Sprint adds four new cities to its LTE roster, revamps 3G in others

By Phil Nickinson  | Aug 29 2012 | 9:09 am  | 62 Comments

Sprint

Sprint's slowly been ramping up its 4G LTE service, and today the carrier has announced four new cities with LTE coverage. They are:

  • Baltimore, Md.
  • Gainesville, Ga.
  • Manhattan/Junction City, Kan.
  • Sedalia, Mo.

Also, Sprint says it's turned on its revamped 3G service (this is all part of its Network Vision initiative) in Baltimore, Boston and Washington, D.C.

Sprint has a number of LTE-capable Android smartphones, including the LG Vipre, Motorola Photon Q, Samsung Galaxy S3, HTC EVO 4G LTE and the Samsung Galaxy Nexus.

Source: Sprint

Phil Nickinson

Phil Nickinson Editor in Chief

"Phil is a recovering print journalist, editor of Android Central, subtitles and street signs."

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There are 62 comments

richardsoper says:

WHY CANT I HAVE THE LTE GOODNESS! Sacramento better get LTE soon!

jrsharp70 says:

don't feel bad, I don't have 4g signal, and I'm 20 min north of Atlanta, SMACK in the middle if a giant "4g area of orange" on the coverage map.

DWR_31 says:

Forget LTE. With the Network Vision upgrades Wimax has gotten way better than it was. Within the last thirty days I've managed to use 40Gbs of data on Wimax, and that's just because I forgot to turn on WiFi when I get home.
When I finally realized I started running speedtests and saw an average of double the speeds I would normally see.

tyrelian says:

Tampa!!!! the rnc is here get some coverage here!!!

jermajesty says:

Good thing they went to all the effort to cover the 10 people that live there. Did Sprint bring running water as well?

tuccman says:

LOLOL. Awesome. What's also awesome, is I've had 4GLTE on my Evo for about 2 weeks now in Lowell, MA. I'm assuming it's just some testing because it doesn't automatically pick up the 4G, I need to reboot my phone after leaving and returning to Lowell to pick up the 4G again (weird). But it is lightning fast right now (cause no one is on it). 30 MB down, 15 MB up.

I_Am_Incredible says:

Woo! Maybe I should test mine over here in BOSTON.

NYCHitman1 says:

Mmhmm. 10 people live in the city of Baltimore. STFU and get some sense. Don't like it, jump ship.

dizzle16 says:

If it ain't Cleveland I don't care. Probably going to t mobile in February. Sprint sucks. This lte rollout crap is a joke to me.

NYCHitman1 says:

Don't let the door hit you on the ass on your way out. By the way, thank you for freeing up whatever bandwidth you were using. Thanks again!

agentmobile says:

man your annoying with all the Sprint Fanboy BS. i have sprint AND AT&T and i actually put my sprint line on standby till the ETF goes down then im gonna TERMINATE because they suck so bad..... oh im sry does that offend you? AT&T gives me blazing fast LTE 90% of the time and if i dont have it, they have the fastest 3G HSPA+ that i clock at 10mbps all day. Have a blast with all your crappy sprint bandwidth :) :) : ) :) :)

icenija says:

I don't see him as being a fanboy. He like most of us don't have bad sprint service where we live so if you do then leave why come to the sprint topic to talk about it? No one is offended if you leave Sprint we are offended that you come to a Sprint topic to talk about it.

tokenbg1009 says:

Its funny, because putting your line on Standby causes the contract to freeze. Once you take it off you'll be at the same amount of time on contract as you were when you started. Enjoy.

dizzle16 says:

It won't and you're welcome. Keep overpaying for crappy service:)

crxssi says:

No service costs less than Sprint. And, like other carriers, service varies by location.

dizzle16 says:

It won't and you're welcome. Keep overpaying for crappy service:)

JobiWan144 says:

Just don't go with Verizon or AT&T. Stick with the little guys!

Btw, the rest of you, a carrier's service can vary widely depending on location. So don't diss just becauseS print doesn't cover his area well. I have Sprint in Texas, so it's awesome, but others are less fortunate.

icenija says:

Well said.

geauxlsutigers says:

Well said, indeed. I worked for Verizon and not a day went by where we didnt get customers coming in complaining of poor service, dropped calls, lack of coverge, slow data, etc... Every carrier has coverage issues. I currently have Sprint and Verizon service (work and personal) and they are both very good, and as expected, there are areas where my Sprint phone gets service and Verizon doesn't, and the opposite is also true.

jarobusa says:

And T-Mobile has LTE?

huskers15 says:

How's the service in Long Island, NY??

