HTC EVO 3D LTE/WIMAX capabilities

DanTheAndroid · Mar 22, 2011

I was reading BlueScreen's posts and responses to EVO 3D threads and read what he had to say... he mentioned the EVO 3D being compatible with LTE/Wimax! Then the EVO 3D was official and there was know mention of it being backwards compatible with LTE like he said! I hope he is right about backwards compatibility... and if he is why didn't sprint say the evo 3d would be LTE/Wimax capable and announce them making the switch to LTE?

I would like a response from BlueScreen...

Thanks

Also BlueScreen mislead us on certain aspects of the EVO 3D... like he said it would have a kickstand, it doesn't have a kickstand, and was wrong about dual channel ram, and was wrong about the EVO 3D having a 3mp FFC! I think this guy just was lying... and the aspects of the phone he was correct about were leaked by BGR!

lordofthereef · Mar 22, 2011

My understanding is that the two techs are backwards compatible and the difference is in firmware (please do correct me if I am wrong but this is what I have read in a couple places). Sprint wouldn't announce thier LTE switch unless things were set in stone which, as I understand, is currently not the case.

RiverOfIce · Mar 22, 2011

There is zero reason to make it backwards compatible. Sprint is not going to dump wimax. I just don't understand why people believe this.

Let try to explain this to you. Wimax and LTE are just protocols. Wimax is open source, which means there are very little fees for the software. LTE is closed source and huge fees for the software.

If sprint dumps wimax and changes to lte. It would be like taking a new car, repainting the car a different color and slapping a new sticker on it.

Would you take your brand new car, fresh from the factory, repaint the car a different color, and label change the name to something else?

And we have been around this tree before, Jackson.

djdisturbed · Mar 22, 2011

I want to believe that its has this, and my current evo is backward compatable. BUT as others have said, they didnt announce anything about LTE. I know other people have said well they didnt announce it b/c its not set in stone, BUT then again I have seen companies make announcements like this before and say "this hardware is also compatable w/ XXXXX but possible future use of XXXXX" and use that as a selling point EVEN if it never comes around untill people have moved onto the next great thing (if then, but they leave the option there in the original release to make it sound better then it is)

DanTheAndroid · Mar 22, 2011

Exactly

jsward12 · Mar 22, 2011

Has anyone noticed any new Clear/Sprint 4G deployments? Probably not, there has to be a plan to upgrade to LTE. I doubt it would happen within the next year but after they retire the iDEN network that would make the most sense.

jsward12 · Mar 22, 2011

Sprint could deploy LTE nationwide by year-end 2013 - FierceWireless

BlackDynamite · Mar 22, 2011

Sprint changing to LTE is imminent. There is way too much smoke, coming from way too many different directions, for there to not be any fire. It absolutely will happen.

However, Blue Screen was a troll. He had no inside info. Once the official specs of the Evo 3D started leaking, everyone should have strongly suspected he was a troll. Once Sprint made the announcement and it was totally different than what Blue Screen had said it would be, there should have been no doubt he was a troll.

crabjoe · Mar 23, 2011

I don't know why people keep thinking you can just reprogram a WiMax phone to LTE because it's not that simple. Even at the basestation, you have swap a card, in addition to the software. On a phone, you have a issue with the antenna. Current WiMax radios have an antenna for 2.5ghz. Sprint has publicly stated that is they go LTE, they would do it at 1900mhz and or use part of their 800mhz spectrum.

Now if the E3D had the MSM8960 SoC, and it had 800/1900mhz and 2.5ghz antennas, I'd say it could do LTE, because MSM8960 has LTE-TDD built in. But being that it's only got the MSM8660 SoC, it's highly unlikely, unless Sprint had HTC spec it with a separate chipset that could do both WiMax and LTE. And if you think it's impossible, think again. There are chips that can do both WiMax and LTE now... So the question is, will the E3D have one of these chipset or separate chips for LTE and WiMax or just a WiMax chip? This would be in addition to all the antenna that would be needed..

BTW, If I were Sprint, I would have gone the WiMax/LTE feature, in addition to having antennas to support 700/800/1900mhz and 2.5ghz. The reason is because Sprint is pushing for the FCC to force low cost data roaming like they have for voice service right now and you'd need a 700mhz antenna to roam on Verizon's LTE service. Roaming would allow them sometime to get their crap together!!

djdisturbed · Mar 23, 2011

crabjoe said:
I don't know why people keep thinking you can just reprogram a WiMax phone to LTE because it's not that simple. Even at the basestation, you have swap a card, in addition to the software. On a phone, you have a issue with the antenna. Current WiMax radios have an antenna for 2.5ghz. Sprint has publicly stated that is they go LTE, they would do it at 1900mhz and or use part of their 800mhz spectrum.

