Those of you that pre-ordered a Magic Box and got denyied for one, here's whySo I was emailing Jason Schnellbacher, Director of Strategic Programs. He is an expert in the area of Carrier WiFi, Small Cells, In-Building Solutions, and most importantly, worked on the Magic Box. He seems like a really cool guy.

So one thing I learned was you can get denied when pre-ordering for the Magic Box. I wanted to know what Sprint was looking for to the ideal​ use of the Magic Box. Here is what he said:

"For your technical question, Magic Box uses what is called “wireless backhaul” (using the LTE-Advanced UE Relay technology) with B41 preferred and B25 fallback (if B41 is not available). For this to work, we need a minimum signal quality measurement (signal to noise ratio) and signal strength in order to “work”. So we do “geoRF” analysis to determine whether or not we think box will work at a given location. We also disqualify locations that are near to a tower that are estimated to already have really good signal strength and signal quality (where the box is unlikely to be “needed”)."

Don't get disappointed yet. Sprint is also releasing the Airave 3 LTE that is coming out mid-June so you should still be able to fix call/data issues in your home if you get denied.

Sprint should be calling you with the number provided letting you know if you were approved or not within the next few weeks.