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Now I know why apple kept FaceTime for wifi only.

TSX

TSX

macrumors 68030
Original poster
Oct 1, 2008
2,632
80
Texas
After using FaceTime over 3G I know why apple kept it wifi only. Where I live I get poor reception, and I tried FaceTime over 3G. It was super laggy and even had about a 45 second delay between the 2 iPhones.

Now when I'm in an area with good 3G everything is fine. I guess apple wanted to keep the experience good.
 
http://gizmodo.com/5602597/how-much-data-does-a-3g-facetime-call-use

FaceTime also sucks up data like no other

500x_3gfacetime.jpg
 
Yesterday I had my friend use his Droid to give me wifi so I could use FaceTime, to my surprise that shlt looked great!! I thought verizons 3G was slower than At&ts lol uh well
 
cocky jeremy said:
Luckily, i still have unlimited data. :)
Click to expand...

If you're not jailbroken, AT&T is going to try to find a way to get subscribers out of their grandfathered unlimited plans, like they tried to do with tethering being limited to the 2GB plan.

and don't forget them trying to institute a fee as well.
 
After jailbreaking the phone, do you have to pay to use the app that allows you to FaceTime over 3G?
 
ITS ME DAVID said:
Did u use my3g op ? How many bars did u have ?
Click to expand...

Yea, I used my3g, I had about 1 bar maybe 2 and it was laggy and even had a delay between the two iPhones. Like I said when I have full bars everything is good.
 
You can see the difference when you use FaceTime, and then use Fring over 3G. I think Apple also wanted FaceTime's debut to be pristine. Right now, it's a clean, smooth video. Good sound. Good sync. It's amazing as they claimed. If it had 3G from the start, people would probably being using it more often over 3G, and the perception of how good it is would be severely tarnished. It wouldn't be much better than any other video chat app/service.
 
skiltrip said:
You can see the difference when you use FaceTime, and then use Fring over 3G. I think Apple also wanted FaceTime's debut to be pristine. Right now, it's a clean, smooth video. Good sound. Good sync. It's amazing as they claimed. If it had 3G from the start, people would probably being using it more often over 3G, and the perception of how good it is would be severely tarnished. It wouldn't be much better than any other video chat app/service.
Click to expand...

The key thing with Facetime whether it be 3g or Wifi is the upstream bandwidth. Figure the typical Broadband wifi has 512kbps up. AT&Ts network in some areas has 1mbps+ up so facetime over 3g in those areas would theoretically be better than on wifi. That being said the AT&T network and consistency is an issue. One can run 2 speed tests from 2 spots 1 foot apart and get different results. Ultimately this is an issue AT&T will have to address over the long term for facetime to be viable. OP: Did you run a speed test to see the speeds you were getting? At lower bars I find my upload (and download speeds to some degree) to be terrible. For example at -88dbm in my office I get 708down, 43kbps up. That's not going to cut it for facetime and will result in a HORRIBLE experience. Exact same spot, ran another speed test, -80DBM, 814kbps down, 724kbps up. A third run about 1 foot away from the original spot and I got -80dbm, 1123kbps down, 1210kbps up (better on the upstream than a lot of broadband connections). The last two results should be sufficient for a solid Facetime experience. Both times I wasn't touching the phone it was simply laying on my desk. You can see that the consistency of the AT&T network is at issue here and until that gets fixed, the results will vary greatly from call to call.

CONSISTENCY of connection speed is key for facetime.
 
I suggested GooderVideo MotionPerfect to Apple, so I hope they can find a way to incorporate it for smooth video over very choppy frame rates. Check out the product page (no affiliation) and 22fps sample video made from only 4 fps: http://www.goodervideo.com/products/MP.html That can severely reduce the upstream bandwidth required.

Also, what's the resolution that's being sent and received? We're not talking Retina Display, are we?
 
This is what Apple meant when they said they were "working with the carriers" on Facetime over 3G. The carriers need to set up their networks so that the network itself understands what facetime is.

The cellular network needs to understand which apps need sustained speeds and which ones are better served by quick bursts. Without an official 3G-Facetime the network just treats it the same as any other app and it doesn't know that Facetime would rather have one smooth slow speed instead of a bunch of fast and slow speeds intermixed.

(This is, incidentally, EXATLY why Firewire 400 was great for video editing purposes and USB 2 was terrible. Firewire was made to be consistant whereas USB varied its speed to be more efficient. That's great for file transfers but not great for smooth video playback.)

None of this is to say that I think AT&T will have 3G facetime anytime soon. They've got other issues besides this. But in other countries where you will see it on 3G soon, these are the issues they will have to work on on those networks. Facetime won't be great on 3G until the networks set themselves up for it. It's not a matter of raw speed.
 
anonymous guy said:
If you're not jailbroken, AT&T is going to try to find a way to get subscribers out of their grandfathered unlimited plans, like they tried to do with tethering being limited to the 2GB plan.

and don't forget them trying to institute a fee as well.
Click to expand...

You mean like the Legacy fee that AT&T charged to Blue subcribers? Even if they wanted to charge a fee like that to grandfathered customers. That's still a long way off and they would also have to allow people out of their contracts with no ETF.

I Doubt AT&T Mobility will do that any time soon. And when they do that it would probarly be with the introduction of iPhone 6 or even iPhone 7
 
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