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Opinions wanted - CDMA iPhone vs. GSM iPhone, which would YOU prefer?
- Thread starter foreignconcepts
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GSM with AT&T, however an option in the future for an Unlocked GSM would be nice too, so when traveling abroad, I could use the phone without being beat in the head with a heavy AT&T bill.
GSM for the traveling flexibility, but on an unlocked phone. I am one of those who prefer the stability of an unlocked iPhone. But I am FORCED to jailbreak and unlock it just so I can use it overseas with local SIM card. Flashing the IOS before and after every trip is getting old...
Your numbers, although roughly correct, don't really have anything to do with the topic. Apple build the Mac for 100% of the market; there's no one sector of the market that can't use a Mac. Whereas with CDMA, they're developing a phone that will only reach 14% of the worldwide market, assuming that everyone who uses CDMA technology buys a CDMA iPhone.
GSM would appear to be "the standard" around the world, with over one billion subscribers (according to gsm.org). Why build a phone that only works on so few networks?
Apple do sell the iPhone unlocked, just not in the US. I have an unlocked iPhone 4 right here
I fully agree with you. The point was that sales or usage popularity isn't the sole reason to get something.
I think they might at first only go after the North and Latin American CDMA market, which is something like 200 million active subs.
Because, as has been pointed out many times before, a billion poor GSM users do not magically equate to expensive smartphone + data plan users.
This has been repeatedly demonstrated by iPhone sales history in populous but poor countries, where uptake of the iPhone is often measured in mere tenths of one percent.
Contrast that to the far wealthier nations, and especially to North America with 12-16% uptake, which has accounted for half of all iPhone world sales since it came out.
The NA market potential for CDMA sales is roughly equal to most of the non-North American GSM world. In other words, the potential to be 1/3 of world sales.
Giving that market up totally to Android and others, is just bad business. Apple knows this; it's partly why they spent time trying to get Verizon interested in the original iPhone.
I don't think i'll ever buy another CDMA phone, they seem to be getting obsolete in north america for the most part.
I think for the cost of investment, CDMA is a better technology for the US since we have a vast amount of land to cover. Less towers to maintain = less $$$ to spend. If GSM/UMTS/HSPA/HSPA+ is properly implemented, I would take that any day. I think the reason we gripe so much about AT&T and T-Mobile here in the US is that the GSM/UMTS/HSPA implementation can be considered good at best. The vast land area in the US is makes GSMUMTS/HSPA/HSPA+ far trickier since it covers less ground. Though you would think with those profits that AT&T keeps announcing and the text messaging prices that they would be able to afford to put more towers in the right places.
And that only happen because of money and government intervention.
Back before WCDMA (GSM 3G) it was TDMA (GSM) and CDMA.
At that time CDMA was better tech but cost more money. TDMA was much cheaper to created and over in Europe they forced it by law.
These types of quotes always make me laugh. The world, minus the US, has had this capability for quite a long time. It is nothing new. Just that the US operators look at this as another way to screw you over.
What poor billion are you referring to? China or India maybe? You seem to have forgotten all of Europe where the first GSM call was actually made. Radiolinja, in downtown Helsinki. About 700 meters from my house. Second, unlike in the US, European operators actually encourage data usage and have these really cool things called: Unlimited data contracts. I have two in fact. One for my iPhone4 (comes with a double sim which goes into my iPad) and another for my portable wifi device. Both combined cost a whopping 20 a month. All data, all the time. And then there is the rest of the world you failed to mention. The Mid East is using lots of data as is Asia. The fact that Nokia, SE, Motorola, Android, as well as Apple seem to be tapping into these markets mean that GSM is the standard because it sells better than CDMA.
GSM, hands down.
With CDMA being locked technology, carrier wars aside, I would like to use my iPhone wherever I may go. And since everywhere I'd go has GSM and not CDMA, it's a no-brainer. GSM's portability scales tons better than CDMA, whose portability doesn't scale at all.
BL.
With CDMA being locked technology, carrier wars aside, I would like to use my iPhone wherever I may go. And since everywhere I'd go has GSM and not CDMA, it's a no-brainer. GSM's portability scales tons better than CDMA, whose portability doesn't scale at all.
BL.
