Is the S5 tri-band ?

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xenokc

Senior Member
Mar 21, 2011
355
88
Spark in NYC has been a disappointment for me. Haven't seen or noticed any improvements at all (I have an LG G2). Typically test as low as 2Mb to as high as 9Mb usually, which is just fine by me. Fast enough to stream stuff without buffering (most times) but it's just not consistent.
Frankly I'll trade some of that theoretical 40Mbps LTE speeds for better LTE coverage and 3G speeds and the ability to talk and surf over 3G and LTE any day. (I know it's not a big deal for lots of folks but i sure enjoyed it when I had the Galaxy S3 and Note 2).

Definitely jealous of your speeds though. :)

Yeah, that near 40Mbps is just at the site where I live and I don't really need it with Google Fiber. 30-40M is consistent at home but not common around town. I tried speed tests while on bus around midtown/downtown KC and it typically ranged from 6-30Mbps. I did see near 60Mbps but it was at the downtown Sprint store.

Lack of concurrent voice/data bothers me too. It's a real shame other carriers are heading this direction too as VoIP by carriers won't be common for a while. Can try Google Voice VoIP in the meantime.
 

mrjeff2

Senior Member
Aug 15, 2012
166
46
it says it right below

" when a Sprint LTE Triband device is in Sprint LTE coverage it parks only in LTE. And doing so means it cannot transmit calls without Circuit Switched Fallback (CSFB) on the network side. CSFB and eCSFB (Enhanced Circuit Switched Fallback) are network controls that will allow a single mode/single path network to operate in two modes, both CDMA and LTE"

Where does it say it will allow a single mode/single path network to operate in two modes simultaneously?
 

eyecon82

Senior Member
May 30, 2010
2,361
1,693
Where does it say it will allow a single mode/single path network to operate in two modes simultaneously?

The article stated "or" and after the update "and"

In programming terms, "and" means simultaneously especially if "or" was stated before

Is this just 2 different interpretations or are you guys 100 percent confident?

I spoke with a tier 3 sprint tech support rep and he even indicated that simultaneous voice and data over LTE will be implemented once all the spark towers have been upgraded

Sent from my SM-G900P using Tapatalk
 

themuffinman

Senior Member
Jan 3, 2008
438
110
The article stated "or" and after the update "and"

In programming terms, "and" means simultaneously especially if "or" was stated before

Is this just 2 different interpretations or are you guys 100 percent confident?

I spoke with a tier 3 sprint tech support rep and he even indicated that simultaneous voice and data over LTE will be implemented once all the spark towers have been upgraded

Sent from my SM-G900P using Tapatalk

Its just two different interpretations but know that I am 100% sure of this. The tier 3 tech is definitely wrong and for what its worth I am part of the staff over on s4gru if that will give me any credibility. The way that one particular sentence is worded can be interpreted differently but once you read the entire paragraph and the following paragraphs you should get a better grasp of what Robert is trying to say. Based on how these tri-band phones are engineered right now there is no way for them to do both voice and lte simultaneously, it can only be connected to one or the other at any given moment. Obviously, this could change over time but it will be based on the hardware of the device and not the network in this particular case. In my previous post, I also provided a link to the thread over on s4gru.com that talks about this issue in great detail. You are more than welcome to join and ask any question you like. There are a lot knowledgeable people there that will give you a far better answer to anything you can come up with compared to talking to anyone at sprint.
 
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ldduran25

New member
Apr 15, 2014
2
0
galaxy s5

My sprint s5 will not switch from 3g\wifi to LTE without me turning on airplane mode or rebooting my phone. Anybody else having this issue?
 

neotremer

Member
May 16, 2008
25
0
Seattle
www.silentspark.net
Sprint Spark is not swappable. It does not support simultaneously data. Which is crap. Also the other issue is that it defaults to the "new" bands. Not the current LTE band they have been using. I wont go to a spark device till i know i can change the priority and or disable the "new" bands.
 

crazyape415

New member
Jan 1, 2010
4
0
The article stated "or" and after the update "and"

In programming terms, "and" means simultaneously especially if "or" was stated before

Is this just 2 different interpretations or are you guys 100 percent confident?

I spoke with a tier 3 sprint tech support rep and he even indicated that simultaneous voice and data over LTE will be implemented once all the spark towers have been upgraded

Sent from my SM-G900P using Tapatalk

The tech is probably correct, but the phone would need to be VoLTE (Voice over LTE) capable. From the article, I gathered that current phones are SVLTE (Samsung S4, etc) or CSFB/eCSFB (Samsung S5, LG2, etc), but not VoLTE. When all towers are upgraded, Voice and data over LTE (VoLTE) will be available _BUT_ we will need to buy a VoLTE capable phone to use voice and data simultaneously on the Spark network.

CSFB, as stated in prev posts, tells the phone to go to voice mode to answer a call and thus disconnects you from data. I'm making the need to buy a VoLTE capable phone assumption based on the fact that CSFB is not needed when VoLTE becomes live for Sprint (if the Tier 3 Tech is right) since the article does not state whether current phones will VoLTE capable via an OTA or if it's a hardware issue (meaning we all need to buy new phones).
 
