Get ready for some superfast LTE speeds — T-Mobile and Ericsson promise gigabit LTE

By Lulu Chang February 27, 2017

t mobile revvl news — Image used with permission by copyright holder

5G isn’t (quite) here yet, but that doesn’t mean that we have to settle for much less. At Mobile World Congress in Barcelona Monday morning, February 27, T-Mobile and Ericsson announced that the two companies would be working together to bring gigabit-capable 4G LTE to the U.S. in 2017.

Sprint made a similar announcement, with the debut of its “Massive MIMO” base station, featuring 128 antennas that can send radio beams to specific customers’ phones. So could this be the beginning of 5G?

Recommended Videos

While it’s technically not the same technology, it’ll certainly be getting speeds up to comparable levels. In the case of T-Mobile, the Un-carrier has been setting up a national 4G network using Ericsson’s Antenna-Integrated Radio (AIR), 4×4 Multiple-Input Multiple-Output (MIMO), and 256 and 64 Quadrature Amplitude Modulation (QAM). T-Mobile also boasts 700MHz tuning and optimization thanks to Ericsson.

This technology, combined with carrier aggregation, will allow T-Mobile to give customers gigabit speeds. And when paired with T-Mobile’s recently announced LTE-U capabilities, customers could be in for speeds of up to 1Gbps.

“T-Mobile’s LTE network is the most advanced in the U.S., and we’ll continue to deploy the latest, global-leading technologies that will create the foundation of a powerful 5G network built for mobility,” said T-Mobile CTO Neville Ray. “We work closely with strategic partners like Ericsson to deliver the most advanced technologies that enhance our customers’ experience.”

Of course, while both T-Mobile and Sprint are excited about how well this new technology could set the stage for 5G, they’re pretty clear that this is not the real thing. As Sprint CTO John Saw noted, “We’re not the marketing department … I think that the gigabit LTE path that we’re on is our path to 5G, [but] I think 5G is more than just gigabit LTE.”

Regardless, it seems that in 2017, you can look forward to much faster connections on your smartphone.

Topics

Former Digital Trends Contributor

Fascinated by the effects of technology on human interaction, Lulu believes that if her parents can use your new app…

Mobile

Have T-Mobile? Your 5G service is about to get much faster

U.S. map illustrating T-Mobile's 5G Ultra Capacity network expansion.

T-Mobile’s 5G network already offers unmatched 5G speeds and coverage throughout the U.S., with 98% of the population covered by some flavor of T-Mobile’s 5G and more than 90% benefiting from its higher-speed 5G Ultra Capacity (5G UC) network.

That translates to the “Uncarrier” taking first place in 5G performance in 46 U.S. states. However, T-Mobile isn’t content to sit at 90% coverage. It’s been working steadily to increase the footprint of its 5G UC network to reach even further, and is bringing those top speeds to areas previously served only by its lower-frequency 5G Extended Range network.
A ‘Massive 5G Boost’

Mobile

Were you affected by the AT&T outage? You may get some free money

Last Thursday was a bad day for AT&T. Early in the morning on February 22, AT&T's network went down for thousands of people across the U.S.. The network was offline for hours and outage reports on Down Detector peaked at nearly 75,000. It was eventually fixed, but the damage was still done. Thankfully, if you were among the many people impacted by the outage, we have some good news for you.

On February 24, AT&T published a page on its website called "Making it right." In short, if your AT&T service was down and you were affected by it, you're getting a discount on your next bill. The AT&T page reads as follows:

Mobile

Everything you need to know about the massive AT&T outage

Large 5G cellular tower with multiple mmWave transceivers against a blue sky.

Happy Thursday! February is drawing to a close, the weather is getting slightly warmer in parts of the country, and AT&T experienced a massive outage that affected its cellular and internet services. It was a bit of a mess.

How many people were without service? When was service restored? Here's a quick recap of what you need to know.
When did the AT&T outage start?
At around 4 a.m. ET on Thursday, February 22, more than 32,000 outages were reported across AT&T's network. Once 7 a.m. rolled around, that number jumped to over 50,000 people. Per the Down Detector website, there were nearly 75,000 outage reports just before 9:15 a.m. ET.
Is the AT&T outage over?
Thankfully, the AT&T outage has finally ended. At 11:15 a.m. ET, the company had restored "three-quarters" of its network. Then, at 3:10 p.m. ET, AT&T confirmed that it had "restored wireless service to all our affected customers."