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Nationwide Study Shows AT&T Has Fastest iPhone Data Speeds, Sprint Most Dropped Calls

I opted to stay with Verizon so I can keep my unlimited data plan (grandfathered in). I'm not too worried about being stuck with 3G speed as I'm almost always near wifi. Hopefully the next iteration of the iPhone will support Verizon's 4G.

Upgrading from DROID X to iPhone 4S in a few weeks
 
NoExpectations said:
AT&T and Verizon both have 4G LTE....both are exactly the same specs and speed.

AT&T and Verizon use different 3G technologies. AT&T's is far superior than Verizon's or Sprint. AT&T is much faster and can support data/voice multitasking.

The current and latest iPhone 4s is a "3G" phone.
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This is not 100% accurate. If one wants to be really technically, neither LTE nor WiMax is true 4G. Verizon/Sprint claim those to be 4G due to the speed that it brings. Because it comes closed to the speed specs documented by 4G.

So when Apple said in their keynote back in Sept that they are not going to say what is 4G and what is not... they said the players (Verizon/Sprint) are calling '4G' if it can acheive a minimal speed performance... than by their definition, iphone 4G with HSDPA+ an do 4G speed too.

'LTE-Advance' is supposed to be 'true 4G'... Sprint is trying to drop WiMax and start migrating to LTE-Advance -- so they say. They claim 'true 4G' technology like LTE-Advance is supposed to be MUCH faster that LTE/WiMax.

Some people would argue that LTE/WiMAX/HSDPA+ are really 3.5G...

T-Mobile's 4G BTW is really HSDPA+ same as iphone 4S; if 4-Mobile can claim HSDPA+ as 4G, than AT&T can say iphone 4S is a 4G phone. =/ In contrast, to say iphone 4S is NOT a true 4G phone is to also say all T-Mobile's 4G phone are also not 4G phones.

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CubusX said:
AT&T has the only "4G" iPhone. If they are using the HSPA+ or whatever it is called while the other carriers are using 3G, it's a mute point. Try using AT&T's actual 3G network. There is no way in hell the 4S and 4 are nearly equal on AT&T.
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HSDPA+ is supposed to give 14.4MBPS...

At around 6 MBPS, it looks like the iphone 4S is only performing at top HSDPA speeds and not HSDPA+.

If it was really going at HSDPA+ it should hit 11MBPS or higher.

It looks to me both iphone4/4s in this chart were performing more on 3G speeds than actual HSDPA+/4G speeds... which is why they were more or less the same...

So at '3G' speeds and according to this chart, it appears AT&T's 3G network speed are faster than Verizon or Sprint's 3G speed for the iPhone 4S/4...

So it is more apple's to apples errr... 3G versus 3G network... not 4G versus 3G network.
 
room237 said:
I think data speeds differ depending on the area, for all carriers. For midtown Manhattan, it's hard for me to imagine anything slower than AT&T.
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*THANK*YOU*!

Make that the entire freakin' NYC metro area, Hoboken here and I suffered so badly with AT&T, and I live on the third floor, with 8 foot windows!

I don't know who funded this study, not a single dropped call on Sprint, and I used something like 3GB last month with no problem...
 
I love how they say:

Computerworld noted that part of the intention of the nationwide study was to show "how performance problems in one city reported by the news media and bloggers shortly after a phone is launched can be less relevant over the entire network over time."
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But we are suppose to draw conclusions for our own individual present or potential experiences based on this nationwide data?

And, I would love to know what entity funded this study also. I find it hard to believe some no-name company (or whatever) performed this study just for knowledge.
 
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; CPU iPhone OS 5_0_1 like Mac OS X) AppleWebKit/534.46 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.1 Mobile/9A405 Safari/7534.48.3)

I'd like to see the same research include iPhone 3GS & 3G results.
But why stop there? Might as well toss in the 2G and cover the entire family.
 
