Database Users

Slow 4G Speeds?

I live near San Jose and today I tested out the "trial" 4G network at the Cisco campus. I seemed to get a good signal but the results were disappointing - 1.5 Mbps downstream, 800 Kbps upstream.
Is anyone able to get better? Maybe the "trial" network at Cisco is just crappy??

Here in Atlanta I'm getting download speeds of about 3megs. I believe that they are capping the speeds. I have a 4g usb dongle and that is the same speed I get on it. Once upon a time I used to get anywhere from 6-11megs using the dongle and it now only gets 3megs (just like my phone). I know there is no signal strength issue because the tower is on the roof of the building and I get a very good signal.
Anyone else experiencing this?

I got 2.2mbps, but no 4g. I was thinking it was 4g, but I shut the 4g button down and it's never said 4g and I still get 2.2mbps down and .32mbps up. I'm in Pasadena. I'm not sure what to make of that.

I'm in a 4g coverage area and still cant get it to connect to 4g unless im at sprint or bestbuy... and even then 3g is still faster...

Nothing against anybody, but I would kill for 3G where I live, let alone crappy 4G.
Be thankful for what you have, no matter how much you may think it sucks.

In the roswell/alpharetta area and I am getting about 4.7mbs works pretty well. Sprint tv needs improvement though otherwise very happy with new phone. Seems snappier than incredible phone I have too.

I'm in Dallas and I"m loving my 4.5ish download and 1.3 upload, you heard right. 1.3 upload.

pretty bAd
I'm getting 1 bar or less of 4g service at my house.. I live in tacoma wa. The 4g coverage map shows that I should have about the best service speed.. I just have to stand outside and down the block to get it. so much for pitching Comcast.

Dallas, TX
I am currently north of Dallas and I get zero bars of 4G, though sometimes I see one bar light up. So far the most I have seen in a speed test is 1.6 mbps down and 223 kbps up.
I will test again when I am actually in the City of Dallas and see if it improves. Web is still quicker than any other phone I have owned.

in san antonio tx i get about 1.8 down and 1.5 up lol.... and before the launch a friend used to get from 10-11 megs on his wireless card... i think since the phone is new the network is congested with ppl doing speed tests and downloading apps

mrmomoman said:
In the roswell/alpharetta area and I am getting about 4.7mbs works pretty well. Sprint tv needs improvement though otherwise very happy with new phone. Seems snappier than incredible phone I have too.
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I'm also in roswell, however i'm not seeing speeds above 3mb

Are you getting close to the speeds of 3?

splicitysplat said:
I'm also in roswell, however i'm not seeing speeds above 3mb
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I've tried running the speed test in the Roswell, Sandy Springs, Smyrna, Airport area, and McDonough and I still keep getting the same speeds nothing higher than 3.3 down. I consistently seem to get anywhere from 2.7-3.0

ShawnN said:
I live near San Jose and today I tested out the "trial" 4G network at the Cisco campus. I seemed to get a good signal but the results were disappointing - 1.5 Mbps downstream, 800 Kbps upstream.
Is anyone able to get better? Maybe the "trial" network at Cisco is just crappy??
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Click to collapse
OP, I did a whole write up on the Bay Area 4G network - which in case you haven't noticed, is just for developer testing, NOT meant for EVO devices - over on my blog. Please read.
http://dylandersen.me/post/633300884/4g-in-the-bay-area-how-fast-is-it-really

THIS NEEDS TO BE SETTLED! I think I have an objective view.
I'm in Houston, TX so we have 4G coverage with ClearWire. I got my EVO yesterday, along with everybody else. I went to Best Buy to look at some accessories, while I was there I was chatting with the ClearWire rep running the demo and trying to sign up new customers. He was inside with store with his Clearwire USB dongle and laptop. We decided to run some speed comparisons, so I downloaded 2 speedtest apps from the Android market, one of them being for Speedtest.net. The best speed I got on my EVO with 4G enabled (and 1 bar of 4g) was about 2.25 Mbit down, and 1.1 Mbit up. I ran this test multiple times with me standing next to him, then putting my EVO next to the USB dongle to make sure I was getting the same signal. The rep's laptop, again running the speedtest from Speedtest.net and us using the the SAME servers, he got at least 6 Mbit down and almost 2 Mbit up. The best he got that I saw was like 7.2 Mbit down. He said that earlier that day he got as high as 10 Mbit down.
This is just telling me that it's either the processor that is limiting the speed, or it's the 4G antenna in the EVO. I saw that his 4G signal was pretty good being a bit outside the city, in Katy at Fry Road and I-10. I live just outside downtown I do get 4G inside my home, but again 1 or 2 bars. With my limited investigation I'm going to have to conclude that the network speed is NOT ClearWire's fault, but more like a hardware limitation on the EVO. If someone modded the phone with a better antenna the speed might improve.
About the existing 3G speed and with EVO is WOW! 3G response is soooo much faster on the EVO that it was on my G1. Another comparison is my home AT&T U-verse: I get 5.71 Mbit down and 0.94 Mbit up. I'm trying to think of a way that I can get my TV another way and get ClearWire for home instead of U-verse.

