It's no secret that T-Mobile USA is ratcheting up its plans to go 4G LTE in the wake of its failed merger with AT&T, with at least two of its smartphones ready for the fast lane this month. Engadget is reporting that T-Mobile USA is pushing out an over-the-air update to the Samsung Galaxy Note II starting today, which enables the phablet's previously unused LTE radio on the carrier's network. Does that mean the 4G LTE rave has begun for the magenta network? Not quite -- the carrier is simply getting its ducks in a row for the big rollout to come. Engadget got to sample the high-speed love in New York City and saw LTE speeds averaging a bit shy of 60Mbps down and 18Mbps up, which is an encouraging sign. And Samsung isn't getting all the LTE fun: T-Mobile's BlackBerry Z10 is launching by the end of March, and will also be ready for life in the fast lane right out of the box. T-Mobile USA ultimately plans to offer LTE to 100 million subscribers by summer, with double that amount by the end of 2013. Ambitions plans, to be sure, but they've been laying the groundwork for quite some time by refarming old 2G EDGE spectrum to the 1900MHz bandwidth, which just so happens to be compatible with 4G HSPA+ on the iPhone -- a device that's also likely to run on the carrier's 4G LTE when it's officially launched later this year. Follow this article’s author, J.R. Bookwalter on Twitter
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