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Tutor

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8 Messages

Wednesday, April 17th, 2019 7:27 AM

When is 3G being shutdown?

I have a 3G ZTE Z222 of which I'm fond.   My friends with Sprint have been notified of an imminent Sprint 3G shutdown. I searched that topic on this forum and found that my phone will be good till 12/2012 or "such time as there is a national shutdown."  I need something more specific as flip-phones are getting scarcer by the week, and the only 3G flip-phone offered by AT&T right now is, bluntly, junk.   How imminent is a national shutdown?

ACE - Sage

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116.6K Messages

4 years ago

@warfase1   This is a touchy subject.  And was enough to push me out the door to Verizon, who has a list of certified phones.  A list which includes phones AT&T has excluded.  
    Let’s be clear, AT&T chooses to exclude phones.  There is no technical, engineering or functional reason NOT to let phones work with VoLTE.  I took 2 phones, a 4 year old Moto pure, and 1 year old 1+ 6t from AT&T, where they were excluded, to Verizon where they work beautifully.  They are both using built on VVM too, which I was unable to use on AT&T.  

@pgrey   Me throwing gas on the fire with my last post.    https://forums.att.com/t5/Phones-Tablets-Devices/New-Phone-recommendations/m-p/6043131#M3666

 

T-Mobile is the poster carrier.  They just let phones work.  If they don’t, it’s not because the carrier is preventing it.   There’s a saying, “lead, follow or get out of the way” AT&T isn’t doing any of those.

(ooo, I cut out sugar and am up too late 😆.)

 

Tutor

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10 Messages

4 years ago

There may not be any reasons on the surface but there are costs in
maintaining old servers and equipment plus new upgrades that may or may not
support the approaching dinosaur status technologies. That and the cost to
make things backward compatible just to name a few. I'm sure the
professionals at at&t have studied the scenarios and are moving in the
direction that they feel is best for them and the customer base that they
are looking for.

ACE - Expert

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23.9K Messages

4 years ago


@warfase1 wrote:
There may not be any reasons on the surface but there are costs in
maintaining old servers and equipment plus new upgrades that may or may not
support the approaching dinosaur status technologies. That and the cost to
make things backward compatible just to name a few. I'm sure the
professionals at at&t have studied the scenarios and are moving in the
direction that they feel is best for them and the customer base that they
are looking for.

Its nothing more than ATT wants the spectrum back to re purpose it for LTE and 5G.  It costs nothing to make a phone backwards compatible because its on the SOC of the phone.   

Master

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3.5K Messages

4 years ago


@warfase1 wrote:
There may not be any reasons on the surface but there are costs in
maintaining old servers and equipment plus new upgrades that may or may not
support the approaching dinosaur status technologies. That and the cost to
make things backward compatible just to name a few. I'm sure the
professionals at at&t have studied the scenarios and are moving in the
direction that they feel is best for them and the customer base that they
are looking for.

@warfase1 Yep, what @GLIMMERMAN76 said.

DB-maintenance for "full 4G/LTE compatible devices" is simply a zero-sum-item, for AT&T, at this point, it costs them NOTHING, to maintain this status, right?

IF you think this is incorrect, please provide technical details that demonstrate/reveal this, thanks.

 

For example, WHAT about a Pixel 3a, this is essentially a BRAND-NEW device (released on 5/8/19), how does this fall into the "dinosaur" category, exactly?  AT&T is "treating it this way", for "business reasons", pure-and-simple.

It's about 6 months-old, at this point, and is a VERY cutting-edge device, in terms of the (current) mid-range devices (the camera alone is FAR superior to ANY mid-range Samsung device, for example).

Tutor

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16 Messages

4 years ago


@lizdance40 wrote:
@Delcat13Tay  FIRST CHOICE 
 
 Best Buy has about a dozen unlocked phones that are compatible with AT&T, and a few work on Verizon, and are also world phones.  
     AT&T does sell some dirt cheap, and occasionally free with activation, prepaid phones.  In general, I discourage buying phones from AT&T because of the 6 month lock policy.  (Truth be told, I discourage buying from AT&T no matter what)
    If a traveler does come to the USA with an incompatible phone and feels buying a phone they can use back home, Verizon has a much better policy if you buy from them, and most of their prepaid phones aren’t as limited, hardware wise (CHECK SPECS).  60 days after activation a Verizon prepaid phone is unlocked, even if you aren’t paying for a second month if service.  


Still a bit of a hassle for many of us, though.  For travelers from countries where dual-SIM is a common (or in some cases, standard) feature in phones sold there (especially in Asia), it is more practical for them to buy a local SIM card upon arriving at their destination and insert it in the second SIM slot, while keeping their home network SIM roaming and inside the first SIM slot.

 

That being said, as new dual-SIM phones across all price ranges now feature dual-VoLTE and are capable of receiving LTE signals on both SIMs simultaneously (as opposed to older phones where only one SIM at a time can receive LTE signals, while the other SIM remains at 2G/3G), it is high time that AT&T open up its LTE network to ALL phones that support any of its LTE bands.  As I mentioned earlier, most budget and midrange phones sold outside the US (especially Chinese brands like Xiaomi [including Redmi], Huawei [including Honor], BBK Electronics' brands [Oppo, Vivo and Realme, which are all Oneplus' sister brands] and Meizu, among others) support the 850 MHz band on 3G, and LTE band 5, while flagship and "flagship killer" models support even more (but usually not all) US LTE bands.  Refarming the remaining 850 Mhz spectrum on 3G to LTE band 5 (and opening up AT&T's LTE network to all phones) will significantly help in making sure that international travelers can use their phones in the US, whether by roaming on AT&T's network, using an AT&T prepaid SIM, or both.

