Vegas strip, slow EVDO but still usable (Sprint and Verizon)

xenophon · EVDO Addict Joined: 30 Aug 2005 Posts: 2004

Am at S end of Vegas strip for Interop conference and have both Sprint and Verizon Merlin 620 cards.

Both can barely reach 400Kbps, sometimes as low as 150Kbps. Signal strength is great near window on both with or without booster antenna. I tried different home agents on the Sprint card, still subpar. Verizon no different. Seems to be tower load with thousands of techies concentrated at the conference. Will try late at night when tower load might be reduced. Luxor hotel room can rarely get up to 500Kbps max on Sprint, no matter which home agent.

More importantly, the WiFi at the conference is overloaded and is essentially unusable. At least with EVDO, no matter it being below marketed range, is still very usable. I'm even doing VPN to work just fine in 150K-200K range. Not snappy but I can get work done. No hotel internet charges either.

Score one for EVDO, even if running below specs.

xenophon · EVDO Addict Joined: 30 Aug 2005 Posts: 2004

http://www.dslreports.com/archive?zip=89119&dnsdom=&start=Search

Here are results, note the spcsdns.net and myvzw domains.

xenophon · EVDO Addict Joined: 30 Aug 2005 Posts: 2004

Looks like switching home agent on Sprint does make a difference. I tried Central CA HA and could only get 500K. Switched to Ft. Worth and Kansas City HAs and can consistently get over 800Kbps.

In a conference room too, not near a window with -76dBm.

See...
http://www.dslreports.com/archive?zip=89119&dnsdom=&start=Search

BTW, all of the Sprint results and some Verizon are mine. Looks like someone else is also posting Verizon results in this zipcode.

xenophon · EVDO Addict Joined: 30 Aug 2005 Posts: 2004

It's late in the conference and most people have left for the day.

Performance is going up significantly for Sprint, over 1Mbps depending on home agent.

Verizon is improving a bit, up to 400Kbps, however I cannot change the home agent.

BTW, both Sprint and Verizon are doing 300ms avg ping time to google.com in conference room. Earlier near window they were both doing about 200ms.

Note timestamps of results.

xenophon · EVDO Addict Joined: 30 Aug 2005 Posts: 2004

I gotta wonder if Sprint has seen this thread and tuned the nearest tower. OK, not likely but... In last two days, I could not ever get over 500Kbps during daytime in any location in bulidings. Now I'm getting around 1Mbps in conference rooms in center of building and hotel room. But this depends on the home agent I set the S620 card to.

Verizon still between 150Kbps to maybe 400Kbps. But I cannot change the home agent, so it could be a limiting factor.

xenophon · EVDO Addict Joined: 30 Aug 2005 Posts: 2004

Sprint chugging away at 600-800Kbps today even in conference rooms and -90dBm signal (see link above). One thing I notice on Sprint with booster antenna, I get decent performance even if signal is not great (-100dbm).

On Verizon near window with 100% signal, cannot get to 400Kbps and in fact it keeps stepping down to 1xRTT, even with booster antenna. Someone else is posting Verizon results too shown in link above, so I'm not the only one getting below 400Kbps.

Would like to find out how to change HA on Verizon. Through traceroutes, I can see that it hits the internet backbone in Dallas (using Level3).

BTW, there is hardly any mention of EVDO at the conference, which surprises me. One instance Verizon EVDO was mentioned and that it was not fast enough for mobile applications. I called them out on that but it is surprising there is no consideration for EVDO in a networking conference.

slowpoke · EVDO Newbie Joined: 21 Apr 2006 Posts: 5

I just wanted to add that many factors play onto the speeds that you will receive. Load on the particular cell tower you are connected to. the type of connection the tower uses (T1 ext..) and much more.