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Sprint, Dish to Trial Fixed LTE Residential Service

Sprint and Dish have announced they'll be experimenting with fixed LTE residential service as part of upcoming trials. According to the companies announcement, the trial service will first appear in Corpus Christi, Texas sometime in 2014, with additional market launches planned if things go well. Dish will install either a "ruggedized" outdoor router or an indoor solution depending on the customer location. Both options will feature built-in high-gain antennas to receive the 4G TDD-LTE signal on Sprint's 2.5 GHz spectrum.


"With millions underserved by inadequate broadband, the potential to bring a high-speed fixed wireless solution is very compelling to both DISH and Sprint," Dish executive Tom Cullen said in a statement on the trial.

This is the second fixed LTE trial Dish will be participating in. The company is also conducting trials with company by the name of nTelos, a new trial planning to offer speeds of at least 5 Mbps to more rural users across Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Ohio and Kentucky.

Both AT&T and Verizon have tinkered with similar fixed-LTE services as they back away from upgrading less profitable DSL markets. AT&T's version utilizes an indoor home gateway, while Verizon attaches a "cantenna" to subscriber homes. While the pricing for these services historically has not been much to write home about, it has often offered an upgrade for users stuck on even more expensive and more heavily-capped satellite broadband service.
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gigahurtz
Premium Member
join:2001-10-20
USA

gigahurtz

Premium Member

Really Sprint?

Perhaps Sprint should worry about improving their network before they launch a service like this. Sprint's data network is bogged down and will not be able to handle a large amount of home users who will use more data than the average mobile user.

toby
Troy Mcclure
join:2001-11-13
Seattle, WA

toby

Member

Re: Really Sprint?

If you live where you get LTE, it works well.
If... though.

swintec
Premium Member
join:2003-12-19
Alfred, ME

swintec to gigahurtz

Premium Member

to gigahurtz
said by gigahurtz:

will not be able to handle a large amount of home users who will use more data than the average mobile user.

It looks like this will only be on their TDD-LTE in the 2.5 GHz spectrum which they have oodles of bandwidth for, once the sites are upgraded. There is a reason they are only using that spectrum and not the others.
iansltx
join:2007-02-19
Austin, TX

iansltx to gigahurtz

Member

to gigahurtz
Actually, Millenicom resold Sprint LTE for awhile, at $70 per month, and the service worked well. I know a few people in my area that used them.

Then Sprint cancelled 'em out, presumably to make way for this product (just awhile in advance).

Also, this service will be using Sprint's TD-LTE spectrum, of which there is plenty. If you're complaining about Sprint LTE being bogged down, you're talking about the 1900MHz spectrum, which won't be used for this project.

I wouldn't be surprised if people got a consistent, unlimited, 10-20 Mbps off of TD-LTE, because you can pack plenty of antennas into a subscriber radio that you can mount onto a house. And it's relatively easy to amp up antenna gain when you know what tower you're pointing to. So you end up with more capacity per user than a lot of DOCSIS 3 plant in use today.
BlueHeron
join:2013-11-14

BlueHeron

Member

Re: Really Sprint?

said by iansltx:

Actually, Millenicom resold Sprint LTE for awhile, at $70 per month, and the service worked well. I know a few people in my area that used them.

Then Sprint cancelled 'em out, presumably to make way for this product (just awhile in advance).

Millenicom was forced off of Sprint for unknown reasons (except by Sprint and Millenicom themselves). Most anything you hear differently is wild speculation and rumor. The most likely cause was the failure of a middleman in a manner that left a very sour taste in Sprint's corporate mouth. It definitely was not to make room for this service.

Millenicom was not the only reseller of Sprint Data. There are others. BTW, it wasn't just LTE service, either.

Former Millenicom sub.
iansltx
join:2007-02-19
Austin, TX

iansltx

Member

Re: Really Sprint?

The wild speculation was entirely mine.

And yes, I do realize that MCom's WiMAX offering went away as well, while BMI's hasn't yet. The operative word is "yet"; remember that Clear WiMAX home broadband service got shuttered about the time the CLWR acquisition went through.
Sahrin
join:2004-05-15
Houston, TX

Sahrin to gigahurtz

Member

to gigahurtz
said by gigahurtz:

Perhaps Sprint should worry about improving their network before they launch a service like this.

Yes, by all means, we should never plan ahead - only look at the objective currently in front of us. That'll accelerate the pace of advance for sure.

intel1212
Premium Member
join:2008-01-17
Henderson, NV

intel1212 to gigahurtz

Premium Member

to gigahurtz
TOTALLY agree. Here in Las Vegas, we are going through the conversion to LTE -- very painful.....
silbaco
Premium Member
join:2009-08-03
USA

silbaco

Premium Member

Sprint

It could work. But how many of the under served markets actually have Sprint coverage? If they have coverage, does it include short ranged TDD-LTE? It certainly doesn't in the under served markets in my state.

fadsfsdvcvv
@comcast.net

fadsfsdvcvv

Anon

Re: Sprint

With 8 by 8 antennas with beamforming the range will be pretty nice actually.
Also even large cities could use this.

atcotr
@rr.com

atcotr

Anon

mimo

Is 8x8 hardware even available as an finished product at any price, let alone mass market CPEs? Sprint just announced "Spark" uses 8x8 MIMO at the tower. But we all know how there a big lag between their promises and actual delivery of services.
iansltx
join:2007-02-19
Austin, TX

iansltx to silbaco

Member

to silbaco
There are a number of markets here where for the longest time Sprint was the only LTE provider. Verizon has joined in over the past month or so, but with home base stations Sprint can sling a TD-LTE signal out for five or six miles from a tower, just like WISPs do...maybe even longer. And since Sprint doesn't have to deal with interference from anyone other than itself on the spectrum, it'll have better signal-to-noise ratios than a comparably spec'd WISP.
Fast Turtle
join:2008-02-19

Fast Turtle

Member

Re: Sprint

You do know that the 2.5GHz band is the same as ever home router (b/g/n) and microwave oven don't you? Interference will be a god damn given when I'm seeing in excess of 20 blasted routers in just my neighborhood on those freqs.
iansltx
join:2007-02-19
Austin, TX

iansltx

Member

Re: Sprint

Nope.

