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Reviews and Video Thread

4 Sprint stores near me, all full of morons... I am unlucky :(

Since we are on the subject of reviewing Sprint stores' ability to handle the new Galaxy S II, and new phones in general, let me say this:

Nearly all Sprint store employees are clueless.

E.g.; I went in to my local store because I was having difficulty with a Google Voice integration with Sprint question. The employee I spoke with, when I asked for someone familiar with Google Voice had this to say: "Nobody here really knows anything about Google Voice. No one has it on their phones."

I said, "Since Sprint has integrated with Google Voice, maybe you folks might want to at least have some basic knowledge of your damn product."

Unfortunately, Sprint employees will rarely know about a new product like the Galaxy S II.
 
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I just want to weigh in here..

Sprint has utterly failed at marketing this phone

This may not be all sprint's fault, due to the speculation here and elsewhere about samsung's delay in releasing it due to production or apple litigation, etc. My point is, when the evo4g came out the first reviews had 100,000 views per day on youtube. Wirefly was at only 15,000 views of that video after 5 days.

I think the point here is this is probably the greatest phone ever released and no one knows about it. Maybe its because iPhone 5 comes out in a month or 2, and sprint is planning to blow their marketing load on marketing that. Who knows. But this might explain why sprint store employees dont have a clue, why radioshack guys are on the phone with me going "dude, this makes no sense to me either, call back tomorrow, I dont even know if we're getting this phone officially yet." (actual words from radio shack on sunday, 9/11).

If I get mine at the sprint store I will not be surprised if I get there at 9am there wont be anyone else there with me, or maybe a couple. Its crazy.
 
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Eek. Not the most favorable review of the phone. I'm disappointed at how much thicker it is than the original, but I suppose for an extra .2" screen, its a trade off.

Serious negatives: 4g battery performance is still terrible. Sigh. On my evo 4g I almost never use 4g because it utterly destroys battery life. This is a serious negative for me.
 
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I just want to weigh in here..

Sprint has utterly failed at marketing this phone

I think the point here is this is probably the greatest phone ever released and no one knows about it. Maybe its because iPhone 5 comes out in a month or 2, and sprint is planning to blow their marketing load on marketing that. Who knows.

I think you might have actually hit upon a relevant and accurate connection between the Epic 4G Touch and the iPhone 5. Sprint has a limited amount of advertising dollars. More so than any other carrier. Sprint is withholding ads right now in anticipation of the iPhone release. Makes sense.

I agree, I don't think sprint is even trying with this phone. They are going to bank on the fact Apple is a big name and the the normal everyday person knows what an iPhone is, and will 'have' to have one. They wouldn't even have to put that much money into the commercial, all it would have to say is "Sprint, yep we got the iPhone... see ya in a few minutes at the register."
 
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I agree, I don't think sprint is even trying with this phone. They are going to bank on the fact Apple is a big name and the the normal everyday person knows what an iPhone is, and will 'have' to have one. They wouldn't even have to put that much money into the commercial, all it would have to say is "Sprint, yep we got the iPhone... see ya in a few minutes at the register."

LOL. I think sprint will easily say "Guess what, want truly unlimited data at about 75% the cost of the others? Come get your iphone at sprint." Done deal. If this happens, I really really hope sprint's datanetwork doesn't destroy itself. This could really occur imho.

To address the cds on this issue: I rarely use sprint's data network period. I live in a very high tech city where there is wifi nearly everywhere. That said, if im in traffic and want to listen to pandora over 4g my phone uses half its battery by the time I got home. And 3g is useless during rushhour. I get about .15 mbit up and down at 5:30pm. Either way, the 4g will be better on the phone if anything just because the battery is better. I'm very curious about whether the nexus prime will have some sort of nextgen 4g solution to the massive battery drain.
 
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I'm very curious about whether the nexus prime will have some sort of nextgen 4g solution to the massive battery drain.

Sprint's "nextgen" 4G solution is called LTE. I get the distinct impression that Sprint is letting WiMax ripen (rot) while they figure a way to incorporate Clearwire's LTE hopes.

