Sprint/Verizon EVDO and Cingular HSDPA compared

jschurawlow · Posted: Mon Oct 02, 2006 1:42 pm Post subject:

xenophon, as many new markets have evdo service currently might be helpful for a new breakdown Smile

Also wanted to mention that in Lehigh Valley (Allentown/Bethlehem area), PA we do have both sprint and verizon and there's been talk of UMTS/HSDPA for cingular (but as far as I know right now they still only have edge). The local cingular store has since even taken down their display of umts/hsdpa cards (bad sign of botched expansion I'm guessing).

Also figured I'd post my test results off a speedtest server that's in PA as well:
Download Speed: 1201 kbps (150.1 KB/sec transfer rate)
Upload Speed: 114 kbps (14.3 KB/sec transfer rate)
Done off of: http://leola.speedtest.frontiernet.net/

Here's to revA coming end of this year or Q1 next Smile

(yes albeit I'm a bit hopeful). Since HP released their bios fix the S720 is turning out to be very nice indeed.

xenophon · EVDO Addict Joined: 30 Aug 2005 Posts: 2003

xenophon · EVDO Addict Joined: 30 Aug 2005 Posts: 2003

http://www.broadbandreports.com/shownews/78545

Sprint Winning Wireless Broadband War
Faster EVDO Revision A deployment, fewer restrictions

Written by Karl Bode

While you may not have even tasted vanilla EVDO yet, EVDO Revision A upgrades potentially offer wireless broadband speeds up to 3.1Mbps downstream and 1.8Mbps upstream. Well, almost; you should see real world downstream speeds from 800kbps to 1.5Mbps (depending on the carrier), with upstream speeds surpassing the 400kbps mark. The most important improvement brought by Revision A is latency: users should see latency drop from around 150ms to 50ms.

EVDO Revision A network cards are already on the market. We touched on the release of the first Sprint Revision A card, the Novatel Wireless S720, back in August; since then we've seen the release of the Sierra Wireless AirCard 595 and the Pantech PX500 PC modem card. Novatel yesterday noted their full suite of EVDO hardware should be on the market during Q3, and Revision A phones should drop by the end of the year.

There's two major providers offering EVDO: Sprint and Verizon. While they're offering the same technology, there's some significant differences between the two.

Sprint claims that their EV-DO revision A upgrades will be available to around 40 million customers by the end of this year (their EVDO network aims to reach about 200 million customers in that same time-frame). The company hopes to have their wireless network fully upgraded by the end of 2007.

Verizon has offered no timetable for their Revision A upgrade plans. The company is facing a longer timeline than Sprint due to the fact that more than 50% of its network consists of 800mhz towers already feeling network strain (compared to Sprint's full array of 1900mhz towers).

Sprint allows users to connect their laptop cards to the network for $60-$80/month. The company also allows you to tether your phone via USB to your laptop with two plan options - $25/month for 40MB/month (with additional per KB charge), or a $40/month unlimited flat charge if you sign a two year contract. Sprint so far does not prohibit the sharing of bandwidth via the growing number of 3G Wi-Fi routers (previously discussed here).

Verizon also charges users $60-$80/month for laptop card access, but unlike Sprint, requires you also have a voice plan with the company. The company limits what phones you can use to tether, and charges users $45/month for "unlimited" data use, plus a $15/month tethering fee. Verizon prohibits the use of sharing bandwidth via 3G Wi-Fi routers. "When customers use unauthorized devices to share the service, they are in violation of their service agreements," says Verizon spokesperson Brenda Raney.

This is where you begin to see the major difference between the two companies: their terms of service and the actual definition of the word "unlimited". The increased capacity allowed by 1900mhz towers means Sprint (so far) isn't cracking down on users who suck down more than their fair share of bandwidth. In fact their website encourages streaming and other uses.

Verizon Wireless meanwhile, has been sending out warning letters to customers who gobble up more than 5 gigs a month. The company's TOS prohibit everything but e-mail and browsing, and company execs have hinted they may replace the "unlimited" tag with metered use.

There's no doubt that Sprint is beating Verizon to the punch when it comes to EVDO and EVDO Revision A. They're deploying the technology more quickly, with better prices, and fewer restrictions. Obviously that doesn't mean Verizon Wireless can't catch up down the road.

