1X - Express Network coming up Real Soon Now in Colorado
Today, my 7135 display changed from "D" to "1X", and I got all excited, thinking that maybe EN was available finally in Colorado.
So, I made a call to the local Verizon store in Boulder, and the knowledgable sales person there told me that his 1X had come up yesterday (I live outside the city), and he called and found out that Verizon was "testing" Express Network in Colorado. He said they were still promising EN availability "sometime in May", but he had been skeptical (thinking it would be mid-June) before seeing his "1X" come up on his LG4400.
Btw, I can't get EN on my phone(s), in spite of the fact that I work in Silicon Valley, and have a house in New Mexico (both with EN availability), because my mobile phone numbers are all Colorado ones, and EN isn't available here, yet. Real Soon Now--I guess we'll see. I'm keeping my fingers crossed.
SERIOUSLY considering it, Robert. My peak data usage is 1/3 of my voice minutes so it might be time to change my plan. One problem -- if I change my plan, nights start at 9 PM and right now it starts at 8 PM. I'll need to think it through.
Originally posted by Beryl SERIOUSLY considering it, Robert. My peak data usage is 1/3 of my voice minutes so it might be time to change my plan. One problem -- if I change my plan, nights start at 9 PM and right now it starts at 8 PM. I'll need to think it through.
The 1X on the screen is very cool.
Yep... I like the 1X too... the whole "D" thing has been done to death over the past few years :p
It's too bad you'd have to give up that hour of N&W though.
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Decided to surf while in a sorority meeting in Denver today (Saturday). I closed my 7135 for a moment and returned expecting to reestablish a connection. Nope -- already connected and able to bring up uncached web pages. Hmmmm. External ID shows the time and not the minutes clicking away as in my normal QNC connection. Later tried making a call -- successful -- and return to internet. Web pages wouldn't come up. "Disconnected" from PrefsPDA-Network and reconnected -- no problem. No minutes ticking away on the external LED. Closed the 7135 and opened it without having to reestablish a connection.
Other funny things happened. The same text message -- alert -- came in every 10 minutes but no other text messages. The call I made while still connected didn't register in Call History. In fact NONE of my data connection time was recorded in my call history and I was connected for over 2 hours.
Left Denver (returned home). Reset, power on/off and all is well again. Pent up messages came in. Established an internet connection and it returned to "Standard" QNC speeds, LED shows minutes ticking away and when I closed the 7135, the connection terminated. Rats! I changed the network session from QNC in hopes to reestablish a EN connection. Nope. The party was only being held in Denver.
I think I had an EN experience and I like it! I am wonder if people can make free voice calls when in EN or if that was a fluke because EN is not officially turned on in our area. Everyone is right that the speed is not appreciatively different on the 7135 though. It would be GREAT if I got DSL speed as a modem so I'm thinking seriously about signing up once EN is official. When/if I do sign up, I will be careful to read the FAQs and resist the newbie questions without searching the threads.
Thanks for the info Beryl. It seems your experience differs slightly from mine...
I was never able to wake up an idle connection like you were able to do. Also, my external LCD always said "data call" when I was in "high data rate" mode. When I was in standard data mode, the LCD showed the connection time. I also tried using the 7135 as a modem for my laptop, and I was getting about 1-1.5 KBps, just like the 14.4 connection.
I even set the "Maximum speed" transfer betw PC and modem to 57600. But the modem I installed via "add new hardware" was a 14400 bps. Anyone else know whether this affects the speed?
Even so, there was one time I was browsing using EIS for about 20-30 minutes, and the battery drain was negligible (down to 93% from 100%)... that tells me that it was probably real packet data and not circuit-switched.
Beryl, was the LED green still green when you had the EN experience?
Circuit-switched data is the technology behind the standard 14.4 connection, while packet data drives EN. The two are completely different animals. I think circuit is controlled mainly by the switch hardware, while packet is by software.
Sounds like they're testing... I was down at Park Meadows yesterday (Sunday, May 4) and actually played with an actual 7135 for the first time (yea!). Anyways, the sales guy said that we're looking at June for EN.
Got this today from my VZW account rep: The system is in the process of being upgraded cellsite by cellsite thru the
end of June. Then the new high speed 1X network will be available for
everyone to get onto July 1st. What you will experience is that it will
work one minute and not the next because they are still uploading all the
software into the system. It just isn't ready right now and really won't be
ready for full time access until it's launch.
Beryl, that doesn't explain why you were able to use it when it wasn't enabled on your account, but it is good to know. I got a similar story one of the times I called Verizon Customer service and asked them when I could sign up.
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