I dont think clear caps their 4G at all. See if you can connect to clear's 4G from your phone.

I get 2.5-3.5mb down and 800-1.3mb up. Still better than my dsl.

1.33 mpbs is the most I've gotten with 4G enabled. I am going to try again when I get home and see if the speed improves.

Anyone out there in the LA area getting 4g? I don't get 4g at all. My 3g is really fast, but no 4g shows. It just shows "scanning" in the settings.
Ok nevermind: LA still shows as coming soon on the sprint site.

****, I'm in Portland, one of the first WiMax areas, and I'm only getting 300/k down and 800/k up as I speedtest it now.
No big to me. I have wifi at home that pegs 5/5ish and at work about the same. I usually keep the 3g/4g off unless I am out and need it. Battery suckin' pig that stuff.

Anyone getting subpar 4G service (Philadelphia)

my 4g signal is coming in pretty weak and the speeds i am getting are fairly slow. when doing a speed test with the evo and my old g1 my results are:
Evo 2,700kbps on 4g
G1 3,800kbps on HSPA+
I know HSPA+ is fast but i would would expect the 4g to be a bit faster, when i use my clearwire usb stick on my laptop i can pull speeds upto 17mbps. I even tried it in different areas around the city with no change. I know its still an emerging technology but i would like to see if anyone else in a 4g are has had this issue. any thoughts?

Ive given up on 4g and Im completely happy on 3g with this phone, saves battery too.
Ive gotten 4g signal ONCE and ive had the phone for a week, in a 4G market. Still love the phone just not buyin the 4g hype. I dont even call it evo 4g anymore, its just...Evo
edit::: in Hawaii (oahu) btw

I hear ya, 4g seems more of a novelty at this point. I love the phone but im tempted to return it and stick with tmobile for now.

psycho9x said:
my 4g signal is coming in pretty weak and the speeds i am getting are fairly slow. when doing a speed test with the evo and my old g1 my results are:
Evo 2,700kbps on 4g
G1 3,800kbps on HSPA+
I know HSPA+ is fast but i would would expect the 4g to be a bit faster, when i use my clearwire usb stick on my laptop i can pull speeds upto 17mbps. I even tried it in different areas around the city with no change. I know its still an emerging technology but i would like to see if anyone else in a 4g are has had this issue. any thoughts?
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Im right over the bridge in NJ and getting 2mb. isnt it capped anyway? its fast enough for me.

I'm around the philly area, and when I do get a 4th signal it will go from 2mbps to 5mbps

I'm near the Baltimore area and so for the most signal I have gotten was one bar and I hit 3500kbps but on average just the 4g icon is lit and I get about 2000kbps. Also when testing you should tether to a laptop because doing the test from the phone isnt very accurate.

I work in King of Prussia, PA and my 4g signal for the past two weeks has been anywhere from 2 to 3.5 mbps. Inside buildings it is worse. Just remember that when 3g first came out it wasn't as good as it is today. It just takes time for a new technology to become a great technology.

Im getting like 2mbps here in new jersey too...

I hear ya, 4g seems more of a novelty at this point. I love the phone but im tempted to return it and stick with tmobile for now.
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I'm thinking the same thing. Did you port your number?, what happens if you did and you decide to go back?
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I read somewhere earlier that Sprint was having a problem with the 4g network, a sprint rep told a guy over the phone (yes the are not always right, but in this case it seems to be something going on). Everyone around the US seems to be reporting similar problems with the 4g network.