Unibrow says:

It depends, out in Nassau I see upwards of 2.6 Mbps sometimes on 3g but most of the time it's between 0.500 Mbps and 1.2 Mbps. Out in Suffolk, still seems pretty slow most of the time. I don't know if it's because I now have the S3 vs the S2 but seems like it's improved somewhat in the last 2 months. Although, 3g which has been better at my job in Lake Success was brought to a dead stop few days ago and basically useless but I've been getting 1.5-2.4 Mbps there lately so who knows.

huskers15 says:

Thanks for the reply. I have Verizon but no unlimited data. I do get lte out in Suffolk on the south shore. The north shore lte is non existent. Was hoping sprint service would improve and give me a reason to switch to get unlimited.

NYCHitman1 says:

I average around 1.75-2.30mbps on 3G in Nassau. I also get WiMAX (11+ mbps) in my area, so it's awesome.

jonyah says:

It's all bs guys. They haven't even truly added LTE to the original cities yet. Here in Houston there's still only a few towers that support LTE and the speed is horrendous, (think 2-3mbps). I've been with Sprint for a long time and at the rate I'm paying I'm not leaving, but their LTE rollout has been nothing less than pathetic.

zhecht says:

Sprint announces LTE available in a market when they have about 40% of the towers activated. Wouldn't you prefer to get some LTE in the meantime, rather than wait until every single tower is ready before Sprint flips the switch.

BTW, AT&T and Verizon do the same thing.

Synycalwon says:

Not sure what the percentages are, but from my experience Verizon doesn't turn up LTE unless a vast majority of the towers are ready. Case in point, the tornadoes of April 2011 delayed LTE deployment for the entire Birmingham, AL market despite only a hand full of towers being damaged on the N/NW side of town. It wasn't until October 2011, after the towers were fixed, when they finally turned on LTE which encompassed the entire market and surrounding suburbs. Experienced the same thing when they turned up LTE in the Montgomery area in early 2011.

scuba_steve says:

Based on s4guru's data...I think that number is closer to 20% - i.e., when they announce that they are live somewhere, the VAST majority of people in that market will not have access to LTE.

Furthermore, this statement:

> Also, Sprint says it's turned on its revamped 3G service
> (this is all part of its Network Vision initiative) in
> Baltimore, Boston and Washington, D.C.

...IS AN ABSOLUTE JOKE. I live in Reston, VA...right outside of DC...in the town that was formerly home to Sprint's HQ...and 3G is ABYSMAL. At times, I cannot even bring up a Google search page. Not query results - just the simple mobile query page that has one field to enter text.

Sprint seems to think that they can rollout LTE and enhanced 3G via press releases. I have news for you Sprint, it takes technicians upgrading towers and backhaul. You can't do it in Microsoft Word.

The VERY DAY that the new iPhone is available (i..e, mid-Sept), I am moving my entire family to VZ...where I will get a GS3 that can actually download at LTE speeds.

geauxlsutigers says:

Sprint's Network Vision involve upgrading every single tower in the country to 1xRTT / 3G Advanced and LTE, this takes time, a lot of time. It didn't happen overnight @ Verizon and it wont happen @ Sprint or AT&T. VZW started their LTE network over a year ago and the headstart shows. I do understand your frustration but realize that Sprint sending many many technicians throughout the country to every tower to upgrade it and is moving as quickly as possible. It's not just press releases on MS Word.

newboyx says:

They have at least 100 live LTE sites in Houston.

Txchas says:

Yes, but their coverage maps shows ALL of Houston covered with 4GLTE. This is flat out WRONG. They are no where near full coverage, yet they continue to advertise it as such. I highly doubt there are 100 towers providing useful 4G LTE. Active and in use may be two very different things.

cowboys2000 says:

Coverage is spotty at best in Cypress (NW Houston). When I go to a corporate store, I was told Houston was a SOFT launch and not to trust the coverage maps!!

scuba_steve says:

It takes more than upgraded towers. They also need backhaul. Regardless, percent complete means very little. The rubber meets the road with actual performance...and from what I have seen posted here and elsewhere, LTE is a joke for most people in the supposedly rolled out Sprint LTE markets.

