Sprint's miserable 3G speed problems explained
If you have used 3G on your EVO lately, chances are you've noticed the network is getting slow very quickly. Blame has been cast on the iPhone's recent adoption into the Sprint network as the slowdowns coincided, but the issues are actually a bit more complicated than that.
While Sprint had plans in place to adapt the network to the growing 3G demands, the providers of the cell equipment that pave our network were short on equipment. Evidently it was not a case of being able to throw money at the problem to solve it. Delays happened in expanding the infrastructure, and only enough equipment was being shipped to maintain the increasingly overburdened network.
The 3G data floodgates were thrown wide open last year with high-powered data-hungry smartphones walking out of Sprint stores nationwide (*cough* HTC EVO 4G *cough*), each one pulling more and more data over the 3G network. Upgrades were not happening to the infrastructure and every one of the 3G phones taxed the system more.
By earlier this year, some towers were seeing upwards of 200% more traffic than they were rated for. Some, in the same areas, were seeing no issues, as they were only for 4G. Some were back-end problems with dealing with not enough internet bandwidth, and not over-the-air issues.
The iPhone launch took a large percentage of former AT&T sufferers and threw them onto our network causing what was a large problem to become a huge problem.
And there you have it, the Sprint slowdown problem in a nutshell. They have a plan to repair and improve over the next two years, but how many people will jump ship if they don't get their 3G speeds at least to acceptable levels since 4G is pretty much a non-service for most of the country?
What are your thoughts on the slowdown?
Thanks to non-EVO owning Kim Justice for originally pointing this out to me.
[Android Police]
