AT&T Optimizing EDGE Network Ahead Of iPhone

[peharri]

From my understanding, even though EDGE is a technology every wireless carrier can cover, ATT is the only one in North America really promoting it. It is possible to access the internet from WiFi but if the iPhone is only compatable with EDGE in the USA, ATT could have better assurance over who used the phone and on what network. I'm not claiming this is a bulletproof argument, but that could be the reason Apple only included EDGE; to satisfy ATT.

Pretty much every GSM carrier in the US I've ever used (AT&T, T-Mobile, Suncom (while roaming), etc) has rolled out EDGE.

I use it regularly with T-Mobile and generally get download speeds of anywhere between 30 and 80kbps. EDGE's real problem is with latency. No amount of bandwidth upgrades at the towers are going to help with that unfortunately. Latency makes a massive difference in both how fast something "feels" and even to some extent how fast it actually works: when browsing the web, you're typically loading many, many, objects, when downloading one webpage; and the higher the latency, the higher the delay before each object can actually be transmitted to your browser.

Latency is also why most current 3G standards aren't as pleasant to use as even the slower forms of DSL, though both the 3GPP and Qualcomm are working on serious reductions on their latest versions of UMTS and CDMA2000 respectively.

Don't expect anything decent on the iPhone regarding cellular data until the first UMTS version. And don't expect anything genuinely comfortable until the first HSUPA (one of the low latency enhancements to UMTS) or 3GPP rel. 8 version.

 

[jjd]

There is no way that apple would really introduce a revolutionary device like this and have it run on old technology. It would be like introducing apple TV but only letting it run on dialup internet.

errr.... you mean it would be like introducing Apple TV and having it only run SD... ???

 

[jhedges3]

I cannot understand why Apple decided to release their high-tech product first in the US. The cell phone penetration level and the enthusiasm for phone services and broadband uses are so much higher in Asia and Europe. In this respect, USA is a 3rd world country that is so many years behind that we won't in any way catch up. If anything, the gap keeps increasing.

It does seem an odd business decision to release the phone first in a country that has a poorly developed mobile phone network. The rest of the world is a much larger and more lucrative market then the US.

Cannot understand. Odd.

What I cannot understand is your logic? The idea is that an American multinational would not face a backlash from American consumers and would accrue increased profits by releasing their product first in Asia and Europe and or "the rest of the world?"

But if these non-American markets have greater penetration and more advanced technologies why again would it make more sense to start there? You're thinking that Apple has erred in wanting to capture some percentage of a set of customers who have an unfulfilled desire for just the sort of convergence device they've developed? Your idea is that they should instead abandon those potential customers for a time and work to compete in markets where in your estimation the level of technology is already higher?

Have you considered among other things that 88% of their retail stores are in the US? Do you know of any precedent of Apple releasing something elsewhere first? Can you really imagine the consequences of them deciding to release elsewhere first with the dizzying level of hype that has surrounded the iPhone even before it's released? And do you really believe that if your hypothesis was actually more likely to make them money they wouldn't be doing it right now?

 

[jjd]

Let's think about it for a second: the iPhone has WiFi so they are doing anything but shutting out the business market that cares about 3G. The speed differences are not nearly as huge as some are making it out to be, especially with the limited rollout of 3G in the US. It is mainly available in major cities which, hey have WiFi. It would be good to have 3G just for more options and the latest tech, but for me personally it's useless especially with the tradeoff with battery life and size.

See, I just don't get people hanging their hat on the fact that the phone as wifi. Wifi is not the answer for a mobile device. I mean, its great for students I guess, who will be in the same wifi environment day in and day out and will not have to hassle with passwords and the like. And sure it will work at home but who cares - that is why I have a desktop and a laptop. When I get off the subway and want to check a score, or drop in to starbucks and want to read the paper or am waiting for a flight at an airport and want to do some google searches, yes there is wifi around but 95% of the time I will need a password and in most cases I will need to pay for it. Just not worth the hassle. Not to mention if you are on a bus or train or a passenger in a car an actually moving - you need a MOBILE data network. And for that, EDGE is very, very weak.

So, why would they do this? Because us geeks don't matter. The truth is most people (and that does not include the people on this forum) aren't really going to stress the data requirements of this phone. Most people will want it for the cool factor first, the iPod functionality second and the rest is icing. They will send texts all day long on it and that will be the extent of most people's data needs. Thats why Apple went with 3 year old technology - most people don't care. My GF has NEVER - NEVER used the browser on her EDGE powered Blackberry, for example. And yet she has GOTTA have an iPhone.