GSM for me. Every single CDMA provider here in Canada has either moved to HSPA (including regional companies like Sasktel) or are planning to in the near future
If those events are outside the US, you're screwed. If you decide to travel out of the US, your iPhone is useless as a phone. Port your account to Sprint or any other CDMA network? No-can-do. I can take my GSM iPhone to Optus in Australia, Softbank in Japan, O2 in the UK, T-Mobile in Germany, Orange in France, or Rogers in Canada. All I'd need is the sim card for that network. Verizon, China Telecom (or China Unicom, whichever one is CDMA in China), and Sprint can't. So not only would you be locked to that CDMA network, you're locked to that carrier, and to the country it is used in.
That is why CDMA doesn't scale well with portability. VZW and Sprint will always have that problem as long as they keep their current CDMA network. When they get rid of it, they'll be on an even keel. Until then, GSM > CDMA.
BL.
CDMA is "popular" in the US and Latin America, but the rest of the world relies on GSM. China, India, Europe (where phone penetration has exceeded 100%) all use GSM. Compare this to the US market and you have a much bigger market outside of the US than in the US.
In reality, it all depends on whether it makes economic sense. There's no point spending however many dollars on developing a CDMA phone unless revenue exceeds development cost. However, in developing a CDMA phone you're instantly taking away one of the iPhone's strengths as a "worldwide phone". I can use my GSM iPhone in the States, just try using your CDMA phone here in Ireland.
It's mute point because it doesn't matter as we are talking about the USA carriers.
What matters in this case is whether CDMA is a good service in the USA and most importantly is CDMA and the iPhone a good match in the USA?
Both CDMA and gsm at least where I live are equally reliable.
Marc
But why are we talking just the US? Last time I checked the iPhone was sold worldwide.
I really don't have a preference. I have used both types of phones in the past and had good and bad experiences with each. I think in the resale market a gsm phone will fetch more.
I thought the beginning of this post, we were talking about the two technologies in general and not carriers, which then makes this more of a world wide discussion. Just remember, the world is flat
I think you failed to understand his logic and his agrument.
Now I do not know the numbers for real but instead going to sum up what he was saying.
He is saying looking at iPhone current sales the US is roughly 1/3-1/2 of all iPhone sales world wide.
Now given that infomation Verizon (CDMA) market size is roughly the same size as AT&T. Therefor by not making an CDMA iPhone Apple is killing off growing its sales by 1/4-1/3.
He is pointing out while GSM might be larger than than CDMA that number means nothing number wise for high end smart phones which is still mostly limited number wise to the rich western countries of the world
Yes, those are part of the supposedly "huge" GSM market that actually does not exist for an expensive phone with data needs. India alone has over 433 million GSM subscribers (30% of the GSM world), but last I checked, only about 50K iPhones have been sold. Reason: cost vs. income.
For that matter, the iPhone barely sold in wealthy Japan (~500K over its first year) until it was given away for free on contract.
I'm not forgetting Europe, it's one of the few actual GSM smartphone markets, and it accounts for about 30% of iPhone yearly sales. And yet... that was only about 8 million sales last year from an area with 544 million GSM users.
Europe still favors Symbian phones over all others. Heck, in parts of Europe, Windows Mobile is used as much or more than iOS.
So let's see. India and Europe. Almost a billion GSM subs, and less than 9 million sales. ATT alone beat that last year. See below.
On the contrary, it could be very close. Last year, 24.7 million iPhones were sold worldwide, 10.3 million of them (42%) to ATT users.
That's a world-beating 12.5% of only 82 million ATT subs, which is why the USA is the most important iPhone market. (The next biggest is usually Canada, then the buyer-to-sub percentage drops off quickly once we get past a half dozen Western type countries.)
Now, there are 137 million CDMA subs in the USA alone. If a less-than-ATT 10% of them got an iPhone, that'd be almost 14 million sales, or the equivalent of the entire non-USA iPhone sales last year.
So whenever people naively bring up "a billion and a half GSM user market", they clearly haven't done any research at all into actual iPhone sales. Otherwise, they'd realize that North America and Europe are the main iPhone buyers (especially NA), and that the CDMA market is a potentially major one for Apple.
This is all without taking into consideration what leaving 2/3 of the USA market to Android etc can mean for the future.