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Article Suggests iPhone is to Blame for AT&T's Network Failures

I dont even live in the US, and yet I think AT&T are being beyond lame. They have no-one to blame but themselves for failing to invest in their network.

No phone manufacturer can be held responsible for their lack of foresight.

Sure, data use probably was hard to estimate a few years back, but it's not that hard to scale up quickly as many other countries have retrofitted fast, high capacity mobile networks over a period of 12-18 months, and seem to elicit less complaints than generated by AT&T.
 
alent1234 said:
supposedly it's the infeneon chips that are the problem
Click to expand...

Back in the day in 2007 the competitive handset manufacturers were saying (to deaf ears) that Apple was unlikely to get it right as to efficiency of network interface because it is a black art it has taken them years to evolve. It turns out not only were they right (while losing market share and industry profits), this non-optimization also made a bad situation worse on the AT&T network. AT&T leaned forward to the tune of $20B/year or more on network rollouts, so they did a pretty good job of staying ahead of the network usage despite all faults.

You have to go with what you got and by being a team, Apple and AT&T did an above average job of covering each other's a$$ on device and network limitations while rolling out the largest and fastest data device uptake ever undertaken.

Hey guys, please do some optimizations on the device side and roll out LTE sooner not later in population centers and travel routes, then when you get a DEVICE that is a substantial improvement, and compatible with forward leaning networks as well, publicize it, so we can all switch over and make you guys a fortune. We're willing.

Rocketman

One more thing:

http://forums.appleinsider.com/showthread.php?threadid=105144

"The iPhone currently utilizes an Infineon chipset for its GSM and 3G networking. Palm uses chips from Marvell, while RIM contracts with Freescale."

It appears the PowerPC type guys they are using with the ARM team might use Freescale style code to make their own network interface someday.
 
kingtj said:
It doesn't explain why so many VOICE calls get dropped or have issues. My big issue with AT&T is with huge amounts of dropped calls.
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Possibly it does. Unlike in more traditional systems like GSM cell towers do not have a fixed area they cover.When there is much traffic in a cell, the noise level will increase in UMTS and any other CDMA based system. Oviously an increased distance from the tower will make your signal weaker.

So with increased distance and growing load in the cell the "signal to noise ratio" will get worse. Under such conditions the devices in the cell that have the worst SNR (because of distance, obstacles or bad receivers) will "suddenly" loose connection because they cannot decode the signal any more.

The cell is said to "breath" because the covered area of a tower increases and decreases depending on the load.

Christian
 
kingtj said:
It doesn't explain why so many VOICE calls get dropped or have issues. My big issue with AT&T is with huge amounts of dropped calls.
Click to expand...

Possibly it does. Unlike in more traditional systems like GSM cell towers do not have a fixed area they cover.When there is much traffic in a cell, the noise level will increase in UMTS and any other CDMA based system.

So with growing load in the cell the "signal to noise ratio" will get worse. This happens when huge transfers are started or when active users move into the area of that tower. Under such conditions the devices in the cell that have the worst SNR (weak signal because of distance, obstacles or bad receivers) will "suddenly" loose connection because they cannot decode the signal any more.

The cell is said to "breath" because the covered area of a tower increases and decreases depending on the load and there are often cycles based on daytime and so on.

Christian
 
So the basic gist I get from this thread is that people in heavily populated areas tend to have band cellular reception from over subscription of cell towers and that areas with a high density of smart phones with webkit browsers and "unlimited" data tend to be the worst off. Areas like New York, San Francisco and London, England seem to be the worst.

You can have full bars and still not be able to make a phone call. Recently, I have experienced dropped calls and not being able to dial calls some times here in Canada on the Fido network on the 3G. It tends to be worst on the weekends when there is unlimited local calling and it seems like everyone is getting an iPhone these days.

I have had to switch off 3G on several occasions to call the cab from my apartment.

Even though data and voice are on separate channels for UTMS/HSPA, a cell tower can still become oversubscribed by a combination of data and voice users. That is something that people often do not stop to consider. The government did not pay for and does not maintain the cell towers. They may have paid for the internet backbone but what you are paying for are the maintenance and setup of cell towers and those have a finite capacity.

Here is what I think AT&T needs to do to fix their network:
1. Find and ban all IMEIs of iPhone running 2.x firmware as that version has bugs in it and users have no excuse not to upgrade.
2. Find and ban all IMEIs of all jailbroken iPhones as they may be running the hack to allow video streaming slingbox over 3G.
3. Offer to officially unlock and unban all IMEIs of iPhones that were banned because of jailbreaking with the understanding that they will be permanently banned if they jailbreak again.
4. Offer unbanning and a forced upgrade to 3.1.2 of all iPhone that were banned for not upgrading.
5. Get rid of unlimited data and institute a 5GB cap at 30 bucks and lower caps for less money.
6. Offer a 10 GB cap for more than 30 bucks but put an limit on number of customers allowed to subscribe to it by geographical area.

