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EDGE vs 3G Shootout Video
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All the 3G fanatics always come after these videos dishing out excuses as to why this happened. I have now seen a few videos where EDGE beats 3G and am yet to see one where 3G just blows EDGE away. Fact of the matter is, EDGE on iPhone is not that much slower than most 3G networks and in some cases it is faster. Oh yeah, slower or not what browser looks better?
If Google or Apple control the spectrum auction then we will most likely skip 3g and go right to 4g, but if Att or Verizon get it we will most likely be forced to endure a slow upgrade to 3g. IMHO
Sorry...
Yeah....I was a bit harsh. *grunt*
Should take my tranquies more regularly
I think he was just joking around. Who let you off your leash?
Yeah....I was a bit harsh. *grunt*
Should take my tranquies more regularly
Speed of network is not necessarily the best measure of these devices. I find much of the download/bandwidth arguments are full of assumptions and false beliefs. There are so many factors that impact how long it takes to download on any network, let alone the above mentioned. What are some comparisons to how long these take at home or on an airport/wireless lan? What type of pages load fastest? Which pages are best optimized for mobile content? Which of these browsers do the best job of using cached items? The iPhone clearly beats them all in user friendly interface and readability. I have long ago given up on my Treo for web searching. It can't even handle the simplest request without several commands and scrolling through endless poorly rendered pages.
To be fair, the E61 is a quite slow device (I have one) and it's only standard 3G @ 0.384 Mbps. I also have the Nokia N95 which both has a faster CPU and also is HDSPA (aka Turbo 3G @ 3.6 Mbps). There's a substantial difference between the two and the current iPhone doesn't compare well at all to the browsing speed of the N95 (however the browsing experience of the iPhone is certainly better).
I'm eagerly waiting for a 3G iPhone as hope they will make it an HDSPA device (preferably @ 7.2 Mbps which is the current standard speed of HDSPA, or maybe even 14.4 Mbps which will be the norm when a 3G iPhone eventually comes out).
I'm eagerly waiting for a 3G iPhone as hope they will make it an HDSPA device (preferably @ 7.2 Mbps which is the current standard speed of HDSPA, or maybe even 14.4 Mbps which will be the norm when a 3G iPhone eventually comes out).
Are you sure that's Apple's doing? I've watched a couple of Youtube videos over a 56k modem recently (my Mac Mini G4 still has one of those). Download times were not much longer than on broadband, but the videos were much more compressed. I think it's a feature of Youtube.
My city doesn't even have 3G along with a lot of others, granted its ranked 59th in the US in size, but hey we have a baseball, football, and hockey team you'd think we'd have 3G...
fairly sure they are iphone specific - google re-encoded "a selection" of their content (kind of at odds with the user-produced content ideology IMHO) into H.264 for the device. the ADC iphone tech talk videos also show webdevs how to encode video specific to wifi or EDGE for iphone.
try to export a video from QT and you'll see 2 iphone export settings: 'movie to iphone', and 'movie to iphone (cellular)'. you then reference both these with a QT ref .mov and bob's yer uncle.
for what it's worth, i found iphone EDGE to be better than any other mobile browser experience i've had (even vs. 3G with opera mini), though if you're serious about browsing, why not just get a data card? onanism is fun, but...
3G is not the second coming of Christ - prepare to be disappointed
I did several speed-tests of the iPhone rendering webpages on EDGE, WiFi, and with
the Macbook tethered to the iPhone. The EDGE-tethered Macbook blew the doors off the
iPhone on EDGE, and was twice as fast as the iPhone on a fast WiFi connection.
My tests are detailed on . Posts #87, 91, and 97 sum it up nicely.
I did several speed-tests of the iPhone rendering webpages on EDGE, WiFi, and with
the Macbook tethered to the iPhone. The EDGE-tethered Macbook blew the doors off the
iPhone on EDGE, and was twice as fast as the iPhone on a fast WiFi connection.
My tests are detailed on . Posts #87, 91, and 97 sum it up nicely.
I love that the Nokia went to sleep before the page loaded. Makes for a wonderful user experience!
That made me laugh when I saw it!
That kind of thing won't show up on a spec sheet, but Apple sweated every detail, while it doesn't look like Nokia designed for even the most basic use cases. I don't actually agree with all of Apple's design decisions, but at least someone actually thought it through and tried to make something that works well.
Chances are this is an option within their OS which is something apple wouldn't give you as they like to decide everything for you.
There is some other discussion about this on a thread posted yesterday... same ideas but a little different discussion.
The EDGE-tethered Macbook blew the doors off the
iPhone on EDGE, and was twice as fast as the iPhone on a fast WiFi connection.
