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So yesterday I got the email from sprint,followed the link and it took me to a "comming soon" page....WTF. So I call sprint, rep asked someone else in the room and said aug. 20. Then I figured I Might as well confirm contract pricing and stuff. She said that the $10/mo. Fee allows higher speed/wider bandwidth connection even on 3g network locations. Can evo owners confirm or deny this?
She also seemed to hint that we might get some sort of pre-notification/pre-order email if your on that list or whatever, I think its all just some sort of bass aackwords social media campain to keep us talking about it...........epic 4g..epic 4g..epic 4g..epic 4g,can I have my phone now?
Evo 4g still is only at select locations "due to unprecidented demand" WTF. Sprint you better pull your head out of your bass and hook an "early adoptor" up.
ummm, what?
radar5 said:
ummm, what?
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That's what I would've said.
Anyway does anyone know if the Epic 4g is gonna cost that $10 extra a month? It's not really all that big of a deal but I still wanna know.
I'd bet 10$ it will. Its here to stay on 4g phones.
Yes its going to cost the extra 10.
I can assure you that they are no faster on 3g than we are. 3g is '3g' is "3g" is EVDO RevA. The technologies don't allow for one device to be different than than other one. The towers don't give an EVO a priority over a Hero, its just not how things work. If the EVO does get a better speed test its because it can process the data faster, so if a website feels like it loads faster - it probably does - but its all in rendering not in the network.
And yes, the $10.00 fee will be there. I am not sure what everyones big deal is with it. It gives you the ability to hit 4G if you can, its a lot easier for sprint to tell you that you can connect to 4G regardless of where you live than for them to keep track of 4G users and non 4G users.
Given I do think they need a 3g super phone for those of you who are complaining.
All about the fee...
Try out explainthefee dot com
Kcarpenter said:
I can assure you that they are no faster on 3g than we are. 3g is '3g' is "3g" is EVDO RevA. The technologies don't allow for one device to be different than than other one. The towers don't give an EVO a priority over a Hero, its just not how things work. If the EVO does get a better speed test its because it can process the data faster, so if a website feels like it loads faster - it probably does - but its all in rendering not in the network.
And yes, the $10.00 fee will be there. I am not sure what everyones big deal is with it. It gives you the ability to hit 4G if you can, its a lot easier for sprint to tell you that you can connect to 4G regardless of where you live than for them to keep track of 4G users and non 4G users.
Given I do think they need a 3g super phone for those of you who are complaining.
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Ok so I kind of accepted what she said ( I don't argue with children or uninformed people),but I asked "sooo the fee makes me somekind of priority user?" She replied "yes" I said "ummm ok". Please understand that I'm not saying she was right or truthful. Also when I went into the sprint store to ask about coverage in my little 3 stoplight town they had multiple overlapping signal strength maps on their terminal (3 I think). They were telling me yes your in 3g coverage area, yes your in area for cell modem, hotspot at home etc. Its my understanding all of these devices operate on the same network, but at differant speeds usually, isn't a cell modem plan more than adding data coverage and also faster? IDK maybe cell modem users do have priority.
The reason makes sense to me is because I use to move pretty often and I had a blackberry pearl that I bought when it first came out specifically for use as usb tether modem. Whenever the local high school let out for the day my connection would take a dump, so I would call T-mobile and explain my problem," is there anything you can do, this is a really important work project? They'd say hold on ill try to boost your network priority. I did this 2-3 times a week and it seemed to work, every time I called in I got the same response,T-mo RIM support had their own dept. Back in the day and they were actually quite good. This took place from 4-2 years ago.
Disclaimer
I am not a lawyer, don't play one on tv, and didn't sleep in a holiday inn express lastnight.
harrybozack said:
Try out explainthefee dot com
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You could just choose not to have Sprint. You always have that choice. They aren't adding the fee to current subscribers without possibly using the service. Unlike the other carriers with similar products, the user experience IS very different. I don't know if its your website, or a website you're just fond of. But if you really want to make Sprint pay for their $10 fee, then don't use them. Even with the $10 fee, they still sold out on the Evo, maybe its because their service isn't half-bad for what you do pay for.
Would you complain to the BBB about AT&T just announcing tiered data plans? No, because there is nothing you can do about it. Want an Iphone 4, pay for your extra data you'll use. VZW will go this way soon enough.
They are charging $10 extra a month on all of their 4G phones now. They charge evo $10 extra for the chance to use 4G if you can find it.
