Boy, we've come a pretty long way from giving you guys basic updates on what cities are getting T-Mobile 3G, haven't we? For 2010, T-Mobile is stepping up and announcing that it will soon be delivering HSPA+ to cities in the East & West Cost. Meaning 21 Mbps this year is going to be last years 7.2 Mbps. GigaOM sat down with T-Mobile and got them to explain the meaning of HSPA+ to T-Mobile and how soon we will see 21Mbps. Here's the juicy parts:
- T-Mobile has already upgraded the existing HSPA software in “major cities” along the California Coast and said “major cities from Washington, D.C. to Boston” will have it on the East Coast, including Philadelphia, where it’s already live.
- T-Mobile has deployed fiber to 7 percent of its towers with 20 Mbps of capacity on those fiber strands. He also said that within the next few weeks the operator will turn on fiber to about 25 percent of its towers.
So basically, the towers on the coast are HSPA+ ready but the backhaul needs to be improved for devices to eventually take advantage of it. T-Mobile believes that their stance with HSPA+ (which is like 3.5G) is better compared to their competitors' stance on LTE (4G) because T-Mobile will be able to get HSPA+ rolling this year while it may take AT&T & Verizon until 2011 or 2012 to get things ready. Plus 3.5G is plenty fast.
But even though we can't wait for devices to take advantage of the 21Mbps network, we're still sure some of you guys are without even regular T-Mobile 3G. Let us know which cities don't have T-Mobile 3G in the comments!
[via gigaom]
41 Comments
So do they already have 7.2mbps out across the country? I live in Tampa and cant get more than 1.5mbps.
But this is great news. Great job T Mobile, itll be great to see this rolling.
I am still waiting for HSPA to arrive in metro-Atlanta, GA. In fact I am still waiting for 3G service that consistently extends more than a quarter mile from the interstates here.
Hmm, I'm in Norcross which is just North of Atlanta. I get consistent 3G pretty much all the time.
I am here in the northern most part of Alpharetta (now the City of Milton) and I get T-Mobile 3G without any problems... the only time I don't get it is when I am on Wi-Fi in my house or in a HotSpot.
Anybody in Philly care to comment?
What's a good test to run on G1? I live in Mercer County, NJ, not far from Philly.
NO 3G SERVICE IN PENSACOLA FL :(
No 3g in Middletown or Goshen New York
Orlando/ocoee has plenty of 3G except backroads and buildings
got a question. so will all of regular 3G phones can get HSPA+ speed when they upgrade their towers? for example, Current Android device, will G1 and mytouch 3G be improved after this network upgrade? I think I saw not all of 3G phones can get HSPA+ speed... idk i mite saw something that never existed.. hope not!!!
The current t-mobile models (all of the androids) only work on HSPA 7.2 MBPS. They have not released any hspa+ devices yet.
I've had T-mobile for a few years now. I finally got a 3G phone, the Nexus One. Their 3G service kind of sucks. It works outside but anytime I go in doors the phone switches to edge. I'm going to return it and have to wait for Verizon to offer the phone.
Sadly T-Mobile hasn't even been able to get 3G or EDGE to Waco, TX we are currently stuck with GPR
It'd be nice if T-Mo would just concentrate on get regular 3G to the rest of it's paying customers before it rolls out bigger and better things. To me it's not fair that I'm paying for data service that doesn't even come close to the other big cell providers. If your paying for data service and still stuck on an EDGE network then you shouldn't have to pay full price when you not getting 3G speeds. Come on T-Mo, for the love of all that's holy finish rolling out 3G to the rest of your customers before you upgrade for the ones who already have it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I would have switched to to tmobile by now if it wasnt for the fact that their 3g footprint is small as hell...
btw the tmobile logo used in this article is not the logo that is used in the USA. that is the European logo. Fix it!
Yup, agree.
I absolutely love what I see in the Nexus One and want one in the worst way, but the fact that it is on tmobile is just a dealbreaker. Tmob has to revive roaming agreements with ATT and get a better coverage map. I can live with spotty data in more rural areas, but simply having nothing..voice or data in areas that ATT and Verizon cover well just isn't good enough. Tmobile appears to have the best pricing on its plans, but here's the deal, I am willing to pay more, for more coverage, and stay away from ATT.
I didn't know there was a difference (between the T-Mo logo and the T-Mo USA version). It's not that big a deal, tho.
