AT&T is joining T-Mobile in shutting down their 2G network over the course of 2016. The announcement came from AT&T CFO John Stevens in an article in Wireless Weekly. According to the report, AT&T has already started the process of re-purposing their 2G spectrum for faster LTE service in areas where 2G usage has dropped off. The plan is to have this complete by the end of the year.
Good news this morning for owners of the Samsung Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge on the AT&T network. There is a new update to Android Marshmallow available for each device that among other things brings you the April Security Update for Android. The update has been released by the carrier and it will take a few days for the update to come to everyone on the network but when it does, you’ll have the latest update from Google along with a few other tweaks from AT&T themselves.
If you have been wanting to get your hands on the latest flagship phone from LG, the LG G5, you can go to any of the major US carriers and pick one up starting today. AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile and Verizon all have the device available for order on their sites and most of them should have the device available for pick-up at their larger stores. If you are planning on trying to get on in person today, be sure to call ahead to make sure your local retail outlet has the device in stock.
If you have the AT&T locked version of the Blackberry Priv, you should start seeing the March security update coming to your device starting today. The update comes 2 weeks-and-a-day after it was released by Google themselves so all-in-all, that is not a bad time frame for a carrier locked device. Further, the update makes AT&T the first carrier here in the US to get the update to the Priv on their network with T-Mobile, Verizon and Sprint all having the device but none of them have pushed out this update. For a point of reference, the update came out the same week as Google released it on the unlocked version of the Priv.
AT&T today has joined the “Let’s upgrade your Galaxy S7” party along with T-Mobile and Verizon, pushing out an update for both the S7 and the S7 Edge. Unlike the other two carriers however, this update from AT&T does not contain the March Security update for Android. This update is focused on general performance and security on the devices but it does not contain the March update. The carrier didn’t give any indication as to when the March update would be seen on their network but given that their main competitors have already rolled it out, the pressure is on.
AT&T announced yesterday on their support site that an important security update for Galaxy Note 5 users on their network will start receiving. The notice simply states that the update has security and performance enhancements in it but does not go into details on what exactly those enhancements are in detail. That’s not that uncommon but what is good to know is that the update brings along with it the February Android Security update for Lollipop 5.1.1 with it.
Following the move by T-Mobile, AT&T has also started shipping the new Samsung Galaxy S7 and Galaxy S7 Edge to customers who pre-ordered the flagship devices. AT&T customers who placed their order for one of the devices are reporting that they have received shipping notices and devices this week. T-Mobile was the first to do this with the new S7’s, with shipping notices going out on Monday of this week and some customers receiving the devices already.
As expected and announced, the new Samsung Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge are now available for pre-sale from AT&T, T-Mobile, Sprint and Verizon. All four of the carriers started taking orders today with an anticipated delivery date no later than March 11th. All of the carriers have the 32GB version of these devices as Samsung has made no plans to sell the 64GB versions here in the US. While the prices for the devices varies a little, all of them have financing plans available to get you the new phone without having to necessarily come up with $600+ dollars today.