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Is One S LTE ready?

P

pda96

Newbie
Hi All,
New to the forum here. Just wanna say "hello". I have a question (did a search but did not find anything relevant)... I have an HTC One S. I called TMO to ask if the phone is LTE capable. They kept telling me "yes". Is this true? I live in San Diego, no LTE yet. So if I go to Las Vegas, which has LTE, my phone will show the LTE icon? In other words, it will pick up the LTE signal? Thanks for the replies.
 
Yes this is a 4G phone. I get avg of 7 mbps download and 1.5 mpbs upload.

I wonder if this phone will be gone once One is release.
 
Thanks all for the replies. I find the One S to be the perfect size. TMO needs a mid level LTE capable phone from HTC. Making the One S LTE capable would be ideal. If Samsung can make the S3 LTE ready, why can't HTC do the same for the One S??
 
pda96 said:
Thanks all for the replies. I find the One S to be the perfect size. TMO needs a mid level LTE capable phone from HTC. Making the One S LTE capable would be ideal. If Samsung can make the S3 LTE ready, why can't HTC do the same for the One S??
Click to expand...

A phone gets LTE through an LTE radio. If your phone doesn't have an LTE radio you can't get LTE. The One S just doesn't have an LTE radio. Tmobile will release a whole new S3 that includes an LTE radio since the original tmobile S3 didn't have one. The Note 2 had an LTE radio already so they just enabled it through a baseband update.
 
pda96 said:
Thanks all for the replies. I find the One S to be the perfect size. TMO needs a mid level LTE capable phone from HTC. Making the One S LTE capable would be ideal. If Samsung can make the S3 LTE ready, why can't HTC do the same for the One S??
Click to expand...

I believe the One S was designed to be a One X equivalent, just without the LTE antenna. By contrast, while in some ways it seems like a naming game, while T-Mobile's S3 didn't have an LTE antenna, Samsung made configurations of the S3 with LTE. So, in the case of the S3, T-Mobile is just buying a different configuration (model number) of the same phone, whereas with HTC they would have to sell a different phone.

My guess is that T-Mobile has decided it isn't worth working to buy an "obsolete" phone from HTC, and instead they will offer the new HTC One and discontinue the One S.
 
I understand what you all are saying. I'm just looking for a mid-level LTE capable Android phone offered by TMO. Right now, the only LTE capable phones are the high end ones, like the One, S3 (soon), and S4. Where are the mid-level LTE phones? If HTC doesn't want to make an LTE One S, then TMO should bring the One X over or something.

My ideal phone would be something with a 4.3" - 4.7" screen, 1280x720, 1G RAM, 16GB, Android 4.1, and of course, LTE. Does such a beast exist?
 
pda96 said:
I understand what you all are saying. I'm just looking for a mid-level LTE capable Android phone offered by TMO. Right now, the only LTE capable phones are the high end ones, like the One, S3 (soon), and S4. Where are the mid-level LTE phones? If HTC doesn't want to make an LTE One S, then TMO should bring the One X over or something.

My ideal phone would be something with a 4.3" - 4.7" screen, 1280x720, 1G RAM, 16GB, Android 4.1, and of course, LTE. Does such a beast exist?
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Try to remember that T-Mo had been involved in a lengthy merger with at&t, which, had it gone through, would have utilized at&t's LTE bands. T-Mo would have put any phone development/rollout plans in hold, given that it did not have any LTE infrastructure, as they had originally planned on rolling out 84Mbps and 168Mbps HSPA.
 
if you can find an unlocked htc one x you should be able to pop your sim in and go.

it has lte support for att's 700 but also for 1700. If im not mistaken in some markets att needed to run lte on 1700 so its in the phone.
in t mobiles refarmed area, I would expect your in one, you will also get HSPA + on 1900 like att does.
 
new optimus said:
if you can find an unlocked htc one x you should be able to pop your sim in and go.

it has lte support for att's 700 but also for 1700. If im not mistaken in some markets att needed to run lte on 1700 so its in the phone.
in t mobiles refarmed area, I would expect your in one, you will also get HSPA + on 1900 like att does.
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I'm not familiar with lte but for hspa+ you'll be good to go.
 