Edit: (between the Euro T-Mo logo and the T-Mo USA version).
Is there a list of cities that either have gotten the upgrade thus far, or will be getting it soon? I'd like to see if any of them will be near where I live.
I don't have T-Mobile, but I know that basically ALL of Upstate, NY doesn't have any T-Mobile 3G (and a lot of it, no service at all). That's a good 300+ mile stretch.
Still waiting on 2G out in Portland, TN
Just ran the XtremeLabs speedtest app in San Diego where 3G coverage isn't bad. I max out at about 500Kbit.
Who cares about 21Mbps... What is this 7.2Mbps thing? Sounds great. Sign me up.
Plenty of 3g in DeLand,And Orange City, Deltona Area. Zipping along at about 3.2 mb\s with just 2 bars of service. Tethered I get around 4.9 mb\s down wit 1.9 mb\s up. Great work T-Mo.
Myt3g 1.5 os
Moto Cliq 1.5 os w\ motoblur
Plenty of 3g in DeLand,And Orange City, Deltona Area in florida Zipping along at about 3.2 mb\s with just 2 bars of service. Tethered I get around 4.9 mb\s down wit 1.9 mb\s up. Great work T-Mo.
Myt3g 1.5 os
Moto Cliq 1.5 os w\ motoblur
No 3G in Springfield MO. We even have a call center but no 3G.
Maybe we will get over 1M in Silicon Valley since we only get about 600k on 3G
No 3g, Ponca City oklahoma, theres actually no 3g in oklahoma at all. Tmo sucks
Who told you no 3g in oklahoma. I get it in tulsa
No 3g in crete, beecher, grant park, momence, manteno, peotone Illinois.
i live in Winter Garden,Florida im right next to orlando and i dont get 3g for nothing all i get is that slow edge on my Mytouch
Hi,
I don't know where they get they information from. In Philadelphia there is not even HSPA, still UMTS. I have testes in every part of the city and I even live by where they said the first HSPA+ towers were up.
If you look in your setting menu under phone info, It will tell you what network your on, mine still says UMTS. With speedtest.net the highest i got was umts with a 1.5mpbs, 99% of the time its under 500kps. So what ever happen to them launching the regular HSPA network nationwide. BTW I think Philadelphia is their 4th biggest market, so we should at least have HSPA.
Only 3G in Yuma AZ is Verizon (180 miles to Phoenix AZ and 180 miles to San Diego CA)
Even if T-Mobile got off their rears tomorrow and deployed HSPA (with or without the plus) to every BTS they've got, they then need to double the number of BTSes. Take a look at, say, Ithaca, New York. T-Mobile has been there since 1998 (back when they had the parrot), but they've maybe got two cell sites. Trumansburg has zippo. You'd think in twelve years they could actually have managed to cover the whole county.
I drool over the N900, but unless VZW announces a surprise Bellus-style conversion to HSPA, it unfortunately isn't happening.
I live in Murfreesboro, Tn. and work in Nashville. Murfreesboro is 30 miles outside of Nashville and only has EDGE - Nashville has 3G. Unless I am on 3G or Wi-fi...my phone is so slow that it is too frustrating to bother. I will be switching to Verizon when they get an Android phone suitable to me.
No 3G service in Panama City area. We're a big vacation destination for east-central US and new airport is opening May 1.
No 3G in Biloxi MS and Mobile Alabama. Sprint/verizon/at&t all have it(had it for while). I guess being a loyal t-mobile customer is not paying off for me. i am actually tempted to possibly switch.
Mohawk TN, No 3g. Just hook it up in greeneville tn or morristown tn.
HSPA+ is live in NYC Metro (NY/NJ) area: I measure between 11-13Mb/s regularly in New York City (Manhattan, Brooklyn) since mid-March and last week I traveled to South Jersey, measuring 7-10Mb/s (lower on a train, higher on foot.)
T-Mobile has neither 3G or HSPA+ anywhere in the entire state of Mississippi that I am aware of, only EDGE. I live on The Beautiful MS Gulf Coast (no oil on the beaches yet) been a T-Mobile customer over 7 years. The I-10 corridor runs through here between Mobile, AL and New Orleans, LA. Always heavy traffic and major tourist with no high speed T-Mobile connection; very disappointing.
So I Live In Yuma Arizona, and tmobile never do I ever Get 3G. Just EDGE. Only when I hit San Diego do I get 3G. Mytouch 3G Slide Btw