[PLUG-TALK] Verizon turns on LTE in Portland

[John Jason Jordan]

It's been on at the airport and nearby areas for some time, but now the
whole city has Verizon 4G LTE service. Supposedly it extends from
Ridgefield WA to Canby and Molalla, and from Hillsboro to Gresham.

I stopped at the downtown Verizon store on Monday to look at Android
phones. They had the Charge and the Thunderbolt on display. On both
phones Speedtest gave me 12-14 Mbps down and 4-7 Mbps up. And those
phones were both *fast*. It's going to be a long time before any other
carriers are going to get close to that kind of data speed.

Out on the sidewalk they had an easel board offering unlimited 4G data
for $29.99. But you have to sign up by July 6 to be grandfathered;
afterwards the data plans will all be tiered, and more expensive.

Now, if they just had the Samsung Galaxy S2. :(

After the Verizon store I went a block down the street to check out the
T-Mobile Sensation. Although displaying 4G in the panel, it gave me
3.02 to 3.17 down and 0.75 to 1.0 up. Standing in front of the display
I pulled my T-Mobile MyTouch 3G out of my pocket and tested it.
Speedtest gave me 2.98 to 3.02 down and 0.74 to 0.98 up. So much for
T-Mobile's "4G" that really isn't.