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Sprint says that unlimited data is staying, including on LTE. They could always go back on it but since they will continue to be third fiddle to AT&T and VZW, I don't foresee them dropping it anytime soon. As we have posted about, Sprint is currently rolling out Network Vision that is upgrading every single tower in their network to gigabit backhaul, better indoor coverage on 800 SMR, improved 3G, and LTE. They are extremely aware that their 3G sucks rear end and are improving it. I can tell you that there are growing pockets of awesome data speeds here in Dallas and I definitely notice those pockets expanding. Every Sprint coverage area will have LTE by end of 2013, with the final towers upgraded in 2014. All major cities should be underway before the end of this year. If you can't wait, then it may be worth leaving. If you live in a major metro area, you should see massive improvements by the end of the year or early next year if things stay on schedule.
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Aug 5, 2012 06:57
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Ender.uNF posted:Sprint says that unlimited data is staying, including on LTE. They could always go back on it but since they will continue to be third fiddle to AT&T and VZW, I don't foresee them dropping it anytime soon. Omaha is getting the short end of the Sprint stick again and the only thing keeping me from jumping ship is the fact that no other carrier with coverage here is acceptable. e: I don't know if it would qualify as a major metropolitan area but I'm guessing we won't get poo poo until late 2013.
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Aug 5, 2012 11:04
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The Entire Universe posted:Omaha is getting the short end of the Sprint stick again and the only thing keeping me from jumping ship is the fact that no other carrier with coverage here is acceptable. Mo offense, but considering that Sprint just rolled out LTE to its first 6 cities, do you really think Omaha is going to be high on the priority list? I would imagine Philly, NYC, and cities in California will get LTE before Omaha.
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Aug 5, 2012 14:34
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Looking on https://network.sprint.com/search/Omaha/ it looks like Omaha should be getting a ton of upgrades this year.
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Aug 5, 2012 14:36
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The Entire Universe posted:Omaha is getting the short end of the Sprint stick again and the only thing keeping me from jumping ship is the fact that no other carrier with coverage here is acceptable. Yeah, everyone keeps touting the prepaid carriers, but until Tmobile/ATT get rural presence, they're useless to me. pre-tax calcuations: Sprint = $70/mo EPRP with smartphone , 50 SERO or 80 normal Verizon = $100/mo for 2gig data. I streamed tons of olympics at work this week so I've already used over 2 gigs since 8/2 
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Aug 5, 2012 16:32
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ExcessBLarg! posted:Two things: I disagree and think it's a valid argument that you want to keep unlimited data based on how your needs might change. I would love to stream video/netflix/olympics to my phone, but the network is too slow to do that. I used less than 1gig last month, and not because I wasn't trying. Audio streaming doesn't work half the time, and unless you're on wifi or a rare upgraded 3G tower with good backhaul, you're not going to get youtube or netflix either. A lot of the time, "upgraded" NV towers still don't push more than 500-800kbps, which is still a vast improvement over the dial-up speed 3G that Sprint has on their legacy towers, but still not enough to really chew through any amount of data. Once NV rolls out completely, I could see myself blowing through gigs of streaming video. You just can't base your future usage habits on what your current usage is because we're limited by Sprints abysmal data network.
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Aug 5, 2012 18:01
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Cmdr. Shepard posted:I would love to stream video/netflix/olympics to my phone, but the network is too slow to do that. But it's a moot point. If Sprint continues to offer unlimited data in two years then someone can cheap-out now on Straigth Talk or whatever and switch back once NV is complete and they can actually use data. If Sprint dumps unlimited data, well then sticking around doubly screws you. Their data network can't be used for poo poo until NV happens, then once NV is done they dump data. The only benefit to sticking around would be to get grandfathered unlimited data in that circumstance, but again, both Verizon and AT&T have been antagonistic towards grandfathered unlimited data plans, and there's no reason to think that Sprint won't "encourage" folks to leave them either should they go down that road. Cmdr. Shepard posted:Once NV rolls out completely, I could see myself blowing through gigs of streaming video. You just can't base your future usage habits on what your current usage is because we're limited by Sprints abysmal data network. The only reason for folks to reup on Sprint right now is either (i) despite their lovely network, you still get better coverage with them than other providers, or (ii) they're still the cheapest/most value provider for your needs.