I'm in Seattle, and when I do get 4G, it's about 1800kbps. In comparison, mt T-Mobile 3.5G on my N900 got about 3800kbps. So far, I'm very unimpressed. Might be taking this thing back if it doesn't get any better.
That being said, the 3G service seems to be very fast and responsive even though I'm only getting about 1000kbps.

as jus10 mentioned, sprints 4g is getting hit extremely hard. they were expecting it and that is why they have not crashed but theres only sooo much bandwidth. so with everyone saying 4g is bad right now, just use wifi for now haha.
we are basically beta testers for 4g. it has never been used in this large of scale. but anyways it will def. get better and better but hey anything faster than 3g is good.

im hoping it gets better cause it saddens me that tmobile hspa+ is faster. as i stated i can can pull 17mbps down on my clear usb 4g stick which makes me think they might need to push out an update for the evo.
I didnt port my number yet cause i wanted to try out sprints network before i commited lol.
also the 4g isnt capped on the down side, only on the up.

What are you guys speed testing with. Also you'll probably see 4g has big advantages on latency and upload speed. Doesn't matter how big the pipe(bandwidth) if the pump (latency) is too slow. Latency will make a big difference in voip and video conferencing. I suggest doing some video streaming comparisons vs. Pure bandwidth tests.
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Sent via the XDA taptalk app from my EVO

donatom3 said:
What are you guys speed testing with. Also you'll probably see 4g has big advantages on latency and upload speed. Doesn't matter how big the pipe(bandwidth) if the pump (latency) is too slow. Latency will make a big difference in voip and video conferencing. I suggest doing some video streaming comparisons vs. Pure bandwidth tests.
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Sent via the XDA taptalk app from my EVO
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Actually Sprint caps upload and latency isn't better than HSPA..
psycho9x said:
im hoping it gets better cause it saddens me that tmobile hspa+ is faster. as i stated i can can pull 17mbps down on my clear usb 4g stick which makes me think they might need to push out an update for the evo.
I didnt port my number yet cause i wanted to try out sprints network before i commited lol.
also the 4g isnt capped on the down side, only on the up.
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When did you hit 17Mbps & is it easily repeatable? I'd just test both back to back in the same area to pin point the problem. Sprint could have the HTC Evo at a lower priority on the network over the data sticks and hotspots.

I can hit 17mbps at my friends house which is about 3 miles from me. tried the evo there and still only getting about 3mbps.

Did a quick test today, 250KBps (2Mbps) down. Thats outside, cuz inside I dont get signal at all... and I thought that Portland, being the most mature city for 4G, would be at least better than that... as someone said above, I also given up on 4G. Tether 3G through USB and I get 140KBps to 200KBps down on my laptop, which is more that enough for emergencies. Otherwise I just use wifi in my house & office. Can't beat 22Mbps comcast connecton
That being said, atm Evo "4G" is just a marketing term, nothing more.

here in Vegas,
This is at my house in whats considered a spotty 4g area. I have noticed over the past couple days the 4G service keeps getting faster. On the first night i was only able to get 2.3 Mbps down.

portland oregon
3g 1.78mb/s down at best
4g 2.89mb/s down at best with full bars

Any PHILADELPHIA updates from EVO owners living in the Philly area? (S, Jersey, Philly burbs, etc)
I am curious about 4G availability, reliability, and speeds.
Thank you.

HSDPA+ rolled/being rolled out to central florida, what to look for

Hopefully this isn't off topic.
What to look for if you still don't have it in your area:
Have had some issues the last few weeks with tmobile and noticed "funny" things like certain areas not having 3g but full edge when I knew they were capable of it. Most of the time this happened around 2am or later. Anyway I now can say without a doubt that HSDPA+ is in central Florida or in the process of being rolled out. Other odd issues I noticed was
Consistent min speed of 2.3mbit when before it was 500kbit min. Highest I got so far in my apartment which is a 3-4 bar area was 5.5mbit. Highest before was 1.5 and in a very strong 4 bar area close by 1.8 max. Upload still leaves *ALOT* to be desired with .23 to -.4 mbps upload. They seem to be using similiar technology to the burst seen on cable modems, ie road runner will give you 20mbit for their "turbo" with "bursts" up to 30mbit. This could also just be how hsdpa works anyway to make sure there aren't alot of re-requests for data due to a bad signal but it definately starts off around 300-500kbit and bursts up after 1-4 seconds to the faster speed.
Either way perfect timing tmobile.

I hope that's true. I've been having alot of 3g outtages lately.