Txchas says:

Just did a speed test on the best 3G signal I could get. 41k down and 38k up. So much for the 4G LTE roll out and the 3G upgrade for Houston.

dswatson83 says:

Wow, this is slower than I thought. Months pass before sprint announces anything and now just 4 cities and most are small towns. Verizon announces 15+ cities in major metropolitan areas more often than this. Ridiculous Sprint. I knew I shouldn't trust that you would have a decent LTE rollout this year. If you were not cheaper than Verizon, I would have jumped ship long ago...and with the slowness of this rollout, you are tempting me

mdmitchell13 says:

hmmm Baltimore..... thats a small city

dswatson83 says:

hence the word most

Geejay22 says:

Awesome, finally...Baltimore was the first city with wimax and we finally got lte. And revamped 3g is good too...now I can buy a lte phone and be justified to do so!

crxssi says:

Oooh, poor Baltimore "FINALLY got lte" but was first with WiMax. What about areas THAT NEVER GOT WIMAX AT ALL???

born2vape says:

LOL What about Chicago? Sprint is terrible!

dougiefresh66 says:

I got 12 mbps down in Chicago on reg 4g quit complaining..or turn on that 4g button..

moonoverparma00 says:

What about it?!? You're going to get it before most of the country.

newboyx says:

The fact that all of the information is readily available on the web regarding how/when/and where Sprint will be rolling out LTE and people still just bitch that it isn't in their back yard yet. It is a big country with lots of towers that are being completely rebuilt. You signed a contract for current services provided by Sprint, not services that may or may not show up where you work or live when you deem it appropriate.
There is a direct relationship between lack of knowledge/information and the amount of complaining on the Internet.

Txchas says:

The how/when/where info from Sprint is mostly lies. Houston maps show full coverage when 4G LTE continues to be very rare and spotty. I am in an area shown as full coverage. I've gotten 4G for about 20 seconds once. Never again. Don't believe Sprint's info.

newboyx says:

I am not getting info from Sprint. That would be the last place to look.

prlundberg says:

With 4G, perhaps. But I signed a contract promising 3G speeds and they can't deliver that with their 3G service.

Also remember store employees are notoriously deceptive when trying to make a sale. I was told my area would have 4G this summer. As I was purchasing my WiMax phone. I'm educated on phones enough now to prevent that from happening again, but I'm still ticked about it.

newboyx says:

I wouldn't believe anything a store rep tells me. Ever.
I feel you on the 3G. At home I sit right next door to a really good tower, but when I leave to visit friends or family it goes to crap pretty quickly

crxssi says:

You think ANY contract from ANY carrier makes ANY guarantees about ANY type of speed?

You are on crack!

JobiWan144 says:

+1 and amen, newboyx.

broncop3t3 says:

C'mon Sprint- Let's get some LTE love in Boise! What's Gainsville got that Boise doesn't?

madmonk00 says:

People...buildings...etc. :-) Sorry...couldnt resist...being a Chicago snob. :-)

prlundberg says:

4G? Right now I'd be happy with 3G speeds consistantly faster than a modem.

Gekko says:

LTE on a phone is overrated.

jeffrok says:

It is, but it's so nice when you NEED it. And I've needed it a few times.

matt3166 says:

Not to be a jerk towads Sprint. But I think they forgot there's a west coast.

epidenimus says:

Does anyone else on Sprint (and I am until next week) think of the South Park episode where the Internet goes down every time someone talks about Sprint 4G? LOL. "Ya got any 4G, man? No, me neither. Let's go find some place that does."

These four towns brings the total live cities to like 19. If those cities were all in the same state and you lived there, you could call it a network. But nationwide?

I'm jumping ship because they do not have a plan. If they could at least tell me that they plan to turn on my city in a certain month next year, I might have stayed. Instead, they would have me buy a new LTE device that only works on their network [that doesn't yet exist and may never] and renew completely blind. No thank you.

suavehouse says:

About that 'revamped 3G' in D.C., don't believe the hype (280kbps down & 403kbps up) and I'm smack in the middle of the district.

geauxlsutigers says:

Interesting, I was just in DC a few weeks ago and consistently got 1.5mbps+ on 3G, the speed and coverage were very good.

Keep in mind that if they are actively doing upgrades / tower maintenance, it will affect your service.

wildside84 says:

no love for Memphis. I don't even think AT&T has LTE here, only Verizon...sigh

rough1200 says:

Not seeing it in Baltimore, somebody lied!! 48kbps down and 84kbps up. I think its time to jump ship!

jarobusa says:

See ya.

samid says:

NOTHING is worse than Sprint in Chicago as of late.