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zl123

Member
Dec 3, 2014
12
2
Solution for talk and surf

This is for the S5, but I assume it would work on the galaxy note 4 and all other devices with this issue.

Hi all, I wanted to let you know that there is a very easy work around for this limitation. It is supplied by Google Inc through the Hangouts Dialer app. I'm not sure whether or not you need Hangouts installed to use it, but it allows you to make calls via the data network and still use the network to browse the web, etc. I have tried it several times at home with WiFi off and it works flawlessly so far.

It's sad that Sprint didn't find a way to bypass this limitation on their own, or at least inform customers, but this is an easy and seamless solution by Google.

I put the icon right next to my default phone icon for future use.

Additionally, I can not believe that Sprint is not aware of this work around. I spoke to a few different representatives today, and none were able to offer a solution.

I found this on my own searching the play store. Hope this helps!!
 

LordLugard

Senior Member
Apr 25, 2008
1,884
344
NYC
This is for the S5, but I assume it would work on the galaxy note 4 and all other devices with this issue.

Hi all, I wanted to let you know that there is a very easy work around for this limitation. It is supplied by Google Inc through the Hangouts Dialer app. I'm not sure whether or not you need Hangouts installed to use it, but it allows you to make calls via the data network and still use the network to browse the web, etc. I have tried it several times at home with WiFi off and it works flawlessly so far.

It's sad that Sprint didn't find a way to bypass this limitation on their own, or at least inform customers, but this is an easy and seamless solution by Google.

I put the icon right next to my default phone icon for future use.

Additionally, I can not believe that Sprint is not aware of this work around. I spoke to a few different representatives today, and none were able to offer a solution.

I found this on my own searching the play store. Hope this helps!!

This is no different than using something like Skype to make a VoIP call over a data connection. In most cases, I prefer the reliability of the 1x voice network when out and about (in making voice calls) over the flakiness/latency of a data network switching back and forth between 3G and LTE, etc.

Now, when on Wi-Fi (which in most cases you're in a stationary location), none of these matter or factor.
 

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  • 4
    I heard it's supposed to be coming sometime around June correct? Trying to remember where I saw I mentioned

    Sent from my SM-G900P using Tapatalk

    yea...sprint hasn't upgraded their network to enable simultaneous voice and LTE with spark....but i heard they are working on....i hope its not region based and they can get all the towers working on it at once

    i miss being able to mess around on the internet while on hold
    3
    Yes, I am very sure, its in the radio design. Even with previous devices that could do svdo and svlte, it was because of radio design of the hardware and not because of the network.

    Read post #12. You are wrong, respectfully

    yes, there is 1 radio..but spark will allow both voice and data over LTE once switchback mode is enabled, hence allowing 2 channels with 1 radio

    Sent from my SM-G900P using Tapatalk
    3
    I am sorry but I don't think you understand what AJ was trying to say in that article. The reason why its not possible is because there is only one transmission path so its only possible for you to be connected either cdma or lte. The purpose of csfb is to let the tri-band device to know when to actually switch, thats why tri-band devices that are in areas that are not fully upgraded with csfb will have connection issues because it doesn't know when to switch. Simultaneous voice and data will not happen with the current hardware design of tri-band devices regardless of whats done in the network side.

    it says it right below

    " when a Sprint LTE Triband device is in Sprint LTE coverage it parks only in LTE. And doing so means it cannot transmit calls without Circuit Switched Fallback (CSFB) on the network side. CSFB and eCSFB (Enhanced Circuit Switched Fallback) are network controls that will allow a single mode/single path network to operate in two modes, both CDMA and LTE"

    yep....read the above....

    ---------- Post added at 02:36 PM ---------- Previous post was at 02:35 PM ----------

    EDIT: And when it talks about csfb is needed, its not needed to be able to do cdma and lte modes at the same time its needed to tell the device when to switch to either cdma or lte.

    yea, but it says BOTH...not "either"

    "allow a single mode/single path network to operate in two modes, both CDMA and LTE"
    2
    Are you sure? Everything I gave read indicates it's a network issue rather than hardware

    The s4 didn't have the svdo radio so we lost simultaneous voice and data on 3g and the original s4 could do it without the extra radio

    Sent from my SM-G900P using Tapatalk

    Non-triband Sprint LTE phones "supported simultaneous voice and LTE (SVLTE). It could do so with two separate transmission paths from the antennas to the chipset. Voice/texting could run via 1xRTT on one transmission path. LTE could run a separate path, allowing data and voice to be used simultaneously."

    "In contrast, Sprint Triband LTE devices do not support two separate transmission paths. They have one path, shared by voice/SMS and data. We were alerted to this months in advance. However, we did not realize that the network would have to run on Circuit Switched Fallback in order for this to work and what the ramifications of this would be."

    Source: http://s4gru.com/index.php?/blog/1/...-due-to-circuit-switched-fallback-technology/

    It's a very informative and extensive read-up and explains, sadly, what is going on.