Ok so I went to explainthefee.com read the transcript and some other stuff. My guess is that some mid level exec. business school graduate got his hot little hands on a evo, flexed its muscles and decided that they "could/should" charge more. Keep in mind 2 things, firstly these guys running the companies don't understand/care about "fringe users like us" their personal phones are not rooted/overclocked/themed they have no idea!,they may have never bothered using youtube etc. On a smaller screeen device. Secondly the new CEO of sprint turned the company around and wanted to offer the lowest priced plans available with the most everything. They want it both ways and that's why they can't answer a simple question "what am I paying for".
I guess the 10$ is for..........Ummm well were not going to restructure our entire rate plan menu because of one device are we? I mean we signed a contract for 1.5m rate plan pamplets, and those little signs in all the stores.........etc.
I say after the epic is released we start a serious email/bbb campain they don't seem to have any firm ground to stand on. They will raise all rate plans $10 or more and allow us our legacy plans without the $10 fee.
Remember AFTER epic release............... Say 10 days?
Indeed, as far as I know, what they're doing is essentially unheard of in the US. I wasn't into phones as much back in 2002 or so when 3G first got started, but I do know that nowadays you don't have to pay an extra surcharge for EDGE over GPRS, or HSPA over EDGE (apologies for the GSM examples). You pay for Internet on other carriers, plain and simple. It would be slightly easier to take if they at least gave you the choice to not use their 4G Internet, especially since it might not be available where you live anyway, and they may have no plans to make it available.
BTW Thank You harrybozack for explainthefee.com
All future epic owners and sprint customers should be aware of
explainthefee.com and their efforts.
explainthefee.com
Epic4g...epic4g...epic4g...epic4g...epic4g...epic4g...epic4g...epic 4g...epic 4g...epic 4g...epic 4g......
Can I purchase my phone now?
gophergun said:
Indeed, as far as I know, what they're doing is essentially unheard of in the US. I wasn't into phones as much back in 2002 or so when 3G first got started, but I do know that nowadays you don't have to pay an extra surcharge for EDGE over GPRS, or HSPA over EDGE (apologies for the GSM examples). You pay for Internet on other carriers, plain and simple. It would be slightly easier to take if they at least gave you the choice to not use their 4G Internet, especially since it might not be available where you live anyway, and they may have no plans to make it available.
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You do realize that when the iPhone 3G came out, they jacked up the cost of the internet plans on AT&T right? I THINK it was $20 for the 1st gen, and $30 for the 3G.
reply
entropism said:
You do realize that when the iPhone 3G came out, they jacked up the cost of the internet plans on AT&T right? I THINK it was $20 for the 1st gen, and $30 for the 3G.
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Firstly we are Android users, and as such I don't drink from the kool-aid cup of at&t/steve jobs/apple. Secondly at&t aplies their rates evenly on all users. Would I pay more per month
For a i4 vs i3gs?
And in conclusion what product or service is being provided for $10/mo. Or $120/yr Or in my case $240/yr? Am I renting a big screen/fast processor/whatever, in addition to paying for the device and service?
I'm sorry but I'm so tired of reading about the $10 fee, (Did a lot of lurking on the EVO forums before it released)
The $10 sucks, but it does allow you to access 4G in various locations around the country. Out of the 5 or 6 Cities I'm visiting in the next year, 4G is everywhere but Wichita so I won't be missing out.
Even then, paying $79.99 for a plan is still cheaper than what you would pay with AT&T and Verizon.
If you're too upset to pay the fee, it's not that hard to switch to another company that offers a comparable high level android phone and not have to pay that $10. Maybe if you and enough like minded people don't sign up for the 4G phones, it'll make a difference to Sprint.
I just get so tired of seeing these same old complaints from people and then they turn around and get the phone anyway!
So let me explain the fee:
With Comcast/Charter you have different levels of speed you are able to get - you pay more for faster speed. They cannot guarantee that you will get 25 mb/s but - you pay for it any way...theres your explanation. You don't want the fee, don't buy the hardware.
I don't understand the drama.
kgold708 said:
Ok so I kind of accepted what she said ( I don't argue with children or uninformed people),but I asked "sooo the fee makes me somekind of priority user?" She replied "yes" I said "ummm ok". Please understand that I'm not saying she was right or truthful. Also when I went into the sprint store to ask about coverage in my little 3 stoplight town they had multiple overlapping signal strength maps on their terminal (3 I think). They were telling me yes your in 3g coverage area, yes your in area for cell modem, hotspot at home etc. Its my understanding all of these devices operate on the same network, but at differant speeds usually, isn't a cell modem plan more than adding data coverage and also faster? IDK maybe cell modem users do have priority.
