Big Vodafone upgrade, now Wellington / Christchurch

Forums › One New Zealand (including Vodafone, WxC, Farmside) › Big Vodafone upgrade, now Wellington / Christchurch - where next?

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#824057 23-May-2013 12:10

I've heard Auckland coverage is still crap following the U900/U2100 DC upgrade anyway.

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eXDee

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#824060 23-May-2013 12:16

ajobbins: I've heard Auckland coverage is still crap following the U900/U2100 DC upgrade anyway.

That would be surprising, given how dense their sites are. What areas?

johnr

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#824062 23-May-2013 12:17

ajobbins: I've heard Auckland coverage is still crap following the U900/U2100 DC upgrade anyway.

What a load of C**p Auckland is still getting fine tuned and a handful of sites still need to be done

ajobbins

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#824063 23-May-2013 12:21

johnr:
ajobbins: I've heard Auckland coverage is still crap following the U900/U2100 DC upgrade anyway.

What a load of C**p Auckland is still getting fine tuned and a handful of sites still need to be done

Settle petal! Just what I've heard

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johnr

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#824067 23-May-2013 12:24

ajobbins:
johnr:
ajobbins: I've heard Auckland coverage is still crap following the U900/U2100 DC upgrade anyway.

What a load of C**p Auckland is still getting fine tuned and a handful of sites still need to be done

Settle petal! Just what I've heard

Heard from Who?

Can I have locations / address and the devices the end users are using?

ajobbins

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#824070 23-May-2013 12:30

johnr:
ajobbins:
johnr:
ajobbins: I've heard Auckland coverage is still crap following the U900/U2100 DC upgrade anyway.

What a load of C**p Auckland is still getting fine tuned and a handful of sites still need to be done

Settle petal! Just what I've heard

Heard from Who?

Can I have locations / address and the devices the end users are using?

No specific locations, just general feedback from a few people who are on the move in Auckland.

Twitter: ajobbins

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#824071 23-May-2013 12:30

ajobbins: I've heard Auckland coverage is still crap following the U900/U2100 DC upgrade anyway.

Works fine here, I am all around the city constantly and I am happy. On my S3 and S4.

coffeebaron

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#824319 23-May-2013 18:53

Many places I work around Auckland, coverage has certainly improved; eg Waima / Laingholm and any other residential areas I visit.

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KiwiSurfer

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#826752 28-May-2013 00:46

ajobbins: I've heard Auckland coverage is still crap following the U900/U2100 DC upgrade anyway.

So if not Vodafone, who would one switch to then? Telecom has a 850MHz network which in theory would have good in-building coverage unless you happen to be in an area where the cell sites to customer ratio is poor. I know of several areas in Auckland where Telecom would benefit from additional sites and/or capacity. I was with Telecom and actually broke out of my contract with them at the end of last year (paying the $280 or something penalty and selling my subsided smart-phone to recoup the cost) cos I was disappointed with their coverage. Switched to a cheap prepay 2degrees SIM as my fall-back phone is a GSM only Nokia!

One example: relative place near the Mount Smart and Selwyn Roads intersection in Onehunga is pretty damn poor on Telecom 850MHz UMTS. Lucky to get one-bar and various speed tests I ran consistently resulted in <1mbits. Not sure if it was a isolated issue but shows that you can have poor service no matter what network you are with if you happen to be in the wrong place.

Another example: intersection of Dominion and View roads. Their network gets slammed pretty hard during the peak commuter times. I used to live in an apartment building near the intersection and it was interesting watching the signal strength on my phone and doing speed tests -- when it gets bad, it gets really bad.

Another: Avondale, Telecom's site placement reduces the quality of in-building coverage at a building I often work in just two blocks down the road. 2degrees/Vodafone on the top of the Racecourse makes a big difference especially if you're screened from the Telecom site by the apartment buildings next to their site (good for the people in the apartment buildings though I guess as they get a pretty good view of Telecom's antennas!).

I'm currently on the market for a new smart phone and I'm also taking a keen look at the three networks and how they perform in places I go to and Vodafone is looking pretty good to me. They seem to have cell sites nearby everywhere I go and their network upgrades (especially the 3G 900MHz at sites that previously only had 3G at 2100MHz) would definitely place them at least a notch above Telecom and 2degrees in most places I go.

Only issue is I live in Kohimarama over the road from the Telecom/2degrees site (with Vodafone up near the beach, I think BellSouth only put their site there cos it was the easiest place to organise microwave back haul for!) but I'm thinking that as I would be using WiFi at home anyway I'm going to focus on performance at the palaces I most often use my phones when I'm out and about. And 900MHz GSM was always pretty good back when I was with Vodafone several years ago so should not be too much of an issue for 900MHz UMTS I think.

Will still do some testing before I choose the phone/network I want but I would be surprised if Vodafone didn't end up being my preferred option. I'd probably spend more time deciding between the S3 and the iPhone! Probaly won't bother with 4G with the prices as they are and 3G is more than enough for my needs -- but if the prices were better...

- James

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#826769 28-May-2013 07:26

KiwiSurfer just a FYI still a very few number of sites to be completed in Auckland could be like 4 - 5 but I know Takapuna 3G 900Mhz DC is not live yet but will be in the next few weeks and not sure where the other couple are off the top of my head

coffeebaron

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#832533 8-Jun-2013 09:54

4G for Field Days Hamilton:
http://www.geekzone.co.nz/forums.asp?forumid=40&topicid=119613
Permanent site, so this could be the start of the Hamilton rollout?

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ALTRON

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#838962 18-Jun-2013 21:56

I'm up in Auckland CBD and north shore on business at the moment and have found data speeds noticeably faster(really fast 16mbps+) in speedtests and real world use than home in Wellington region

Does Auckland have better dual carrier coverage than welly?
iPhone 5

johnr

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#838966 18-Jun-2013 22:02

ALTRON: I'm up in Auckland CBD and north shore on business at the moment and have found data speeds noticeably faster(really fast 16mbps+) in speedtests and real world use than home in Wellington region

Does Auckland have better dual carrier coverage than welly?

iPhone 5

Auckland has U900 Dual carrier live as well as 4G / LTE, Wellington is getting done now that's what this thread is about also the Vodafone NZ site has INFO about the upgrade

http://www.vodafone.co.nz/network/speed/

Click on ' More ' below ' Better coverage '

owenw

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#846652 28-Jun-2013 11:22

Just noticed Vodafone put live LTE in their Wellington Lambton Quay store.

ALTRON

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#850009 6-Jul-2013 10:06

Getting 20Mbps at Z station pipitea Wellington
Faster than my 19Mbps home connection, NICE!

Any dual carrier for lower hutt CBD? doesn't look like it according to the voda DC map.

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