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T-mobile/Sprint possible merger

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July 28, 2019, 04:06 PM
sns3guppy
T-mobile/Sprint possible merger
The only reason I moved from Verizon to Tmobile is the ability to use the phone internationally. The service sucks. It sucks more internationally, but there isn't a lot of flex considering the other companies. Tmobile was a definite step down from verizon. Verizon was a step down from reasonable and decent.

Years ago I briefly tried sprint. They assured me that their plan was unlimited, to be used anywhere, any time. When I got my first bill, it was elevated, showed roaming, and sprit explained that their people had lied, and said that they were allowed by law to lie; unless I used something like 80 percent of my service in the area where I bought the phone, then I didn't get all the things I was sold on. I ditched it.

I did the same thing to AT&T; their service was dishonest and very underhanded, and when I quit, they hit me with an eight hundred dollar early termination fee. I refused to pay it for ten years until I was told point-blank in a security clearance interview to get it fixed ASAP or lose the clearance. Bent over a barrel by uncle sam.

AT&T also harassed me and sent bill collectors after me for nearly a decade for a phone that had been shut off in another state...I kept getting disconnect notices and collection notices for a phone I didn't have. Bastards.

I can't imagine sprint mixed with tmobile will be any better.
July 28, 2019, 04:27 PM
bigdeal
quote:
Originally posted by 41:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1O3v-PI6TEQ

May.20 -- FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr discusses the regulatory hurdles to T-Mobile Us Inc.'s planned takeover of Sprint Corp. with Bloomberg's Caroline Hyde and Scarlet Fu on "Bloomberg Markets: The Close."
|"Changes in home broadband service". Remember this sentence as this is truly the game changer when it comes to next gen tech completely upending the current paradigm with broadband service nationwide. It will take a while to completely implement, but if 5G lives up to its hype, it will force broadband cable pricing down to compete, as it forces multiple new options into areas that have had little to no options thanks to the BS monopolies wired cable providers have enjoyed and exploited.

Personally, I think this merger is good for T-Mobile and for the consumer, and I think the people who oppose it don't have a clue what 5G is or why its important.


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Guns are awesome because they shoot solid lead freedom. Every man should have several guns. And several dogs, because a man with a cat is a woman. Kurt Schlichter
July 28, 2019, 04:43 PM
kkina
quote:
Originally posted by walker77:
I dont see how they could make this work. They work on two totally different systems.

quote:
Originally posted by Dusty78:
Remember Nextel?


Exactly. I was with Sprint during the abominable Nextel merge in 2005. Two incompatible technologies resulted in nothing working right. A flustered customer service unable to deal. I'm sure they finally hammered it out, but I was long gone. A T-Mobile merger would probably have been another disaster.



ACCU-STRUT FOR MINI-14
"Pen & Sword as one."
July 28, 2019, 05:29 PM
Paten
quote:
Originally posted by kkina:
quote:
Originally posted by walker77:
I dont see how they could make this work. They work on two totally different systems.

quote:
Originally posted by Dusty78:
Remember Nextel?


Exactly. I was with Sprint during the abominable Nextel merge in 2005. Two incompatible technologies resulted in nothing working right. A flustered customer service unable to deal. I'm sure they finally hammered it out, but I was long gone. A T-Mobile merger would probably have been another disaster.


This thread started 2 years ago. The initial merger attempt from back then failed but the second merger attempt that started last year just got approval from the Justice Department on Friday. So there still might be a merger coming up. Since T-Mobile already has experience absorbing a CDMA carrier from when they merged with MetroPCS, they shouldn't have much of a problem doing the same thing with Sprint.
July 28, 2019, 06:14 PM
ensigmatic
quote:
Originally posted by sns3guppy:
The only reason I moved from Verizon to Tmobile is the ability to use the phone internationally. The service sucks. It sucks more internationally, ...

We've been with T-Mobile since leaving Sprint in late 2013. We've found the service to be satisfactory in metro areas and tolerable out in the weeds. The international service was flawless.

quote:
Originally posted by kkina:
quote:
Originally posted by walker77:
I dont see how they could make this work. They work on two totally different systems.

quote:
Originally posted by Dusty78:
Remember Nextel?

Exactly. I was with Sprint during the abominable Nextel merge in 2005. Two incompatible technologies...

First of all: CDMA and GSM are giving way to LTE, anyway. Secondly: TMO managed to borg MetroPCS without a hitch, and they were a CDMA network.

I'm not the least bit concerned.