The reason makes sense to me is because I use to move pretty often and I had a blackberry pearl that I bought when it first came out specifically for use as usb tether modem. Whenever the local high school let out for the day my connection would take a dump, so I would call T-mobile and explain my problem," is there anything you can do, this is a really important work project? They'd say hold on ill try to boost your network priority. I did this 2-3 times a week and it seemed to work, every time I called in I got the same response,T-mo RIM support had their own dept. Back in the day and they were actually quite good. This took place from 4-2 years ago.
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There is a priority on the network, and it would probably allow you to drop less calls. I think priority 0 is reserved for emergency departments use - but speed would not be affected by it. Just how often you can poll the tower and how likely you are to be bumped off in high traffic.
1: I'm ok with paying $10 extra for decreased latancy/higher network priority. Not ok with "enhanced user experience" BS
2: I am going to sign a contract for @$3840-4000, 2 devices 2yr contract, that $10 fee is $480. If I pay over $500 (after tax) for something, don't you think I should know what it is?
3: Sprint fanboys/employees,how about next time they charge $20/mo (Android 3.0 provides an enhanced-enhanced experience).
Companies are being really stupid when it comes to 4G, and the Ipad having 4g is really dumb because of the dumb choices by the cell phone companies. Whats the problem? Should be obvious, data caps. What the hell is the point of faster internet when you can't use it without paying hefty premiums? I am watching verizon advertisements about 4G and how you can download 1100 songs and stream multiple HD movies and it makes me sick. Sure you can download 1100 songs on 4g, if you don't use ur internet for single byte of data for anything else. Sure I can quickly stream movies over 4g, whats the point when the movie will eat up half my data plan? Sure webpages will load faster, but the only websites where it will make a real difference are ones that will eat up my data. What do they think, people want their email messages to download faster? OOO I have 4g, my one email downloads half a second faster. Give me a break.
Putting 4G on the new Ipad I think is more for marketing than it is for anything else, because people will quickly realize that their data usage bills are through the roof when they start using that data for a lot of the things people will use an Ipad for, and by that time it will be too late, they already bought the product. In the long run this will create a ton of consumer backlash. I am so glad I am grandfathered in with unlimited data, because if I had a data cap life would be extremely difficult in regards to my cell phone and tablet usage (HTC Thunderbolt with wireless tether)
AMEN BROTHER!
Just like no sd cards in phone, they give you cloud storage for free, but you get to pay for data. My sd card never charges me when I use it! This is a blatant ploy by the wireless providers to get us to use more and more data, paying them more and more, when they claim they are struggling to keep up with demand and don't have enough spectrum!
Sent from my Inspire 4G using XDA
Your right that's one other thing. I love the claims that they need data caps to keep up with demand on a 4g spectrum that is no where near capacity, its so insane how selfish and greedy they can be.
PS I also have grandfathered unlimited data and ATT decided that unlimited is really 3gb and then you get switched to edge. I never agreed to this. I guess big companies can do whatever they want.
And by the way, The HTC Vivid is still sending some data over 4g even when you are on WiFi! I have seen it on 3 phones now! 1.6gb 3 weeks usage, only gmail and weather when not on WiFi, very minimal user, no streaming, no downloading! Beware!
Sent from my Inspire 4G using XDA
Well Bros
You Guys are Talking "4G",
Whereas we ,in Pakistan are still Waiting for 3G To be launched...
Or, you could go with someone that offers unlimited data still or buy unbranded like I did.
z33dev33l said:
Or, you could go with someone that offers unlimited data still or buy unbranded like I did.
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In America the only major carrier that still offers unlimited data to new customers is Sprint, who is known for being one of the worst carriers when it comes to getting a signal. I do not know if Europe or other areas have 4G coverage yet and if those countries have options when it comes to unlimited bandwidth.
Also what do you mean when you say buying unbranded?
T mobile does, att does on prepaid.
z33dev33l said:
T mobile does, att does on prepaid.
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You are sort of right about Tmobile, they won't charge you for overages, but you get dropped to the lower speed network when you go over your plans allotment for 4g, you can pay for 2 gb of 4g speed or you can pay more for 5 gb of 4g speed, so they are still doing tiered data plans and charging more for higher allotment, but doing what ATT does when you go over your plans allotment and dropping you to slow speed.
I believe this should still be considered a problem when they advertise all the high bandwidth things you can do with 4G but require you to either pay a hefty premium to have a decent amount high speed data or force you to crawl internet speeds when you don't want to pay extra but want to do internet intensive things. I just feel its shady marketing practices, especially the current verizon 4gb data 4g ad.
And clearly I do not know how to spell allotment.
I'd hardly consider 3g a crawl...
