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AT&T Migrating 3G Network to 7.2 Mbps, Planning for 21 Mbps Later This Year?

antdfsc said:
how about expanding regular 3G to areas that don't have it yet? I live in MA and it is very inconsistent from one city to another...
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Agreed.....I live less than 2 miles from Louisville, KY and the data service can be very shotty at times. I typically try to use pandora radio on my iphone while im riding in the car and sometimes it cant connect or it will stop streaming. :( very frustrating.
 
AT&T - Apple Partnership

This AT&T - Apple partnership is interesting from a business perspective. I can understand why Apple wants to partner with them since it gives them access to the most customers and because AT&T seems to be leading the pack in areas like deployment of faster, broader networks.

However, from a business philosophy perspective this seems to go against Apple's model because AT&T seems to be focused on quantity of customers and not quality of product/service. As many forum posters have mentioned, 3G has not even been deployed adequately in many areas and already they're on to the next technology. That's not an Apple-like approach which focuses on getting things right and thus ensuring customer satisfaction. It will be really interesting to see if Apple re-ups with AT&T - the problem being that over time AT&T's customer perception may begin to taint Apple's name brand. As an AT&T customer, I really hope they do not re-up.
 
nefster said:
However, from a business philosophy perspective this seems to go against Apple's model because AT&T seems to be focused on quantity of customers and not quality of product/service.
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Welcome to America. You've just described every cellular provider here.
 
antdfsc said:
how about expanding regular 3G to areas that don't have it yet? I live in MA and it is very inconsistent from one city to another...
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I live in a "3G" area so says ATT.

Coverage is pretty much unreliable unless I am East of 495
 
Anyone know what the situation is with Germany's T-Mobile 3G network regarding speeds? I'm considering getting an iPhone and am currently waiting to see what comes in summer. Would a theoretical 3.5G iPhone hardware upgrade be any good to me here?

I'm going to wait anyway to see if at least a 32GB iPhone comes out, or something with any other compelling hardware upgrades (improved battery life, camera and so on).
 
This seems to make a lot of sense to me, but not for the reasons mentioned in the article.

I think the true driver is Verizon moving to 4G and the expiring Apple contract.

At 100mbts down, Verizon is going to crush AT&T without their next generation. Crush them. Even with AT&T at 21mbps, Verizon is going to be 500% faster. And we all know how bad AT&T backbone has been.

Years of being cheap on infrastructure and managing wall street earnings has caught up with AT&T.

Thank heaven for competition. Verizon made a poor choice not going with the iPhone, so they are cranking their network speed up and getting ready to steal the iPhone exclusive from AT&T.

Imagine this: Verizon @ 100 mbps with the iPhone exclusive. AT&T will be kicked to the basement. This is clearly Verizon's play.

The big winner is Apple. With market power, blazing fast pipes, and unlimited data deals, Apple is going to have the fertile soil to innovate.

AT&T sees this too. They have no choice but to seriously invest in their backbone, jump to 21 mbps, and by 2011 be in the same ballpark as Verizon.

I always thought it was odd that AT&T leaked they wanted a one year extension. But with Verizon coming online this year, and AT&T not being able to roll-out their next generation until about 1 year later, the 1 year extension allows AT&T to block Verizon.

The other big winner is us. This is going to force innovation across the board from Apple, Google, Motorola, SonyEriccson, etc.

It's amazing to see what competition can do for an industry. Look at the same company's behavior around the crappy games with their ISP business.
 
czeluff said:
Wow, 7.2? I'm stuck with a 4mbps Comcast connection at home for $50/mo. All of a sudden the $30/mo I pay for AT&T 3G doesn't seem like the crappiest end of the stick...

cz
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Not quite, you get close to the advertized speed all the time with Comcast, however with the iPhone you can only get the good speeds in certain areas, think along the lines of Comcast telling you for some random hours every day you get 1Mbps and in other hours you get 8Mbps and yet in others you might see 3 or 4.


1Zach1 said:
Upgrade=bigger pipe=better service in crowded areas?

I didn't see it in the article, does this upgrade need a hardware upgrade or do the current cell towers just need some sort of software upgrade to get the update?
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I saw in another article (on CNET?) that most of the newer 3G towers were ready for the roll out and it was more software updates than hardware, but obviously if you are in Edge only areas then there is a lot more required.