"America is at that awkward stage. It's too late to work within the system,,,, but too early to shoot the bastards." -- Claire Wolfe
"If we let things terrify us, life will not be worth living." -- Seneca the Younger, Roman Stoic philosopher
July 28, 2019, 06:41 PM
sns3guppy
I use the Tmobile internationally daily; last use was two days ago in Europe and Africa a day before that. I use it all over the globe. It's universally poor. Even in the big cities.
July 28, 2019, 06:52 PM
bigdeal
quote:
Originally posted by ensigmatic:
First of all: CDMA and GSM are giving way to LTE, anyway.
Another item of note is that Verizon (primarily CDMA) has now given way to supporting GSM. Spectrum's new mobile service rides the Verizon network, yet the majority of the phones they sell in their stores are GSM (i.e SIM card) phones. It appears the tech across all these companies is converging to better support 5G.
quote:
Originally posted by sns3guppy:
I use the Tmobile internationally daily; last use was two days ago in Europe and Africa a day before that. I use it all over the globe. It's universally poor. Even in the big cities.
And as noted by someone else previously, that's not at all my experience. I've had exceptionally good service from T-Mobile throughout most of the US (it did lag in Montana and Wyoming when I was there last year), and in Europe on a couple trips there.


-----------------------------
Guns are awesome because they shoot solid lead freedom. Every man should have several guns. And several dogs, because a man with a cat is a woman. Kurt Schlichter
July 28, 2019, 10:07 PM
Ogie
I just dropped Sprint. They lied to me when I signed up a couple of years ago regarding iphones I purchased. Their coverage was/is spotty. Verizon was much better. I just switched to Xfinity and am saving almost $100.00 per month. Reception and coverage are notably better.
July 29, 2019, 09:31 AM
ensigmatic
quote:
Originally posted by bigdeal:
quote:
Originally posted by sns3guppy:
I use the Tmobile internationally daily; last use was two days ago in Europe and Africa a day before that. I use it all over the globe. It's universally poor. Even in the big cities.
And as noted by someone else previously, that's not at all my experience. I've had exceptionally good service from T-Mobile throughout most of the US (it did lag in Montana and Wyoming when I was there last year), and in Europe on a couple trips there.

In fact TMO international support was so good (we were in the Netherlands) that we couldn't tell the difference in connectivity between home and there. And the coverage outside major metro areas was, if anything, better than we experience here.

It really was seamless mobile connectivity. That's really the way it should be everywhere, with every carrier, IMO.

We've also roamed in Canada, in the past. Likewise: Seamless coverage.



"America is at that awkward stage. It's too late to work within the system,,,, but too early to shoot the bastards." -- Claire Wolfe
"If we let things terrify us, life will not be worth living." -- Seneca the Younger, Roman Stoic philosopher
July 29, 2019, 02:01 PM
dewhorse
quote:
Originally posted by ensigmatic:
quote:
Originally posted by bigdeal:
quote:
Originally posted by sns3guppy:
I use the Tmobile internationally daily; last use was two days ago in Europe and Africa a day before that. I use it all over the globe. It's universally poor. Even in the big cities.
And as noted by someone else previously, that's not at all my experience. I've had exceptionally good service from T-Mobile throughout most of the US (it did lag in Montana and Wyoming when I was there last year), and in Europe on a couple trips there.

In fact TMO international support was so good (we were in the Netherlands) that we couldn't tell the difference in connectivity between home and there. And the coverage outside major metro areas was, if anything, better than we experience here.

It really was seamless mobile connectivity. That's really the way it should be everywhere, with every carrier, IMO.

We've also roamed in Canada, in the past. Likewise: Seamless coverage.


I have used TMO roaming in Ukraine, Poland, Indonesia, Taiwan, Dubai, and Tanzania and it has been good....except for the rates Big Grin

TMO has improved so much since I worked for them (started back in '99 for Voicestream) they still are not competitive in coverage with VZW and ATT but with the merger they will be.

Sprint has been aging not so gracefully for years, they put bandages on it from 2011 until 2014 or so and last year started throwing out CAPEX in what I assume was a plan to up their pop count.
July 29, 2019, 02:52 PM
ensigmatic
quote:
Originally posted by dewhorse:
TMO has improved so much since I worked for them (started back in '99 for Voicestream) they still are not competitive in coverage with VZW and ATT ...

I think that depends upon where you are. E.g.: In Michigan, now--or at least the areas I've travelled, I'd say TMO's w/in about 90-95% of VZW's or AT&T's coverage.

quote:
Originally posted by dewhorse:
...but with the merger they will be.

The merger probably won't have much effect on TMO's coverage. TMO and Sprint overlap for most of their respective coverage areas.

quote:
Originally posted by dewhorse:
Sprint has been aging not so gracefully for years...