Would you consider dial-up a crawl? I'm using it now and I would like to shout some distasteful comments about it
Sent from my Lemon™ 5GS using Tapatalk
I get 3g speeds after running my 4g into the ground.
sfetaz said:
In America the only major carrier that still offers unlimited data to new customers is Sprint, who is known for being one of the worst carriers when it comes to getting a signal. I do not know if Europe or other areas have 4G coverage yet and if those countries have options when it comes to unlimited bandwidth.
Also what do you mean when you say buying unbranded?
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Speaking for europe I can say there is no 4G in uk but plans for 4G within two years.
We are stuck with 3G which cost me five pound for five hundred mb.
Dave
Sent from my LG P920 using Tapatalk
We have a 30Gb data limit here in Finland for 4G LTE.
The carriers want you to go over your data limit so they can charge you more. Then they want to recharge you for the same data if you want to tether with it. And for some of us we don't have a choice of many carriers if we want coverage.
They also impose the data cap because VZ is marketing part of their 4g bandwidth to customers now. FIOS is in pretty limited markets and it's a pretty low-cost method for VZ as they don't have to put down new cables or anything. What sucks though is that now you will have people attempting to run all their normal computer data over the same data network as people on their phones which doesn't seem like it will have a good outcome.
Unlimited data
This is the only reason I will not switch from Sprint to Verizon or AT&T. UNLIMITED data! Sooner or later Sprint will take the lead for this simple reason...
All these companies need to break away from wanting consumers to sign a new contract for data on a tablet.
I also believe that having 4G on an iPad is pointless because if you get a texting+voice app you now have a huge iPhone.
Well the telecommunication corporations in north America charge the most in the world so what do you expect. Furthermore, they can get away with it and there is nothing you the consumer can really do about it because it is something such a wide spread amount of people use that they can charge whatever they want.
Not to go off topic but I think socializing the telecommunications industry would be the best course of action as it is a universal service that pretty much everyone uses. It would lower the rates greatly if there wasn't a huge mark up on all the services.
Then again anything a little related to communism is scary because you know Nixon said so and corporations tend to push technology further to stay ahead of their competition so meh.
http://blogs.barrons.com/techtrader...-on-iphone-lte-prospect/?mod=google_news_blog
The article basically states given the Sprint LTE spectrum, there is pretty much a 2mbps limit.
I was going to upgrade to an LTE phone in June because I heard LTE was right around the corner, but if it's going to be anything like the Wimax rollout, then I might just eat the unlimited data loss, and hope verizon rolls around with the 4GB data package again soon. In the past 2 years, I've used on average 600mb to 1gb per month.
What do you guys think. Anyone with a contract expiring soon, or anyone in general have any opinions?
I think caping data limits is gunna be a big hit to sprint. All most all of my friends who have sprint have it because of the unlimited data. Theyll loose a lot of customers
Sent from my Desire HD using xda premium
Sprint is horrible around my area.. I guess it could get worse.
They've already publicly announce they will not have caps whatsoever. Unlimited 4g LTE (just dont torrent / hotspot ~ tether).
+ the only thing they they got is their unlimited data plans anyways. Kill that and you will kill the customer base and they know it.
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Hi, thanks for looking at my thread. Hopefully you can help me out. My situation is described below.
My family and I are currently on a Verizon Wireless plan. We have two smartphones connected to the plan, and two dumb phones. One smartphone has been grandfathered into the unlimited 4G data plan and needs to keep it because that line uses about 4-8GB/month. The other smartphone is on the tiered data plan of 2GB, which is fine for this line because it uses about 1-1.25GB/month. We have 1400 minutes (we do not use all of this) and unlimited text (necessary) shared throughout the plan. We are using a corporate discount, yet our bill is still ~$200USD/month, which is pretty absurd for what we get in return. The two dumb phone users really wish to upgrade their line to smartphones, but we have not proceeded because the bill is already quite high and we are looking for alternatives. The contract is ending in the next few months, and I am looking for guidance on what to do that would allow the following:
# of lines: 4 (all smart phones)
Minutes: 800-1000 shared
Text: Unlimited shared
Data: Preferably unlimited, but each device really only needs about 2GB, with the exception to the one line requiring unlimited. Also, 4G is important, and I have grown to love the speed, but it is something I am willing to part with to allow the other two lines upgrade to smartphones.
My goal is to overall lower the monthly costs of our plan and allow all four lines obtain smartphones. From research, I have found that this, from my knowledge, is more than unlikely to occur at Verizon Wireless and this is why we are planning on taking our business elsewhere. I have been doing intense research on prepaid plans, and considering this instead of the traditional plan, but I am new to this and need some guidance.
If anyone wouldn't mind pointing me in the right direction, I would really appreciate it. All suggestions are highly appreciated.
Lastly, since one of the lines requires a more extensive plan (unlimited data), I am willing to split that line into a second plan if it would save money as the other lines would more than likely be able to share 5GB/month.
