Help Should we worry about the 800mhz/1900mhz debacle?

[3volut1on]

What's everyones thoughts on this phone rolling out with the 1900mhz radio, that will eventually make way for the much improved 800mhz band in 2013? Will this make you wait for the next Evo or first LTE 800mhz phone?

Personally? It wont bother me as I'm in Phoenix and have never seen 4G anyway.

Sprint's 1900MHz Network Vision Is Nice, But The 800MHz Rollout Will Drop Your Jaw

 

[Sauske]

No! And the only choice you would have is to leave sprint and that would mean you can't get LTEvo (technically)...and hopefully with all that field testing their doing, the decision made was made accordingly!

 

[BenChase7]

I dont think its much to worry about, Sprint still has to decommission all (or at least most) the iDen/Nextel sites (which is where they are getting their 800mhz capacity) before there is LTE on 800mhz w/ Sprint. They have begun decommissioning, however. But there are 1,000 and 1,000 of towers to shut down. I would bet it will be well over a year before we see 800 mhz LTE widespread on Sprint. You'll have that to look forward too on your next upgrade though!

 

[EarlyMon]

Per their FCC submittal, 1900 only.

 

[BenChase7]

it's going to be leaps and bounds better than the WiMax 2.5Ghz band... and honestly 1900 is a better band than alot of the world will see...

LTE is going to be rolling out on 800,900,1500,1600,1800,1900,2400,2500,2600

so it's in the middle. 1900 is good enough for me in all honesty, when they move to 800 it'll just get better.

any confirmation on whether the LTEVO is prepped for 800 or will it require new phones AGAIN when they switch bands?

From Everything I've seen, Sprints LTE we be on 1900 to start, and eventually they will add LTE on 800 (down the road, though). There is also a strong possibility that we will be able to gain access to Clears LTE on 2500, again, down the road. And as EM said, the EVO FCC docs state LTE on 1900, just like the other LTE devices Sprint as put through. They do however support 800, but not for LTE.
So 1900 LTE to start, which is what the new EVO supports. Future devices will likely get 800 LTE too, and possibly even Clears 2500 LTE. I'm not sure where you get all those other frequencies from, though.

 

[BenChase7]

they have nothing to do with sprint, they are just showing the "chaos" that LTE is in across the world

OK! that makes sense now... Thx!

 

[Rush]

Hey guys, what about the not so 'techie members' reading through this thread, and is wondering what the 'heck' are they talking about?? How would you explain (to them, not me ) what is the difference between one frequency to the other.. 800mhz network - 1900mhz network - etc.

 

[novox77]

Hey guys, what about the not so 'techie members' reading through this thread, and is wondering what the 'heck' are they talking about?? How would you explain (to them, not me ) what is the difference between one frequency to the other.. 800mhz network - 1900mhz network - etc.

The number represents the frequency of the radio wave. We're talking about electromagnetic radiation in the radio spectrum area. Other parts of the spectrum you may have heard of are visible light, infrared, UV, etc.

Radio waves are the longest waves in the spectrum. Gamma rays are the shortest. Shorter waves have a lot more energy and can do serious damage to you. Longer waves pass through you with little to no harm. We're only concerned with radio here, and most of our wireless technology are concerned with wave frequencies below 2500mhz.

For example, Wi-Fi is 2400mhz (or more commonly specified as 2.4ghz). Microwaves operate around this frequency as well and therefore can sometimes cause interference with Wi-Fi signals.

The higher the frequency, the less able it is to pass through materials. Metal is a good blocker of radio waves. That's why our mobile devices cannot be completely encased in metal; otherwise the radios inside would not be able to communicate with the outside world. In the Evo LTE, the top portion of the phone backing is intentionally made with plastic to allow maximum passage of signal.

Data rides on top of the radio wave, so the higher frequency wave, the more information it can carry. Therefore higher number supports either higher transfer speeds, or more simultaneous data connections (a bigger pipe). But the tradeoff is that the wave tends to get absorbed by the things it passes through, air included. Therefore higher frequencies don't have as much range, and the signal weakens more indoors due to the absorption from building walls. Denser walls, like concrete, will absorb more than wood, plywood, and drywall walls.

Carriers want both range and speed, so it's to their advantage to secure a high band and a low band. Low band may not be as fast, but it offers more coverage.

FM radio waves operate between 88 and 108mhz, and as you know, this low frequency offers incredible range: one tower can cover an entire city and metro areas. But Wi-Fi at 2.4ghz typically can cover one residential home and sometimes a few neighbors.