Now if the E3D had the MSM8960 SoC, and it had 800/1900mhz and 2.5ghz antennas, I'd say it could do LTE, because MSM8960 has LTE-TDD built in. But being that it's only got the MSM8660 SoC, it's highly unlikely, unless Sprint had HTC spec it with a separate chipset that could do both WiMax and LTE. And if you think it's impossible, think again. There are chips that can do both WiMax and LTE now... So the question is, will the E3D have one of these chipset or separate chips for LTE and WiMax or just a WiMax chip? This would be in addition to all the antenna that would be needed..

BTW, If I were Sprint, I would have gone the WiMax/LTE feature, in addition to having antennas to support 700/800/1900mhz and 2.5ghz. The reason is because Sprint is pushing for the FCC to force low cost data roaming like they have for voice service right now and you'd need a 700mhz antenna to roam on Verizon's LTE service. Roaming would allow them sometime to get their crap together!!

While this is mostly true (90% of it) you can use antennas as dual band antennas. Most of us HAM radio operators do this often. It all depends on the wave length of the antenna and other things that allow the transceiver to do this, so in other words, they have have it work like, if wimax is present it uses the wimax radio, but if its not and it detects LTE signals it switches over to that on the same antenna (those they can use both at the same time possibly, like we do in ham radio). I'm not sure if they can do it in such a small form factor, but those of us that work with HAM radio do this quite often, even have our radio's act as a cross band repeater and receive something in one feq band while transmitting it back out at the same time on a diff feq band on the same antenna.

BlackDynamite · Mar 23, 2011

djdisturbed said:
While this is mostly true (90% of it) you can use antennas as dual band antennas. Most of us HAM radio operators do this often. It all depends on the wave length of the antenna and other things that allow the transceiver to do this, so in other words, they have have it work like, if wimax is present it uses the wimax radio, but if its not and it detects LTE signals it switches over to that on the same antenna (those they can use both at the same time possibly, like we do in ham radio). I'm not sure if they can do it in such a small form factor, but those of us that work with HAM radio do this quite often, even have our radio's act as a cross band repeater and receive something in one feq band while transmitting it back out at the same time on a diff feq band on the same antenna.

Yeah I'm pretty sure Sprint does this right now with Wimax/CDMA. I doubt they put more than 1 antenna in the phone.

However, I think it would probably use more battery power if it was doing all those different radio types and frequencies.

djdisturbed · Mar 23, 2011

BlackDynamite said:
Yeah I'm pretty sure Sprint does this right now with Wimax/CDMA. I doubt they put more than 1 antenna in the phone.

However, I think it would probably use more battery power if it was doing all those different radio types and frequencies.

Well, they do put more then 1 antenna in the phone now, the phone antenna, the wimax, the bt, and the wifi all have a diff antenna, open up the back of your evo and you can see each of them

, but yeah i know what you are saying I'm just saying it IS possible to have one antenna used by more then one transceiver chipset if its set up right and the feq's that they use are able to use the wavelength that the antenna they are using it is set to.

djdisturbed · Mar 23, 2011

BTW, from the photo i saw with the batt cover removed I can see 4 antennas (2 on each side of the camras) and what might be a 5th antenna on the bottom side of it, but not sure it that is one or not. I know the 4 up top are for phone, wifi, 4g (wimax) and bt, but if that is a 5th antenna what would it be for? lte? but like i said, i cant tell compleatly if that is one or not, prob not, but then again. (thats from the photo here, http://androidforums.com/htc-evo-4g/131928-what-features-do-you-want-evo-2-a-26.html#post2465015 )

crabjoe · Mar 23, 2011

djdisturbed said:
While this is mostly true (90% of it) you can use antennas as dual band antennas. Most of us HAM radio operators do this often. It all depends on the wave length of the antenna and other things that allow the transceiver to do this, so in other words, they have have it work like, if wimax is present it uses the wimax radio, but if its not and it detects LTE signals it switches over to that on the same antenna (those they can use both at the same time possibly, like we do in ham radio). I'm not sure if they can do it in such a small form factor, but those of us that work with HAM radio do this quite often, even have our radio's act as a cross band repeater and receive something in one feq band while transmitting it back out at the same time on a diff feq band on the same antenna.

Didisturbed,

Isn't the only reason that you can use multiple frequencies with Ham Radio operations because the frequencies are fairly close together (30 mhz for ham radio?) like FM radio? If not, I learned something new and would like to learn more.