Those interested in seeing if they can get either, can find the Sprint coverage map and zip-code qualifier here, and Verizon's here (check BroadbandAccess in the menu). Also check out (and contribute to) our Sprint and Verizon Wireless speed tests.

http://www.dslreports.com/archive/spcsdns.net
http://www.dslreports.com/archive/myvzw.com

Ben Miller · Posted: Wed Oct 04, 2006 9:16 pm Post subject:

The guy who wrote that article is a moron when it comes to BWA. It's too bad that there's people out there who will read it and take it as gospel.

This is why you should't rely on amateur sites for your tech information.

xenophon · EVDO Addict Joined: 30 Aug 2005 Posts: 2003

Looks like everything in there is correct except what you've been challenging about 800/1900mhz capacity. While you may be correct that 800mhz has same capacity as 1900 in terms of spectrum, 800 covers more area than 1900, which typically results in higher user/tower ratio and clearly Verizon has a much higher user/tower ratio than Sprint, ultimately meaning less capacity. So in general, it's not incorrect to say that 800 has less capacity than 1900 in real world likelyhood of user/tower ratio differences.

The consistently lower Verizon performance scores over the year support that. And more and more Verizon users (40% in last sample) are getting below the marketed range, less than 400Kbps. Curious enough, Verizon has added many more 800mhz only markets the last couple of months.

n6gn · Posted: Thu Oct 05, 2006 9:10 am Post subject:

Ben Miller · Posted: Thu Oct 05, 2006 4:24 pm Post subject:

1) Even mentioning EV-DO Rev. A at this point is irrelevant. They don't even market the fact that they have Rev. A devices to the general public and they have made nominal gains (if any) in the market due to releasing Rev. A devices.

2) It still has yet to be determined whether Sprint will actually roll out an EVDO Rev. A network nationwide first. Verizon's last press that I saw on it claimed 2006 and so does Sprint's.

What's probably happening here is that Verizon has a similar timeline to Sprint but they don't want to canibalize sales of EV-DO Rev. 0 devices. Sprint's stock is in trouble anyway so taking a big loss on Rev. 0 devices now so that they can show growth in the future makes sense if they want their stock to go up. For the bottom line of the company, however, Sprint's releasing of EV-DO Rev. A cards before the network is ready is asinine.

3) Verizon's HUGE lead in BWA market share is utterly ignored.

4) While Sprint keeps rolling out cards with no network behind them, Verizon is selling an Expresscard adapter that people can actually use. According to Michael from EVDOinfo this new card has been selling like crazy. Heck, it even caused a long time Sprint loyalist like me to switch over to Verizon for data.

5) Verizon has much broader coverage for NationalAccess than Sprint has for Vision due to roaming agreements. This may not seem like a big deal, but for business travelers it's huge to at least have that 100+ kbps connection rather than nothing. Trust me, I'm loving it this week.

6) I don't see how Sprint has, "fewer restrictions." If you read their Terms of Service they prohibit everything that Verizon prohibits, but they just mention it in less specific wording.

The one valid point made in the article is about price, but even that one is slightly deceiving. It makes sense that Verizon costs more for data because they have a better network.

To the point of today's EV-DO performance made by xenophon, I just checked the venerable DSLreports.com and it looked to me like Sprint had about a 20% edge in downlink data and Verison had about a 30% edge in uplink data (I had to exclude one outrageously high result from Verizon's numbers). Personally, I care more about the uplink because I do a lot of Skype over my connection. I'll conceded the point, however, that most users care most about downlink speeds.

n6gn · Posted: Thu Oct 05, 2006 6:20 pm Post subject:

Ben Miller · Posted: Fri Oct 06, 2006 3:06 pm Post subject:

EV-DO is CDMA2000. I was differentiating between 1xRTT and EV-DO, which are both CDMA2000.

I stand by my assertion that the article was written by an EV-DO moron. I also stand by the fact that Verizon has a huge market share lead in EV-DO *subscriptions*. It's possible that Sprint covers more of the U.S. population (Sprint's TV ads claim 153M+ while Verizon's TV ads claim 148M+), but that is beside my point. The point is that Verizon is killing Sprint on EV-DO subscriptions and Sprint needs to do something about it. Releasing EV-DO Rev. A devices without a network behind them and hyping them to Internet nerds is not the answer.

xenophon · EVDO Addict Joined: 30 Aug 2005 Posts: 2003

^Where is your source that Verizon is killing Sprint in DO subscribers? Sprint has 1.2 million DO subscribers (q2) and Verizon hasn't disclosed numbers. Sprint does about $9 in data ARPU for CDMA while Verizon does $6.40 data ARPU, and Sprint's data on pdaphones is much cheaper, which means many more % of Sprint voice users subscribe to data services than Verizon voice users.