Thank you very much!
If you need any additional information, please let me know.
Honestly it depends on coverage for all the carriers. If you have good coverage on all four carriers I'd consider T-Mobile honestly. If your current Verizon smartphones have GSM built in you should be able to get good speeds. Or you could sell your account (with the unlimited grandfathered plan, you could get something good for that), then use the money to recoup some of the cost involved with moving over. I think out of the four postpaid carriers T-Mobile isn't a bad way to go, and data is per line. There's also plenty of prepaid options like Virgin Mobile. You can get the $35 plan x4 = $140 a month (pay a little more for the one line with more data) and you can get 4G up to either 2.5 or 3.5GB unthrottled then it throttles down. If VM/Sprint works good in your area that might be something to consider.
Honestly it's gonna take research. The problem is if you sign up for a plan you'll have to pay for phones. If you have the money to plunk it down up front you could buy 4 Nexus 4s or even find some used phones and start there off of like Craigslist/eBay or something. You can very easily spend less than $200 a month, just do some research.
You never did state your area.
Thank you very much for your reply. I am sorry I forgot to state my area, I am in central Ohio, USA. I live in a rural area, so out of most providers, we don't get the best service. I'm on the very edge of Verizon's 4G service (I only get it in one corner of the house), but this is not particularly important because our wifi works quite well, and 4G LTE is a battery hog anyhow. I've been looking into T-Mobile, especially since they announced their family plan, but I'm slightly worried about coverage because some people I have spoken with said they cannot even receive text when in our area, and that would be a big problem. I may look into grabbing a monthly prepaid on one line and testing the network prior to switching. Thanks again!
Edit: http://www.t-mobile.com/shop/plans/family-plans.aspx is the tmobile family plans I am referring to, but unfortunately, this is only saving $20/mo, but on the bright side, everyone is able to have smartphones on the plan.
c21johnson said:
Thank you very much for your reply. I am sorry I forgot to state my area, I am in central Ohio, USA. I live in a rural area, so out of most providers, we don't get the best service. I'm on the very edge of Verizon's 4G service (I only get it in one corner of the house), but this is not particularly important because our wifi works quite well, and 4G LTE is a battery hog anyhow. I've been looking into T-Mobile, especially since they announced their family plan, but I'm slightly worried about coverage because some people I have spoken with said they cannot even receive text when in our area, and that would be a big problem. I may look into grabbing a monthly prepaid on one line and testing the network prior to switching. Thanks again!
Edit: http://www.t-mobile.com/shop/plans/family-plans.aspx is the tmobile family plans I am referring to, but unfortunately, this is only saving $20/mo, but on the bright side, everyone is able to have smartphones on the plan.
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If you're in a partner area, then yeah you will only get roaming coverage, which will suck. If your area is a 2g area, you will get either GRPS which is dialup speeds or edge which is up to 256kbps down, but really is more like 100 kbps or maybe 150 kbps real world conditions, enough for streaming Pandora on low or having it buffer. Since I don't know exactly, it looks like Sprint only has 3g so it may be crappy fast but might be decent (comparable to Verizon 3g EVDO, but slower as they don't seem to have as much bandwidth to their towers as Verizon). You might ask people on Sprint/AT&T and then consider Virgin Mobile.
Another option is to get a SIM card and test the network on prepaid for T-Mobile. They let you have full access to their network speeds in your area on prepaid so if you have a LTE capable phone unlocked and stick a T-Mobile SIM in and active on like the $3 a day play or the $30 5GB plan you would get LTE speeds. But you'd be stuck on edge probably and you might have to go with one of the big two companies or maybe Sprint. Some MVNOs are pretty good and reading up on HowardForums would be a better option
Looks like John Legere just said, "hahaha sucka.. you've been baited to our unlimited data cap"
It has come to our attention over the past few days – thanks to a couple of our readers – that T-Mobile has changed the fine print to its unlimited 4G LTE Simple Choice plans. Head on over to the individual plans or family plans page on T-Mobile’s website and you’ll see the following short line added at the bottom of the page:
“*Unlimited 4G LTE customers who use more than 21 GB of data in a bill cycle will have their data usage de-prioritized compared to other customers for that bill cycle at locations and times when competing network demands occur, resulting in relatively slower speeds.”
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http://www.tmonews.com/2015/06/21gb...mobiles-unlimited-4g-lte-simple-choice-plans/
What are you thoughts?
I avg 35-45gb a month. But how do we know if our area is congested?
Legere has been bashing other companies about their throttle, but yet he's doing the same thing.
twe90kid said:
What are you thoughts?
I avg 35-45gb a month.
