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How is Sprint in Orange County?

I

icomputered

macrumors member
Original poster
Oct 19, 2011
70
0
Hi guys, I ordered a 16 GB white iPhone 4S, and I am afraid that I made a mistake.

For Sprint users in the Orange County, CA Area (Preferably Irvine): How are the data speeds? Where I live, I generally get 3-5 bars, but I am unsure of how fast Sprint's 3G is. My current phone, a simple cheap phone, does not use 3G so I cannot test Sprint's speeds.

Thanks in advance!
 
Last edited:
Well, I read on their website that their 3G maxes out at 2Mbps dl on 4S... so, I'd assume it won't be faster than that in Irvine, CA. Not sure though...
 
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I live in Irvine. Been using the 4s on Sprint since Friday. I've been using it to stream music as I drive around the OC and there have been a few spots of interruption but fine for the most part. I don't make a lot of phone calls but the few times I've used the phone haven't been a problem. No dropped calls or lesser signal quality. Did have a little bit of trouble with watching some HD videos but that's in my house where my area seems to be a trouble spot. I rely on wi-fi at home though so for me it doesn't really matter. Been using Siri as well, shes able to connect maybe 80% of the time. I had been considering jumping to AT&T bc I'm pretty sure it's faster than what Sprint offers here (highest data speed I've tested so far is 1.8 mbps down) but decided I'm gonna stick it out with Sprint. I'm not the type who downloads a lot on the road or tethers or watches videos when not on Wi-fi - I only need speeds capable of streaming music when I'm at the gym and Sprint is good enough for what i need to do with my phone. Plus I noticed that I've already used over 400 mb since I got the phone - granted I've been using data on purpose to test out Sprint but I'm pretty sure I would've exceeded the 2gb limit imposed by both AT&T and Verizon. Plus I like the idea that I can take my phone overseas with me.
 
I'm up in Costa Mesa (by Harbor & Sunflower, near Ikea & AAA).

No iphone as my speeds are too slow at my home & office.

4G is fine (on my EVO) = 125 ms, 4.7 down, .574 up

3G is terrible! = 116 ms, .72 down, .31 up (and those are some of the fastest 3G speeds I've seen in a while)
 
Qisma said:
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; CPU iPhone OS 5_0 like Mac OS X) AppleWebKit/534.46 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.1 Mobile/9A334 Safari/7534.48.3)

I live in Irvine. Been using the 4s on Sprint since Friday. I've been using it to stream music as I drive around the OC and there have been a few spots of interruption but fine for the most part. I don't make a lot of phone calls but the few times I've used the phone haven't been a problem. No dropped calls or lesser signal quality. Did have a little bit of trouble with watching some HD videos but that's in my house where my area seems to be a trouble spot. I rely on wi-fi at home though so for me it doesn't really matter. Been using Siri as well, shes able to connect maybe 80% of the time. I had been considering jumping to AT&T bc I'm pretty sure it's faster than what Sprint offers here (highest data speed I've tested so far is 1.8 mbps down) but decided I'm gonna stick it out with Sprint. I'm not the type who downloads a lot on the road or tethers or watches videos when not on Wi-fi - I only need speeds capable of streaming music when I'm at the gym and Sprint is good enough for what i need to do with my phone. Plus I noticed that I've already used over 400 mb since I got the phone - granted I've been using data on purpose to test out Sprint but I'm pretty sure I would've exceeded the 2gb limit imposed by both AT&T and Verizon. Plus I like the idea that I can take my phone overseas with me.
Click to expand...

Thanks for your reply! Have you ever gotten below, like, 800 kbps? I would be totally okay if I get 1-2 mbps, but anything below is too slow. ALso, how are your upload speeds? By the way, I had an ATT iPhone 4 a few months ago, and coverage in Irvine is very spotty. When I had good reception, which was VERY uncommon, I did get good speeds.
 
I live in Tustin Hills, work in Irvine. I usually get like 300-800 kbps on Sprint with the 4S, though twice (both times in Irvine) I got 1.5 and 2.2 mbps. Both times was at the Marketplace off Jamboree, on the Irvine side. But that isn't normal. Sprint definitely has more areas of Orange County covered compared to ATT (less blackouts in like Orange and the canyons) but it's also a lot slower.

With that being said, I still have no problem growing on Safari or streaming Pandora and Netflix. Downloading apps and loading images takes forever though.
 
Here's some of my history

Oops, sorry for double post
 

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icomputered said:
Thanks for your reply! Have you ever gotten below, like, 800 kbps? I would be totally okay if I get 1-2 mbps, but anything below is too slow. ALso, how are your upload speeds? By the way, I had an ATT iPhone 4 a few months ago, and coverage in Irvine is very spotty. When I had good reception, which was VERY uncommon, I did get good speeds.
Click to expand...

I need to upload a screenshot of my speed tests but to answer your question - yes, have definitely gotten below 800. The last few tests were at .11 mbps :( Upload has varied from .11 mbps to 1.13 mbps, I'd say average is around .5. For me, I don't notice much of a difference in using my phone for most things (playing around with apps, using Safari, streaming music, pulling up GPS or maps - they're all at a reasonable speed) unless its downloading apps or maybe watching HD video. I tried doing that at a restaurant in Irvine - took maybe 2-3 minutes to download one app and video kept stuttering.

I'd agree with the other poster that data coverage is spotty here. Some areas are pretty fast, other areas are super slow. For me, it's not a huge problem since I don't anything really data-intensive during the day or that I couldn't get over Wi-Fi, so I can live with Sprint's speeds. I just text, use some apps, listen to music and make phone calls. I'm simple :) But if you do more than that...Sprint might not satisfy your needs.
 
My friend has the 4S on sprint and his speeds are very comparable to my 4S on Verizon.

Just tested it this morning and he got 1.7 down.
 
KoukiFC3S said:
My friend has the 4S on sprint and his speeds are very comparable to my 4S on Verizon.

Just tested it this morning and he got 1.7 down.
Click to expand...

In irvine??? Wow! Do you happen to know in which area of Irvine the test was performed? Thanks in advance!
 
icomputered said:
Sorry for the confusion, I meant Irvine, CA.
Click to expand...

Don't apologize, the east-coaster, cyks, just couldn't understand.
I understood that you were talking about Irvine, CA just fine.

Also, anyone in Orange County, CA know if Sprint stores are sold out of the iPhone 4S?
 
teamjaycub said:
Don't apologize, the east-coaster, cyks, just couldn't understand.
I understood that you were talking about Irvine, CA just fine.

Also, anyone in Orange County, CA know if Sprint stores are sold out of the iPhone 4S?
Click to expand...

Last time I checked (last week), the majority of Sprint stores in orange have sold out of iPhone 4S devices, or have only 64 GB in stock. I asked one of the representatives when they would get more, and he said there was a waiting list of about 40 people in most stores. So, I decided to order one directly from Apple. Also, every day at 9 PM, you can go on Apple's website and reserve an iPhone 4S at your local apple store.
 
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