Uhhh.... I'm not sure what your point is. What were you expecting from a 10x more powerfull dual-CPU running Safari? Did you think Safari was going to be the same speed on edge on a macbook?
Of course the iPhone's processor is the problem, but 3G would still make a difference on alot of pages. Not that my city has 3G anyway...
I think this is a really good point.
I switched from an EDGE Treo 650 to a 3G AT&T Tilt, and then ultimately to an iPhone because I disliked Windows Mobile 6.
Even though the Tilt's 3G itself was faster, in practical use it didn't make much difference because the web browsing experience still was mediocre - especially with Pocket IE, but even with Opera Mini - compared to the iPhone.
So while it may take somewhat longer for the page itself to load up, once it does, it's much quicker for me to navigate through and read the content on a page.
And given the battery life problems associated with 3G still (check out the various HTC Kaiser/AT&T Tilt forums for the people trying to find out how to disable 3G in order to save battery life), I think the iPhone is a pretty good balance right now.
When the 3G iPhone does come out, assuming they do wait and put it in when the battery life will not be impacted so heavily, it will certainly be the best of all possible worlds, but until then, I think it is a pretty good solution.
I switched from an EDGE Treo 650 to a 3G AT&T Tilt, and then ultimately to an iPhone because I disliked Windows Mobile 6.
Even though the Tilt's 3G itself was faster, in practical use it didn't make much difference because the web browsing experience still was mediocre - especially with Pocket IE, but even with Opera Mini - compared to the iPhone.
So while it may take somewhat longer for the page itself to load up, once it does, it's much quicker for me to navigate through and read the content on a page.
And given the battery life problems associated with 3G still (check out the various HTC Kaiser/AT&T Tilt forums for the people trying to find out how to disable 3G in order to save battery life), I think the iPhone is a pretty good balance right now.
When the 3G iPhone does come out, assuming they do wait and put it in when the battery life will not be impacted so heavily, it will certainly be the best of all possible worlds, but until then, I think it is a pretty good solution.
The point is that there's a serious bottleneck if the iPhone is taking 27 - 40
sec to load well-optimized pages like MacRumors - and it doesn't translate
so much to EDGE itself, since other devices (such as Macbook) can load
the same pages at the same data-rate in 3 or 4 seconds.
I don't expect to see too much of an improvement. Sending and receiving
data will certainly be faster, and the ability to use the phone and data
at the same time will be great. But rendering webpages? Hmmm.
Incidentally, I seem to get an average of 80 - 100 kbps on EDGE in the SF Bay Area.
What sort of real-world speed results can we expect from ATT's 3G implementation?
I'm going to preface my responses by saying I love the iPhone, and I think the software platform and interface are truly revolutionary, and the best on the market.
The web browser is the best browsing experience I've ever had on ANY device smaller than a laptop. It definitely has the fastest, most fluid webpage rendering on the market.
I am not disputing this. However, it's important to be totally honest and objective with critiques, reviews, etc. I'm sick of the fanboys making everyone look bad.
First of all, the Nokia E61 CAN ONLY USE *BASIC UMTS* with a theoretical max download speed of 384kbps. Modern HSDPA networks (and other 3G phones) run at between 3600-14,400kbps or 10-40X faster.
Now of course these are maximums, so you will not obtain quite these speeds in the real world. Although UMTS is a 3G technology, to me It's really misleading to compare EDGE vs "3G" using UMTS in light of the fact that HSDPA is available nearly everywhere the much slower UMTS is.
Additionally, there are so many variables already with speed tests thats it not really fair to compare two different phone models with different radios, different processors, hardware specs, software, etc. It's apples and oranges.
Some phones may theoretically have a faster connection, but their radio hardware limits the real-world speed that they will be able to receive. Other phones may have crap hardware with slow processors and a deficiency of memory, which will cause the webpages to load slowly no matter what type of connection they have. What it comes down to is if you compare two identical phones with the same hardware specs and radios, and artificially force one to use only EDGE, the HSDPA-enabled phone will be much faster in downloading data. In other words, a 3G/HSDPA Iphone will blow the pants off of an EDGE iPhone in most circumstances.
Regarding the OP, I have had a Treo 700P and 700W and both are very slow with regards to rendering web pages. Compared to newer smartphones, the Treos seems to be much slower when receiving 3G/EVDO data. I think the inadequate processing power, memory, radio, don't allow these phones to take advantage of much bandwidth.
I hate regurgitating this, but I'm sick of hearing this stuff. There are plenty of phones with 3G EVDO or UMTS/HSDPA chipsets that have decent battery life. Not 8 hours in a slim package like the iPhone, but I think good enough for most people considering the vast majority end up plugging their phone in nearly every night. Adding to this, we have to acknowledge the fact that Apple seems to have a good grip on battery and power saving technology as shown by the advancements in battery life the iPhone has seen over the last couple of years.