*Edit*
Listen to Christian, he is right. CDMA 2000 networks would have the same problems as UTMS (3G) networks have with so many iPhones on the network at once. Verizon is ok right now because their subscriber base is more spread out and they have less smart phones on their network of the same calibre as the iPhone.
 
The best article on this subject is Fake Steve Jobs posted on 12-11-09. Truly one of the best that Daniel Lyons ever scribed (typed, penned, noodled, whatever) -- awesome.

A not-so-brief chat with Randall Stephenson of AT&T said:
Randall, baby. we’ve got a hit on our hands. We’ve got the smartphone equivalent of Meet the Beatles. It’s not like that album was the first rock album ever. It’s not like nobody ever made a band with some guitars and drums before. But it was radical. It was new. They took old forms and made them new. Same with us. We didn’t invent the smartphone or the PDA or the music player or the Web browser. We just made them better. We made them new. We changed the ***** world, Randall.
Click to expand...
Again -- Fake Steve is rocking the blog with this one! Check it out if you haven't!
 
I can't say much for the current iphones on ATT as I haven't had one in awhile. Back when I had an original iPhone the phone had terrible reception compared to other phones on the ATT network. Even my replacement had poor reception. I then moved back to Blackberry. I've been an ATT customer for 17 years straight and have had dozens of phones. I'm also a Verizon customer but only for the 3 wireless cards I have for business related laptops. I went Verizon because the equipment offered for the wireless appealed to me more.

With that being said, at least here in Phoenix, I rate my experience probably 8/10 with regards to ATT service with my Blackberry Bold. In fact the speaker phone on my Bold is superior to my office phone and will end up using it during conference calls and never worry about a dropped call. I had a 2.5 hour training on Friday where I was on the Bold during a training. I rarely drop calls with an exception for my business partner's house. His house is brick and even my Verizon card only has 1 bar in it...

I travel to England once or twice a year and yes, the service is and always has been superior to our own. I have family from over there that visits at least once or twice a year and they always complain about our service when they come over. :) You have to realize though they have a lot less land area to cover when newer technologies come out....and therefore far less infrastructure to roll out.

In closing, I know the iPhone *used to* have poorer reception than my other phones. I've heard though this is not the case anymore so take that for what it's worth... I do however see how there's certainly a possibility that having such a high percent of iPhone users on the network could cause some issues since the typical iPhone user uses much more bandwidth than the user of a different phone. That's ATT's fault for not keeping up with infrastructure but if that's the case and you move all the iPhone's over to Verizon it's possible that Verizon could certainly experience the same issues...
 
Anyone who says that this is anyone's fault other than AT&T, is most likely a drone that is only taught that AT&T is flawless and that everything they do is right. As others said, other non-US networks handle the iPhone just fine without hiccups, with plenty of users using them. And considering that Verizon actually invests in its own network, is highly reliable, and that other smaller non-US networks can handle the iPhone, Verizon would not have the same problems AT&T is having, if at all.
 
This is not AT&T's fault...

...its the cellphone business model that is to blame.

Contract customers pay a fixed rate for data (and a fixed rate for a package of voice calls). AT&T get this money, month on month, regardless of whether the voice call drops - or whether the data connection fails.

It's not possible for customers to leave AT&T and take their iPhones to other carriers.

This broken anti-competitive model means there is absolutely no financial incentive for AT&T to fix their network. The less they spend on upgrading the network, the more profitable they are.

If this were a real market - customers could make a choice to place their call with the cheapest network - or the most reliable network - or the fastest network on a call-by-call basis. The money would follow the calls.

In such an open market, the carriers would be incentivised to improve their products. They would compete for the calls. They would be motivated to upgrade their networks to meet the demand.

The current unsatisfactory state of affairs is the inevitable conclusion of a locked-in, locked down, minimum contract pseudo market.

I would argue that it works against the interests of the consumer and it needs fixing.

C.
 
scroto said:
Alot of people in denial, the Iphone's not perfect.
Click to expand...

It's about as close as you damn well can get. And it keeps getting better.

When the complaints don't carry over to iPhone users in the rest of the world, there's a problem with the carrier doing the crying.


JGowan said:
The best article on this subject is Fake Steve Jobs posted on 12-11-09. Truly one of the best that Daniel Lyons ever scribed (typed, penned, noodled, whatever) -- awesome.

Again -- Fake Steve is rocking the blog with this one! Check it out if you haven't!
Click to expand...

Gotta love Fake Steve!
 
I would be curious to see a full break down of the # of iPhones each provider has (w/breakdown by model 2g vs 3g) the % of total phones on their network which are iPhones, and the saturation in the areas where the biggets problems are.

Given the iPhone is biggest in the US, and NYC & SF would be the cities on top of the list for the most iPhones, I wouldn't expect to be shocked by the numbers or the fact that they are having the most issues.

I also wouldn't be surprised to see a lot of iPhone users being Consumer Reports subscribers, I just don't see pay as you go or very basic cell phone users making up the majority of the subscribers to CR.