My area was at the edge of WiMax when Sprint introduced it last summer. (I get it from my house if I step outside.) And there it remains, never growing, stagnant with no sign of improvement. Until Sprint decides to either move forward or stick with a hopelessly slow 4G, WiMax is off the burner.

The review by Slashgear notes how slow the Sprint 4G is. This is a valid comment, and underscores Sprint's weakness with emerging technology. I will stick with Sprint because the pricing and unlimited data fit best with my situation. I just wish Sprint could move both WiMax and LTE forward, but, sigh, I don't think they intend to stick with WiMax.
 
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Sprint's "nextgen" 4G solution is called LTE. I get the distinct impression that Sprint is letting WiMax ripen (rot) while they figure a way to incorporate Clearwire's LTE hopes.

My area was at the edge of WiMax when Sprint introduced it last summer. (I get it from my house if I step outside.) And there it remains, never growing, stagnant with no sign of improvement. Until Sprint decides to either move forward or stick with a hopelessly slow 4G, WiMax is off the burner.

The review by Slashgear notes how slow the Sprint 4G is. This is a valid comment, and underscores Sprint's weakness with emerging technology. I will stick with Sprint because the pricing and unlimited data fit best with my situation. I just wish Sprint could move both WiMax and LTE forward, but, sigh, I don't think they intend to stick with WiMax.


I think it's a useless and baseless complaint. I am using a clearwire hotspot in the los angeles area, coverage is good, the only issue from time to time is building penetration, not speed.

the most speed I have gotten from 4g here is around 650 KB/s ~ 5.2 mbps, I have heard of verizon lte speeds of double or triple that, and to that I say so god damn what.

the speeds of wimax are fast enough to stream 1080p HD with zero issues, what is the speed given too slow to accomplish? Slower torrent downloads? again, so what, use home broadband for that.

its like complaining about a car that goes ONLY 200 mph for not being as fast as the ferrari that can do 400 mph, but what about the fact that the ferrari has a range of only 100 miles (data caps !!!!!)

conveniently ignored, crap priorities, just people bowled over by higher numbers completely unmoored to any actual tangible benefits.

EDIT:

On the lte vs wimax future front, they already announced a deal with lightsquared, and clearwire is made mention of lte plans. And sprint released info on their own site about future plans, with more info to come soon.

http://newsroom.sprint.com/press_kits.cfm?presskit_id=19

the game plan is probably going to be expansion of multimodal towers that broadcast both lte/3g/wimax in the same tower. That is where they are likely headed. This is good, it means as their lte expands, so will their wimax, it means people with current wimax phones will still be covered, and future phones might have one of those radios that pick up both wimax and lte, lte on a lower frequency for better building penetration, and wimax on the higher frequency for unlimited data.

Best of all worlds, not go lte and get great coverage, so long as you only take teaspoons of data. The future of sprints 4g look brighter than ANY other carrier depending on what they announce, but the direction we have hints at good news, not bad.
 
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Sprint's "nextgen" 4G solution is called LTE. I get the distinct impression that Sprint is letting WiMax ripen (rot) while they figure a way to incorporate Clearwire's LTE hopes.

My area was at the edge of WiMax when Sprint introduced it last summer. (I get it from my house if I step outside.) And there it remains, never growing, stagnant with no sign of improvement. Until Sprint decides to either move forward or stick with a hopelessly slow 4G, WiMax is off the burner.

The review by Slashgear notes how slow the Sprint 4G is. This is a valid comment, and underscores Sprint's weakness with emerging technology. I will stick with Sprint because the pricing and unlimited data fit best with my situation. I just wish Sprint could move both WiMax and LTE forward, but, sigh, I don't think they intend to stick with WiMax.

See I don't have any issues with wimax speed. At home sitting on my couch I get about 4Mbit/1Mbit, even during rush hour. Worst I've ever seen it do is about 2.5Mbit down (though this "good" speed is probably because most sprint users are still on 3g only). This is definitely enough bandwidth to stream pandora or watch sprint tv / youtube videos in the dentist waiting room. I guess you have a different perspective because you don't have it right at home and its kind of a slap in the face that you can step outside and get it. For me, its the battery murder. If my phone only lasts 3 or 4 hours with 4g im really reluctant to use it at all unless im on my way home. Kinda stupid and wish this would just get fixed.
 
