Starting today, Verizon users who live in the Lehigh Valley area and have an EVDO phone will finally be able to use the EVDO functionality. To take advantage of the EVDO functionality, you’ll need to first update your phone’s PRL by dialing *228 and selecting option 2. After the phone downloads the update, you should see the EVDO symbol in your status bar, provided you’re in range of an EVDO signal. Unfortunately, I have no clue how much of the Lehigh Valley area has been covered with an EVDO signal. We’ll have to wait until Verizon updates their coverage maps to see how much of the area has been covered. I suspect there is now EVDO all the way from the Lehigh Valley until Philadelphia, but like I said, we’ll have to wait to see if that’s the case.
I’m aware that this probably only effects a minority of my readers, so if this has no effect on you, ignore me. I’m just a geek excited over new technology, and this certainly is new technology for my area. I know some of you have probably enjoyed EVDO for the last year or so, and the effect has probably worn out already. However, this is all new to me, so for the next week I’ll be enjoying my blazing fast free WAP.
2 Comments
I live near Dieruff, and some of the guys here at work have evdo phones. They said their batteries recently started draining quickly. Their theory is that the phone is detecting one of the new evdo network enabled towers in the lehigh valley area, and the phones are frequently switching between evdo and x1. They also told me there is a secret menu (accessed by pressing the 0 key a bunch of times or something like that) to turn off connecting to the evdo network. And that this has resolved the battery drain problem. Just thought I’d let you know. I have verizon and a samsung i600 ms smarphone for about 2years, which connects to the older x1 network, but no evdo support. I have been concidering getting a new phone, the new motorol Q MS pocketpc phone maybe, but wont waste my time until evdo is firmly in the area.
Dave M
That’s what was occurring on my EVDO phone when I bought it back in late March. It was randomly detecting the upcoming EVDO network, but since it wasn’t functional, it had to switch back to 1X. That drained my battery as you said. However, now that the EVDO network is functional I have great battery life.
As you said, you can turn off EVDO if you have no use for it (Mobile Web, Vcast). It’s different on each phone, but it can be done.
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[...] Earlier today, I was interviewed Lauren Mayk of the Sarasota Herald-Tribune on the topic of Verizon’s EVDO test networks draining batteries; an issue I mentioned previously on this site. My interview resulted in a couple of quotes in an article in the Herald-Tribune. If you’re interested in hearing what I had to say, be sure to check the article out. [...]