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Mjrtom7's profile

Explorer

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25 Messages

Wednesday, September 19th, 2012 6:57 PM

Closed

Will Northeast MI ever receive 3G?

I've heard talk about how ATT is "working on their network coverage" and plans to provide 3G service in Northeast MI "in the coming months".  Well, now that another 2 year contract has expired, I'm seriously wondering if I would be better off jumping to Verizon.  The EDGE data network up here if virtually useless.  5 full bars, yet extremely poor data transfer.  

 

Can anyone provide an HONEST answer as to when this coverage is planned to be upgraded???  Verizon has had 3G for quite a long while up here...

Scholar

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151 Messages

10 years ago

There is new coverage on Sensorly. Almost all of 41 is now ATT 4G from Gladstone to Marquette. But from M-35 Perkins to gwin is still Edge.

Scholar

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391 Messages

10 years ago

I can say that the 3G/4G signal is getting out farther than what the coverage map is depicting:)  I studied the AT&T coverage map for a while this evening and pretty much figured out there are 8 or 9 towers in NE lower MI that are still 2G but haven't checked the U.P. yet.

 

I am still waiting for a reply regarding the tower in Lathrop. I also asked why certain towers, including the Lathrop site, only have 1 broadband panel per sector. Every single site I have seen has 2, 3 on sites with LTE.

 

Well, the deep freeze has set in and I think all the AT&T tower crews have migrated to Florida for the winter. Smiley Frustrated

Scholar

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391 Messages

10 years ago

Just a quick note....it shouldn't be very long now until the new tower on Drummond Island is up and running. When that site goes live, it should have HSPA+ w/fiber backhaul right from the get go soon followed by LTE.

Mentor

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43 Messages

10 years ago

Hi guys/girls,

 

Still on Edge..haven't seen trucks or spots of hspa+ or 3g since last time I posted.

Makes it awesome to run a business when not in the office and need to check email or go online.

I'd rather have a 14baud modem like I did in '89 on BBS... This is getting depressing and ignorant.

there's no competition  up here though. ATT/Verizon/Charter and their various mnvo.

Pardon the emo rant. Frustrating to not be able to use a service (data) that you pay for. When google.com times out with full "signal" I'm stuck finding a McDonald's to use their WiFi....

 

Scholar

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391 Messages

10 years ago

You good folks up there have a right to be upset and I don't blame you at all. AT&T has decided to upgrade their entire network, but unfortunately they have been trying to do literally years worth of work to catch up in a short period of time. Don't know why they didn't even upgrade EDGE to Class 10 across their entire network years ago. I can lock my device in E here downstate and get 200 Kbps down and 90 up which loads webpages quickly.

I am starting to think that backhaul is the culprit for a majority of those towers up there not being upgraded yet.

Scholar

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136 Messages

10 years ago

3/31/14 is the target date for all current active UMTS cell sites in NE MI to have enhanced backhaul and LTE live. Moreover, AT&T will be deploying HD Voice over their UMTS (3G/HSPA+) network VERY soon. Training will be this week in Chicago for some AT&T employees. I expect that HD Voice over UMTS will be active by the end of Q1. 

Scholar

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151 Messages

10 years ago

Interesting. What is HD voice? Just higher quality calls?

Scholar

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136 Messages

10 years ago

Yes, much higher quality calls using the AMR-WB voice codec. Check out this video for a sample of HD Voice: http://youtu.be/LXEIi2JwgR4

 

It doubles the sampling rate of the human voice and reduces background noises substantially. 

Teacher

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29 Messages

10 years ago

There have been many different target dates within the last two years and I don't believe ATT hit any one of them.  I don't think many of us will be holding our breath or sipping the kool aid.  Target dates for ATT are arbitrary dates they throw out to keep people happy and have something to look forward to.  Funny thing is it makes matters worse.  People would like the truth and a concrete date rather than being strung along month after month.

Oh and HD Voice is something TMobile has had for the last year, so it's nothing novel that ATT is releasing. .   

Scholar

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391 Messages

10 years ago

Well, target dates that a few of us have given aren't "officially" from AT&T, but rather from people who are actively involved in working on the towers and network buildout. It is hard to say exactly what the hold up is in regards to the majority of 2G only sites that haven't been upgraded yet, but I am guessing it is the backhaul. I agree it is frustrating to say the least.

As far as T-Mobile.....you can't really compare them to AT&T. Their native coverage area, including Metro PCS's assets, only covers about 1/3 of Michigan and not all of their coverage area has HD voice or even 3G. My area (Romeo/Almont) has Verizon, AT&T, and Sprint LTE already but T-Mobile is still 2G only and they roam on AT&T's network in the northern 2/3rd's MI. Lol

Edit: I guess my point is yes T-Mo had HD voice for a while but in limited areas. AT&T will be launching theirs over their entire 3G/4G network which is much larger than T-Mo's. By summer, AT&T's 4G/LTE network should be much larger and faster than it is today:)

 

 

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