Category: Local

A couple months ago, folks with iPhones in the area were starting to see 3G coverage, and now you can officially get an iPhone in Bend, starting April 1 (hopefully not some sort of April fools joke).

I still have nearly another year on my contract with Sprint and with my phone, but my plan is quite a bit cheaper than the plans offered by AT&T. I’m probably going to go Android on renewal rather than an iPhone, but we’ll have to see.

Update on 3/2/10: Apparently US Cellular is now offering 3G in the area, which might convince me to go back to them as their phone coverage is probably the best around here in the areas I work, but their data speeds sucked. Their coverage out here in Sunriver was far better than what I get from Sprint. When I force my phone to roam on the USCC network, it actually performs better. I noticed a “EV” icon showing up on my wife’s phone last week (she on US Cellular), and was wondering if they had turned on an EVDO service here, just didn’t have a chance to contact them. So I guess that answers that question.

So it appears that the mystery company behind the datacenter that’s going to be built in Prineville is going to be none other than Facebook, according to KTVZ, KBND, the Bulletin, a couple people I know, as well as a few comments on my site from yesterday. Of course, none of this is completely official yet, as the official announcement is scheduled to come later today. Considering the press this is getting this morning, I doubt that the company behind all this is anybody other than Facebook — though it would be quite hilarious if everybody was wrong.

Update: More on this: Apparently a construction worker on-site slipped to the Bulletin about this, even though they weren’t supposed to say anything. I’ve talked to somebody who is close to the whole thing (and under NDA and annoyed that the story got out — honestly, I’m amazed it took this long), and they have confirmed that it is Facebook. Official announcement from the company should be coming later this morning.

Update later: It’s official. Here’s Facebook’s blog post, story from the Oregonian, and the KTVZ story has been updated (all with pretty artist’s renderings). For those hardcore datacenter geeks, Data Center Knowledge has a good article up about where Facebook’s move from leasing space to building their own center (I was amazed they were co-locating their servers all these years). Techcrunch has the story as well.

Congrats to all for making this happen!