You're confusing unlicensed 2.4GHz (2412-2486 MHz I believe) with the EBS and BRS bands in the 2500-2700MHz range. Which are exclusively licensed or leased to single providers, mostly Sprint (formerly Clearwire).

I've seen BRS/EBS in action in Austin, on Sprint's old WiMAX network (ex-Clearwire). Range is limited when you've got a hotspot two-thirds the size of an iPhone, but no interference issues.
bcltoys
join:2008-07-21

bcltoys

Member

Short Range

If you can't sprint's 1900mhz LTE there is no hope to get the higher 2500-2600mhz LTE.

toby
Troy Mcclure
join:2001-11-13
Seattle, WA

toby

Member

Re: Short Range

said by bcltoys:

If you can't sprint's 1900mhz LTE there is no hope to get the higher 2500-2600mhz LTE.

Maybe, as they are upgrading the existing clearwire towers where Clearwire's current service is, on different towers.

Plus these antennas are placed on the houses, not inside.

But if you can't get Clearwire/Sprint while stood on your roof, sure, you might not get service today.
amungus
Premium Member
join:2004-11-26
America

amungus

Premium Member

cap?

Neat idea, sure, but what's the cap? If they can let users actually use this like wired service, with at least 150GB, preferably 200+, it might be worthwhile. Somehow, I doubt that they offer more than 25GB.
videomatic3
join:2003-12-12
Pleasanton, CA

videomatic3

Member

Re: cap?

considering sprint is the only one left with unlimited data, i cant imagine them capping the service too badly

WHT
join:2010-03-26
Rosston, TX

WHT

Member

Sprint caps

said by videomatic3:

considering sprint is the only one left with unlimited data

Sprint used to have unlimited usage on their data cards, I had two of them. Over the last two years, they dropped unlimited on data cards and the ones that were grandfathered mysterious got "ungrandfathered" and no way to put them back. So I'd say it is likely Sprint will have caps on their fixed terrestrial wireless offering.
elefante72
join:2010-12-03
East Amherst, NY

elefante72 to amungus

Member

to amungus
Fixed wireless is not bound by caps but by bandwidth utilization, so they could say offer unlimited internet at night (which also gets better signal) so people can download their steam or console games and no worries.

During prime periods (say 5-8 PM) that is when they want to heavily dis-incent people from using the links, especially if they are sharing w/ mobile also.

The same goes for caps in general, they are stupid ways to try to behavioral-traffic shape people without traffic shaping them.

Try to drive in London during rush hour, you pay more.
iansltx
join:2007-02-19
Austin, TX

iansltx to amungus

Member

to amungus
150GB or 200GB may be pushing it. But then again there's plenty of capacity when you have 8x8 radios on each end. I'd expect 50+ GB when this system comes online, at which point you'd still have to watch your usage but when the alternative is 3M DSL at best 50GB isn't so bad.

I could be pleasantly surprised though and see 100-200GB. Or unlimited. But I wouldn't count on it.
sonicmerlin
join:2009-05-24
Cleveland, OH

sonicmerlin

Member

Re: cap?

Don't they have 120 MHz of 2.5 GHz spectrum? They can offer more bandwidth than wired cable ISPs. They should easily be able to do unlimited, especially once LTE Advanced is implemented.
iansltx
join:2007-02-19
Austin, TX

iansltx

Member

Re: cap?

Cable plants have less subs per node than SPrint will have users on a tower. And SPrint doesn't have 120MHz everywhere. THey may be able to put three 20MHz TD-LTE carriers together per sector, but their capacity has an upper limit.
tabernak4
join:2013-08-10

tabernak4 to amungus

Member

to amungus
It all depends on what they're trying to compete with, if they're just trying to compete with other wireless broadband solutions, then you may be right. Hopefully they're also targeting DSL users, then perhaps you could see caps starting at 50 GB or better. LTE has the potential to take away DSL users if they so choose.

Maybe they could do something where they charge a reasonable rate after the cap, like $.10-.50/GB, basically like utilities.

At least Sprint doesn't have divided loyalties between wireless and landline users like Verizon and At&t. I wish them good luck, rural users could certainly use some good fixed location wireless broadband.
supertbone
join:2002-04-04
Pleasant Grove, UT

supertbone

Member

Good luck getting coverage

The funny part is that if you live in an area were all you can get is Satellite internet, you will most likely not be living in a Sprint LTE area. Sprint just upgraded to LTE on a bunch of towers in Utah and LTE is not that great yet. Ironically, I have found their improved 3G service to be better than LTE in some locations.
OCP
Premium Member
join:2004-10-11
USA

OCP

Premium Member

I'm the first?

»Sprint Broadband Direct Goes Offline July 31 [45] comments
Nobody else remembers Sprint Broadband Direct? Almost the exact same thing from the same company. Wow.
snarf7
join:2013-08-31

snarf7

Member

cap

What's the cap