We’ve heard reports recently that Sprint has been testing WiMax in bigger cities, and it looks like NYC might be next up for an official launch. While it’s not official just yet, our own commenters have been saying that they’re seeing WiMax in various parts of the New York City boroughs from the Bronx all the way down to the southern parts of Brooklyn. HTC EVO 4G and Overdrive 3G/4G users have been seeing brief surges while others have been seeing a strong, regular 4G signal over the course of days or even weeks.
To find out for myself, I the 4G switch on my own EVO 4G this morning, currently running Android 2.2 or Froyo, and I was both surprised and delighted to see the 4G logo light up! To make sure it wasn’t a fluke, I decided to run a number of speed tests to see that it was legit.
Much to my excitement, I was seeing anywhere between 1.8 to 6.2Mbps download speeds, and 0.6 to 1.1Mbps on the uplink. Not bad, but I’m hoping that the full and official launch brings consistent speeds and a more reliable signal. As of now, other users and I are seeing weak and unreliable signals. Others claim they are seeing strong signals every single day in their areas.
KnowYourCell recently received a statement from Sprint:
We have not launched 4G in NYC yet. As they have been recently, customers may continue to stumble across 4G from time to time in NYC as we work to build, test and optimize the network.
Perhaps these brief stints and extended periods of WiMax availability are just a result of Sprint’s testing, but we’re all hoping that this is an indicator that the 4G/WiMax launch will be approaching much sooner than later. Especially since we’ve already had a taste of what’s to come.