The HTC EVO 4G LTE is being herald as the best smartphone on Sprint to date by tech pundits already and creating quite the stir with Sprint subscribers who have been waiting for the carrier to roll out another superstar device like the original HTC EVO 4G which had users on other carriers jealous at the time.
Sprint HTC EVO 4G LTE and Samsung Galaxy Nexus utilize 1900 band only?
The HTC EVO 4G LTE will of course be joining the Samsung Galaxy Nexus, another LTE Android smartphone destined to hit Sprint in Q2 2012. However before you get too excited about these two devices, a user on Reddit brought to our attention a very important point about the frequencies the LTE radios on these phones would use. Reddit user ‘BirthdayShop’ explains:
“Before you buy the new Evo or the Sprint Galaxy Nexus, or any other upcoming Sprint LTE phone, take a look at the frequencies that the LTE radios use. Sprint’s immediate LTE rollout is on the 1900 MHz band. Generally speaking, the lower the frequency, the better the signal travels over distances and through barriers. For comparison, T-Mobile’s 3G is on the 1700 MHz band so if you aren’t satisfied with T-Mo 3G you probably won’t be satisfied with Sprint LTE. By contrast, Verizon’s LTE is on the 700 MHz band which is part of the reason it’s so great.
But all is not lost! beginning in 2013, Sprint will be moving its LTE on to their 800 MHz band that is currently being used by their old iDen network while transferring its iDen customers onto its CDMA network. This is scheduled to be completed by the end of 2013. Once that happens, Sprint is going to be tough to beat in terms of both value and network coverage.
If you are already on Sprint and want to stay with them, by all means pick up an LTE phone. But if you are jumping to Sprint from another carrier you may want to rethink entering into a new 2 year contract on a phone that won’t be able to use the 800 MHz band, which could be up and running in your area a little over a year from now and should be nationwide in under two.”
Given that Engadget recently reported the Sprint Samsung Galaxy Nexus will only use the 1900 band based on FCC filings, this doesn’t look good at all. Simultaneously, from what information we can dig up about the HTC EVO 4G LTE, it too appears to be pegged with the 1900 band only. We certainly hope that the 800 band is just left out of the specs sheet since it isn’t operational on Sprint yet but it is baked into the hardware. However something tells us this will not be the case.
We’ll keep you posted as more develops. Share your thoughts in the comments below.
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