Sprint and Clearwire expand WiMax coverage in the Seattle area

[bigsnake49]

Jul 19, 2011 (GlobeNewswire via COMTEX) -- KIRKLAND, Wash., PHILADELPHIA, and OVERLAND PARK, Kan., July 19, 2011 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Clearwire /quotes/zigman/112837/quotes/nls/clwr CLWR -3.48% , Comcast /quotes/zigman/89307/quotes/nls/cmcsa CMCSA -2.18% and Sprint /quotes/zigman/240259/quotes/nls/s S +0.48% today announced an expansion of the Clearwire 4G network footprint and key capacity upgrades for mobile broadband customers in the greater Puget Sound, including communities on the Kitsap Peninsula, in Snohomish County and near Tacoma. The regional CLEAR(r), XFINITY(r) Internet 2go and Sprint 4G service area has added coverage for an additional 240,000 people. Now, nearly three million Puget Sound area residents have access to Clearwire's 4G mobile broadband network. This expansion represents enhanced coverage since Clearwire's initial launch on Dec. 1, 2009.

Enhanced capacity and expanded coverage can be experienced in the following communities: Bellevue, Edmonds, Elk Plain, Everett, Federal Way, Frederickson, Kirkland, Lakewood, Lynnwood, Marysville, Parkland, Puyallup, Renton, Seattle Hill-Silver Firs, Seattle, South Hill, Spanaway, Tacoma, and Tukwila.

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/cle...k=MW_news_stmp

[NGeorge]

I can tell you that this is all marketing hype and total BS. Aside from a tower or two around Elk Plain/Spanaway and 2 towers for each Tumwater and Lacey (completely avoiding Olympia, the state capitol), they haven't done much that is noticeable.

You still can't listen to streaming radio from the base to Seattle without multiple dropouts like you can on EV-DO, the phones still drop the service and jump back to 3G way to quickly, and it's still better to keep 4G off unless you are sitting practically under the tower since if you try to surf the internet with 1-2 bars of 4G service, your finger will cover up the antenna in your phone and it will bounce back and fourth to 3G service causing your phone to display "unable to connect" as you move from page to page. There's also still numerous (very annoying) gaps in coverage where there are sites they could easily co-locate on.

On the other hand, Verizon just did a major upgrade of their 4G service around Seattle--coverage all the way down to Chehalis with no gaps in one fell swoop.


If only Sprint wasn't so damn cheap.... lol

Ya know, if you go back and read speculation from 2003-2005, you'd have though WiMax was the next coming. Surely they realized they would have to install a MASSIVE number of towers for 2500 mhz. to work. I wonder what the difference in price is for a 800 mhz. site vs. a 2500 mhz. site.
--Nat