JCopernicus said:
I hope that's true. I've been having alot of 3g outtages lately.
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I'm almost certain it is. I just called last night to complain about it because I was staying at my parents house sitting and it happened up there too, as well as by my girlfriend's house about 10 minutes down the road from my apartment.
I'm really bothered though by the upload speeds.. but i guess its whatever. It's either my area, or tmobile in general.. I've had a couple of swaps with the same issue so its not the phone.
As a side note.. does nexus support 21mbit hsdpa+?

no the nexus one only supports up to 7.2mbps

Orangeandblue302 said:
no the nexus one only supports up to 7.2mbps
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ouch I was really hoping that wasn't the case. any that go beyond to 21mbps?

I wish AT&T upgraded the towers here. I can't tell you how many times I go into a classroom at UCF and there's no reception.

mariolopezjr said:
I wish AT&T upgraded the towers here. I can't tell you how many times I go into a classroom at UCF and there's no reception.
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I'm pretty sure schools do that on purpose so you can pay attention in class.
The same thing happens at my university up here in Illinois, once you step outside the building, full bars again.

rolled out in Houston Texas
Hey - starting last week, I noticed flaky things with T-mobile in Houston area similar to what OP stated. But over the weekend, I realized they were rolling out hsdpa+ and then the next day - full blown hspa. I'm so happy.
Before today, the ul speeds were .5 - .6. Today, I'm getting between 1.5 and 1.8 ul speeds!

TurboTsi said:
I'm pretty sure schools do that on purpose so you can pay attention in class.
The same thing happens at my university up here in Illinois, once you step outside the building, full bars again.
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More than anything its the wireless spectrum they use and the fact that you're in a large buildling. Depending on the frequency your provider uses you'll have better luck than some indoors.. generally its all the same. Of course the number of towers is important too. But for example LTE on 700mhz will give verizon LTE speeds 8-10 miles from the tower, 2500mhz on wimax will give sprint 2-3 miles from the tower. Higher frequency means more bandwidth available however.
I'm in engineering at UCF and pretty good reception in HEC and engineering 1 as long as you're not in the inner part of the building and those hallways and labs you're good. Brick walls = signal drop with anything but the lower frequencies and a well covered area. It's pretty strong coverage over here though on this side of campus.
They do have paint and stuff that have metal in it I think because its illegal to have a device that emits a radio signal to jam cellphones, however blocking it with shielding isn't. I'm pretty certain its expensive though. This was years ago that I saw that link on it... don't know if it still exists.

How big of a swath is it being rolled out to do you think? I am in Deltona and nothing has changed as of yet. I assume your talking about the Orlando metro area...
I am using the FRF50 radio by the way.

yeah you will get a increase in speeds due to the extra bandwith, but don't expect to get past the 7.2 mark, hell don't even expect to hit the 7.2 mark due to all the other factors.
not many devices out there to take full advantage of the added speed. new blackberry bold does........not sure what else, even the *cough* iphone 4 doesn't

saint327 said:
How big of a swath is it being rolled out to do you think? I am in Deltona and nothing has changed as of yet. I assume your talking about the Orlando metro area...
I am using the FRF50 radio by the way.
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I was up in deland when I noticed the problems 2 nights ago with the 2g and not going to 3g in an area that I knew had 3g. This was actually during the day. I just tested it again within the last day before leaving and it was working again. Give it a week or two and I'm sure you'll see it. It seems the whole area is being upgraded including you. I'm on the older radio... update-1 radio.
Also please report problems to tmobile as you see them. I'm going to report my ****ty upload speeds. Looking online it seems other areas have better upload than I do. I mean 200kbps max 400 and choppy is just terrible.

y2whisper said:
yeah you will get a increase in speeds due to the extra bandwith, but don't expect to get past the 7.2 mark, hell don't even expect to hit the 7.2 mark due to all the other factors.
not many devices out there to take full advantage of the added speed. new blackberry bold does........not sure what else, even the *cough* iphone 4 doesn't
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ATT is only going to 7.1 HSDPA... at least offically announced as of a month ago.. I guess that could change.. They're doing LTE after that.

Re 3g in O-Town.
I have had full 3g bars when I visit my younger brother around Alfaya and UCF.