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Aug 5, 2012 18:44
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Is there a way to see last month's roaming usage? I just checked to see my usage this month (starting 8/2), and I'm at 3.8gb due to the fluke of being in an office where I get strong Wimax + olympics to watch all day. I can see my roaming usage is minimal, but I'd like to see last month's which I know is a lot. Edit-nevermind, found it under analyze plan, 3g data off network. Looks like it hasn't updated yet for last month's usage, sadly. mastershakeman fucked around with this message at 19:46 on Aug 5, 2012 |
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Aug 5, 2012 19:32
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mastershakeman posted:Yeah, everyone keeps touting the prepaid carriers, but until Tmobile/ATT get rural presence, they're useless to me. Ironically enough, near me, AT&T has the best rural coverage. AT&T didn't come to VT until 200...7?8? Anyway, they came in when they bought up Unicell (not sure if they bought them nationally or just regionally.) But Unicell had one good thing going for it: great coverage in all those rural VT areas, so when AT&T got their towers, they inherited the great rural coverage. In theory, everything is getting upgraded to LTE for Sprint by the end of 2013, but we're at the bottom of the list, so what are the odds everything goes to schedule? So I don't feel like waiting one a half years for good speeds. And if Sprint surprises me and the NV and/or LTE arrive sooner than I thought, I'll come crawling back like a bird on it's belly.
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Aug 5, 2012 20:01
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Cmdr. Shepard posted:A lot of the time, "upgraded" NV towers still don't push more than 500-800kbps, which is still a vast improvement over the dial-up speed 3G that Sprint has on their legacy towers, but still not enough to really chew through any amount of data. Those speeds were most likely not an upgraded Network Vision tower. That was a old tower that had some additional T1 lines added to it. The only places you might see speeds like that on the new network are really dense parts of Chicago (because Sprint has relatively less spectrum there) or NYC. Once devices start coming out with 2.5Ghz LTE that will be alleviated by traffic offloading to Clearwire... In fact the Clearwire deal is explicitly to offload heavy data usage in large metro areas where coverage distance is less important. You can often tell if a tower is really an upgrade by the ping times... The NV network tends to get pings in the sub-100ms range while the old network gets 250+ for the same download speeds. That's not a perfect rule but close enough. Be aware that for some  reason, the upgrades listed at Sprint's network site are just old towers getting temporary T1 upgrades, etc. None of their Network Vision stuff is public. It is the dumbest PR move in the world - everyone knows Sprint's network needs updating but corporate PR departments think if you admit anything no one will sign up. They should be posting YouTube interviews with the contractors, network engineers, etc showing the new fiber, new infrastructure, etc. Spin it as a huge positive. It's crazy how dumb companies can be.VT is part of the New England market and it wont be starting until mid to late 2013. Sprint hasn't scheduled it yet. The good news is that the deployment is picking up speed. Much more of the backhaul, leasing, tower design, etc is done than what they've started actually installing so as they catch up the backlog for installs the next install is ready to go with no waiting. In DFW they also seem to be letting towers stay live as they come online even if Sprint hasn't listed it as complete yet (if the lease requires the equipment cabinets to be brown, Sprint won't "accept" the tower from the OEM until they go back out and paint the box, even if LTE is fully operational, so this skews what we know of the schedule from the outside).
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Aug 5, 2012 20:22
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Ender.uNF posted:It is the dumbest PR move in the world - everyone knows Sprint's network needs updating but corporate PR departments think if you admit anything no one will sign up.
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Aug 5, 2012 20:41
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My dad has an EVO 4G and no insurance. The external speaker is crapping out (sounds all tinny and distorted when he gets a notification). Will Sprint repair it and at what cost?
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Aug 5, 2012 21:11
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Ender.uNF posted:Those speeds were most likely not an upgraded Network Vision tower. That was a old tower that had some additional T1 lines added to it. The only places you might see speeds like that on the new network are really dense parts of Chicago (because Sprint has relatively less spectrum there) or NYC. I'm utilizing programs like Netmonitor and maps on S4GRU.com to determine when I'm connected to an NV tower or not. And yes, this is in the greater Chicago market. New NV towers tend to push 1.5-2.0mbps 3g, but then slowly degrade until several months later (now) where I'm seeing 500-800kbps be more normal. I blame it on the fact that more Sprint customers are seeing that data is working again and using it, therefore bogging it down again. Hopefully once they fill in the rest of the market and complete their backhaul upgrades, speeds will be more stable and over the 1mbps mark. But by that time, I should hopefully be on LTE the whole time anyways. I just worry that the NV backhaul they're installing won't be enough to handle the demand. I know people on Sprint who rely almost entirely on wifi and don't even bother turning on their 3G radio because it's literally useless. How Sprint even got into a position where 3G towers are posting sub 100kbps speeds is beyond me.