So the potential for a relative quick & large initial roll out is possible, but population coverage numbers as they could cover most of metro NYC, Boston, Chicago & say Los Angeles and population wise a lot are covered by geogrpahic coverage is pathetic in comparison.
 
Saw this article and started to laugh....

ATT wireless and speed: an oxymoron if there ever was one. I live in San "I wish they'd just provided decent coverage" Diego. My phone does the rumba switching between 3g and Edge WHEN I DO GET A SIGNAL. So with poor coverage, who cares about speed. Lets fix the root cause of most of ATT's problems: Coverage. They have acknowledged it as a major issue by thier CEO about a moth ago with San Francisco being the initial focus of improvement. Well, from what I have been told by locals, no improvement yet.

So when ATT starts down this path it is to distract us from the fact that Verizon is going to 4G next year and has, from a national perspective, much better coverage.

Funny stuff, ATT.
 
I agree with a lot of posters. The 3G network is really spotty and needs a lot of work. Upgrading something that doesn't quite work right is laughable. I'm in Chicago and have to run off the Edge network to make phone calls. AT&T seems more concerned with perspective than reality when it comes to their networks.
 
Verizon LTE Speeds NOT 100 Mbps At Launch

Check out this article.

While Verizon Wireless is launching LTE later this year or early next year ... speeds will not be on par with the 100 Mbps that many are quoting ... rather 8 - 12 Mbps at launch with an upgrade path towards 100 Mbps.

When we compare apples to apples, speeds will most likely be very similar on Verizon Wireless's LTE network at the start with AT&T HSPA+ network at 21 Mbps. Most likely in real life everyone will be around 10 - 15 Mbps two years from now ...
 
I am glad to hear they are skipping an upgrade to go higher faster. Although I would rather they jump the 21mps and get straight to 4G
 
AT&T needs to continue expanding their current 3G coverage and also get all areas up to one speed. Here in northern California the speed and coverage varies all over the place, but it is rarely "almost as fast as wifi" as Jobs stated when the 3G was announced.
 
whens LTE rollin out? i have found conflicting reports. Especially when will ATT and Verizon both have it? (LTE Verizon iPhone- the only way i see it coming to Verizon. Conservation of design)
 
If this means better reception, I am all for it

I tried making a few calls today and the lack of reception is just an absolute joke. It really borders on being criminal how bad it is on a supposive phone.
 
These speeds are meaningless since I only see bandwidth cap getting smaller, monthly cost to the consumers getting more expensive, and more draconian TOS (no streaming of any kind of content). Maybe AT&T should start by selling phones unlocked out of the box.
 
It sounds like ATT needed to throw some numbers out there to compete with all the attention Verizon will be getting with their new network.

But just like everyone has been saying, I'd rather have better coverage nationwide. The speed increase should be a given. But its still the reason I'm with verizon. Dependability. It's a phone afterall.
 
I wonder if the new chip in the iPhone is going to be able to handle the 21 mpbs or if it will be another update to the phone. iPhone 3G version 3?
 
Capacity

Theoretical speeds are one thing but their problem is capacity right now. What good does 7.2 do if you're not pumping the proper amount of bandwith to the tower now? This was just a press release for good headlines.

I want them to increase their trunks to the towers first. Then I'll be excited about possible speeds.
 
macnchiefs said:
I want them to increase their trunks to the towers first. Then I'll be excited about possible speeds.
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Exactly. Most 3G towers have about a 10 Mbps line. Which is better than older towers (1.5 Mbps), but small if you have lots of simultaneous users.

That's why carriers are having to spend big bucks upgrading their networks. For example, Verizon is running fiber to all their towers over the next five years, to give them at least 50 - 100 Mbps of backhaul.
 
3G in NYC on iPhone

How about AT&T fixes the coverage at the same time as implementing 21Mbps!! Sometimes my iPhone loads pages really fast, but most of the time (even with full signal) my phone takes forever to load simple websites. AT&T needs to increase their capacity, especially when planing for the next gen iPhone. There are more and more smart phones in the market now and the network just cant keep up
 
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