As far as off-topicness goes I do think XDA is large enough to need carrier forums..
But yes, 3G/2G switching where it previously wasn't, weak 3G, no 3G, 3G not working, are all signs that 3G is being worked on for HSPA+ which includes going from T1's to fiber backhaul
My sig shows what I get with my slow G1. This is in a high traffic area, where before it was .10Mbps during the same time, yes.. that slow and congested.
Also if you're not getting HSUPA you need to make sure your Nexus One has it enabled. Stock roms do have HSUPA enabled, some custom ones don't.

blisk said:
I was up in deland when I noticed the problems 2 nights ago with the 2g and not going to 3g in an area that I knew had 3g. This was actually during the day. I just tested it again within the last day before leaving and it was working again. Give it a week or two and I'm sure you'll see it. It seems the whole area is being upgraded including you. I'm on the older radio... update-1 radio.
Also please report problems to tmobile as you see them. I'm going to report my ****ty upload speeds. Looking online it seems other areas have better upload than I do. I mean 200kbps max 400 and choppy is just terrible.
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Cool. I was discouraged back in January when they supposedly flipped the switch to HSDPA. As it turned out the backhaul wasn't here to support it. The max down I can remember is right at 1Mbps. Most of the time its around 900Kbps. Uploads usually come in around 350Kbps, with 500 being the highest I've seen. I live in Deltona, but work in Lake Mary and the speeds have been similar in both locations.
I hope that with this rollout everything will be in place.

HSDPA was already active on the network. The most they did was enable HSUPA.

blisk said:
More than anything its the wireless spectrum they use and the fact that you're in a large buildling. Depending on the frequency your provider uses you'll have better luck than some indoors.. generally its all the same. Of course the number of towers is important too. But for example LTE on 700mhz will give verizon LTE speeds 8-10 miles from the tower, 2500mhz on wimax will give sprint 2-3 miles from the tower. Higher frequency means more bandwidth available however.
I'm in engineering at UCF and pretty good reception in HEC and engineering 1 as long as you're not in the inner part of the building and those hallways and labs you're good. Brick walls = signal drop with anything but the lower frequencies and a well covered area. It's pretty strong coverage over here though on this side of campus.
They do have paint and stuff that have metal in it I think because its illegal to have a device that emits a radio signal to jam cellphones, however blocking it with shielding isn't. I'm pretty certain its expensive though. This was years ago that I saw that link on it... don't know if it still exists.
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You can be right about that, but I think it's mostly older buildings to blame and not the fact that they did it on purpose to block cell phone usage. Classroom Building 1 has horrible reception and around it too. At my job (in Millican Hall) the reception is horrible at my coworkers office (but it could be because the office is near a lot of beams). So structure is sometimes the cause.
I also get almost no reception in my cousin's house. She lives a little bit past Pegasus Pointe.

prscott1 said:
Hey - starting last week, I noticed flaky things with T-mobile in Houston area similar to what OP stated. But over the weekend, I realized they were rolling out hsdpa+
Before today, the ul speeds were .5 - .6. Today, I'm getting between 1.5 and 1.8 ul speeds!
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I think you mean HSPA. HSDPA wouldn't help your Uplink.

saint327 said:
Cool. I was discouraged back in January when they supposedly flipped the switch to HSDPA. As it turned out the backhaul wasn't here to support it. The max down I can remember is right at 1Mbps. Most of the time its around 900Kbps. Uploads usually come in around 350Kbps, with 500 being the highest I've seen. I live in Deltona, but work in Lake Mary and the speeds have been similar in both locations.
I hope that with this rollout everything will be in place.
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I use to get approximately the same speed at my apartment.. with a place I work on campus getting 1.8mbps down and .3-.5 mbps up and that was the best speed I've gotten around here. Its alot better now.. i'm sure they're still tweaking it.. I hope they are with the upload speeds.. its choppy and inconsitant.. sometimes just stops. Download did that a couple times too but that's probably related to the terrible upload (downloading needs upload to request the next bits of data to be sent.. it sends "acks" to acknowledge that the packet of data was sent properly). It's just really bad sometimes around UCF where it refuses to send a text, make a phone call, or go online as it just has that stuck up arrow thing. Really annoying.
I called tmobile to complain about the upload speeds and I guess they didn't want to fill a report out. Also HSDPA+ is only in Philly and there is no way I could get it in this area they claim.. gave me a hard time about things. So I asked what the max speeds I should be getting and I said well I'm getting much faster than that.. why is that? I think its cause I called twice recently and they already filled out one for each occasion. I had to really be forceful about them filling one out for me.. with the original person one not filling it out and then transferring me to pda support and then he didn't want to either. Both said they couldn't select nexus one as a phone when reporting a service issue and the second guy just decided to bull**** me off the phone the whole time after finally admitting that. I said bull cause I just had two filled out previously... they just kept discounting what I was saying.

And you think you have bad 4G speeds...

