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|| SportsShooter.com: Member Message Board
Sprint Wireless Data.
Robert Hanashiro, Photographer
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Los Angeles | CA | | Posted: 2:53 AM on 10.21.08 |
->> Having used Verizon's wireless data service for a few years, one thing that is very frustrating is its performance at events.
At the places you really need to use this service, like playoff baseball and basketball games, the throughput is so bad that it is not worth using. At Dodger Stadium for the NLCS, for instance, once the game started throughput dropped to .3 - .8k. Before the game and after, files were flying via Photo Mechanic FTP.
Other photographers using Sprints' data service at these same events have been able to transmit, while not at blazing speeds, it at least was workable, which Verizon was not.
Anyone out there with practical experience with the Sprint data service at big events have any insight whether it would be worth dropping my Verizon data for Sprint.
Throughput info and examples of where Sprint worked over Verizon would be helpful.
It is unfortunate that so many people view a trip to see a ballgame an opportunity to just keep the cellphone clamped to their ears rather than enjoy the event itself. |
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Darrell Miho, Photographer
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Los Angeles : SFO : HNL | CA | usa | Posted: 5:28 AM on 10.21.08 |
->> make sure you have the latest verizon aircard and firmware.
i have a sprint aircard. it's supposed to be EVDO speed, but a year ago, it didn't seem to be all that fast. at macworld this year, i spoke to a sprint rep and she upgraded my firmware and it seems to be a lot better...almost as fast as my DSL, but i am not at an event.
sprint is now using revA, which is faster than EVDO. i don't have actual numbers for you, so sorry i can't be of more help. |
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George Bridges, Photographer, Photo Editor
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Washington | DC | USA | Posted: 9:51 AM on 10.21.08 |
->> Bert,
I've run into some of the same problems with Sprint. The card will work fine right until around kickoff or tipoff and then it bogs down or doesn't work at all.
I don't know if it's the system getting overloaded or interference from TV radio signal frying my connection or what it could be.
At the Verizon Center here in DC (where, amazingly, Verizon FIOS is not offered) for a long time I was able to use the Sprint card from the basketball court or rink side with no problems. But the last few games I tried the bandwidth dropped to practically nothing, but as soon as the game was over I walked back to the same spot and tried it again and it was flying, which leads me to believe it could be some interference from TV's wireless cameras and mikes flying around.
And at the same time I've tried to use my iPhone to surf the net to make sure photos are posting properly and it's been bogged down as well on a different network. I asked the arena IT folks if they were doing anything different and they said nope.
At the Super Bowl last year I was testing the Sprint Card on the Cradlepoint system and before the game it worked fine but right after kickoff it pretty much died and was taking umpteen minutes per photo.
I think a lot of the problem is as more and more people get phones that use EVDO or RevA or 3G or whatever the networks call their high-speed system the more and more the system gets bogged down at big events. You get so many people suddenly wanting to send a cell-phone photo of the big game and that starts eating into your connection speed and even if their traffic dies down your speeds don't go back up. |
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Francis Specker, Photographer
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Riverside | CA | USA | Posted: 10:11 AM on 10.21.08 |
->> I have Sprint and I use it in Southern California at a lot of events and stadiums.
It's great at the Staples Center/Nokia Theater for the Grammys and Emmys. It worked well at the Shrine Auditorium.
And at the Home Depot Center, it is also been great.
But at Dodger Stadium, Angels Stadium and at the Kodak Theatre during the Oscars, I had major problems and resorted to traditional hard-wired internet.
During last years' Independent Spirit Awards on the Santa Monica beach, and at events at Universal Studios for their big entertainment events, I can't seem to get a decent signal.
I'm using the Sprint card for a lot of remote editing similar to what Reuters does and you have to plan and make sure if your Sprint card will work during an event, not before or after.
When it does work, my upload speeds can exceed 700k, which is faster than my home's cable modem.
I don't really know the reasons for the wide variation of performance in different locales, but it may be linked to the number of people using their cell phones and the infrastructure of Sprint's CDMA network. |
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