It used to be pretty simple to be a
Verizon customer. You buy a phone, and you knew that while you might
be paying a more than the average customer, you knew that not only
was your network everywhere, it worked all the time. There was a time
when Verizon customers would make fun of AT&T or Sprint
customers when their phones lost data, or text didn't work. You
really do get what you pay for, especially at a sporting event or
other large gathering of people in a small area. Verizon always
seemed to work better than the competition.
As more people are buying LTE devices
on Big Red, there are more and more people grumbling about Verizon's
phones not working as intended. Dropped data is a big one, or getting
stuck on 1X. It isn't any fun when you expect 4G and get 1X. So
what's going on? Let's take a look at what's going on with Verizon
today.
There aren't any engineering degrees
hanging on my walls, I am a chef by trade. However, explaining what's
going on with Verizon right now isn't rocket science. It is just a
matter of math.
Currently, Verizon is supporting quite
a few different kinds of networks. Most of the USA is covered in 3G,
and that's what most people are thinking of when they buy or use a
phone. 3G works great, it transfers data to your phone relatively
fast, and the phone and tower talk to each other with a minimal
delay. That's to say that the 'ping' or 'lag' is low. What that means
is stuff starts happening almost right away when you press a button
in your phone's browser.
In areas that are far away from towns,
or fringe coverage areas, your phone might pick up 1X. That's an old
network. It is 1G so to speak, compared to 3G and 4G. (2G wasn't
really adapted.) It works fine for calling and texting, but you might
notice that data doesn't work all that great on 1X. Not only does the
data crawl along at a snail's pace, slower than dial-up speeds, it
also has a very high amount of lag. It might take 2 seconds for data
to travel back and forth from the tower, so browsing websites and
apps might act like they are not connected at all when you start
using them.
The technology used above is CDMA. You
don't need to know what that means, except that CDMA phones don't
need SIM cards. But wait, 4G LTE uses a SIM card so what's up with
that? LTE technology is based on GSM, like your friends on AT&T
there is a SIM card involved, and all Verizon 4G phones have a SIM
card tucked under the battery cover.
Here's where the issue comes in. CDMA
doesn't talk to GSM. It just doesn't work. So Verizon had to make
another network to manage the handoff between 4G and 3G. That network
is eHRPD. If you have a Verizon LTE phone that's on 3G, it's hanging
out on the eHRPD network. You can check this yourself by going into
your phone settings--> About phone--> Status and it's listed
under Network.
This go between network is what's
causing most the issues with Verizon's network lately. It is also why
when the LTE network goes down, 3G tends to go down for 4G phones,
despite what Verizon's PR teams might say. It is also why the
transition from 4G to 3G can be painfully long, as the phone tries to
handshake back and forth from 3G to 4G.
Well if eHRPD is the problem, can I
just
disable it? Well there is a way to do it on most phones, but it
doesn't always stick if you reboot the phone, not to mention it
involves digging into test menus that Verizon really doesn't intend
the general public to get into.
So where does that leave us now? Well
Verizon is in a transition phase right now. The idea is to get the
whole country in LTE coverage by the end of 2013, that means phasing
out 3G and also 1X. Once Verizon has us all on LTE phones, then you
will see phones that don't have 3 different radios in them-and
hopefully battery life will be much improved by then. Verizon is
going to have your
voice data over LTE soon, the concept is just now
breaking. This isn't ideal for us now, and believe me, if you buy a
LTE device now or in the next year, you are an early adaptor of this
new technology. Things are going to be so much better when these
legacy networks go away.
