Reality Check: Sprint #1 Network in Two Years?

Sprint CEO Marcelo Claure predicted Sprint will have the top network in the next 18 to 24 months. Claure said that when he started, Sprint's network was "drop-dead last." We decided to see where Sprint has come from and how far it has to go to beat AT&T and Verizon in network performance. These data compare results from tests performed twice a year for smartphones and netbook data cards. The first three rounds of testing were done for 1,200 locations, the second three rounds expanded to 1,990 locations.

Device: Samsung Galaxy 4 (LTE)

1. Overall TCP Failure Rate

Looking at how often a TCP connection fails (TCP is the measurement used most often when comparing speed), data from tests of all four providers showed a slight increase in TCP failure, with T-Mobile and Sprint on the higher end.

2. Locations Where TCP Met "Served" Threshold

For purposes of comparison, we looked at the percentage of tested locations where average TCP downstream met or exceeded 6 megabits per second and average upstream met or exceeded 1.5 megabits per second. This threshold is what we use at the CPUC for determining "served" status. Note that these averages are not adjusted using standard deviation. "Average" in this case averages smartphone & netbook as well as west and east coast servers.

3. Over The Top VoIP Readiness

Using a Mean Opinion Score formula we reported on earlier in this blog, we calculated the number of measurements (1 measurement = 1 location/device/provider combination) where the calculated Mean Opinion Score met or exceeded 4.0.

Round 7 Testing 70% Complete

New tester record: 30 sites in a day

Here is where Tester #2 finished his day yesterday with 30 test locations under his belt:

Here are the smartphone results from that location:

• AT&T Mobility: 2.297 Mb/s up, 16.592 Mb/s down
• Sprint: No service
• T-Mobile: 4.368 Mb/s up, 4.354 Mb/s down
• Verizon Wireless: 1.544 Mb/s up, 7.596 Mb/s down

Five Dollar A Gallon Gas? No Other Choice...

Sand Storm in Death Valley

How To Estimate VoIP Quality? Mean Opinion Score (MOS)

Some of you have asked us how we calculate a mean opinion score to estimate voice quality for over-the-top voice over internet protocol (VoIP) service. Well, here is the formula we use.

MOS

=IF(AND(ISNUMBER(R-value)),IF(AND(R-value>0,R-value<101),(1+0.035*R-value+0.000007*R-value*(R-value-60)*(100-R-value)),0),0)

R-value

=IF(Effective latency<160,(93.2-(Effective latency/40)-2.5*Avg. UDP packet loss),(93.2-(Effective latency-120)/10-2.5*Avg. UDP packet loss))

Effective latency

=Avg. latency + Avg. jitter*2+10

Easter Island Visitation?

Mysterious discoveries on the road....

Mobile Testing now in the Second Half

One this is for sure: switching from netbooks with data cards over to tablets has decreased testing time. As of yesterday, our team had completed over half of the test locations. Keep up the good work!

Thanksgiving in May

Spring 2015 Testing More Than One Fifth Complete

Cinco de Mayo: 6% of Locations Tested As of Yesterday

Field testers have started with a strong showing in the Chico area as well as Los Angeles area. There are even a few completed locations along the Digital 395 corridor. Keep up the good work!

Spring 2015 Field Testing Has Begun!

As noted in an earlier post, we decommissioned the data cards and replaced them with Android tablets. It may be no surprise to anyone that we are seeing what appears to be performance differences between the tablets and the phones. The tablets, of course, are brand new and feature both faster processors and a higher category of LTE.

Tablets: Samsung Galaxy Tab 4 8.0 16 GB LTE

• LTE Cat 4 (150/50 Mbit/s), HSDPA+ (4G) 42.2 Mbit/s, HSUPA 5.76 Mbit/s, UMTS, EDGE, GPRS
• Qualcomm Snapdragon 410 8916 (Quad core, 1200 MHz, ARM Cortex-A53, 64-bit)

Phones: Samsung Galaxy S4

• LTE Cat 3 (100/50 Mbit/s), HSDPA+ (4G) 42.2 Mbit/s, HSUPA 5.76 Mbit/s, UMTS, EDGE, GPRS
• Qualcomm Snapdragon 600 APQ8064T (Quad core, 1900 MHz, Krait 300)