I am an Apple zealot and spend a silly amount of money on Apple hardware, but I won't be getting an iPhone because I only want one device and it won't cut it for business. No Rim or Good push email, no physical keyboard, no speed dialling, no voice dialling. If I didn't need a "work-oriented" device I would get it, but things that would still bother me: keyboard doesn't work in landscape mode (why?), no video recording, no iSync (huh? - iSync works with 200 other phones but not the iPhone - crazy), no java on browser... oh and no 3G. And I have a sneaking suspicion that by about the 10th of July someone will be filing another class action insisting that Apple fix the scratch magnetic screen...

rant over

 

[JPyre]

Why are all these people from tiny countries bragging about how they get dsl speeds on their phone? Spain is almost 20x smaller than the United States. We've got 3x more area than the EU so of course the US' wireless coverage is going to lag behind everyone but Russia and Antarctica.

Spain 499,542 sqKm
EU 3,000,000 sqKm
US 9,161,923 sqKm

Wow... EDGE is really slow :-S
Spain has got 3.6 Mbps availability via HSDPA for more than 70% of the population (not territory). Upload speeds are 300 Kbps right now, but they've been bumped up to 1.4 Mbps just recently. Later this year they'll be 7.2/1.4 Mbps. And if you're not in the lucky 70%... there are 64 Kbps speeds for more than 95% of the Spanish territory, virtually 100% of Spain's population has those speeds.

Pink is were there's 64 Kbps speeds, Yellow is were there's no connection at all:



Orange is were there's 12.2 Kbps speeds, Beige is were there's no connection at all:

If all we (the US) had to cover was Texas (like you) it wouldn't be an issue.

There seems to be something really wrong with USA's broadband policies. Sure the US has less population density but... either way... WTF?

 

[heffeque]

Cannot understand. Odd.

What I cannot understand is your logic? The idea is that an American multinational would not face a backlash from American consumers and would accrue increased profits by releasing their product first in Asia and Europe and or "the rest of the world?"

But if these non-American markets have greater penetration and more advanced technologies why again would it make more sense to start there? You're thinking that Apple has erred in wanting to capture some percentage of a set of customers who have an unfulfilled desire for just the sort of convergence device they've developed? Your idea is that they should instead abandon those potential customers for a time and work to compete in markets where in your estimation the level of technology is already higher?

Have you considered among other things that 88% of their retail stores are in the US? Do you know of any precedent of Apple releasing something elsewhere first? Can you really imagine the consequences of them deciding to release elsewhere first with the dizzying level of hype that has surrounded the iPhone even before it's released? And do you really believe that if your hypothesis was actually more likely to make them money they wouldn't be doing it right now?

I have to concur with you there. In a market like the Asian with such an oversaturated smartphone selection of smartphones (and different taste/idea of what smartphones do) I sincerely think that the iPhone would be more a waste of time there, specially in the Japanese market where most phones have an integrated "wireless mastercard" called "Suica", a free service of DTT (Digital Terrestrial Television) that broadcasts in h.264 + AAC+ called 1 seg, a 3 Megapixel (or more) camera in the exterior, a 1 Megapixel one in the interior for videoconferencing, and now they even have very high end screens like the one in DoCoMo's 904i segment with resolutions of up to 854*480 compared to iPhone's 480*320 resolution. Some of them even have motion control that's used for gaming with the cellphone similar to the Wii-mote. Just take into consideration this: Nokia has less than a 1% share of Japanese market. You can tell things are very different there from the rest of the world.

If all we (the US) had to cover was Texas (like you) it wouldn't be an issue.

Like me? I'm not covering anything. Just some old loudspeakers under a cloth ;-)

 

[jhedges3]

I have to concur with you there. In a market like the Asian with such an oversaturated smartphone selection of smartphones (and different taste/idea of what smartphones do) I sincerely think that the iPhone would be more a waste of time there, specially in the Japanese market where most phones have an integrated "wireless mastercard" called "Suica", a free service of DTT (Digital Terrestrial Television) that broadcasts in h.264 + AAC+ called 1 seg, a 3 Megapixel (or more) camera in the exterior, a 1 Megapixel one in the interior for videoconferencing, and now they even have very high end screens like the one in DoCoMo's 904i segment with resolutions of up to 854*480 compared to iPhone's 480*320 resolution. Some of them even have motion control that's used for gaming with the cellphone similar to the Wii-mote. Just take into consideration this: Nokia has less than a 1% share of Japanese market. You can tell things are very different there from the rest of the world.