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Aug 5, 2012 21:34
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Is there a place where you can see historical data on Sprint's decreasing data speeds? I remember they used to be pretty decent. What exactly happened? Oh, also is there any word on if the 3D's ability to use the SMR band will ever come in handy? d[-.-]b fucked around with this message at 21:49 on Aug 5, 2012 |
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Aug 5, 2012 21:40
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Vykk.Draygo posted:My dad has an EVO 4G and no insurance. The external speaker is crapping out (sounds all tinny and distorted when he gets a notification). Will Sprint repair it and at what cost? If you care to, the fix is easy, open the case, remove external speaker, and drop it on a hard drive magnet. Metal dust sticks to the speaker, and distorts the sound. I've cleaned mine three times.
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Aug 5, 2012 22:30
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I might have better luck in the general android phone thread but I'm having weird contact issues with my e3d. I haven't jumped to the ICS update yet, just because I'd like to make sure this is all sorted just in case.. I have GV integration, as well as being a gmail account. I'd like all the contacts on my phone to also be mirrored in gmail/GV. Right now, I have contacts that only show in the phone dialer and nowhere else. On top of that, it seems like the gmail contact sync refuses to work in account settings. Every other facet of the google sync passes except contacts, with a generic sync is unavailable right now message. Because of this, I hadn't had contacts on the phone synced in over 6 months. I did a manual export in the People app of both google contacts and phone contacts. I imported those successfully, yet I still have contacts that just don't exist anywhere other then the dialer, and I can only get to them by using the quickdial option. Here's my best guess as to what's going on.. I have a contact named John Hudak. He existed in my gmail contacts sans phone number, so he exists in gmails/gvs contact list. When he and I became facebook friends he was added again in my phone, and I added the contact number. When I see his contact, it's defaulted as a facebook contact, yet when I sort for just facebook contacts in the people app, he's not there. How can I export anyone who is a facebook contact or has a facebook contact linked? Why doesn't this sync to the people app? I'm afraid I'm going to lose a bunch of random people that only exist in some weird pocket dimension of .vcfs that refuse to be exported to anything..ad I won't even know it because I can't check it against any other contact list... edit: so, after even more searching and asking around- basically no. I need a way to export any contacts that have numbers and only exist as facebook contacts..which doesn't exist..there were some loopholes and scripts, but facebook markup changes so much they stopped working years ago. it looks like i'll have to manually copy these contacts into gmail/gv's address book since there's no way to export that information. i get that maybe this is a fringe case...if you had a new device, both facebook and gmail would then sync to it and you'd get your contact list back, but there are times when i'm using google voice and not having a contact that exists on the phone because it's a facebook contact is incredibly lame. zer0spunk fucked around with this message at 23:05 on Aug 5, 2012 |
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Aug 5, 2012 22:48
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Possibly export your contact list to your sd card then re import them. Either through the phone or directly into Google via a computer.
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Aug 5, 2012 22:51
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Cmdr. Shepard posted:I'm utilizing programs like Netmonitor and maps on S4GRU.com to determine when I'm connected to an NV tower or not. And yes, this is in the greater Chicago market. Ah well that explains it. LTE will help because it is using different frequencies and over time more and more frequencies will be transitioned to LTE which obviously shoves a lot more data down the same pipe. There are two factors in cell data speeds... Backhaul and the individual cell itself (with towers having multiple cells). CDMA is limited to 3Mbps per cell for all users of that cell on that frequency, so in really dense markets you build smaller cell sites and setup cells to use multiple frequencies. If you don't have enough frequencies you are stuck unless you reduce power to shrink the cells and build new cell sites in between. In theory you could operate a provider with one single block if you were willing to build towers every 1500 feet. That's why spectrum is so valuable... It saves you billions on cell sites. In Chicago, Sprint doesn't have as many blocks as they do almost everywhere else so that is probably what you are seeing. However assume that a single tower has three cell zones and 4 frequency blocks on each. That's 36Mbps (in theory) if all cells are saturated. If the site only has 10 T1s, then it has 15Mbps of backhaul. If even half of the cells are saturated, ping times shoot up and speeds start dropping like a rock. This is the case in the vast majority of Sprint's old network right now. So you need enough cell towers with enough cells spaced close together (in urban areas). You need to be using frequencies that don't bounce or travel too far, otherwise the sites interfere with each other due to being so close (it's the opposite in rural areas - you want low frequencies that travel far at high power so you can cover maximum area per tower). You want multiple spectrum blocks so you can have one antenna in one cell effectively run multiple networks thus improving capacity even further. And you need a big fat pipe at the tower to carry all that traffic. Backhaul in the new network doesn't require truck rolls or a month-long delay from the telco. In the old system it could take 4 months to get the T1s upgraded and by that time the site would need even more bandwidth. The new system allocates bandwidth in 50MBps chunks at minimum and like I said it is software so it can be brought online quickly. Some of the backhaul providers only hand out 100Mbps chunks. All of it is gigabit minimum per tower, with busy towers getting 10gig. I believe metro markets are starting off with 150-200Mbps per site but as more LTE comes online this will be bumped. In Chicago, Sprint has a smaller block of spectrum... However their first LTE channel is nationwide for a single block (unheard of in the wireless world, a gift from the FCC for forcing Nextel to change frequencies). This should provide relief to spectrum constrained markets like Chicago. When Nextel shuts down in 2013 that should provide more relief as they'll have LTE at 800 SMR. For Chicago specifically I think those two will almost double their available spectrum.