ACE - Sage

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116.6K Messages

4 years ago

@Delcat13Tay   Oh, for sure.  And if AT&T suffers for being short sighted, that would be pretty much how they operate.  (See what they’re doing to TV).   
   3g is going to be shut off in favor of LTE and 5g.  But there is no reason to believe 3g 850 and 1900 will become LTE 2 and 5.  5g operates on lower frequency.   Now expecting a phone with only band 5 to work in the US is ridiculous.  I can’t recall when or if I have ever seen band 5, it’s all band 17/12 in my area.  
And because AT&T uses 2,4,5,12/17,30,66 for LTE, depending on just 1 of those is just not going to work.   
To be pretty blunt, if a phone doesn’t have 12/17 (which are interchangeable) it doesn’t have hardware to work after the shutdown, even if AT&T stops blocking them, because phones with 12/17 usually have other correct bands too.  

Tutor

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10 Messages

4 years ago

I feel the same way about Google as you do about AT&T. But Google is ten
times worse. Their people are rude all Google software is intrusive,
sneaky, and just plain disgusting. Google can not be trusted and I would
never recomend anything with their brand on it. However AT&T has been
around for many, many years and will be here for many, many more years to
come. As for the pixel 3 technology that you called cutting edge, they are
already well into pixel 4 and it is supported by AT&T so that's why I said
pixel 3 is approaching dinosour technology. The thenological industry moves
so fast and to keep the money moving companies must force people to spend
the money and upgrade in order to cover their own expenses. Leading the way
like AT&T does isn't cheap. AT&T is much more reliable and trusted than
Verizon or any other second rate, low quality, limited service out there.

Tutor

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16 Messages

4 years ago

@lizdance40 My current phone only supports LTE bands 2, 4 and 5 in the US.  Will that be enough for coverage on AT&T after the 3G shutdown, or should I turn to T-Mobile the next time I go to the US?  It's a dual-SIM, dual-VoLTE phone with WiFi calling support.

ACE - Expert

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23.9K Messages

4 years ago


@Delcat13Tay wrote:

@lizdance40 My current phone only supports LTE bands 2, 4 and 5 in the US.  Will that be enough for coverage on AT&T after the 3G shutdown, or should I turn to T-Mobile the next time I go to the US?  It's a dual-SIM, dual-VoLTE phone with WiFi calling support.


Thats not enough for LTE coverage right now let alone in 2022 when there is no 3g anymore.  OEM's are going to have to quit being cheap and inlcude all LTE bands in all phone period.

Tutor

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16 Messages

4 years ago


@GLIMMERMAN76 wrote:

@Delcat13Tay wrote:

@lizdance40 wrote:
@Delcat13Tay  FIRST CHOICE 
 
 Best Buy has about a dozen unlocked phones that are compatible with AT&T, and a few work on Verizon, and are also world phones.  
     AT&T does sell some dirt cheap, and occasionally free with activation, prepaid phones.  In general, I discourage buying phones from AT&T because of the 6 month lock policy.  (Truth be told, I discourage buying from AT&T no matter what)
    If a traveler does come to the USA with an incompatible phone and feels buying a phone they can use back home, Verizon has a much better policy if you buy from them, and most of their prepaid phones aren’t as limited, hardware wise (CHECK SPECS).  60 days after activation a Verizon prepaid phone is unlocked, even if you aren’t paying for a second month if service.  


Still a bit of a hassle for many of us, though.  For travelers from countries where dual-SIM is a common (or in some cases, standard) feature in phones sold there (especially in Asia), it is more practical for them to buy a local SIM card upon arriving at their destination and insert it in the second SIM slot, while keeping their home network SIM roaming and inside the first SIM slot.

 

That being said, as new dual-SIM phones across all price ranges now feature dual-VoLTE and are capable of receiving LTE signals on both SIMs simultaneously (as opposed to older phones where only one SIM at a time can receive LTE signals, while the other SIM remains at 2G/3G), it is high time that AT&T open up its LTE network to ALL phones that support any of its LTE bands.  As I mentioned earlier, most budget and midrange phones sold outside the US (especially Chinese brands like Xiaomi [including Redmi], Huawei [including Honor], BBK Electronics' brands [Oppo, Vivo and Realme, which are all Oneplus' sister brands] and Meizu, among others) support the 850 MHz band on 3G, and LTE band 5, while flagship and "flagship killer" models support even more (but usually not all) US LTE bands.  Refarming the remaining 850 Mhz spectrum on 3G to LTE band 5 (and opening up AT&T's LTE network to all phones) will significantly help in making sure that international travelers can use their phones in the US, whether by roaming on AT&T's network, using an AT&T prepaid SIM, or both.


You need to understand how spectrum is used in the USA they are just not going to shut down 850mhz 3g and make it LTE..  Most markets are actually 1900mhz 3g...  The US is a hodge podge of spectrum that each carrier owns some of in different areas.  In a 40 mile drive to work I see bands 2,5,12, and 30 across the drive.


Guess I'll have to find a way to unlock at least Band 12/17 on my phone.

 

And yeah, the spectrum you use there in the US can be quite confusing, like having 5 bands just for 700 MHz FDD-LTE (Bands 12, 13, 14, 17, 29), while back here in my country (and other countries in the Asia-Pacific region), we only have one band shared by networks for that specific frequency (Band 28).

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