Like me? I'm not covering anything. Just some old loudspeakers under a cloth ;-)

The Suica stuff looks really cool.

 

[rtdunham]

embarrassing

It's clear that there is a disparity. But why is it that you assume the disparity is attributable to "USA's broadband policies?"

Could it not be a combination of factors, some good and some bad and some just how it is? Are you suggesting, for example, that the disparity has nothing at all to do with simply being at this point in the progression of this market in the US and the various factors that have gotten us to this point?

In addition, why restrict your comparison to the US and Spain? Even though most of us already know the take home message (the one you and so many others like to remind us of, the US has in some respects lagged technology) you might as well give us some numbers or figures that compare the US to other European nations or other Western nations or the rest of the world.

I guess for you, though, the problem with opening the comparison up in that respect is that doing so might, regardless of the result, dilute some of the unspoken satisfaction that we can assume you derive from pointing out that your country in particular has faster networks. This pride, and the faster transmission of wireless data, has me yearning to leave New York for Spain as soon as possible. I just have to find a nice Spanish girl to make it happen, assuming that Homeland Security still allows for that sort of thing.

your post seems sort of reactionary, moderated only a bit in your follow-up posts. maybe i'm just finding "the other side's" arguments more compelling. ah well...

 

[jhedges3]

well, this was a totally uninformed and embarrassing post. knock that chip off your shoulder, fellow American, and just deal with the facts.

What's uninformed about it?

What are the facts and what do those facts have to do with what I said?

 

[shamino]

there are 64 Kbps speeds for more than 95% of the Spanish territory, virtually 100% of Spain's population has those speeds.

Pink is were there's 64 Kbps speeds, Yellow is were there's no connection at all:



Orange is were there's 12.2 Kbps speeds, Beige is were there's no connection at all:



There seems to be something really wrong with USA's broadband policies. Sure the US has less population density but... either way... WTF?

First off, as others have pointed out, Spain has a lot less area to cover.

Second, a lot of the "no service" areas on that US map (especially in the western half) are places with very low population density. It doesn't make sense to set up cell phone towers in the middle of empty land where there aren't even roads, let alone towns.

Third, is this a GSM-only map? CDMA is much much more popular in the US. It is well known that GSM coverage in the US is far from complete.

My "real world performance" numbers of Verizon Wireless are pretty pathetic. I get about 10KB/s - 80KB/s MAX ... Usually more like 18KB/s. Anything better than that would be fabulous.

Must be your location. My experience with Verizon EVDO (in a suburb of Washington DC) is a lot faster than what you're reporting. Sprint's current EVDO offering actually outperforms my DSL line. Are you using EVDO or are you using the older and slower "1X" service?

ISDN I remember that was quite popular around -99 or something, nowadays you can't even order it... Has the whole US gone completly Amish when it comes to internet connections or what? *teasing*

Ah yes, ISDN. Short for "it still does nothing" .

Seriously, the US jumped right past ISDN and went straight to DSL and cable modems (and fiber-optic solutions today.)

ISDN was always overpriced and underpowered in the US.

If there's no 3g chip, how do you expect them to suddenly enable it?

Assuming the chip's not there. People were surprised when Apple started shipping MacBooks with disabled pre-n WiFi cards as well.

I agree with you, that it is unlikely they'd use a 3G chip and not turn it on, but I would've said the same thing about pre-n WiFi. Once the iPhone ships, I'm sure a few enterprising individuals will decide to take it apart and identify the actual chips. Only then will we really know what they can and can not enable with a firmware update.

 

[Tara Davis]

See, I just don't get people hanging their hat on the fact that the phone as wifi. Wifi is not the answer for a mobile device. I mean, its great for students I guess, who will be in the same wifi environment day in and day out and will not have to hassle with passwords and the like. And sure it will work at home but who cares - that is why I have a desktop and a laptop. When I get off the subway and want to check a score, or drop in to starbucks and want to read the paper or am waiting for a flight at an airport and want to do some google searches, yes there is wifi around but 95% of the time I will need a password and in most cases I will need to pay for it. Just not worth the hassle. Not to mention if you are on a bus or train or a passenger in a car an actually moving - you need a MOBILE data network. And for that, EDGE is very, very weak.

So, why would they do this? Because us geeks don't matter. The truth is most people (and that does not include the people on this forum) aren't really going to stress the data requirements of this phone. Most people will want it for the cool factor first, the iPod functionality second and the rest is icing. They will send texts all day long on it and that will be the extent of most people's data needs. Thats why Apple went with 3 year old technology - most people don't care. My GF has NEVER - NEVER used the browser on her EDGE powered Blackberry, for example. And yet she has GOTTA have an iPhone.