Assuming Ham radio only uses one antenna because the frequencies are close together, I don't see how they can do with with cell service. From 800mhz to 1900mhz is a huge jump, even 700 to 800 is large. In fact, a 700mhz antenna in a cell phone already doesn't just do 700mhz, it works in a range of, lets say, 700-720mhz, in the case of LTE. Knowing this, I just don't see how they could build a small enough antenna, that can work across wide variances of frequencies that cell phones use. I'd think if it were possible, they would have already done it.

djdisturbed · Mar 23, 2011

crabjoe said:
Didisturbed,

Isn't the only reason that you can use multiple frequencies with Ham Radio operations because the frequencies are fairly close together (30 mhz for ham radio?) like FM radio? If not, I learned something new and would like to learn more.

Assuming Ham radio only uses one antenna because the frequencies are close together, I don't see how they can do with with cell service. From 800mhz to 1900mhz is a huge jump, even 700 to 800 is large. In fact, a 700mhz antenna in a cell phone already doesn't just do 700mhz, it works in a range of, lets say, 700-720mhz, in the case of LTE. Knowing this, I just don't see how they could build a small enough antenna, that can work across wide variances of frequencies that cell phones use. I'd think if it were possible, they would have already done it.

um no, Im talking COMPLEATLY diff Feq Bands, like UHF (400mhz band) and VHF (50mhz and 144mhz bands) using the same antenna at the same time, its all about the feq wave length and if the antenna is right for the wave to "come out of it" (for laymens terms) at the right point in the wave. There are other radios that we use the use high feq and much lower feq, the lower feq are harder to use one antenna for multiple bands w/ out adding an antenna tuner to the set up, but the higher feq are more forgiving when it comes to that b/c of the shorter wavelength of the feq. allot of people make that mistake when they see "fm radio transciever writtten on ham radios... FM is just the TYPE of signal it sends out for voice, had nothing to do with the feq its using.

RiverOfIce · Mar 23, 2011

BlackDynamite said:
Sprint changing to LTE is imminent. There is way too much smoke, coming from way too many different directions, for there to not be any fire. It absolutely will happen.

Once again, WHY? Please explain why they would do it?

lordofthereef · Mar 23, 2011

RiverOfIce said:
Once again, WHY? Please explain why they would do it?

I think people are basing these statements solely on Sprint's lack of Wimax expansion as of late, along with the fact that the "news" has been reporting a debachle between ClearWire and Sprint.

Assuming the above is true I see three options:
1) Sprint resolves things and expands Wimax
2) Sprint sits on it with no resolution/expansion (IMO this isn't a legit option)
3) Sprint cans clearwire and adopts LTE, which MAY be the right choice seeing as the other two big guns are adopting it and we would have roaming capabilities (assuming this would be affordable, which I know nothing about)

BlackDynamite · Mar 23, 2011

RiverOfIce said:
Once again, WHY? Please explain why they would do it?

Well they confirmed they were talking to LightSquared about using their LTE network, there are all kinds of reports about them talking to infrastructure providers about launching an LTE network (with some credible sources even saying such a network rollout is already underway and called project leapfrog), and then there is the fact that both Sprint and Clear have repeatedly talked about how they could change to LTE at any time on almost a moment's notice. Oh yeah, and there are also confirmed reports that Clear was actually testing LTE recently.

Why would they do it? Probably because just about every carrier worldwide has chosen that technology. They learned their lesson with CDMA. They were never the carrier with the best handsets (until they got the Evo). And that was with Verizon using the same technology as them. When Verizon went LTE, Sprint was really on a deserted island.

And not only does it basically kill handset selection, and make handsets cost more, but it makes it harder to roam.

And then there is the whole issue of Wimax using up more spectrum than LTE per user.

I don't think there is any question that Sprint is going LTE. Especially with Sprint confirming that they were studying the issue and would make a decision sometime this summer. So if you really want to know why they are, you'd have to ask Dan Hesse why he ended up making the switch.

EDIT:
Check this out:
http://www.lightreading.com/video.asp?doc_id=205968&

Clearwire confirms they were really impressed with their LTE trials and are not testing Wimax 2.

RiverOfIce · Mar 23, 2011

BlackDynamite said:
Why would they do it? Probably because just about every carrier worldwide has chosen that technology. They learned their lesson with CDMA. They were never the carrier with the best handsets (until they got the Evo). And that was with Verizon using the same technology as them. When Verizon went LTE, Sprint was really on a deserted island.

And not only does it basically kill handset selection, and make handsets cost more, but it makes it harder to roam.

And then there is the whole issue of Wimax using up more spectrum than LTE per user.

