31–40 of 112 posts
Are there any updates on their GSM network? There are rumors that it will be also sunsetted, but I hope it will stay on. GSM is still useful because of its broad compatibility.
3G is supposed to shut down in July but curiously 2G will live until December 2022.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is mostly about drama around Boost Mobile. T-Mobile wanted to shut down their CDMA network on January 1, 2022. Boost (now owned by Dish) doesn't want to upgrade users that have handsets that don't work with VoLTE. Upgrading users involves sending them notices, giving them options of free handsets, shipping those handsets, getting the users to actually activate them, etc. While T-Mobile gave Boost nearly double t…
Are they legally required to offer replacement phones? Or is it just customer retention?
In Boost's case, they might legally have to. Dish bought Boost as part of T-Mobile's deal to buy Sprint. I don't remember all the specifics of the agreement or what was committed to in terms of non-VoLTE Boost customers. T-Mobile had to give Dish 6 months notice before shutting down the CDMA network and they gave 14-months (now 17 months with the 3-month delay). I don't know if Dish committed to upgrading those customers as part of the deal (I know that it's their responsibility, but I don't know if they're required to upgrade them or if they can just wave goodbye to customers that don't want to migrate).
Ultimately, I think Dish is at least informally required. Dish is likely going to be looking for goodwill from regulators in the coming years. They have major build-out requirements coming due soon and they don't seem to have made much progress - and they have licenses worth tens of billions at stake (worth more than the company's market cap). Angering regulators at this point isn't a great move for Dish.
I surprised that US iPhone 13 still supports CDMA2000 EV-DO. Is it still worth to support?
That's a hard question to give a definitive answer to. In many ways, the answer is "no". However, as with most things in tech, there are always edge cases. Sprint's network (which T-Mobile bought and is integrating into the T-Mobile network) never went fully VoLTE (voice over LTE) so if you had a phone that didn't support CDMA voice and you were on the Sprint network experience and you traveled to one of the rare are…
Perhaps in the US, but CDMA is used elsewhere too. In several countries in the recent past, fixed wireless CDMA operators (intended for home phone lines) started operating mobile handsets. Those places may not be on the upgrade path to LTE anytime soon, because of expense.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
It seemed strange that T-Mobile would have a CDMA network, until you remembered that it came from Sprint. This seems like good news. I'm glad that starting with LTE all the carriers started agreeing on a single platform with SIM cards. Even though there are little nuances between each carrier, the fact that you can buy a single phone and have it work with the four (three now) major carriers is a big deal.
Not really. There have always been smartphones that supported both GSM and CDMA. The three major carriers not only use different LTE bands, but also Verizon and shortly AT&T (in February) have adopted a whitelist model where only select handsets can be activated on their networks. It's a much less open marketplace than it was five years ago.
Not surprising. T-Mobile has always been a GSM network, CDMA is what they inherited from Sprint.
This is mostly about drama around Boost Mobile. T-Mobile wanted to shut down their CDMA network on January 1, 2022. Boost (now owned by Dish) doesn't want to upgrade users that have handsets that don't work with VoLTE. Upgrading users involves sending them notices, giving them options of free handsets, shipping those handsets, getting the users to actually activate them, etc. While T-Mobile gave Boost nearly double t…
The CPUC says T-Mobile representatives lied under oath. They claimed that Dish would have until 2023 to migrate customers off of the CDMA network. T-Mobile is facing sanctions because of it:
https://docs.cpuc.ca.gov/PublishedDocs/Efile/G000/M398/K955/...
Not a long read.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not really. There have always been smartphones that supported both GSM and CDMA. The three major carriers not only use different LTE bands, but also Verizon and shortly AT&T (in February) have adopted a whitelist model where only select handsets can be activated on their networks. It's a much less open marketplace than it was five years ago.
By select handsets, I assume any big name handset, e.g. iPhone, Pixel, Galaxy, would be allowed, but a no-name handset wouldn't be allowed? Isn't this similar to the pre-iPhone days, when if you brought an overseas GSM phone you had to go through some hoops to get it activated with Cingular/T-Mobile? I remember getting handsets from China and Europe and the reseller would have to circumvent something to get it activa…
On the other hand, some handsets that are blatantly missing LTE bands are on the whitelist, such as the Chinese Oneplus 8T.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
It seemed strange that T-Mobile would have a CDMA network, until you remembered that it came from Sprint. This seems like good news. I'm glad that starting with LTE all the carriers started agreeing on a single platform with SIM cards. Even though there are little nuances between each carrier, the fact that you can buy a single phone and have it work with the four (three now) major carriers is a big deal.
Not only are phones cross network compatible, with eSIM support, you can provision new service within minutes on any supported carrier, no physical SIM required.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
How is this legal?
This doesn't really go into how it's legal, but the situation around VoLTE has been difficult. It hasn't just been every phone working perfectly. Beyond that, it's possible to buy a phone that sort-of works. For example, let's say that you're an AT&T customer and AT&T has 700MHz, 850MHz, 1900MHz, 1700MHz, and 2300MHz spectrum. You buy some foreign phone that supports 1900MHz. Great, now you're running a device that w…
"Hi, this is a free SMS from AT&T. We noticed you're trying to use a Galaxy A32 phone on our network. Unfortunately this phone doesn't support some of our bands (12/13/17), so you might experience poor or no coverage in some situations. We recommend you upgrade your phone, otherwise you might run into issues. If you have any questions, please call our representatives at 1-800-288-2020."
You'd think they could automatically annotate these accounts with a little note for the next customer service rep so they're aware of this possible issue if the customer calls. Then users won't be confused as to why their coverage is poor, but they can still use their devices if they really want to.
Why is it so hard for companies to communicate honestly and openly? Why do they prefer to let others stay in the dark and make problems 10x harder for everyone instead? Isn't it kind of unreasonable to expect customers to be "understanding" of problems when they don't put in an honest effort into helping them understand the problems?
I surprised that US iPhone 13 still supports CDMA2000 EV-DO. Is it still worth to support?
That's a hard question to give a definitive answer to. In many ways, the answer is "no". However, as with most things in tech, there are always edge cases. Sprint's network (which T-Mobile bought and is integrating into the T-Mobile network) never went fully VoLTE (voice over LTE) so if you had a phone that didn't support CDMA voice and you were on the Sprint network experience and you traveled to one of the rare are…
Not surprising. T-Mobile has always been a GSM network, CDMA is what they inherited from Sprint.
This is mostly about drama around Boost Mobile. T-Mobile wanted to shut down their CDMA network on January 1, 2022. Boost (now owned by Dish) doesn't want to upgrade users that have handsets that don't work with VoLTE. Upgrading users involves sending them notices, giving them options of free handsets, shipping those handsets, getting the users to actually activate them, etc. While T-Mobile gave Boost nearly double t…
It's kind of amazing to watch them keep pushing out half-baked protocols with the details on what phones actually support being so hard to find. I guess the lesson they learned from rolling out LTE phones with no Voice over LTE support is that nobody really cares, which is why they repeated the same issues with 5G and there's all this stuff about "non-standalone 5G".