Q3 results coming later this month, but here is Q2...

http://seekingalpha.com/article/14951 Sprint q2 results
http://seekingalpha.com/article/14768 Verizon q2 results

Fast subscriber growth is not a good thing on the network unless growing the user/tower ratio with it. Verizon is adding more users at a faster pace than adding towers - good for Verizon's bottom line but not good for users in oversold markets. Sprint has been adding towers at a faster pace and also plans to transition load to WiMAX in next few years.

The fact you call the guy a moron, who didn't have any real discrepancies, it cheapens your position.

n6gn · Posted: Fri Oct 06, 2006 3:57 pm Post subject:

Ben Miller · Posted: Fri Oct 06, 2006 11:33 pm Post subject:

n6gn,

Verizon's broader 1xRTT coverage is, in fact, helping them win the "wireless broadband war". If the column is about which company is winning, then you'd be an idiot (there, he's not a moron anymore) to ignore 1xRTT.

xenophon,

I have absolutely no idea where you get this stuff from. Where is this fantasy about Verizon not adding towers fast enough coming from? Where are the complaints from people who subscribe to NationalAccess or BroadbandAccess? The only complaints I am aware of are from a tiny percentage of people who posted online about getting terminated for violating their terms of service. Obviously I don't know the whole story about those complaints but none of them were mad about crappy data service.

I also have absolutely no idea why you are even bringing up WiMAX for Sprint. We don't even know what they are going to do with WiMAX and whatever they do won't happen for years.

I also am perplexed as to why you bring up Sprint's higher data ARPU. That has nothing to do with this discussion. We all know that Sprint has done a fantastic job selling Vision phones but this is about Mobile Broadband data services.

If you want to live in fanstasyland and hold on to the idea that Sprint is killing Verizon on BWA, then go ahead. When you post this fiction to the general public, however, I have to take issue. The writer of that column is clueless when it comes to BWA. Either he has an agenda to promote Sprint (hmmm, who does that sound like?), he's a lazy journalist who reads your posts in the forum as his only research source or he just doesn't understand what "winning the broadband war" means to a service provider. Maybe more than one of those three. No matter which one it is, he still qualifies as a moron when it comes to BWA.

n6gn · Posted: Sat Oct 07, 2006 12:14 am Post subject:

Ben Miller · Posted: Sat Oct 07, 2006 12:19 am Post subject:

n6gn,

I think we are on the same page here. I find it interesting as well and I think we are so early in this "war" that it is hard to make any strong conclusions about the final outcome.

I do think that it shows a disconnect with reality to assert that anyone *but* Verizon is winning at this point. They have the most users, they have the most name regonition for their service and they have arguably the highest quality service. Again, the outcome is far from determined but from any objective viewpoint you'd have to put Verizon on top.

xenophon · EVDO Addict Joined: 30 Aug 2005 Posts: 2003

http://www.steelintheair.com/Blog/2005/08/total-cell-towers-and-cell-sites-by.html
Q2/2005 - estimate
From an American Tower Presentation to RBC:
Total number of cell sites per carrier:
Nextel: 20,000
Sprint: 25,000
Cingular: 44,000 (Other estimates show 50,000)
Verizon: 22,000
TMobile: 24,000
Alltel: 8,000 (I assume this is pre Western Wireless)

http://ir.wfinet.com/downloads/051122wfi.pdf
Q4/2005 - estimate
Cingular 40,000 (TDMA/GSM/AMPS, has been shutting down TDMA)
Sprint Nextel 48,000 (about 20K-21K are iDen so ~27K+ are CDMA )
T-Mobile 31,000
Verizon 23,000
Other 38,000

Sprint plans to increase CDMA towers by 40% by 2008 (about 10K more, mostly on existing Nextel iDen sites). Given the other plans that have come through, this isn't unlreastic. It's easier/cheaper for Sprint to add more CDMA cellsites to existing Nextel sites, not having to go through legal process, community approvals, new lease agreements, etc.
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1895,1946355,00.asp

I can't find sources but it is commonly known that Verizon had more towers than Sprint in 2000, so either I must be having some delusional "fantasy" that Sprint has been adding more at a faster pace or Mr. Miller enjoys unjustly insulting people.