On the other hand, I do recognize that the iPhone has a large screen and is intended for music and video playback on a level which we haven't seen from a phone before. But regardless, I just don't buy the argument that battery life would have suffered as much as Jobs says it would. I think there are other factors at work here.
The web browser is the best browsing experience I've ever had on ANY device smaller than a laptop. It definitely has the fastest, most fluid webpage rendering on the market.
I am not disputing this. However, it's important to be totally honest and objective with critiques, reviews, etc. I'm sick of the fanboys making everyone look bad.
A video at AppleiPhoneInfo.de (German) pits the Apple iPhone against a Nokia E61i in web page loads. The iPhone, of course, uses the EDGE (2.5g) network while the Nokia uses a faster UMTS (3g) network.
Despite the network differences, the website load times compared between the two were not that different, demonstrating that the iPhone's rendering capabilities far exceed the Nokias.
Indeed, in my own experience, in moving from the Treo 700p (EVDO) to iPhone (EDGE), I found general web browsing on the iPhone to be a subjectively faster and more pleasant experience. That being said, the iPhone coupled with a 3G network would likely be far better.
First of all, the Nokia E61 CAN ONLY USE *BASIC UMTS* with a theoretical max download speed of 384kbps. Modern HSDPA networks (and other 3G phones) run at between 3600-14,400kbps or 10-40X faster.
Now of course these are maximums, so you will not obtain quite these speeds in the real world. Although UMTS is a 3G technology, to me It's really misleading to compare EDGE vs "3G" using UMTS in light of the fact that HSDPA is available nearly everywhere the much slower UMTS is.
Additionally, there are so many variables already with speed tests thats it not really fair to compare two different phone models with different radios, different processors, hardware specs, software, etc. It's apples and oranges.
Some phones may theoretically have a faster connection, but their radio hardware limits the real-world speed that they will be able to receive. Other phones may have crap hardware with slow processors and a deficiency of memory, which will cause the webpages to load slowly no matter what type of connection they have. What it comes down to is if you compare two identical phones with the same hardware specs and radios, and artificially force one to use only EDGE, the HSDPA-enabled phone will be much faster in downloading data. In other words, a 3G/HSDPA Iphone will blow the pants off of an EDGE iPhone in most circumstances.
Regarding the OP, I have had a Treo 700P and 700W and both are very slow with regards to rendering web pages. Compared to newer smartphones, the Treos seems to be much slower when receiving 3G/EVDO data. I think the inadequate processing power, memory, radio, don't allow these phones to take advantage of much bandwidth.
In my experience, Treos are not only slow in rendering webpages because of their ***** hardware, they don't seem to utilize available 3G/EVDO/HSDPA bandwidth very well. I would have to put the blame on the slow hardware.
I hate regurgitating this, but I'm sick of hearing this stuff. There are plenty of phones with 3G EVDO or UMTS/HSDPA chipsets that have decent battery life. Not 8 hours in a slim package like the iPhone, but I think good enough for most people considering the vast majority end up plugging their phone in nearly every night. Adding to this, we have to acknowledge the fact that Apple seems to have a good grip on battery and power saving technology as shown by the advancements in battery life the iPhone has seen over the last couple of years.
On the other hand, I do recognize that the iPhone has a large screen and is intended for music and video playback on a level which we haven't seen from a phone before. But regardless, I just don't buy the argument that battery life would have suffered as much as Jobs says it would. I think there are other factors at work here.
No... First of all, the analog shutoff doesn't happen until 2009, and even if Apple or Google actually won a block of the spectrum it would take a long time to rollout. Much too long to not have a stop-gap Iphone. Regarding a ATT/Verizon win, Yes, AT&T blows capacity to rollout their 3G services, but Verizon on the other hand, is actually doing very well. A large part of their coverage areas are already running at EVDO/3G, and they just finished upgrading *ALL* of their EVDO/3G towers to the faster "revision A" variant of EVDO. Even where my parents live in a small city of 30,000 in Idaho they have EVDO.
59th? My guess is you FOR SURE have EVDO 3G from Verizon.. and probably sprint too! It's only AT&T (well T-mobile too, but there are reasons for that) that can't seem to upgrade their network worth a damn.
I think he was being a bit tongue-in-cheek . . . easy there killer.
it was a little too straightforward maybe for tongue and cheek. let me get my dictionary
I dare not quote you, Winterspan (it's too big to quote!), but that was a really great post. You analyze things very completely. It's pretty easy when you're a big fan of something (be it Apple or 3G or whatever) to endlessly sing its praises without looking at the bigger picture.