Sprint says they have 4G in Boise, ID and the surrounding area including Nampa, which is where I live (About 20 mi. from Boise). I've been running speed test on 3g and 4g everywhere I go. I'm lucky if I even have the dot on 4G unless I'm in a sprint store or LOS of a tower.
So far, 4G is always half the speed of 3G, almost always. The only time it hasn't been much slower is when I was standing in the sprint store.
On 3G I avg. between 150 to 850 kbps down - 50 to 500ish up.
On 4G I've gotten anywhere from 150 to 3000 kbps down. But anything over 1000 kbps down was when I was standing in the sprint store or within sight of a sprint tower.
Ping is 200 at its low and has been all the way up to 800ms.
As far as which sprint servers I'm connected too, they seem to be anywhere from KS to CA and once in a while in ID or CO.
I don't know about you, but this seems to be wayy slower than what the rest of you are reporting as "slow", sadly. Because at this point, 3g is beating 4g and 3g isn't even close to its capasity. (Got 1.5mpbs down on my iphone 3G)
Wifi works great, 5 down, 1 up even with 0 bars cross the house, by the way.
I love the evo and android, and sprints pricing, but even with millions upon millions of iphones out there, att can somehow keep their speeds up.

I'm almost right there with you. I was driving down I-270 in St. Louis with full 4G bars and I was only getting 1.5 Mbps. I get that through 3G!!! So why am I enduring the pain of this battery life when I got the same speed from my blackberry?
Ok...that's not meant to be answered. I really really really love my Evo, but like any mobile device, it has its flaws.

i have a lot of family in both marsing and nampa, too bad they all have verizon, i myself live in fresno tx and area that is supposedly saturated in 4g according to both clear maps and sprint maps and i am not getting 4g at all, on top on that i one main sprint tower down the street and about 6-7 antennas (repeaters) in fresno, for any small town thats overkill and fresno is small i can get 4g if i walk down the street towards arcola (another small town next door) and in the opposite direction towards houston i get 4g but were i live nothing and the speeds....one 4g test says .65kbps up and 125kbps down

I usually get ~3mbs in st louis. I've had 9mbs bursts too.

Be patient..
I recommend being patient. In my area (where Clear has had a presence for while), as soon as the EVO came out, speeds hit the floor. My 3G was handily beating the 4G speeds I was getting up until a couple of days ago. My guess is that the influx of all these Wimax devices hit their network pretty hard and they're still doing whatever it is they do to bring the speeds back up.
On the brightside, I've gotta give them credit for at least keeping it stable. It may have been slow, but it always seemed to work when I switched to it.
I'm sure if it was AT&T we'd be screwed.

TeknoJnky said:
I usually get ~3mbs in st louis. I've had 9mbs bursts too.
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topdawgn8 said:
I'm almost right there with you. I was driving down I-270 in St. Louis with full 4G bars and I was only getting 1.5 Mbps. I get that through 3G!!!.
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I've only tested 4G through I-55 in Arnold and out in Fenton at Gravois Bluff. Moving I've never hit over 2-2.5mb, and stationary outside the Great Escape theater at Gravois Bluff I hit 3mb once. I have NEVER hit above 3, which is kind of a disappointment. It could just be the fact that Arnold & Fenton are both kinda on the fringe of 4G coverage, but still...
I'll be going into downtown Saturday for the Cardinals game and I'm interested to try it out then actually in the city. Hopefully it's a little better. Sprint, here's your chance to blow my mind with some amazing speeds
P.S. @TeknoJnky DAMN! You're lucky with those 9mb bursts! Thats as fast as my cable connection at home! Jealous...

I test my 4G speed, and it's usually 1/4 of the 3G speed, but i download webpages faster through the browser in 4G, despite the lower bandwidth score. It's a weird phenomenon, but another user on PPCGeeks mentioned the same thing.

Results from real-world testing 4G: Verizon LTE vs. Sprint WiMAX in NYC

So watching this video inspired me to do a little real-world field testing.
I just got out of the Verizon store by Grand Central in NYC.
This is disappointing, because I was pricing out the Thunderbolt all day and almost signed up.
Side to side, Sprint beat Verizon at least 75% of the time. It was always 2-4MBps faster on the download (~8MBps vs ~4MBps or so). The other 25% of the time that Verizon was faster it was about 1MBps or less.
I checked coverage maps before I did this and Verizon has full dark red 4G coverage all over NYC, so it should be as fast as it can get. And I can't imagine there's a lot of congestion on their network the day after the phone came out.
Sprint on the other hand has only light green coverage (not dark green "best") in that area. Again, I was inside the store so LTE should have had the edge.
The latencies were comparable, both around 110ms. The only part that blew me away was Verizon's upload speed, about 38MBps compared to Sprint's 1MBps. But as we all know download is more important than upload.
Sorry to say, but LTE isn't all that it's cracked up to be, at least when and where I checked it for myself. Surprisingly, Sprint seems to hold the crown for 4G speeds at the moment.

