By Sprint’s announcing the continued expansion of their growing 4G network (something that’s starting to become a nice trend for Mondays). While today’s expansion might not be as beefy as weeks past, we can’t say we’re disappointed about it. Those in Modesto and Stockton, California will finally be able to enjoy 4G coverage today after many of you were accidentally able to tap into the network not too long.
Additionally, Sprint customers in Jacksonville, Florida, Wilmington, Delaware, and Grand Rapids, Michigan are all being lit up. With the HTC EVO 4G out now and the Samsung Epic 4G headed our way sometime soon, we can only imagine these 4G expansions will continue to spill out like water from a bottle as Sprint’s newfound business model mostly depends on them getting as many people as they can using 4G services.
Sprint’s also launched their promotional site for the Samsung Epic 4G earlier. There’s not much to see here except some eye-candy, specs, and a sign-up form to be notified when the phone becomes available, but that should be enough to get you too click on through, no?
Sprint Launches 4G Coverage in Delaware, Florida and Michigan and Extends 4G Coverage in California
Modesto, Calif., Stockton, Calif., Jacksonville, Fla., Wilmington, Del., and Grand Rapids, Mich., Launched Today
OVERLAND PARK, Kan., Aug 02, 2010 (BUSINESS WIRE) —Today, Sprint (NYSE:S) unveiled 4G service to populous areas of California, Delaware, Florida and Michigan. With today’s launches of Modesto, Calif., Stockton, Calif., Jacksonville, Fla., Wilmington, Del., and Grand Rapids, Mich., Sprint boasts 48 metropolitan areas enabled with the new mobile broadband service, which allows for Internet traffic at super fast speeds. Unlike competitors, Sprint is the first national wireless carrier to actually launch wireless 4G technology in cities across the country. Wilmington, Jacksonville and Grand Rapids are the first cities in Delaware, Florida and Michigan to offer 4G service.
With 4G, Sprint customers experience fast mobile downloads, streaming video without the lag, and turbo-charged Web browsing. This new wireless technology boasts download speeds up to 10 times faster than 3G.1 Users can video chat with friends and family via the popular HTC EVO(TM) 4G, America’s first 3G/4G wireless smartphone. And in the near future, Sprint customers will be able to purchase Samsung Epic(TM) 4G, the company’s second 4G enabled smartphone.
With the Overdrive(TM) 3G/4G Mobile Hotspot by Sierra Wireless, users can create a 4G hotspot on the road or at home. With the Sprint Free Guarantee, customers can try 4G for 30 days and if they are not satisfied, they can cancel service and have the opportunity to be fully reimbursed.2 Sprint also offers simplicity and savings vs. competitors with Everything Data plans, which include unlimited Web, texting and calling while on the Sprint network for one low price.
“Sprint customers are the first in the country to use 4G with either a smartphone like HTC EVO or one of Sprint’s other 4G devices like the 3G/4G Overdrive Hotspot to wirelessly connect a laptop to the Internet,” said Matt Carter, president of 4G, Sprint. “Later this year, Sprint will launch Boston, Miami, New York and Los Angeles, enabling millions more to harness this powerful new service.”
As summer travel continues, people will find that 4G is available in many markets across the country: California – Merced, Modesto, Stockton and Visalia; Delaware – Wilmington; Florida – Jacksonville; Georgia – Atlanta and Milledgeville; Hawaii – Honolulu and Maui; Idaho – Boise; Illinois – Chicago; Maryland – Baltimore; Michigan – Grand Rapids; Missouri – Kansas City and St. Louis; New York – Rochester and Syracuse; Nevada – Las Vegas; North Carolina – Charlotte, Greensboro (along with High Point and Winston-Salem), Raleigh (along with Cary, Chapel Hill and Durham); Oregon – Eugene, Portland and Salem; Pennsylvania – Harrisburg, Lancaster, Philadelphia, Reading and York; Texas – Abilene, Amarillo, Austin, Corpus Christi, Dallas/Fort Worth, Houston, Killeen/Temple, Lubbock, Midland/Odessa, San Antonio, Waco and Wichita Falls; Utah – Salt Lake City; Virginia – Richmond; Washington – Bellingham, Seattle, Tri-Cities and Yakima. For more information, visit www.sprint.com/4G.
Sprint is delivering the power of 4G as the majority shareholder of Clearwire, the independent company that is building the WiMAX network.
About Sprint Nextel
Sprint Nextel offers a comprehensive range of wireless and wireline communications services bringing the freedom of mobility to consumers, businesses and government users. Sprint Nextel served more than 48 million customers at the end of the second quarter of 2010 and is widely recognized for developing, engineering and deploying innovative technologies, and is the first and only wireless 4G service from a national carrier in the United States; offering industry-leading mobile data services, leading prepaid brands including Virgin Mobile USA, Boost Mobile, Common Cents Mobile and Assurance Wireless and instant national and international push-to-talk capabilities; and a global Tier 1 Internet backbone. With its customer-focused strategy, you can learn more and visit Sprint at www.sprint.com or www.facebook.com/sprint and www.twitter.com/sprint.
You got me all excited that the Epic 4G website was up, but its just that darn teaser page still. :(
woo! go modesto! haha
WOOHOO! Stockton BABY! thank you for the awesome news.
and we, in Grand Rapids, are grateful!
GSM version ?
I know it says Miami is coming “later this year” but I’ve gotten 4G service a few times in Downtown Miami and only once near Haulover Beach. I’ve sat at my desk and actually gone online over 4G but it wasn’t very fast, slower than over the 3G connection. I guess they are still testing it out/setting it up. Oh, forgot to mention I’m using an EVO.