JPyre must be from Philadelphia or Pittsburgh . . . and both of those cities have 3G, to the best of my knowledge. AT&T list a definite yes on their coverage map, and Verizon say they have Broadband and Vcast . . . is that their 3G service? I don't know much about Verizon's data packages.
JPyre must be from Philadelphia or Pittsburgh . . . and both of those cities have 3G, to the best of my knowledge. AT&T list a definite yes on their coverage map, and Verizon say they have Broadband and Vcast . . . is that their 3G service? I don't know much about Verizon's data packages.
I think he was being a bit tongue-in-cheek . . . easy there killer.
Didn't really seem tongue-in-cheek to me.
I find web browsing in an EDGE area to be faster than my old phone (SE M600i) which had 3G.
The web browsing experience is FAR better on the iPhone. Opera was just too awkward and unpleasant to use on the Sony Ericsson. I had a deal with Vodafone that gave me unlimited data, and I rarely used it because it was too awkward, often pages wouldn't finish loading etc etc.
The iPhone is a joy to use.
The web browsing experience is FAR better on the iPhone. Opera was just too awkward and unpleasant to use on the Sony Ericsson. I had a deal with Vodafone that gave me unlimited data, and I rarely used it because it was too awkward, often pages wouldn't finish loading etc etc.
The iPhone is a joy to use.
EVDO to a Treo 700p vs. 3G to an iPhone won't mean a hill of beans if the infrastructure beyond the iPhone -> Cell Tower link doesn't have sufficient throughput for all the subscribers in a given location.
Yes my iPhone has a better rendering engine than any other hand-held on the market... But the fact that my iPhone is able to download and render web content at a speed comparable to an EVDO equipped handheld says as much good about the iPhone as it says lots of bad things about the EVDO carrier's infrastructure.
In short, 3G on the iPhone will still be slow if the carriers don't put sufficient infrastructure behind it. It's the same reason that EDGE on the iPhone saturates at around 40kbps or 80kbps if you are lucky, despite EDGE's capability to do nearly 200kbps -- the infrastructure is the limiting factor, moreso than the handheld data technology.
Regards,
\Leon
Yes my iPhone has a better rendering engine than any other hand-held on the market... But the fact that my iPhone is able to download and render web content at a speed comparable to an EVDO equipped handheld says as much good about the iPhone as it says lots of bad things about the EVDO carrier's infrastructure.
In short, 3G on the iPhone will still be slow if the carriers don't put sufficient infrastructure behind it. It's the same reason that EDGE on the iPhone saturates at around 40kbps or 80kbps if you are lucky, despite EDGE's capability to do nearly 200kbps -- the infrastructure is the limiting factor, moreso than the handheld data technology.
Regards,
\Leon
As pointed out earlier in the thread, location and (of course) HSDPA availability are factors.
An N95 connecting to HSDPA services blows EDGE out of the water, hands down. Here in the UK, HSPDA is widely available on Vodafone, and was one of the main reasons why we didn't commit to the iPhone. Our high-end mobile services such as Sky TV streaming are 3G only and our new music services - though work adequately well on 2G - suffer problems as result of a slower connection.
Voip services, too, run as they should only on 3G/3G HSDPA connections, though it's still a bit of a novelty without a perfected infrastructure.
4G services (next gen Voip) are not too far off, and Apple do need to consider the global market with future offerings. O2 have had a whale of a time putting old tech masts in place purely for the iPhone - and they're becoming all unlocked anyway.
I'm here personally as I love Apple/Macs/the iPhone, but simply could not commit to the handset without at least 3G connection. I use my n95 as a modem regularly, and its HSDPA functionality is a necessity to me above and beyond the iPhone's brilliant interface.
Roll on the 3G version.
An N95 connecting to HSDPA services blows EDGE out of the water, hands down. Here in the UK, HSPDA is widely available on Vodafone, and was one of the main reasons why we didn't commit to the iPhone. Our high-end mobile services such as Sky TV streaming are 3G only and our new music services - though work adequately well on 2G - suffer problems as result of a slower connection.
Voip services, too, run as they should only on 3G/3G HSDPA connections, though it's still a bit of a novelty without a perfected infrastructure.
4G services (next gen Voip) are not too far off, and Apple do need to consider the global market with future offerings. O2 have had a whale of a time putting old tech masts in place purely for the iPhone - and they're becoming all unlocked anyway.
I'm here personally as I love Apple/Macs/the iPhone, but simply could not commit to the handset without at least 3G connection. I use my n95 as a modem regularly, and its HSDPA functionality is a necessity to me above and beyond the iPhone's brilliant interface.
Roll on the 3G version.