The problem is as always talked about - the fact that WiMAX kills battery and i assume LTE does the same. They need to come up with a way to have these great - high speed options with better battery life or its relatively useless.

I think the problem with wimax is penetration, because I was at the park today in Philadelphia Pa(Center City). and I reached speeds of 8.04 Mbps but when I am at home (South Philadelphia)...I barely get 1.5Mbps...

OPPOSITE here in Chicago. Both had strong signals
Evo got hammered by the T-Bolt repeatedly on site downloads and speedyest apps. Not even close. ONE time in 15 minutes of test Evo beat TBolt and that's because I didn't hit the Url cleanly!
LTE Verizon + TBolt is fastest mobile phone experience to date. By a mile.
Sprint Wimax is a crock.
aph said:
So watching this video inspired me to do a little real-world field testing.
I just got out of the Verizon store by Grand Central in NYC.
This is disappointing, because I was pricing out the Thunderbolt all day and almost signed up.
Side to side, Sprint beat Verizon at least 75% of the time. It was always 2-4MBps faster on the download (~8MBps vs ~4MBps or so). The other 25% of the time that Verizon was faster it was about 1MBps or less.
I checked coverage maps before I did this and Verizon has full dark red 4G coverage all over NYC, so it should be as fast as it can get. And I can't imagine there's a lot of congestion on their network the day after the phone came out.
Sprint on the other hand has only light green coverage (not dark green "best") in that area. Again, I was inside the store so LTE should have had the edge.
The latencies were comparable, both around 110ms. The only part that blew me away was Verizon's upload speed, about 38MBps compared to Sprint's 1MBps. But as we all know download is more important than upload.
Sorry to say, but LTE isn't all that it's cracked up to be, at least when and where I checked it for myself. Surprisingly, Sprint seems to hold the crown for 4G speeds at the moment.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

jonathaflores said:
I think the problem with wimax is penetration, because I was at the park today in Philadelphia Pa(Center City). and I reached speeds of 8.04 Mbps but when I am at home (South Philadelphia)...I barely get 1.5Mbps...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I was INSIDE the store , a good 20 yards away from any exit

rockky said:
OPPOSITE here in Chicago. Both had strong signals
Evo got hammered by the T-Bolt repeatedly on site downloads and speedyest apps. Not even close. ONE time in 15 minutes of test Evo beat TBolt and that's because I didn't hit the Url cleanly!
LTE Verizon + TBolt is fastest mobile phone experience to date. By a mile.
Sprint Wimax is a crock.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Appreciate the feedback, but simply not so in NYC. So decidedly very regional.

You didn't get that high of an upload speed. I know your phone says you did, but you didn't. Google it.
Btw id drop sprint for verizon anytime, but the girl won't let me grrr
swyped from my cyanogenized and gingerbreaded EVO

Yay for WiMax, if I paid attention to my networking class correctly, WiMax will be expanding for faster up and download speeds in the next year or so.

twiz0r said:
You didn't get that high of an upload speed. I know your phone says you did, but you didn't. Google it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Tried, got a link?
twiz0r said:
Btw id drop sprint for verizon anytime, but the girl won't let me grrr
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I was planning on the same thing today until I ran the tests side by side.

I only get a download speed of about 2.5 MBps and upload of about 1.7 MBps in St. Louis.
And it kicks me off the 4G every 2-3 minutes. My 3G speeds are literally in the 100-200 KB/s range.
It's the most pathetic thing I've ever experienced. Can't believe I've got one of the best phones on the market with speeds as terrible as these.
I tried to download a beer drinking app the other day from my car and it took a good 10 minutes to download.
EDIT: The St. Louis, MO server is 25.80 miles away. My last test just got 107 KB/s download speed. I wish I were exaggerating.

aph said:
Tried, got a link?
I was planning on the same thing today until I ran the tests side by side.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
go to engadget and read their review on the Thunderbolt. They have a report from speedtest.net saying their app doesn't accurately test the upload speed of the phone. An update will be out shortly to fix the issue. I would assume other speed test sites are the same. The phone hooked up to a PC via hotspot produces much slower uploads than the "38" your phone told you it does cause it is tested correctly. All of that info is found in engadgets post.