There are other factors as well, such as the power of the source. You can make 2.4ghz go farther with more power. You can think of power like volume for music... The intensity of the wave is amplified. More power however, means more operating cost. Bluetooth also operates at 2.4ghz, same as wifi, but it is lower power; therefore the range is reduced to within a room or two.

Sprint has the 1900 band for LTE, so naturally, people are concerned that it might not have good range or penetration through building walls. The 800 band would not have these issues. WiMax I believe was 2500mhz, and its range and penetration was not very good at all.

 

[Rush]

novox77

Well written explanation. I guess the not so techie members (not me, of course. ) have a better understanding of what all these MHZs frequency means.

 

[Sauske]

The number represents the frequency of the radio wave. We're talking about electromagnetic radiation in the radio spectrum area. Other parts of the spectrum you may have heard of are visible light, infrared, UV, etc.

Radio waves are the longest waves in the spectrum. Gamma rays are the shortest. Shorter waves have a lot more energy and can do serious damage to you. Longer waves pass through you with little to no harm. We're only concerned with radio here, and most of our wireless technology are concerned with wave frequencies below 2500mhz.

For example, Wi-Fi is 2400mhz (or more commonly specified as 2.4ghz). Microwaves operate around this frequency as well and therefore can sometimes cause interference with Wi-Fi signals.

The higher the frequency, the less able it is to pass through materials. Metal is a good blocker of radio waves. That's why our mobile devices cannot be completely encased in metal; otherwise the radios inside would not be able to communicate with the outside world. In the Evo LTE, the top portion of the phone backing is intentionally made with plastic to allow maximum passage of signal.

Data rides on top of the radio wave, so the higher frequency wave, the more information it can carry. Therefore higher number supports either higher transfer speeds, or more simultaneous data connections (a bigger pipe). But the tradeoff is that the wave tends to get absorbed by the things it passes through, air included. Therefore higher frequencies don't have as much range, and the signal weakens more indoors due to the absorption from building walls. Denser walls, like concrete, will absorb more than wood, plywood, and drywall walls.

Carriers want both range and speed, so it's to their advantage to secure a high band and a low band. Low band may not be as fast, but it offers more coverage.

FM radio waves operate between 88 and 108mhz, and as you know, this low frequency offers incredible range: one tower can cover an entire city and metro areas. But Wi-Fi at 2.4ghz typically can cover one residential home and sometimes a few neighbors.

There are other factors as well, such as the power of the source. You can make 2.4ghz go farther with more power. You can think of power like volume for music... The intensity of the wave is amplified. More power however, means more operating cost. Bluetooth also operates at 2.4ghz, same as wifi, but it is lower power; therefore the range is reduced to within a room or two.

Sprint has the 1900 band for LTE, so naturally, people are concerned that it might not have good range or penetration through building walls. The 800 band would not have these issues. WiMax I believe was 2500mhz, and its range and penetration was not very good at all.

Sharingan! lol! Lower band are weaker but cover greater distances at slower speeds and High band are stronger and cover shorter distances at faster speeds! Penetration is better on Lower band and weaker on higher band....You've open my eye!

 

[dan330]

to recap.. best i can .. as best i understand it..

this is all about 4G data service

wimax is 2500 mhz.. it's major down fall; the high mhz have issues penetration walls and other obstacles.

sprint is currently rolling out 1900 mhz LTE ..

and have plans to use the 800mhz on the next phase of LTE roll out.
but has to first get rid of all the devices currently using 800mhz iDen / Nextel service.

the thing is.. the lower the mhz the better ability for the signal to travel through obstacles.

the new EVO 4G LTE is confirmed to have 1900mhz LTE.. but no mention of any other frequencies.. so it is believed that it will only have 1900. therefore it will be left out of the next phase of LTE and lower mhz.

but i am sure.. in 2 yrs..
when the next LTE version is rolled out...
my next upgrade will be up..
so.. i am ok....

 

[Sauske]

Could it be that LTEvo has the 800mhz radio, and when 800 frequencies come available send an update to have that radio use!? Same when the OG Evo had the wifi n locked (correct me if I'm wrong) but root user where able you activate it!

 

[3volut1on]

Great explanation Novo.

I'm eligible for yearly upgrades so I'm thinking by the time Sprint gets around to rolling out LTE in Phoenix I'll be on the next Evo. My concern is more for the people upgrading this year that will be potentially stuck with the 1900 mhz phone in a 800 mhz area.