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What and how much are you downloading?
twe90kid said:
Looks like John Legere just said, "hahaha sucka.. you've been baited to our unlimited data cap"
http://www.tmonews.com/2015/06/21gb...mobiles-unlimited-4g-lte-simple-choice-plans/
What are you thoughts?
I avg 35-45gb a month. But how do we know if our area is congested?
Legere has been bashing other companies about their throttle, but yet he's doing the same thing.
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Not trying to pick a fight, but I'd like to hear how you consistently use that much data on your phone. I'd consider myself a heavy user, and I do break the tethering rules a few times a week, and I don't think I've ever passed 20GB in a month.
ummduh said:
Not trying to pick a fight, but I'd like to hear how you consistently use that much data on your phone. I'd consider myself a heavy user, and I do break the tethering rules a few times a week, and I don't think I've ever passed 20GB in a month.
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A fight it is, lol. But seriously is not about how much data someone's uses but if this is true then it's the fact that John goes around bashing AT&T and Verizon but then pulls this $hit. How much data you use is non of my business but have you ever watch a 5 min YouTube video in 1080 or 1440? There goes about half a Gb.
ummduh said:
Not trying to pick a fight, but I'd like to hear how you consistently use that much data on your phone. I'd consider myself a heavy user, and I do break the tethering rules a few times a week, and I don't think I've ever passed 20GB in a month.
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Breaking 30 - 40 GB is easy depending where you are. Last year I took a family vacation to Disney World and forgot to bring my laptop to store each days videos and pictures. At the time I had a G3 and wife had a Note 3.
At the end of the day our phones would be out of storage when recording videos in 4K and taking pictures in max resolution. Our only two options for making storage space available was to either buy storage for our phones or to upload everything to google drive, dropbox, youtube, box .... Having the unlimited dataplan, why not use it and just upload everything each night so we can clear our phones the next day. Doing this over five days four nights we used over 80 GB of data combined (all videos ended up on youtube while phones were saved in the cloud.
We are going to Disney and Universal in a couple weeks and I plan on doing this again. Outside of special occasions like this, I think we used between 6 and 10 GB combined a month.
moehagene said:
Breaking 30 - 40 GB is easy depending where you are. Last year I took a family vacation to Disney World and forgot to bring my laptop to store each days videos and pictures. At the time I had a G3 and wife had a Note 3.
At the end of the day our phones would be out of storage when recording videos in 4K and taking pictures in max resolution. Our only two options for making storage space available was to either buy storage for our phones or to upload everything to google drive, dropbox, youtube, box .... Having the unlimited dataplan, why not use it and just upload everything each night so we can clear our phones the next day. Doing this over five days four nights we used over 80 GB of data combined (all videos ended up on youtube while phones were saved in the cloud.
We are going to Disney and Universal in a couple weeks and I plan on doing this again. Outside of special occasions like this, I think we used between 6 and 10 GB combined a month.
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Yup.
With a rooted phone and having xposed. My youtube is set to play 1440P as long as it's available.
I also upload my 4k videos that I record at car events.
Photos that you take are about 5mb each (16mp).
Just streaming music and video daily will easily eat 21 GB in less than two weeks. I have a feeling this might get repealed or changed to 31. At least that's a gig a day. It's kinda hypocritical like people have said. There's some interesting comments on tmonews under the article. This will really screw the commuters in big cities plus those who listen to music or videos via headphones at work etc. I guess we really need to see how it goes because there are a few unanswered questions here like what are the peak times and if this changes from tower to tower after depriorization. We'll have to just see how this affects people.
sino8r said:
Just streaming music and video daily will easily eat 21 GB in less than two weeks. I have a feeling this might get repealed or changed to 31. At least that's a gig a day. It's kinda hypocritical like people have said. There's some interesting comments on tmonews under the article. This will really screw the commuters in big cities plus those who listen to music or videos via headphones at work etc. I guess we really need to see how it goes because there are a few unanswered questions here like what are the peak times and if this changes from tower to tower after depriorization. We'll have to just see how this affects people.
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I still like to know what the deprioritize speed is.. for example, if you hit 21gb. And your in a congested area, what speed are you capped at? 1mbps? 5mbps? 10mbps?
Also, does it mean that if we jump from one network to another network, the prioritizing stops? What happens if we go back to the original network, does it start again?
twe90kid said:
I still like to know what the deprioritize speed is.. for example, if you hit 21gb. And your in a congested area, what speed are you capped at? 1mbps? 5mbps? 10mbps?
Also, does it mean that if we jump from one network to another network, the prioritizing stops? What happens if we go back to the original network, does it start again?