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I agree, I don't think sprint is even trying with this phone. They are going to bank on the fact Apple is a big name and the the normal everyday person knows what an iPhone is, and will 'have' to have one. They wouldn't even have to put that much money into the commercial, all it would have to say is "Sprint, yep we got the iPhone... see ya in a few minutes at the register."


This is my first post here, but you made me almost piss my pants laughing, LOL.

Sprint could be getting the Galaxy S ]l[ with quad cores and running Android 5.0 "Jellybean" and they wouldn't even let you know about it, oh you're here for that S3 thing, let me look in the back somewhere. But just wait till they get the outdated at launch iPhone5, it will be the hottest thing since sliced bread.
 
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See I don't have any issues with wimax speed. At home sitting on my couch I get about 4Mbit/1Mbit, even during rush hour. Worst I've ever seen it do is about 2.5Mbit down (though this "good" speed is probably because most sprint users are still on 3g only). This is definitely enough bandwidth to stream pandora or watch sprint tv / youtube videos in the dentist waiting room. I guess you have a different perspective because you don't have it right at home and its kind of a slap in the face that you can step outside and get it. For me, its the battery murder. If my phone only lasts 3 or 4 hours with 4g im really reluctant to use it at all unless im on my way home. Kinda stupid and wish this would just get fixed.

It's a case of crossed priorities, anytime I see a reviewer get starry eyed over 15mbps and go crazy or put down wimax speeds, I think to myself this person is completely clueless. They would take triple the speed with limited range vs still fast enough speed to do ANYTHING a person wanted to on the net with no issues AND unlimited range/speed...

It's such a broken perspective and priority to the point of being a cartoon. There are legitimate knocks on wimax, like building penetration at clears frequencis vs verizon lte, but speed is not one of them.
 
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It's a case of crossed priorities, anytime I see a reviewer get starry eyed over 15mbps and go crazy or put down wimax speeds, I think to myself this person is completely clueless. They would take triple the speed with limited range vs still fast enough speed to do ANYTHING a person wanted to on the net with no issues AND unlimited range/speed...

It's such a broken perspective and priority to the point of being a cartoon. There are legitimate knocks on wimax, like building penetration at clears frequencis vs verizon lte, but speed is not one of them.

Reading your response to unplugged I think you over reacted a bit to what he said, but your points are still valid. People forget that on May 31, 2010 it was a dream getting 1Mbit. 15 months later with 4g phones people are complaining about 4Mbit or 6Mbits on Wimax because its much slower than LTE's 13Mbits. I really think unplugged is probably not too happy because he just can't get it at his house and he pays $10/month for this "premium speed." I can feel his pain.

Again, I don't have any issues with 4g speeds. There are very few spots in my city that aren't 4g covered, either. But 4g is like having AAA for your car - better to have it than not. It really isn't an always on solution, which is really pretty shitty considering I pay $10/month for it. This is my major beef with 4g. I couldn't even imagine living in rural nebraska or something and not having 4g at all.. that would make me irate paying that $10/month.
 
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I really think unplugged is probably not too happy because he just can't get it at his house and he pays $10/month for this "premium speed." I can feel his pain.

And it's not just my situation, but the fact that the LA market was introduced as the first segment last summer, and that Irvine would be the boundary of 4G. (I knew that would be the case because Sprint's Western regional HQ is in Irvine.) But once the initial installation was made, there has been no further build-out.

As to speed comparisons, we need to keep in mind that higher traffic results in lower speeds. Sprint doesn't have much speed to play with. Verizon does.

As to Sammael's mention of Lightsquared and LTE; you do realize that Lightsquared is mired in issues with GPS band proximity? Without the conflicted upper level bands, Lightsquared is not an alternative. (As Sprint's contract withdrawal provisions underline.)

Sprint has alternatives, and hopefully this will be addressed at the October 4G/ iPhone summit. The fact remains that once the initial build-out occurred, there has been no improvement, and Sprint has been left in the dust by the other carriers as far as 4G coverage is concerned.
 
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