 

[IOWA]

If Clear had the resources, the 2.5ghz could have been a beast. The same applies for LTE. With enough saturation, 2.5Ghz will rock the socks

 

[novox77]

Could it be that LTEvo has the 800mhz radio, and when 800 frequencies come available send an update to have that radio use!? Same when the OG Evo had the wifi n locked (correct me if I'm wrong) but root user where able you activate it!

No, as EarlyMon stated earlier, the spec HTC sent to the FCC showed that the Evo LTE only supports the 1900 radio, not the 800. So it will never take advantage of the 800mhz rollout unfortunately.

Also, to clarify: all electromagnetic radiation travels at the same speed: the speed of light. When I mentioned speed, I was referring to the rate of data transfer, not the speed of the signal. A higher frequency wave can carry more data.

Which is why Sprint is in a good position to offer unlimited 4G. They have good bandwidth for it on the 1900 spectrum. Even better at the old Wimax frequency.

 

[EarlyMon]

I think that it's important to clarify that nowhere in the article in the OP did they say that the 800 MHz band freed by iDEN would be used for LTE.

Note that the Evo, 3vo, and now all 2012 phones are dual frequency CDMA, and that second frequency is 800 MHz, to give greater CDMA range (as novox77 said).

m.gizmodo.com/5847643/its-official-sprint-is-going-lte

So I think all of this concern about Sprint using the iDEN band is not a real issue, so much as it is a misreading of reports.

Unless some news hit and I missed it.

This article suggests that Sprint will just be using all sorts of LTE bands.

MobileBurn: Sprint details 4G LTE network roll-out plans, launch in mid-2012

I think that I would like to see something definitive from Sprint. This is sounding like a lot conclusions with little background data to me.

PS - credit on the FCC thing goes to one of our regulars in the pre-release thread from when I had the same question. Sorry, will give credit when I can search.

 

[CriticalCritic]

Thanks for the explanation Novo.
But what I'm gathering is (please correct me if I'm wrong)...

Lower frequency (800 MHz) = Higher penetration for BOTH a better signal AND a longer tower range, and lower radiation emissions from the device itself, but at the cost of slower data speeds.

Higher Frequency (1900 MHz) is just the opposite = Lower penetration for a comparably worse signal (but better than WiMax), higher radiation emissions from the mobile device, but higher data download speeds.

Is that about right?

 

[EarlyMon]

S4GRU first to capture Sprint LTE live in the wild! - Sprint 4G Rollout Updates

By the way, I think many of happy with 1900 MHz already -

http://androidforums.com/htc-hero-sprint/14379-cdma-1900-mhz-rocks.html

 

[Sauske]

S4GRU first to capture Sprint LTE live in the wild! - Sprint 4G Rollout Updates

By the way, I think many of happy with 1900 MHz already -

http://androidforums.com/htc-hero-sprint/14379-cdma-1900-mhz-rocks.html

Can't wait until it roll out in Orlando Fl!!!!! LTEvo your mines!

 

[Sauske]

S4GRU first to capture Sprint LTE live in the wild! - Sprint 4G Rollout Updates

EarlyMon what those the pics implies!? Or are this finding saying we in good hands?

 

[novox77]

Thanks for the explanation Novo.
But what I'm gathering is (please correct me if I'm wrong)...

Lower frequency (800 MHz) = Higher penetration for BOTH a better signal AND a longer tower range, and lower radiation emissions from the device itself, but at the cost of slower data speeds.

Higher Frequency (1900 MHz) is just the opposite = Lower penetration for a comparably worse signal (but better than WiMax), higher radiation emissions from the mobile device, but higher data download speeds.

Is that about right?

Looks right. I'm not sure if the power output from the cell phone is higher for the higher frequency radio. It would make sense, since the signal is more prone to degradation. It also explains why battery life is worse for 4G connections: the broadcast requires more power.

BTW, Early linked to another thread (http://androidforums.com/htc-hero-sprint/14379-cdma-1900-mhz-rocks.html) where one guy claims that higher frequency waves actually have an easier time passing through walls.