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Exactly... Not sure. Some people in the comments on tmonews are clarifying some of those concerns. But really it just seems like speculation so far. I guess we'll see... Not really happy about this myself.
I wouldn't get too upset about it. A good network always has a QOS system in place.
Note that the statement says 'de-prioritized', not throttled. Instead of assigning your account to a lower bandwidth speed, you could be placed in a lower tier in a packet queuing scheduler. This doesn't necessarily limit your bandwidth, it just lets other user's packets go first. When an area is 100% congested, your 'share' of the bandwidth will be less than others. Once there is free network capacity your bandwidth would go back to normal as there would be enough free resources to do so. Realize that network saturation changes by the second, so unless a congested area is constantly overloaded at 100% capacity, you shouldn't experience much speed reduction.
This is completely within the new FCC rules, and is actually a good network management practice.
xanmato said:
I wouldn't get too upset about it. A good network always has a QOS system in place.
Note that the statement says 'de-prioritized', not throttled. Instead of assigning your account to a lower bandwidth speed, you could be placed in a lower tier in a packet queuing scheduler. This doesn't necessarily limit your bandwidth, it just lets other user's packets go first. When an area is 100% congested, your 'share' of the bandwidth will be less than others. Once there is free network capacity your bandwidth would go back to normal as there would be enough free resources to do so. Realize that network saturation changes by the second, so unless a congested area is constantly overloaded at 100% capacity, you shouldn't experience much speed reduction.
This is completely within the new FCC rules, and is actually a good network management practice.
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Yeah it's good in theory (compared to plain throttling) but we haven't really seen it in practical application so far. I live in medium sized city (300 thousand city/1 million metro) and don't have much to worry about really. I have WiFi at work/home and no real excuse to use 60GB a month like I do. Just bad habits. I just have to remember to leave WiFi on lol! No biggie for me. The folks I feel bad for is those who work outside or have no WiFi in office (other than work purposes. Strick company policy a holes etc) and/or commuters that have to ride the subway. I don't really feel sorry for those (and I have a few friends like this) that are too cheap to buy broadband Internet at home. This isn't meant to be a replacement for home Internet unless you have a Hotspot device or whatever they call it these days. I get that. I guess we'll have to see. This plan has been in place a few weeks now. We'll have to see how much it affects people. Hopefully not too much. Good reply though! Clarification is always welcome here:good:
sino8r said:
Yeah it's good in theory (compared to plain throttling) but we haven't really seen it in practical application so far.
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Well, until we get some technical info or some really good test results, we won't know exactly what they are using. Though priority queuing and class based queuing are common in today's networks. I can guarantee they are already using hierarchical fair service curves as it is pretty much required for the HD voice feature to be reliable.
If this system is already in place, then they probably are not using regular throttling tiers, as I am well past the soft cap and am still putting down 80/20 speed. Though I am most likely in an un-congested area. I am wondering just how weighted the de-prioritization scale is for users above the cap.
I use alot of data (70gb) one month that was the most extreme. I download alot of movies and torrents while i sleep. Theres know doubt in my mind that they mess with my speeds especially during peak hours. I with search and get lte then 5 seconds later it drops down. I will search and get it again and the same thing will happen. Meanwhile my wifes phone stays on lte. I also noticed at times ill be on lte but will only be downloading at 100 or 200 kbs where im normally at 1 mbs. But like i said it's usually only at peak hours and lasts for 30min to a hour
twe90kid said:
Looks like John Legere just said, "hahaha sucka.. you've been baited to our unlimited data cap"
http://www.tmonews.com/2015/06/21gb...mobiles-unlimited-4g-lte-simple-choice-plans/
What are you thoughts?
I avg 35-45gb a month. But how do we know if our area is congested?
Legere has been bashing other companies about their throttle, but yet he's doing the same thing.
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Wait, this is just now making news? That's been in their fine print for almost a year now ever since they started their unlimited data campaign.
I average about 150-200GBs a month on my line alone. I really heavily on my phones data for everything I do while I'm not at home. Sometimes even when I'm home I'll use data just for the heck of it.
T-Mobile is throttling but not as rampant as the other carriers. T-Mobile's throttling depends on network congestion. Other carriers just throttle once you hit a certain number.
There really isn't a way to tell though if your area is heavily congested unless it's a major city; i.e Denver Metro, Manhattan, LA, etc etc.
I am very torn by this as I live in a congested neighborhood that this cap is designed to manage. The tower that serves my neighborhood is oversold. I routinely suffer from slow network speeds on the best of days and I personally have never used enough data to hit the cap. So on one hand, I certainly want my fellow users capped if they are data hogs as bandwidth is very constrained in my local neck of the woods. On the other hand, because my tower is so congested, if I did hit the cap and was de-prioritized, I would immediately hit 2G speeds because there is so much traffic to compete with. So T-Mobile has essentially told me that I have a 21GB data plan as in my neighborhood I will never get more.
