My parents travel in their motorhome full time. They are in some poplutated areas with great coverage and in some remote areas with not so great coverage. They use the Verizon network. They have just decided to finally upgrade to a android smart phone. The current feature phone (ancient) has an external antenna port. My Dad thinks that his new smart phone needs an external antenna port also to remain getting coverage in the remote areas. My question is.... Is there a smart phone with an external antenna port? Or what about the boosters for coverage-do they work? I'm hoping to point them in the right direction. Thanks
Note that newer devices have more powerful hardware. This includes the radio. My buddy just got the evo 4g lte and his data speeds are double what they were with evo original.
Verizon definitely has the best coverage, though they are EXPENSIVE and rough with their customers. AT&T is equally a bully and EXPENSIVE.
I am worth Sprint and coverage is terrible without hacking verizon prl's
I really think T-Mobile is up and coming, especially their sim only plans. Look for a used GSM Android phone, here or at Swappa. Then get the device unlocked and you get an unlimited plan for 50 bucks a month.
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Now that Clearwire announced the move to LTE what happens to all of us with WiMax antennas in their phones stuck in a city where there is no towers? Can they do a software upgrade and change our phones to support LTE? I heard that if they implement LTE on the same frequency as WiMax is currently, the software upgrade would be possible.
http://m.cnet.com/Article.rbml?nid=20087725&cid=null&bcid=&bid=-266
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whether its possible or not is regardless no carrier would let you upgrade your 2 year old phone to work as nice as the current ones when you can come in and buy something new and shiney.
afaik they are using lightsquared for lte and supplementing it with clear wimax/lte
Well I'm foreseeing a lawsuit case for every city which doesn't have and will never get WiMax for all the devices sprint is currently selling. New models still come out with 4g WiMax antennas built-in and it seems like it would be in sprint's best interest to make sure they can switch all these phones to work on the "new" LTE network. Especially when they force people to carry that $10 / mo charge which started as a 4g charge and since had been changed to be called "premium data" charge.
Too many phones on sprint have that big 4G title on the box for consumers not to notice that there are no 4g connections anywhere.
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sprint has their ass covered with a coverage may vary. no lawsuit would be taken serious after that. sprint has no obligation to "upgrade" users to lte (if its even possible). yes there were rumors of it but if they use different freqs well then sorry sucks to be you. besides by the time lte is available to most everyone on saprint there will be new faster phones etc etc.
as for the 10 dollar charge, i had mine removed thanks to a very nice csr on both lines., and i have 4g here
shabbypenguin said:
sprint has their ass covered with a coverage may vary. no lawsuit would be taken serious after that. sprint has no obligation to "upgrade" users to lte (if its even possible). yes there were rumors of it but if they use different freqs well then sorry sucks to be you. besides by the time lte is available to most everyone on saprint there will be new faster phones etc etc.
as for the 10 dollar charge, i had mine removed thanks to a very nice csr on both lines., and i have 4g here
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Looks like there is already one lawsuit in progress. An then there is this website which I'm not sure who owns.
Judging from the past consumers lawsuits, it really doesn't matter what you put in the fine print. Walk into any Sprint store or Best Buy and the 4G now network signs could be very much misleading consumers because of other carrier’s which do offer nation wide 4G. Some people could be simply switching to sprint thinking they'll get 4G phone which has 4G speeds.
But I may try to get that $10 charge removed. Thanks for the tip.
So I am on Verizon using the Galaxy Nexus, and obviously Verizon is dragging its feet since there are reports of Sprint's LTE Nexus shipping with 4.0.4.
Kinda tired of Verizon's BS and thinking of jumping ship, but to who I have no idea.
Grandfathered into Verizon's network with Unlimited Data, and I can't bring myself to part with it.
So my options are the other 3 networks.
AT&T had HSPA+ in my school area and LTE in my home area (although I can't get unlimited data....) and hot swapping between phones is tempting.
Sprint is the next option, but I don't want to be stuck on another CDMA provider. WiMax in my areas but not in its initial LTE roll out, and I have no faith LightSquared will get its stuff together even with the extra 2 years.
T-Mo, no LTE plans I know of, and not really interested. Cheap though.
Anyone have any input? Suggestions for a carrier?
Power data user, can tailor usages to conform to data limitations.
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What is the status of Sprint?
They put a lot of money into supplying iPhones and they're probably hoping the EVO 4g Lte will bring them up some too. Their WiMax network cost them some big bucks, and now its costing them more to rebuild their network into an LTE one. The war between WiMax and LTE is similar to the technology war with HD-DVDs and Blu-Rays. Sprint went the wrong route though with their network choice in the beginning.
Sprint is out some money.
I hope in five or ten years, we don't see Sprint gone/bought out from the industry. What does Sprint have going for them? Really, over the other carriers? Unlimited data is really all I can think of.
I was with ATT for two years in West Virginia. Sprint had better network speeds than ATT at the time in WV. I am not sure about now. So my allegiance with Sprint stems from my better experience with them at that time.
Opinions? Views?
My experience with them has always been very slow data speeds (20kbs) and constantly dropped calls. I finally went to at&t and while it's more expensive, the better data speeds and zero dropped calls has been worth it for me.