I belonged to Verizon for years before I switched to AT&T and I personally had alot of problems with them to switch. Lousy support in their stores, drop calls and no service in areas. It wasn't the iphone that I changed carriers. All this comparison stuff is just moot. Some people have issues and some don't.
 
AT&T has only few more dropped calls than Verizon?

Rule of thumb: don't believe in statistics you haven't forged yourself.
 
People, it's only FIVE cities that were used to gather this data. Thus, it can't possible represent a meaningful national average or (worse yet) tell you anything about the performance you might expect from any of these carriers.
 
The only stats that matter are the ones in your town and where you travel. For me Verizon is rock solid. AT&T is awful and you can always tell when you get a call from an AT&T user. Sprint has seemingly random dead zones.

AT&T still charges $20 for texting, though. Ugh. At least it includes unlimited mobile to mobile calling.
 
Macboy Pro said:
AT&T - You can tether your phone and talk at the same time, while getting 3 times the speed of Verizon.

Verizon - You can't tether your phone, you can't talk at the same time, and you get 1/3 the speed of Verizon

Sprint - Unlimited data at 1/10 the speed

All carriers, you get dropped calls. It depends on where you are and your carriers good/bad spots.


Now... we know why AT&T customers remain loyal and why Mr. Jobs chose AT&T and stuck with AT&T for 3 years exclusively.
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Lol hilarious. Actually with Verizon, you CAN tether....I have an iPhone right now with Verizon. In fact, they had iPhone tethering before AT&T had it with the iPhone 4. And yes, AT&T has HSDPA which is faster than EVDO Rev A. However, Verizon has a large actually 4G LTE network.....The iPhone just isn't capable of it.....but plenty of other Verizon phones are. You mention that all carriers get dropped calls. That's true, but there's certain carriers that are clearly better in that category, and Verizon has been known to be king according to several different surveys and tests, for quite some time now.

And last, AT&T customers are more "loyal" to the iPhone because AT&T has had a 4 year exclusive to it, and more people are in contracts already with the iPhone, and after 4 years, many just decided to stay.

If you want to look at facts.....Verizon overall, has had the lowest churn in the U.S. wireless history for at least the past 5 years.
 
I switched to Sprint right after they released the iphone on their network. I had an Iphone4 with ATT. I have not had one drop call on my Sprint Iphone and the data speed seems ok. I had a couple of dropped calls a week when I had ATT. My two phone bills with my Sprint unlimited service has been about $80 a month. That compares to about $130 for my unlimited ATT. Fingers crossed that my Sprint Iphone 4S will continue to be a pleasant surprise. Just thought I would add my comments to the thread.
 
KnightWRX said:
The iPhone 4S can't use Verizon's 4G service. But it can use AT&T's. So really this article is pure bunk. Of course AT&T is going to have the faster data rates.

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Your grasp of what we are talking about here is astounding. What does reachability have to do with bandwidth ?
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"The number one question I've gotten is: When will the iPhone work on Verizon?" Apple COO Tim Cook said.

Perhaps the new question he'll get will involve an iPhone 4G. Cook got one of those immediately after the announcement, during a question-and-answer session with reporters.

"Verizon customers told us they want the iPhone now," Cook said, explaining why the carrier will begin selling a 3G version first. The first batch of chips designed for Verizon's 4G network would require Apple to rework the phone's casing and "force design changes we wouldn't make," he said.

http://articles.cnn.com/2011-01-11/...-customers-verizon-wireless-iphone?_s=PM:TECH
 
notabadname said:
Remember the 90's? They weren't.

Without the success of the iPhone, iPod and iPad, there likely would be no "Macs".
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I'm surprised so many people rated this comment down. In all honesty, people have to admit, the iPhone and iPod have made it possible for the Mac to come back to life and get more interest as a legitimate player in the home computer space than it ever would have been otherwise. The "halo effect" is real, and we're all better off for it, but without the wild success of the iDevices, even Steve Jobs might not have been able to turn Apple into a juggernaut that was capable of driving down the Mac's price point to these consumer-friendly levels. Multi-billion dollar contracts have a way of making people very friendly toward your business.
 
notabadname said:
Remember the 90's? They weren't.