Also something to factor in, is there a breakdown of the numbers of CR subscribers who are AT&T subscribers & then iPhone users in SF or NYC, vs break down of numbers for other networks and phone types.

Without a full understanding of the sampling it is hard to full understand the validity of the numbers. Maybe the iPhones users are just the biggest whingers, maybe AT&T does have serious issues, maybe Apple hasn't optimized the device and went with form over function.

iPhone owner, 8 year AT&T subscriber, more issues with the device than the service, and then it is the user experience and not hardware failures that annoy me.
 
I do not follow you...

entropys said:
In Australia, all carriers and MNVOs have the iphone. (disclosure, I use an unlocked iphone on virginmobile in the city, and Telstra in the country)

The buildout of the various networks goes
Telstra (best);Optus medium;Vodafone; '3' smallest.. Some of these also have roaming arrangements with the others

(Virgin is an MNVO and subsidiary of Optus, but operates as a separate business but uses the optus network. You can also get iphones through them).

You can also buy outright from Apple unlocked and go with whoever, and even if the iphone is bought on contract, you can pay to get it unlocked, or get it unlocked after a certain time for free.


So, how does the iphone do on various networks?
Optus & Virgin have the best deals, so most people have gone with them.

Result: Optus suffers constant loss of network issues. The network cannot handle the massive increase in data volumes. They have minimised dropped calls however, by prioritising calls over data services. This can be very annoying though when you are accessing data, but a solution I have found is to turn airplane mode on and off. I think this is because for some reason the network thinks you are a new entrant to that tower and lets you on.

Telstra has hands down the best network, but charge like wounded bulls for access. There are no problems whatsoever with this network. it is fast, reliable and never drops a call. But as a company they hate the iphone, as users tend to treat Telstra as a dumb pipe, and Telstra want to sell you a lot of 'value added'

All that said, the likely answer as to whether or not it is AT&T or the iphone to blame for the US problems, based on a network comparison in Australia?

It's the network, stupid!
Click to expand...

So you are saying that the more iPhones any particular provider has the more troubles there is but ... this is definitely not an iPhone related problem. It might be a stretch :) Granted, we just do not have data to claim otherwise but your observation clearly does not help to prove that iPhone is without blame in this situation.
 
Just read the article...

Evangelion said:
Such as?

Sure, it could be said that iPhone causes AT&T's network to burst at the seams. But that's not because iPhone has a "technical flaws", quite the opposite. The iPhone is the first phone that is actually actively used for those net-features operators have advertized for years. It's the first phone people use to actively surf the web.

The problem is not caused by "technical problems" in iPhone, it's caused by the fact that AT&T's network is unable to handle all those people actually USING their iPhones for web-browsing and the like.

Remember: web-connected phones were advertised as the future of cell-phone-service and cell-phones in general. Well, future is here, today, and AT&T is failing to keep up.

Technical flaw my ass.
Click to expand...

Network capacity is a separate issue. The fact that AT&T might have capacity issues does not prove that there is no technical issues (flaws) with iPhone. You did not provide any facts to the contrary either. All we have to go with is the facts stated in the article. So far, I did not hear Apple rejecting these claims either (granted it might be simply too soon for that)

Piece of advice: keep you ass for something more useful.
 
iPhoneNYC said:
ATT is just pathetic. With carriers around the globe why is it only ATT who complains? One suspects that upper management is last in brain cell use just like the company ranks in customer satisfaction. The sooner ATT has some Verizon competition with the iPhone the better it will be for all users.
Click to expand...

Did you consider the possibility that AT&T has the highest percentage of iPhones than any other carrier in the World?
 
iPhoneNYC said:
ATT is just pathetic. With carriers around the globe why is it only ATT who complains?
Click to expand...
In part because the other carriers around the globe were finished with their 3G network deployments before they started selling the iPhone.
 
*LTD* said:
That's enough baloney to make a sandwich.

I guess I get great reception and performance on the Rogers network . . . because something's really wrong with the iPhone hardware. LOL.
Click to expand...

Or maybe you are the only Rogers customer with iPhone. The article claims that the nature of the problem is "interference". So it's not like any individual iPhone will have a problem, it's that iPhones interfere with the work of the network. It's when you get enough iPhones in the system that the problem becomes severe.

Again, not really my claim, just helping you read the article.
 
solideliquid said:
I can see this argument being valid in certain situations. However why is it that my iphone can only get 1-2 bars of edge when I live 2 miles from a tower? I drive down the street and I get full 3G but not at my front door.
Click to expand...
raybo said:
Crappy tower?
Click to expand...
Right. Just because you live 2 miles from a tower doesn't guarantee that the antennas on the tower are pointed in a way that gives you the coverage that you would assume that you'd get.
 
Are you kidding me?!

Why on Earth are we having a debate on who's to blame? If AT&T couldn't handle the surge in network usage, they shouldn't have negotiated exclusivity. Some will argue that they had no idea of the massive increase in usage. If that were true they should have automatically began rolling out the necessary steps to make this a non-issue.

This is like blaming automobile manufacturers for rush hour traffic! Give me a break!
 
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