Everything I've ever learned about electromagnetic radiation tells me that what he's saying is completely wrong. No clue where he's getting his info, particularly around the faraday cage. We're talking about materials that have very low conductivity (like air, water, wood, concrete, etc). The fact that a high frequency signal decays faster in air is already indication that it would fare much more poorly in a denser substance. And in the case of metals, it's a known fact that metals are reflective. Microwaves are built with stainless steel walls because it is especially reflective to the 2ghz spectrum. No radio signal will pass through a metal surface. Same reason you get little to no signal in an elevator. You're standing in a metal box.

Even a sheet of aluminum acts as a good reflector for radio waves. That's the foundation of many "pringles can" homebrew antennas for boosting wifi.

 

[EarlyMon]

Yeah, I was less concerned about all of the East and West thinking in that article than I was in pointing out that maybe 1900 MHz isn't a problem in the first place.

Here's the thing about caring about signal loss in buildings as a function of frequency - deciding if high or low frequency is better goes in assuming that all things are being equal.

In theory, you can make all things equal, here's one equation that does it -

Free-space path loss - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

But in practice, there's more -

Radio Signal Path Loss :: Radio-Electronics.Com

10 Commandments of Wireless Communications - B&B Electronics

Are buildings harder on higher frequencies? Pretty much. Is that the whole story? Not really.

Think about how the inside of your home looks with only moonlight as a source of light in the dead of night. You get a lot of surprising shadows and glowing places as light bounces around. Radio signals are like that. So you may attenuate the signal with building materials, but you are going to create vast changes in nulls and hot spots, too. So you'll possibly experience what you do already in buildings - some spots will be better than others.

And aside from frequencies, we have a few other important factors to consider - the towers and the phones are going to be quite different from WiMAX on Evos.

If it makes you feel any better, 1900 MHz LTE is lower frequency than 2400 MHz WiMax. And I don't think that we're going to get 800 MHz LTE and need to care about that anyway.

In fact, setting aside Clear, Light Squared and Aunt Sally, I find myself staring into a time machine -

I am seeing maps, claims and a whole lot of promises from Sprint et al.

PS to Sauske - the measurement traces tell us that the signal is for real and looking properly broadcast at the test location.

And as twospirits reminded me lately, s4gru.com got a lot right early on about WiMax back when we were all learning to spell Evo, so that's who I'm following for Sprint LTE news these days.

 

[novox77]

that 10 commandments article was informative and funny to read. hard to justapose ye olde english with the technological terminology

A while back, I was struggling to get a strong wifi signal from my router. I had to visualize the router as a bright light (representing the wifi signal). Then I had to figure the approximate translucency of my walls and ceilings in my mind and try to picture the light shining through that. It definitely helped me figure out where the pockets of good reception (brightest light) would be. Would be cool to develop a program that could visualize in various bands of electromagnetic spectra. Kinda like night vision IR, but for radio frequencies.

 

[IOWA]

Yeah, I was less concerned about all of the East and West thinking in that article than I was in pointing out that maybe 1900 MHz isn't a problem in the first place.

Here's the thing about caring about signal loss in buildings as a function of frequency - deciding if high or low frequency is better goes in assuming that all things are being equal.

In theory, you can make all things equal, here's one equation that does it -

Free-space path loss - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

But in practice, there's more -

Radio Signal Path Loss :: Radio-Electronics.Com

10 Commandments of Wireless Communications - B&B Electronics

Are buildings harder on higher frequencies? Pretty much. Is that the whole story? Not really.

Think about how the inside of your home looks with only moonlight as a source of light in the dead of night. You get a lot of surprising shadows and glowing places as light bounces around. Radio signals are like that. So you may attenuate the signal with building materials, but you are going to create vast changes in nulls and hot spots, too. So you'll possibly experience what you do already in buildings - some spots will be better than others.

And aside from frequencies, we have a few other important factors to consider - the towers and the phones are going to be quite different from WiMAX on Evos.

If it makes you feel any better, 1900 MHz LTE is lower frequency than 2400 MHz WiMax. And I don't think that we're going to get 800 MHz LTE and need to care about that anyway.

In fact, setting aside Clear, Light Squared and Aunt Sally, I find myself staring into a time machine -

I am seeing maps, claims and a whole lot of promises from Sprint et al.

PS to Sauske - the measurement traces tell us that the signal is for real and looking properly broadcast at the test location.

And as twospirits reminded me lately, s4gru.com got a lot right early on about WiMax back when we were all learning to spell Evo, so that's who I'm following for Sprint LTE news these days.

Here's the bottom line pretty much, if you can currently get Sprint 3G signal, you'll be able to get an LTE signal once it's up and running.

 

[EarlyMon]

Yep.