Without the success of the iPhone, iPod and iPad, there likely would be no "Macs".
Click to expand...

I think the reverse is true. Jobs first speech back at Apple at MacWorld he said Apple had 2 core businesses. Education and creative professionals. And they threw more Macs into this. The new (at the time) iMac mostly. and later eMacs. And it worked. If the Mac died in 1997-2000 there'd be no iPod or iPad or iPhone.

I believe the success of the iMac led to the iPod and the success of the iPod led to the iPad/iPhone.
 
I have had three iPhones on AT&T. The last two (iPhone 3G and iPhone 4), have had abysmal service (and the first wasn't that great). I travel a lot for work, so I spend quite a bit of time in various cities, mostly major metro areas. With both phones, I have rarely ever seen over 3 bars, call quality is pretty bad, and my phone fluctuates between 3G and Edge quite a bit. Even when it's on 3G, it can sometimes take 30 seconds just to load an email. Downloading an app can take 10 minutes or more. I often have to stand right next to a window or go outside even in a normal building.

I took the 4 back to an Apple store and an AT&T store, but at both, my service miraculously jumped to 5 bars and good data speeds. They did diagnostics and found nothing wrong, so I couldn't swap it for a new one.

Yeah, I don't believe this study at all.
 
at&t is A+. Forums in here are for complainers. We have 2-4's, a 4S, and a 3GS. We have been on at&t since 2007. We have never experience 1/4 of the issues u see in here.

It is about location, location, location. I have a friend with a Sprint 4S that drops calls all day. Why, this is not a strong area for Sprint.

People not knowing what they are doing when they select a carries is responsible for 75% of the carrier complaints in here.

And yes, HSPA+ Rules on my 4S, because it's robust in MY AREA. :apple:
 
samiwas said:
I took the 4 back to an Apple store and an AT&T store, but at both, my service miraculously jumped to 5 bars and good data speeds. They did diagnostics and found nothing wrong, so I couldn't swap it for a new one.

Yeah, I don't believe this study at all.
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That's easy. Both Apple and AT&T saturate their stores with great signal. No one will ever have a bad signal at one of these locales.
 
Never had a problem with dropped calls on Sprint nor did I have a problem with download speeds.

Forgive me if I question the validity of this supposed "study".
 
the8thark said:
I think the reverse is true. Jobs first speech back at Apple at MacWorld he said Apple had 2 core businesses. Education and creative professionals. And they threw more Macs into this. The new (at the time) iMac mostly. and later eMacs. And it worked. If the Mac died in 1997-2000 there'd be no iPod or iPad or iPhone.

I believe the success of the iMac led to the iPod and the success of the iPod led to the iPad/iPhone.
Click to expand...

These are both true, of course, but the iPod was the more important development for Apple.

Without the iMac (and many other changes Steve made when he came back to Apple - cutting product lines, streamlining inventory, rationalizing the supply chain), Apple would have ended up in bankruptcy. So no iMac=no Apple = no iPod.

However, the pre-iPod Apple was a very small player - profitable, yes, but with only about 3% of the US market and 2% of the global market. Within only 2-3 years of its introduction, the iPod was making as much for Apple as the Mac and - perhaps even more importantly - was making Apple a much more visible, interesting, and hip brand. This, in turn, allowed Apple to take bigger risks with the Mac (such as switching to Intel), which made the Mac better and made adoption by new users much more feasible.
 
Sandman97 said:
Which one vibrates the hardest you guys? I need to know by tonight.
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:D

According to this study, AT&T will vibrate the FASTEST, but chances are you dont' have a signal so it won't vibrate at all...

Verizon on the other hand offers very good vibration, and its' reliable...

As for Sprint, it offers you UNLIMITED vibrations at a wonderful value, but you should be ok with it vibrating 10% below the speed of Verizon ;)
 
Has to be a phone issue because I have been with sprint for 8 years and I may get 1 dropped call every 3 to 4 months.
 
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