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Aug 5, 2012 23:18
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Cmdr. Shepard posted:New NV towers tend to push 1.5-2.0mbps 3g, but then slowly degrade until several months later (now) where I'm seeing 500-800kbps be more normal. 
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Aug 5, 2012 23:58
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Duckman2008 posted:Mo offense, but considering that Sprint just rolled out LTE to its first 6 cities, do you really think Omaha is going to be high on the priority list? I would imagine Philly, NYC, and cities in California will get LTE before Omaha. I don't expect it right away, but I was expecting to be sometime before the end of next year. It sucks to basically be considered equivalent to the toejam suburb/rural markets between major cities but at least there's coverage. GSM doesn't exist here.
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Aug 6, 2012 00:41
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Vykk.Draygo posted:My dad has an EVO 4G and no insurance. The external speaker is crapping out (sounds all tinny and distorted when he gets a notification). Will Sprint repair it and at what cost? My Evo 4G stopped vibrating 2 weeks ago. They gave me a refurbished one for $35. I paid it gladly. I don't have insurance and my contract was up. They gave me no issues at all.
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Aug 6, 2012 01:27
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Vykk.Draygo posted:My dad has an EVO 4G and no insurance. The external speaker is crapping out (sounds all tinny and distorted when he gets a notification). Will Sprint repair it and at what cost?
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Aug 6, 2012 01:57
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Vykk.Draygo posted:My dad has an EVO 4G and no insurance. The external speaker is crapping out (sounds all tinny and distorted when he gets a notification). Will Sprint repair it and at what cost? To add to this, officially its $35. Unofficially its a really, really easy repair and unless the store is busy if you catch people in a good mood they may just harvest the speaker from an outgoing phone and swap it in. That's what I would do.
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Aug 6, 2012 05:18
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td4guy posted:A poor buddy of mine is getting these speeds on LTE on every Dallas tower he's connected to so far. We are getting screwed by backhaul issues in DFW right now. My local towers are delayed for the same reason.
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Aug 6, 2012 06:23
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So I should be getting that Nexus from Duckman sometime today or tomorrow. Once I get it and port the number to Google Voice and go through the ETF stuff, what do I do from there? Duckman told me that I'll have to verify my discount and all again, so I figure what I can do is just walk into a Sprint store and start my service with Sprint again? I want to be sure I have this all sorted out before tomorrow.
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Aug 6, 2012 11:29
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The Entire Universe posted:I don't expect it right away, but I was expecting to be sometime before the end of next year. It sucks to basically be considered equivalent to the toejam suburb/rural markets between major cities but at least there's coverage. GSM doesn't exist here. My gf uses At&t? Sprint coverage in Omaha is bad... If you go inside any building, good luck with data. We get shafted on wimax and now this.
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Aug 6, 2012 13:18
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Skeezy posted:So I should be getting that Nexus from Duckman sometime today or tomorrow. Once I get it and port the number to Google Voice and go through the ETF stuff, what do I do from there? I can't think of a reason you need to go to a Sprint store. Get the verification form at sprint.com/verify fill it out and send it in. Or just plug in your email. The phone will already be active, all you have to do is turn it on. Then you port your number to Google voice, download the Google voice app on your phone, select Google voice integration and select your phone number as opposed to the number on the phone itself. And then you will be good to go.
