Sprint Says LTE Decision Coming in 4-6 Months
Please go LTE
I think they should have jumped on LTE much sooner. Now, they'll have to transition current 4G customers over to a new standard, which means new hardware.
I hope they have enough spectrum to operate both a WiMax network and a LTE network concurrently during a transitional period. That may sound costly, but it would be the smoothest way to do it without losing their existing 4G customers.
Overmann said:
Which doesn't really help much, since that means LTE 4G Sprint phones will have to be redesigned to handle 2.5Ghz and 700MHz in order to cover the bases.
Which isn't far from 2.5GHz WiMax and other bands of CDMA...
Existing WiMax customers would just keep their 4G services going as is until they were ready for an upgrade.
I don't really see Sprint or Clear stopping WiMax services...
I see them implementing LTE in the areas they don't already have WiMax.
But Sprint has almost 4 times the spectrum(nationally) than the other carriers, so it could very well be possible to run both networks in the same market... It just depends on how much is available in the individual markets.
Azeron said:
Why doesn't Sprint continue to run W-Max and just have manufacturers put LTE radios in future handsets to take advantage of roaming opportunities?
I think another thing Sprint may be thinking of is roaming revenue. Knowing that if they did a WiMax-LTE hybrid system, they would pay for their customers to roam on competitor's networks, knowing that those competitors would never provide any roaming back to Sprint.
With LTE, they could partner and have reciprocal roaming agreements. It would be much easier from an engineering standpoint to add frequencies abilities to chipsets using a single technology than it would to have multiple frequencies *and* multiple technologies. Plus, with econo...
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The Blackberry playbook for example is going to be a WiMax device for Sprint.
I have a feeling that even though the decision will be made in "4-6 months"... we won't see a Sprint LTE device until at least 2012 if they decide to go that route.
Like I said in my other post, I believe it makes the most sense to release LTE in markets that do not already have WiMax that way they can have the best of both worlds while they migrate to LTE.
Azeron said:
Why doesn't Sprint continue to run W-Max and just have manufacturers put LTE radios in future handsets to take advantage of roaming opportunities?
Because it's really expensive to put an LTE microprocessor and a WiMAX microprocessor in the same handset- not to mention the extra antennas needed.
If they start by deciding to stop WiMAX roll-out and move to LTE in their 2.5 GHz bands, then they still have to insert LTE chipsets, but they don't have to redesign the antennas. Then in a few years when VoLTE is standardized and widespread they can drop EVDO support entirely like Verizon will.
Kayslay34 said:
Your actually wrong about that, switching from Wimax to LTE is a software change not hardware. Sprint has stated this multiple times.
If Clear deployed high-quality programmable base stations, it's basically a software change at the cell site.
However, it's still a non-upgradeable hardware change at the handset level.
So, while it would be fairly easy for Clear to shift from WiMAX over to LTE, it would be relatively expensive for Sprint's customer's to move from WiMAX to LTE. They would have to buy new phones and modems.
I think it could be done, as long as they start acting quickly. This is what Sprint is talking about when they say they're looking at uptake ...
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Plus, this is at a time shortly after Clearwire announced plans to shutter the Clear retail stores. Sounds almost like a product that's about to be discontinued.
I live in Atlanta right now and I have a choice between MetroPCS LTE, Verizon LTE, or Sprint(Clear) WiMax. Why not go for the prevailing standard, especially when it's cheaper?
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