I am an Apple zealot and spend a silly amount of money on Apple hardware, but I won't be getting an iPhone because I only want one device and it won't cut it for business. No Rim or Good push email, no physical keyboard, no speed dialling, no voice dialling. If I didn't need a "work-oriented" device I would get it, but things that would still bother me: keyboard doesn't work in landscape mode (why?), no video recording, no iSync (huh? - iSync works with 200 other phones but not the iPhone - crazy), no java on browser... oh and no 3G. And I have a sneaking suspicion that by about the 10th of July someone will be filing another class action insisting that Apple fix the scratch magnetic screen...

rant over

Sounds like you want a blackberry with a data contract.

Not everybody shares your needs.

I'm constantly at or near free WiFi hotspots, and if I need to get online it's not such a burden to go find one. I don't browse in moving cars and have no desire to pay 30 bucks a month for the privilege of doing so.

 

[Earendil]

Sounds like you want a blackberry with a data contract.

Not everybody shares your needs.

I'm constantly at or near free WiFi hotspots, and if I need to get online it's not such a burden to go find one. I don't browse in moving cars and have no desire to pay 30 bucks a month for the privilege of doing so.

Same here. If I wanted to be able to search the internet in my daily life more often, it would be easier for me to find a wifi hotspot, than it would be to lug my laptop around with me everywhere.
Even if the iPhone only had access to the internet via wifi, it would still greatly improve my internet access.

~Tyler

 

[Lanbrown]

It's been rumoured elsewhere that the iPhone will have a different form factor in Europe. That could mean it will have a slightly larger case to accommodate 3G. Let's hope so.

It doesn't add that much room in any. Most of the current chipsets provide GSM (2G), GPRS (2.5G), EDGE (2.75G), 3G (UMTS) and HSDPA (3.5G) in one package.

 

[Lanbrown]

From my understanding, even though EDGE is a technology every wireless carrier can cover, ATT is the only one in North America really promoting it. It is possible to access the internet from WiFi but if the iPhone is only compatable with EDGE in the USA, ATT could have better assurance over who used the phone and on what network. I'm not claiming this is a bulletproof argument, but that could be the reason Apple only included EDGE; to satisfy ATT.

T-Mobile has EDGE in most areas as well. By nature the phone will also support GPRS. Not includung 3G has nothing to do with AT&T. AT&T is spending a lot of money getting 3G rolled out, why wouldn't they want it used?

 

[Lanbrown]

Still not getting ya I'm afraid... if anything isn't AT&T the only GSM carrier with any real 3G in the USA? Assuming people manage to unlock the iPhone, EDGE would work just as well on T-Mobile (and whatever other smaller GSM carriers there might be). If Apple included 3G, it's not like anyone overseas would be able to use it anyway due to conflicting 3G frequencies used, and here it would pretty much just work on AT&T (until T-Mobile rolls out 3G, I don't know if they've already started), so don't see how it would be a bad thing for them at this time.

Though, I buy the argument that Apple didn't include it due to technical limitations (size, battery, whatever) but that we'll definitely see a second revision before too long that has 3G for the US market.

T-Mobile will have their 3G on yet another frequency not used in Europe.

 

[Lanbrown]

Third, is this a GSM-only map? CDMA is much much more popular in the US. It is well known that GSM coverage in the US is far from complete.

In the US there are places where CDMA isn't offered and they rely on analog. My GSM phones works just fine though. Care to guess who is offering the analog service that Verizon and Sprint use? Yep, AT&T and what do you think will happen next year when they turn it off? CDMA phone users won't be taking any calls in those areas.

 

[shamino]

In the US there are places where CDMA isn't offered and they rely on analog. My GSM phones works just fine though. Care to guess who is offering the analog service that Verizon and Sprint use? Yep, AT&T and what do you think will happen next year when they turn it off? CDMA phone users won't be taking any calls in those areas.

Did you have a point to make? Are you trying to imply that GSM has better coverage in the US? Go compare the different carriers' coverage maps and then tell me which covers more area.

I never said that you couldn't find a place where there is only GSM. I said that GSM is not as widespread as CDMA. This is a known fact.

(And if you think personal anecdotes are more important than statistics, I've got a counter-example for you. I routinely travel to rural parts of the northeastern US (central PA, NY's fingerlakes region, etc.). My Verizon/CDMA phone always has digital service there. When I go with friends, their GSM phones are completely dead - no signal whatsoever.)