Ain't that the truth Frown

Sprint, which I joined when it was SprintPCS, was once the maverick TMO became. You didn't lease phones, you bought them. Aggressive build-out. Aggressive plan pricing. Great CS.

It all started going south when they bought Nextel. They bungled that acquisition badly. I guess that screw-up took the wind out of their sails, because they eventually ended-up being just like one of the bigger wireless carriers, only without the coverage.

Around about 2011 they started a major network upgrade. ("Network Vision," they called it.) Our coverage just got worse-and-worse. By the summer of 2013 I'd had enough and we bid them adieu.

About that time the acquisition of Sprint by the Japanese firm SoftBank was finalized. SoftBank Chairman and CEO, Masayoshi Son, instead of getting Sprint back on course, tried to pull an AT&T/Microsoft: If you can't beat 'em, buy 'em and bury 'em. TMO and U.S. regulators weren't having it. Son eventually gave up and, Sprint going nowhere slowly, gave it up to TMO.

And that's the rest of the story.



"America is at that awkward stage. It's too late to work within the system,,,, but too early to shoot the bastards." -- Claire Wolfe
"If we let things terrify us, life will not be worth living." -- Seneca the Younger, Roman Stoic philosopher
February 11, 2020, 06:19 AM
Pipe Smoker
I hope it happens. Re: “initial reports said it could mean a surge in prices for customers.” I doubt that.

“A US district judge is expected to rule in favor of allowing Sprint and T-Mobile to finally merge, despite a state antitrust challenge, two sources familiar with the matter say.

The two companies had agreed to merge nearly two years ago in a $26billion deal that has already been approved by federal regulators.

US District Court Judge Victor Marrero is expected to make his decision public on Tuesday, one source said.

Once merged, Sprint and T-Mobile vowed to build the next generation of wireless service called 5G, but initial reports said it could mean a surge in prices for customers…”

https://mol.im/a/7989199



Serious about crackers.
February 11, 2020, 06:23 AM
CQB60
My Ex has T-Mobile. She is there worst customer


______________________________________________
Life is short. It’s shorter with the wrong gun…
February 11, 2020, 08:12 AM
Pipe Smoker
quote:
Originally posted by CQB60:
My Ex has T-Mobile. She is there worst customer

A useful data point.



Serious about crackers.
February 11, 2020, 08:40 AM
Mr.9mm
Switched from Verizon to TMobile for the Veteran's Plan. Service in the mountains of Western NC is spotty, but in the Upstate of SC, it's fine.

I hope the service only gets better with this merger. I would hate to have to ever go back to Verizon, they were way over-priced.
February 11, 2020, 11:11 AM
PowerSurge
Sprint and T-Mobile suck in North Georgia. Now they can suck together.


———————————————
The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God. Psalm 14:1
February 11, 2020, 11:51 AM
Pipe Smoker
And it’s official.

“A federal judge in New York on Tuesday approved the $26.5-billion merger of the third- and fourth-largest wireless carriers, creating a much larger rival to AT&T and Verizon.

"Today was a huge victory for this merger … and now we are FINALLY able to focus on the last steps to get this merger done," said T-Mobile CEO John Legere in a statement…”

www.google.com/amp/s/amp.usatoday.com/amp/4721902002



Serious about crackers.
June 11, 2020, 08:20 AM
Pipe Smoker
It appears that the Sprint-T-Mobile merger is now in effect:

www.t-mobile.com/support/accou...e-sprint-merger-faqs

I’ve had Sprint mobile service since 1999 – very good service here in San Diego. With the merger it’ll get even better. According to the link (above), I can keep my current plan if I want.

I’m hoping that the iPhone 12 will support 5G (as rumored). Sprint has a ton of beach-front 2.4 GHz 5G spectrum.



Serious about crackers.
June 11, 2020, 08:28 AM
Oz_Shadow
The Sprint website has been directing people to Tmobile for a couple months when you login, at least some parts of it.

Hopefully the network is strengthened. I think they originated on two completely different systems, but I guess equipment has all been slowly becoming the same.

Locally my Sprint tower seems like it has been shut down for some reason - could just be maintenance. It's always been pretty bad since there are restrictions on a border.
June 11, 2020, 01:29 PM
dewhorse
As far as the separate technologies, the company I work for as well as our competition are working on BBUs (radio controller) that can handle both.

I would expect (I certainly don't have any inside info) that they would decomm most of the dated Sprint equipment except in areas that TMO doesn't have coverage.

We are going to busy over the next couple years...exciting times