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Right now I have Verizon and can upgrade next month but my contract ends in december if I upgrade with Verizon I'll loose my unlimited I was thinking about going to att cause I'd get an extra gig for the same price then was thinking about sprint cause they have the cheapest plan and unlimited but no 4g I either want to get the HTC evo lte/htc one x or the S3. So I guess I'm wondering if I should break my contract and get another gig with att, go with sprint for unlimited but only 3g for who knows how long or should I just stick with Verizon?
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Att is good but expensive bad covrage in buildings. Varizon is kind of limited have good signal inside building 850 band is great. Sprint and t-mo cheaper but weak signal data slow. In my area t-mo is using atts towers. Sprint is cheap... but you ge alot of CAN You hear me nowwwww. JM2C.
Signed &
I really, really hate VZ. Been with T-Mobile for 14 years and very happy. Good service and best prices. Very good coverage in my area.
Speaking of coverage... Coverage with any carrier is EXTREMELY location-dependent. Coverage maps can only give approximate coverage areas. Signal strength within a coverage area can come and go from mile to mile, block to block or even room to room.
People are constantly asking about coverage but trying to give meaningful advice about expected coverage is just worthless. It is. The only thing that really works is first, check a map to get a rough idea what to expect. Pick a provider that shows good coverage in the area then actually try their service in places you expect to use it. Walk around the house, work, etc and see if it drops calls or loses data connection.
It's the only way to be fairly sure you'll be happy with any provider's signal quality.
Registered Linux user #266531. Android user since v1.0.
Yea I'm starting to hate Verizon as well with the shared data andno option for the individual plans anymore unless your grandfathered in like me but that will probably change next year like there doing with the unlimited plans. Both att and Verizon have about the same coverage in my area. Sprint has cover mostly in my area but some dead zones. And tmoblie only has voice in my area so that's out of the question. I'm thinking I'll stick with Verizon even though I really don't want to... was also thinking about a prepay smartphone but none in my area has good enough coverage.
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Honestly AT&T's LTE Is plenty fast for me but id want a Sprint phone
Verizon has the only SGSIII with a locked boot loader. That would be enough for me to leave.
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lowandbehold said:
Verizon has the only SGSIII with a locked boot loader. That would be enough for me to leave.
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What does that mean?
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But being that Verizon is CDMA, phones sell much cheaper here and on eBay. You could get decent phone for $300ish, not use your upgrade, and keep unlimited. Just a thought.
Mark930 said:
What does that mean?
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Locked bootloaders prevent custom images/roms from being loaded on the device. A good example of that is the now ancient DROID X on VZW there was a huge fuss about their being a chip that would destroy the phone and ish, but I digress, it essentially makes it so you can only load VZW Official or VZW based roms. No AOKP, No CM- anything etc.
If you're not into that, it's not a big deal. But I, as a flashaholic must have unlocked bootloaders.
Now carrier wise, Tmo is better because if you exceed data they just slow you down.
Att (mine) charges $10/GB over 3GB so 2GB over costs you the same as the 5GB plan essentially.
Sprint... Well do you want people to hear you?
But as it was said before, coverage is the deal breaker. But Tmo is also adding brought spectrum from VZW, which should prove interesting since the Tmo/Att merger got the kaibosh
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Ah OK I don't think I'll be rooting my next phone cause I'm pretty sure I messes up my last phone the Samsung fascinate from rooting and flashing ended up buying an iPhone on cregslist caue I can't even boot my fascinate any more. I think Verizon is $10/1G overage too but who really knows with all their changes
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good nice
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I just upgraded with Verizon which forced me to change to a shared plan from unlimited. I was bummed about this, but Verizon has been amazing to me.
Here's how I justified it. Largest network/Best service. I had unlimted data...I rarely use more than 100 - 500mb as I have Wifi at home and at work/school. So it wasn't really a loss. Check out your data use...do you really use that much data? (You could, I'm just sharing my experience)
I use around 1.8-2.5G a month and how smart phones are getting better and better I can see data use going up as well I don't have wifi t work and my wifi at home is choppy.
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So did they make you join the shared plan or did you have the option to drop down to 2g from unlimited?
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Hello everyone. Glad to be a new member of you community.
Recently I moved from Europe, now I'm living in California. At home I was enjoying a super fast Internet, here my free wireless service is a nightmare. Now I'm looking for a wireless unlimited solution for my laptop. That's why I want to buy a 4G LTE smartphone, using tethering to get unlimited bandwidth nationwide. Firstly, I made some research, I have find out that only 3 carriers have unlimited plans : T-Mobile, Sprint and MetroPCS. Because Sprint and MetroPCS is using CDMA technology, I'll go with T-Mobile 70 $ Unlimited plan, but unfortunately only 500 MB for tethering. So, my questions are:
1) Is T-Mobile the right choice in this matter?
2) Which 4G LTE capable smartphone is best suited for this job ? (I'm ok with rooting, custom roms, etc.)
3) Is there another reasonable solution, maybe not using my smartphone for this job but let's say, a usb modem or a contract with a Wireless ISP ?
I don't care much about the smartphone's futures, like camera, screen, design or battery as long as I can tether it on 4G LTE network. Thanks in advance.
P.S: Sorry for my terrible English, it's not my first language.