aph said:
So watching [Link Removed] video inspired me to do a little real-world field testing.
I just got out of the Verizon store by Grand Central in NYC.
This is disappointing, because I was pricing out the Thunderbolt all day and almost signed up.
Side to side, Sprint beat Verizon at least 75% of the time. It was always 2-4MBps faster on the download (~8MBps vs ~4MBps or so). The other 25% of the time that Verizon was faster it was about 1MBps or less.
I checked coverage maps before I did this and Verizon has full dark red 4G coverage all over NYC, so it should be as fast as it can get. And I can't imagine there's a lot of congestion on their network the day after the phone came out.
Sprint on the other hand has only light green coverage (not dark green "best") in that area. Again, I was inside the store so LTE should have had the edge.
The latencies were comparable, both around 110ms. The only part that blew me away was Verizon's upload speed, about 38MBps compared to Sprint's 1MBps. But as we all know download is more important than upload.
Sorry to say, but LTE isn't all that it's cracked up to be, at least when and where I checked it for myself. Surprisingly, Sprint seems to hold the crown for 4G speeds at the moment.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
HAHA thats funny, i was at the same verizon store last week and i had the same results as well.

The things that will condemn Sprint's 4G in competition against Verizon's LTE have more to do with external factors than the technologies themselves.
Here in Houston is a perfect example. This was a debut WiMAX network, but has been largely abandoned (along with a ton of other cities) by Clear in favor of spending on new-market rollouts in places like Hemet, CA (I suppose the buffalo and trailer parks needed 10Mbps down on the go) and building worthless retail locations. The Sprint 4G map shows dead spots at a great many busy intersections here in town, and the Clear map shows no planned expansion to remedy the issue. Even Clear's current developmental floundering is set to come to a grinding halt as Clear runs out of debt capacity. Sprint can't/won't come riding to the rescue for two reasons: (1) Sprint shot its load on the network modernization project in December; (2) Sprint and Clear already had a falling out over the last few billion Clear wasted on retail locations instead of service and coverage upgrades. WiMAX coverage in most locations is unreliable and spotty (Try watching ESPN on Sprint TV next time you are on a highway as a passenger for more than 2 straight minutes) and that will almost assuredly not improve.
The bottom line is that Sprint and Clear have neither means nor unity of purpose required to deliver a solid, reliable nationwide 4G network. Verizon has deep pockets and only 1 management chain to control. Unless Sprint's modernization project is going to be truly revolutionary in what it delivers to the entire Sprint coverage footprint, Sprint's 4G just can't compete long-term against the Verizon money machine. I can already see the Verizon guy walking around with a Thunderbolt everywhere going "Is it streaming in HD now? ... Good." Verizon can and will deliver more dense and reliable 4G coverage than Sprint in the next couple of years.

I'm in Houston and I have a Thunderbolt for test purposes. Speedtests show download speeds of 18-40mb/s consistently, and I've also hit 50 mb/s occasionally. Upload speeds have been proven incorrect on the speedtest app, but when I go to the speedtest website and test uploads are showing 3-4mb/s.
Sprint Wimax doesn't work at my house so I leave it off most of the time. When it does work I normally get 3-5mb/s.
Clear is broke and i don't expect them to do much building out until they find an investor, but I don't see that happening. Tmobile was rumored to have some interest because they needed spectrum, but now with the AT&T deal this isn't gonna happen.
Sprint has signed a deal with Lightsquared and I expect to see LTE sooner rather than later. Lightsquared is backed by a private equity firm (it means they have money). Their goal is to build out a nationwide LTE network and be a wholesaler (unlike Clear who wanted so badly to have a successful retail operation). Sprint is a partner, and Cricket has also signed a deal with them. Sprint's deal with Lightsquared will also allow them to put their equipment on Sprint's towers so this well help with the build out. Previously Sprint wanted Clear to do the same and help coordinate the build out, but Clear refused and wanted to do their own thing. Lightsquared has spectrum I believe in the 1600mhz frequencies so penetration won't be an issue like 2500mhz wimax.
Check out Lightsquared's website for more info. They expect to have some consumer products available the 2nd half of 2011, and they say smartphones from partners in 2012. Everything I've posted I pieced together reading about Sprint and Lightsquared, but I think this makes a lot of sense.