With that figure in mind, I have to say that a 15GB plan from Verizon that actually would give me decent speed now seems not so far off from my 21GB "unlimited" plan. T-Mobile is supposed to be adding bandwidth in my neighborhood, but it is no longer a comparison of XGB vs unlimited, but XGB vs 21GB. Verizon and for that matter, Sprint (yes, I know) are offering competitive packages to 21GB and it is possible that even Sprint may give me faster speeds. I am not so sure that I may not make the jump to someone if they can deliver better speeds. For those that live in non-congested neighborhoods, that 21GB cap may never be seen. But in my area, that is a wall.
They are doing what Verizon started doing. Throttling only on congested towers to the top data people. I use to get throttled by Verizon when the Detroit Lions or the Tigers were playing since I work downtown Detroit. Once the games were done I would get better data speeds.
Sent from my SM-N910T using Tapatalk
Using over 80gb a month is taking advantage of a good thing. People who consistently abuse the data limits are the same people who screwed this for everyone. These are the people who feel entitled to abuse every inch they can. Hotels have wifi, there are other ways. I have the unlimited data package fir years, never abused the privilege. Whenever at home I use my wifi even though I have sick DL speeds at home. I will never abuse a situation, just the way I am.
Sent from my Note 4.
So sorry that us heavy users misunderstood what unlimited means. Dangit I knew I should have paid more attention in vocabulary class.
Now I just need to remember not to buy that nice car I want because that would taking advantage of a good thing as others aren't buying it.
Not to step on anyone posting, but I believe that T-Mobile is at fault here. Notwithstanding the individuals that break the rules and tether more than the rules allow, T-Mobile sold me an unlimited plan. I have not exceeded the 21GB limit. My data, according to T-Mobile, is at 11GB. But when I subscribed to the unlimited plan, I asked what that meant and I gave some far out there examples (streaming videos 24 hours a day, etc.). I was told by the T-Mobile customer rep, unlimited means unlimited. No sweat.
The problem is that T-Mobile wanted to attract more business and they used and still use unlimited data plans to attract that business and their network wasn't really ready for that level of activity. I read comments to an article as much as 6 months ago that had users saying that T-Mobile's network was, unlike the other carrier's networks, impervious to slowdowns from added traffic which is simply not true.
But I believe T-Mobile has helped build that impression with the selling all of these unlimited data packages. TMONews had an article a couple of weeks ago asking if unlimited data packages are going away and they quoted John Legere saying that unlimited data packages are only guaranteed for 2 more years. (http://www.tmonews.com/2015/05/is-unlimited-data-going-to-disappear/) Then shortly after they announced this cap. The article's point is that unlimited packages are unsustainable. But T-Mobile keeps selling the idea. All carrier's need to sell what they can provide and not promise more than they can deliver. Perhaps they should say no to a new customer that lives in a neighborhood that is oversold. But they won't.
I love T-Mobile, but I experience very slow speeds due to a wildly oversold network. I would have been much better off if T-Mobile only promised what they can deliver. They can't really deliver unlimited to me. What they told me last week is that unlimited is actually 21GB, if you could get 21GB at the slow download speeds they are currently delivering. For the fellow that got 80GB, if he followed the rules, he is paying for an unlimited plan. In my neighborhood, except for DSL that is unusably slow, I have no other options except wireless. No cable, nothing. I am willing to pay for my data needs. But I want and need the data at reasonably fast speeds. It is not clear that in my neighborhood that T-Mobile can deliver. But now that the cap is in place, T-Mobile has made the comparison clearer. Who can deliver 21GB faster, cheaper and more reliably than anyone else. Because in my oversold neighborhood, 21GB is all that I will get. YMMV.
Good luck finding another carrier that will only delay your packets after 21gb when there is congestion instead of crippling access all together. Your situation is unique and the result should be expected. There is nothing a carrier can do if your area is under serviced when it comes to internet access. xanmato completely gets the concept here. This is not a cap, even calling it a soft cap is a bit much. This is Quality of Service (QOS) at its best and T-Mobile shouldnt be slammed for doing this. Just because its unlimited doesn't mean you can go ahead and use it as your sole internet source for everything you ever do. That was never its intended purpose. If everyone used 80gb a month it would cripple any cellular network unless the heavy users had some kind of consequence and maybe make them use their wifi for once. Maybe in the future the cell network or whatever comes after that will be robust enough to handle everyone using large amounts of bandwidth at once but until then we have to respect the fact that a cellular carrier is not the same thing as an ISP