Just checked the specs the htc amaze is hspa + 42, but no lte radio.

when they say 4g they dont usually mean lte Hopefully now that all the big carriers have lte they will stop calling hspa + 4g.
 
I wonder when we'll start to see more LTE devices on the TMO website. I'm starting to lose faith in HTC since they're so slow with OS updates. Samsung seems to be doing a much better job at this. I'm anxious to find out how much the LTE S3 will cost once it's available. It's my # choice right now for an upgrade. Both the ONE and S4 are a bit too rich for my blood. Similarly, when will Google have an LTE version of the Nexus 4??
 
There will not be a LTE Nexus 4. The next Nexus will very likely have T-Mobile LTE but not come out until late this year. Doesn't matter to me, HSPA+ 42 on the Nexus 4 is so fast I don't miss LTE at all.

Linux user #266351. Android since v1.0
 
are you guys certain that older t mobile devices will not be capable of picking up LTE? :confused: not doubting anyone,just looking for info.

they will be diustributing LTE via the current 1700 band,wich all t mobile devices currently use for hspa+.

i read somewhere that the note 2 will have LTE enabled in a later update,so it seems reasonable a new radio may not be neccessary if t mobile wants to include the the one s(or any older device) for LTE cabability.

one last bit,in trying to figure this out,a google search led me back to my own forum,lol :D
 
scotty85 said:
are you guys certain that older t mobile devices will not be capable of picking up LTE? :confused: not doubting anyone,just looking for info.

they will be diustributing LTE via the current 1700 band,wich all t mobile devices currently use for hspa+.

i read somewhere that the note 2 will have LTE enabled in a later update,so it seems reasonable a new radio may not be neccessary if t mobile wants to include the the one s(or any older device) for LTE cabability.

one last bit,in trying to figure this out,a google search led me back to my own forum,lol :D
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The note 2 and the nexus 4 have lte radio's in the phone, they are just not active. The Note 2 the radio was planned from the start and so they just rolled out an update to enable it when lte was deployed before that it would just be one more thing draining battery so keeping it off was beneficial.
The Nexus 4 on the other hand the lte radio did not go through FCC so they do not Officially support it, from the reading I have done the optimus G which the nexus seems to be based on has lte and they thought it would be cheaper to leave it in rather then doing a total rework on the phone.
 
thanks for the info.

have any ideas what the phone will do if its not in an lte/refarm area? will the lte radio still pick up hspa+ ? :confused: if not,seems alot of "un-farmed" areas could leave the device with edge data(like an att phone that doesnt pick up the 1700 band)
 
scotty85 said:
thanks for the info.

have any ideas what the phone will do if its not in an lte/refarm area? will the lte radio still pick up hspa+ ? :confused: if not,seems alot of "un-farmed" areas could leave the device with edge data(like an att phone that doesnt pick up the 1700 band)
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the lte radio only picks up lte.

Your phone, assuming its a lte capable device has 2 radio's one for lte only and one for voice and all other data.
So if you are using a t mobile phone with lte but are not in a lte market that radio will search for a signal but not get it(using up some battery) then the other radio will take over.
Now if your using att phone without wcdma 1700 then yes it will drop to edge speeds because it could not pickup the signal, and the lte radio only picks up lte
 
scotty85 said:
thanks for the info.

have any ideas what the phone will do if its not in an lte/refarm area? will the lte radio still pick up hspa+ ? :confused: if not,seems alot of "un-farmed" areas could leave the device with edge data(like an att phone that doesnt pick up the 1700 band)
Click to expand...

LTE requires its own radio, so without the LTE radio the phone cannot pick up an LTE signal. If it has the LTE radio, the LTE radio can only pick up the LTE signal. The phones have a separate radio for HSPA.

So, if the area is refarmed and an AT&T phone has LTE it will pick up both 3G (HSPA+) and LTE. If the area is not refarmed and has LTE, it will not pick up 3G but it will pick up 2G and LTE. If the area is not refarmed and does not have LTE, the phone will be limited to 2G.
 
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