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Aug 6, 2012 14:40
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Duckman2008 posted:I can't think of a reason you need to go to a Sprint store. Oh dang, Duckman you own  ------ Edit: Right now on the Sprint Verify page, if I punch in my number it tells me I don't have to do anything. I'm guessing once I port to Google Voice and all that it'll change and I'll have to fill out the form then? Edit: Oh and my dad wants my EVO so I think I need to go into a Sprint store for that. Skeezy fucked around with this message at 14:48 on Aug 6, 2012 |
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Aug 6, 2012 14:43
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TLG James posted:My gf uses At&t? Sprint coverage in Omaha is bad... If you go inside any building, good luck with data. We get shafted on wimax and now this. poo poo, how's her coverage on ATT?
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Aug 6, 2012 18:22
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AT&T doesn't work everywhere in Omaha. I've got a couple friends on it and I can get service in a lot of places that they simply can't. I just wish Sprint would stop being so silent on updates..or anything, really. The GSM international carriers have spoken up on their JB updates for the NS and GNex, but Sprint doesn't care at all.
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Aug 6, 2012 18:40
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My parents are on vacation in Nova Scotia and PEI, and my dad says their phones aren't working at all. They did add the Canada Roaming Plan before leaving, but apparently people there say there's a roaming issue agreement between Sprint and Rogers/Bell. Can anybody in the know shed some light on this? This website says both Halifax and Charlottetown are covered by roaming: http://internationalroaming.sprint.com/IntlCoverage/WelcomeRoaming.do
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Aug 6, 2012 20:46
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"d[-.- posted:b" post="406172921"] I know this is from a page or two ago, but allow me to white knight Swype. They fixed this in the betas of Swype, and as someone who has used Swiftkey for the last month or so based on reports of it's awesomeness, you're wrong (anecdotally). I'll be switching back to Swype. Frankly, Swiftkey works well if you're just sending the same few types of messages to people, but to try and communicate, it's really frustrating. Really, Swype is totally different between the version activated on phones by default and the beta. It has a small learning curve to use right (pretty much just watch the videos and you're good to go). They should be considered different keyboards. Swype beta allows me to type close to as fast as I can on a keyboard on my PC, great editing functions (swype from the swype key to the space bar), only learns which words you want it to, and has a swiftkey style prediction (which isn't that great, but it has improved over the last couple of betas). I know keyboards are a matter of preference, and that the Swype betas are a pain in the rear end to install, and if Swiftkey or whatever works for you, great, but don't judge Swype until you've tried the betas.
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Aug 6, 2012 22:57
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The Nexus hasn't shown up yet After a long boring day at work I had my hopes up and everything. Oh well, there's always tomorrow.
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Aug 7, 2012 00:04
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Skeezy posted:The Nexus hasn't shown up yet I hate waiting for something coming in the mail, but I love when it gets here. It is like Christmas. I think that reaction is why I'm addicted to Amazon.
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Aug 7, 2012 00:16
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I figured by Tuesday it would be here anyways, Duckman sent it out on Saturday if I remember right. Worst case it'll be here Wednesday but I hope not. Works better for me anyways since I get paid tomorrow and can pay off the ETF and all that.
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Aug 7, 2012 00:18
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I don't know if this is for everyone or just SERO, but I find it annoying that I have to call in every time I want to change from a 4G to 3G phone. Would I get kicked off if I switch my phone too often?
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Aug 7, 2012 06:18
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I just swapped my Wife's dying Evo shift for a epic4g (she likes keyboards.) Holy poo poo what a better phone in every way. With CM10 on it it's an amazing phone. I'm a very happy camper now.
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Aug 7, 2012 06:20
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ZeroAX posted:I don't know if this is for everyone or just SERO, but I find it annoying that I have to call in every time I want to change from a 4G to 3G phone. Would I get kicked off if I switch my phone too often?
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Aug 7, 2012 06:27
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ratbert90 posted:I just swapped my Wife's dying Evo shift for a epic4g (she likes keyboards.) Holy poo poo what a better phone in every way. With CM10 on it it's an amazing phone. I'm a very happy camper now.  This is adorable, like when I gave my old iPod to my little brother for Christmas.the Epic made my life a living hell. Buggy-assed GPS, lovely duct taped install of android, my battery killed itself for no reason. Back then Cyanogen was too busy with practically every other phone and so everything available in terms of custom ROMs was absolute poo poo. Trying to find working software on that site was almost as hard as finding someone non-repugnant on Reddit. Good to see it's gotten the support it so desperately needed.
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Aug 7, 2012 07:15
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Sprint can go gently caress themselves. When did the termination fee become $350? I'm glad to be done with this amateur bullshit.
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Aug 7, 2012 14:01
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