I don't think there is any question that Sprint is going LTE. Especially with Sprint confirming that they were studying the issue and would make a decision sometime this summer. So if you really want to know why they are, you'd have to ask Dan Hesse why he ended up making the switch.

EDIT:
Check this out:
Light Reading - 4G/LTE - CTIA 2011: Clearwire Updates on LTE - Telecom Video Document

Clearwire confirms they were really impressed with their LTE trials and are not testing Wimax 2.

Wimax 2 is fully up in running is 9 cities. Please check your fact.

You will NOT beable to roam with LTE. Let me try that again, you WILL NOT be able to roam with LTE, not for the next 3 or 4 years.

You are dead wrong on the spectrum, wimax uses a fraction of the spectrum of LTE. Wimax can collect about 900 users per 5mhz of sepectrum. LTE can do about 200 user per 5mhz of spectrum.

The same LTE test you point out. Wimax did 125mbps, while LTE did only 90mbps, on the same equipment and same 20mhz spectrum use.

BlackDynamite · Mar 24, 2011

RiverOfIce said:
Wimax 2 is fully up in running is 9 cities. Please check your fact.

You will NOT beable to roam with LTE. Let me try that again, you WILL NOT be able to roam with LTE, not for the next 3 or 4 years.

You are dead wrong on the spectrum, wimax uses a fraction of the spectrum of LTE. Wimax can collect about 900 users per 5mhz of sepectrum. LTE can do about 200 user per 5mhz of spectrum.

The same LTE test you point out. Wimax did 125mbps, while LTE did only 90mbps, on the same equipment and same 20mhz spectrum use.

So are you claiming that Sprint will not switch to LTE? Do you care to place a wager on that?

Watch the video man. Then you can direct your rant at the clearwire exec that was talking about how great LTE is. And read the papers. Then you can direct your little rant at all the Sprint and clearwire execs that have been talking about how they plan to test LTE and make a decision this summer, while reputable sources all report that the decision has already been made and the rollout is underway. Not to mention the fact that it was confirmed that Sprint was talking to LightSquared about using their LTE network.

You may not be able to roam on LTE for a while, but you will NEVER be able to roam on wimax. At least not on Verizon/AT&T/T-Mobile/LightSquared (the largest networks in this country).

And what 9 cities does clearwire have wimax 2 running in? Watch the video and the clearwire exec very clearly (no pun intended) says they aren't even testing wimax 2 yet.

Again, if you just want to argue then take it up with clearwire and sprint. All indications are that their mind is already made up and the switch is underway.

If you are making a prediction that Sprint will not go the LTE route, then I will be happy to make a friendly wager with you.

JMac202 · Mar 24, 2011

jsward12 said:
Has anyone noticed any new Clear/Sprint 4G deployments? Probably not, there has to be a plan to upgrade to LTE. I doubt it would happen within the next year but after they retire the iDEN network that would make the most sense.

We just got 4G here in Wichita, KS at the beginning of the month. Pretty new if you ask me.

dan330 · Mar 24, 2011

i am still hoping .. wimax will win .. and sprint will stick with wimax.

I am scared of what lte will do to our pockets... and freedom to use the internet...

BlackDynamite · Mar 24, 2011

dan330 said:
i am still hoping .. wimax will win .. and sprint will stick with wimax.

I am scared of what lte will do to our pockets... and freedom to use the internet...

Don't let anyone fool you, Sprint can restrict Wimax just as easily as they can restrict LTE.

dan330 · Mar 24, 2011

yes.. they can... you are right...
but: and you can drive 150mph on the hwy... but you end up in trouble if caught.

wimax is open-souce and has rules and restrictions...

lte is designed by carriers for carriers for making money...

BlackDynamite · Mar 24, 2011

dan330 said:
yes.. they can... you are right...
but: and you can drive 150mph on the hwy... but you end up in trouble if caught.

wimax is open-souce and has rules and restrictions...

lte is designed by carriers for carriers for making money...

Sprint is not obligated to keep Wimax free and open, lol. They do because that is the way they choose to operate. But if Sprint started charging extra for say, tethering, oh wait... Or maybe Clear could say a certain device is only allowed to be used on their network if it is used with an Apple product, woops, already done...

The point is, Wimax may be open source, but the carriers are still free to use it how they see fit. They can absolutely restrict things with it if they want. And even if there was some fine print in the Wimax standard that prohibited it, the federal government recently allowed it with their bogus net nuetrality rules.

Much like Android is open source but Motorola (and even new HTC) bootloaders and recovery are locked, and AT&T Android phones don't even allow apps to be installed unless you get it from the market. The new Amazon market isn't even allowed on AT&T Android phones.

HTC EVO 3D LTE/WIMAX capabilities

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