As you’ll recall, Sprint made some pretty big WiMAX promises earlier this year–namely, they promised that XOHM networks in Chicago and Washington D.C. would go live by the end of the year and that 100 million folks would have access to XOHM by the end of 2008. Well, a lot has changed since then–CEO Gary Forsee left, Sprint was courted for a buyout and the company’s partnership with Clearwire dissolved. Regardless, it looks like they’re soldering on with WiMAX by making good on the first of their promises. According to Bin Shen, VP of Product Management and Partnership Development, the XOHM network will go live in Chicago, Baltimore and Washington D.C. “in the next few days.” Of course, this will just be a soft launch, with the official launch of the network scheduled for sometime during the second quarter of next year. Still, it can’t hurt to warm up those pipes, even if it’s only to prove that the network is nearing completion. No word yet on devices or if there will be any sort of beta test, though we’ll probably find out soon.

For more on the soft launch:
– see this Phone Scoop article