Will Northeast MI ever receive 3G?

[Mjrtom7]

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...

[jwagger]

Sounds like they are done or gave up on the U.P. 

I would love to see a map that shows what their coverage will be after completion.

I for one am giving them until early summer to rid of this pitiful Edge service.  If not, I am jumping ship to "Red" with my 4 lines.   

[Lewyman]

No, AT&T did not give up on the U.P. With the onset of winter, that has basically idled backhaul and hardware upgrades at cell sites so they are now hitting (upgraded) sites in certain areas for LTE. Come spring, they be hitting those sites in U.P. and finishing up.  Also, LTE was tuned up in Midland yesterday giving complete coverage in the Tri-Cities area. I know it is frustrating being stuck with 2G.......been there!

[Mjrtom7]

I moved to Midland a few months back and yes indeed...LTE is up and running here now! I started this thread back in November of 2012 while living in Alpena (when the data speeds reminded me of AOL dialup!) and since then, thankfully, the folks at ATT have made great strides to keep pace with big red. Hopefully the expansion of service upgrades continues at a steady pace for the rest of Michigan!

[c0n]

Hey Lewyman..

Right now using my Moto X.  There's no 3g up on the hill by the towers behind the hospital either. It just flashes from HSPA+ back to Edge..

The main comm/tower area (charter/verizon/att etc..up there)  sits on a hill overlooking the town. clear line of sight from anywhere in town. There is no 3g..just edge.

The hospital sits on a plateau on the front side of that hill.

It's weird...

Wish we had other providers besides ATT/Verizon....

Although Verizon has 4g almost everywhere up here..Not a fan of Verizon at all though.

pain in the butt when i get calls for product and I can't login to my website, gmail app, google.com,ebay app...

riding in friend's truck yesterday..guy calls from Germany, wants around 3k in product (we sell custom knives/custom leather sheaths/bark river knives etc...we're close to Bark River and we get many of their 1x only never made again knives).

Full bars, times out, not near a wifi spot.

./end rant

I have a friend that splices fiber (that is not a fun job) here, i'll have to hit him up and see if he knows anything....

[Lewyman]

The area you are in is fringe coverage from a couple of towers in Wisconsin. I would have to say it will be anytime now when AT&T fires up 3G on those towers in your area there.

Post Edit: AT&T has lit up LTE in Manistee. 

[c0n]

So last night we drove from Iron Mountain to Iron River for my daughter's basketball tourney....

she dropped 14pts and had 10rebs and 2blocks....i love my 5'9" 13yr old Kareem Abdul Jabbar....

We pull into West Iron's parking lot and I see a flash of 4g then the wifi kicks in and i didn't think more about it because like i said, it's happened a couple of places around here.

We get home and the other guy who coaches with me asks what the weird symbol is next to his bars because there's usually an E there. He's not very tech friendly.

I look at mine and lo and behold 4g.....

I turned my phone off and back on and 4g. I took a drive around town under the premise that "mom's at grandma and grandpa's helping them out and i'll take you out to eat"...

4g all through town now.

I would have been happy with Edge that would load a simple page or email, but since that hasn't happened in roughly 8yrs, so if 4g will, I'll take it.

[Lewyman]

Excellent!! Congrats!!! They are running 2 months behind on their target date so I would say there are probably more towers that were turned up as well.

So you get a good "4G" signal at your house?? What dBm is your phone receiving?? Speeds should be decent and when they upgrade to true HSPA+ you will really see a difference.

One thing that AT&T started doing is exaggerating what they label HSPA+. Before the disclaimer said HSPA+ was service with *enhanced backhaul* (i.e. fiber ethernet backhaul). Now there are areas, specifically in the thumb, that are shown on the 4G HSPA+ coverage area(darker orange) that are still on T-1 backhaul with terrible speeds. Peck, Sandusky, and other areas in that part of the state are very slow. They should re-label that coverage as 4E Lol.

Anyway enjoy the new coverage!! AT&T has come a long way since last spring and they will be ramping up network upgrades in the next 4 months. Hopefully you will see 4G LTE on your phone by summer time

[American Ninja]

Nothing new to report for the Lathrop tower. Still the same for now.

[c0n]

yeah..the 4G is a misnomer, but for up here it's like going from a 14.4 baud modem (I had one when they were the rocking fast modem) to a T1.

I do get strong signal in the house and all throughout town and all the way to Iron River, which is 45-50miles westish of here.

I'm actually getting a pretty great signal. -59 to -64dBm.

It was nice to be able to work on the backend of my site while riding in the car for an hour....

fast enough for what i'd need it for..

[Lewyman]

That is great to hear and there were 4 or 5 sites I believe that were turned up in your area. I know in Posen, which is in NE lower MI, tpeltz reported getting 11.5 Mbps down and 2.5 up on HSPA+ which is very good and on true "enhanced backhaul".

American Ninja.....it should be anytime now when they turn up the Lathrop tower and most likely the surrounding ones as well.

I would really like to know if the new site on Drumond Island is live yet and if the site in Goetzville is upgraded.

[broski0508]

LTE is now live in Midland, MI! This was turned on last week and the coverage map is still not updated for all of midland. After running a speed test this was the result

Keep up the work ATT!

[Wild Banchi]

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@c0n wrote:

So last night we drove from Iron Mountain to Iron River for my daughter's basketball tourney....

she dropped 14pts and had 10rebs and 2blocks....i love my 5'9" 13yr old Kareem Abdul Jabbar....

We pull into West Iron's parking lot and I see a flash of 4g then the wifi kicks in and i didn't think more about it because like i said, it's happened a couple of places around here.

We get home and the other guy who coaches with me asks what the weird symbol is next to his bars because there's usually an E there. He's not very tech friendly.

I look at mine and lo and behold 4g.....

I turned my phone off and back on and 4g. I took a drive around town under the premise that "mom's at grandma and grandpa's helping them out and i'll take you out to eat"...

4g all through town now.

I would have been happy with Edge that would load a simple page or email, but since that hasn't happened in roughly 8yrs, so if 4g will, I'll take it.

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The statement I bolded above made me chuckle. Nice comparison - and a "GREAT JOB" to your daughter, by the way! I'm in Bay City and an apparent star (6' 3" sophomore) just transferred from AuGres to our Bangor John Glenn girl's varsity basketball team. Needless to say, AuGres was devastated, but Glenn welcomed her with open arms!

It's kind of strange to jump straight from EDGE to 4G LTE. It seems like there should have been some middle ground (3G) several years ago. Needless to say, glad to hear that AT&T has expanded its network to include some of the "less populated" areas around the state. 

Enjoy your LTE speeds - you make me want to upgrade to a newer LTE-capable smartphone!

[Wild Banchi]

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@broski0508 wrote:

LTE is now live in Midland, MI! This was turned on last week and the coverage map is still not updated for all of midland. After running a speed test this was the result

Keep up the work ATT!

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Awesome! It's about darn time! I figured that Midland wouldn't have been far behind Bay City/Saginaw. 

Nice temp by the way. I feel ya on that one!

[Lewyman]

 AT&T has upgraded the coverage map this morning. There are several sites in MI that been upgraded to HSPA+, including a site in Kingsford/Iron Mountain. It appears there is some new LTE west of Midland as well so AT&T is slowly continuing to upgrade.

[Tpeltz]

Looks like the map update shows the new cell site in Rogers City as HSPA+. This was previously UMTS (3G). Weird because it's still only using 4 T1's for backhaul and I haven't seen fiber ran to the site yet.