Even as AT&T is planning to acquire T-Mobile, the smaller wireless service continues to expand its own faster 4G network to more markets. The company has announced that starting today it is flipping the switch on its 4G network in a whopping 55 cities and metro areas in the US. T-Mobile claims that its 4G service will let people download data at a very fast 42 Mbps. In practice it"s more than likely that real world speeds will be much slower.
The new cities added to T-Mobile"s 4G network include launch population areas such as Los Angeles, Chicago, Houston, Dallas, Atlanta, Miami, San Francisco, Denver and many more. T-Mobile has announced that over 200 million people in the US now have access to its 4G network and by the middle of 2011 over 150 million more will gain access.
T-Mobile has also announced that it will launch its first USB laptop device that connects to its 4G/42 Mbps network starting tomorrow, May 25. The T-Mobile Rocket 3.0 device comes with three colorful faceplates (cobalt blue, dark violet and matte black) that can be changed. The laptop device can be purchased online or in select T-Mobile stores for $99.99 (after a $50 rebate) with a two year contract or for $199.99 without a contract. If you go with a contract T-Mobile has monthly plans that start at $29.99 for 200 MB all the way to 10 GB for $84.99. None of the contract plans have overage fees but your data speed is throttled down after you reach your monthly limit. T-Mobile also has pre-paid fees for no contract plans that go up to 3GB for one month for $50.