No matter where I go there aren't any WIMAX connections..

Looks like this might be getting returned...