T-Mobile Samsung Galaxy S3 skips out on LTE party

It is official – if you are going to rock to the Samsung Galaxy S3 on T-Mobile’s network, then be prepared to miss out on LTE goodness, as this particular smartphone will not play nice with T-Mobile’s upcoming LTE network. A T-Mobile spokesperson did confirm that the same LTE radio inside T-Mobile’s version will be the same as any other Galaxy S3 model arriving in the US, although it will be incompatible with T-Mobile’s future LTE network.

The Samsung Galaxy SIII won’t run on T-Mobile’s LTE network in the future, but we will continue to operate our HSPA+ 42 network when we launch LTE in 2013.

The culprit behind this bit of news? Well, the fault apparently lies in T-Mobile’s AWS spectrum, as AT&T and Verizon rely on bands in the 700MHz spectrum for their LTE – which is not something that T-Mobile will do. Of course, do take note that LTE does have the promise of superior speeds, but T-Mobile’s HSPA+ 42 is no slouch either, where independent tester RootMetrics claimed is faster compared to Sprint’s 4G WiMax. Is this a make or break decision for you if you have been rooting for a Samsung Galaxy S3 all this while on T-Mobile?

Edwin Kee
Categories: Cellphones
Tags: Galaxy S3, Samsung, T-Mobile