Well I guess Jvil in florida is closer to me then before… hopefully they keep going south.
Progress is progress.
I hear the Central Florida area should be getting 4G this month. Out back of my workplace we have a Sprint tower. There have been contractors working on it for the past 2 weeks. My hope is they are upgrading the gear for 4G coverage.
Why Jacksonville over miami. Jacksonville the largest city by size, but not as big on population.
I can’t believe Jacksonville is the first city in Florida to be activated. We never get nice things here
Hey if you guys are in the Tampa Bay area 4G is live in many spots..Found it on Saturday and have been mapping it since on my drives
Good…now just Get Orlando, Miami, Tampa, and Naples/FT. Myers green lighted & Florida people will all quiet down. Ive been blessed with 4G in Baltimore Area for years….But When i visit Family in FL. My phone will have to chill out.
Go Jax, FL. Yes!
Clearly there is some ISSUE that sprint is ignores larger markets at times. Eg- no NYC but smaller upstate NY communities, no LA but Modesto (no offense but if you folks didn’t have that perve congressman that was suspected of killing his staffer a few years back none of the rest of us would have heard of your place), and Jacksonville over miami fl. They have Philly, Chicago, Vegas, Houston & Dallas, etc, etc though so I wonder why they can do those larger places but can’t pull it together for the big 2 (NY and LA) and some other places?
Makes ya wonder if Verizon can get their stuff straight and lunch LTE in LA and NYC markets first. That would give them a big head-start in the “covering XX million people” type ads.
Seriously, that epic page has been up. Give me a release date
Its takes more time…lots more time to do bigger cities. You have to find all the holes, get around or through buildings. Get new towers if need be. They are not ignoring those cities in fact many of them starting getting built-out well before any of these smaller cities but they just take way more time to refine and fill all the gaps.
I would rather them wait and build it out properly then to rush it and it suck…kudos to Sprint for getting it right.
@michaelk Honestly, I think the issue with larger cities is trying to get the proper permits and the red tape that comes with it. Places like Modesto are likely a lot easier to do the running around to get this stuff opushed thru than a place like NY for example. Add to that the Line Of Site nightmares that come with a major city 10 story buildings and such just takes a longer time to figure the engineering stuff out
what about NEW YORK?!?!?!?!?!?
makes sense that it could be red tape and the like- I think that’s the reason ATT gave for taking so long to fix their coverage issues in NYC. Will be interesting to see if verizon knows how to handle that better since NYC is one of their earliest markets or if they too take time to get LTE up and running there.
It is interesting that we still don’t have 4G in Southern California, but, you can’t find an EVO phone in inventory in any Sprint, Radio Shack or Best Buy store in Southern California. What will happen we do get 4G here and no one can get any phones? I hope Samsung has a larger first build on the EPIC than HTC did on the EVO. I really want an EVO but might have to go with the EPIC(don’t like sliders).
What about wanting diego, Riverside county area… I live in temecula, ca by the way.
I meant san diego area… sorry.. lol.
Im really wanting to get the epic when it comes out… Anybody who has an upgrade for sprint, and wants my evo… and I’ll get the epic on ur upgrade, hit me up here.
@MVtom…u can get my evo if u have an upgrade that I can get?
This site was up over a week ago sprint sent me a email with it in it(i signed up a wile ago to get update about the epic)
Bring 4G to Orlando Florida!!! -__-
I’ve tested all over areas of NJ that i travel through.
I get 4G in Exchange Place (Jersey City), and areas of Elizabeth, Rahway, Linden, and Newark.
Note that there are merely small pockets in each of the areas that i mentioned above. I see the signals connecting in all those cities when i travel the NJ Coastline on NJTransit.
So, even though it’s ‘not live’ in NJ, you can find pockets of it being tested consistently.
@waltz – you don’t need my upgrade. I have been a Sprint customer for many years. Any time I wanted to upgrade, they just added 2 years to my existing contract. I have a feeling that when the EPIC comes out there will suddenly be a lot of EVOs available because, unlike me, many people prefer the slide out keyboard. I suspect there will be quite a few EVOs on Craig’s list. Radio Shack or Best Buy (or even Sprint) might even offer a trade-in program because of the high demand for the EVO.
@Waltz – you stand a better chance of getting 4G service in Temecula before I do in Orange County, they seem to be opening up the smaller markets first for reasons already discussed in this thread.
@Patric and @Feech You may see 4G service before the official launch date. We are on track to launch when all of our planned areas are built out to receive our advertised speeds and tech support.
@MichaelK Clear is in some larger cities like Houston, Chicago, Seattle, etc, but you are right, we have been launching the smaller cities around our planned larger cities first (NYC, LA, SF). BigT is right that it takes more time to build enough towers to cover higher-density population.
To keep up with new 4G gadget and area launches, make sure to follow the official Facebook page at http://www.facebook.com/clear4g
Cecile
theCLEARblog.com
@MVtom, ya youre probably right about that. i’ll just wait till the epic comes out and see if they do offer some sort of trade-in program for the evo or something.
I can’t believe some of the areas that have 4g, and those that don’t. I’ve been using Sprint’s 3g/4g wireless card for 2 months now and there’s still no 4g in south Florida at all… I’m paying monthly and have very limited access for viewing vids uploading or downloading material because space fills up fast!
Populated areas… hello? Miami, Ft Laud, West Palm? Get on the ball Sprint!
I have 4g in Orlando right now. It is a little up and down but I think that is because they are testing it out.