Official new iPhone 4

Originally Posted by Rambo

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I thought I remembered reading somewhere that Verizon was already testing as well.
Supposedly it's already running, but handsets for it aren't readily available yet. I just found something interesting. http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2374564,00.asp

Originally Posted by Tokyo Slim

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Supposedly it's already running, but handsets for it aren't readily available yet. I just found something interesting. http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2374564,00.asp
That is interesting. They basically said "*******!" and caved into the telco's definitions.

It's all bullshit.

Originally Posted by Tokyo Slim

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It's all bullshit.

Its the American way

Originally Posted by Tokyo Slim

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This makes no sense, but ok.

They are all misleading people. I don't see why LTE people get a pass. Both technologies surpass the 3G standard. Neither qualify for the 4G standard. They are both a stop-gap technology, and most of the major players (including AT&T) are going to be on a nationwide LTE Advanced 4G network when it becomes available around late 2012. AT&T's LTE network is up and in testing as we speak.
What I am getting at is HSPA+ has been around for a while. ATT deciding to suddenly call it 4G is nothing but cheap marketing meant to fool the public at large. It's completely disingenuous. The consumer will be buying these HSPA+ "4G" handsets and be getting the same speeds they have currently. It's shortsighted too, because how is ATT going to sell their LTE network once it's fully rolled out if they are calling their old/current network 4G? LTE is a new network technology and will offer some tangible advances to the consumer. It's not misleading to sell it as such.

Originally Posted by JMRouse

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What I am getting at is HSPA+ has been around for a while. ATT deciding to suddenly call it 4G is nothing but cheap marketing meant to fool the public at large. It's completely disingenuous. The consumer will be buying these HSPA+ "4G" handsets and be getting the same speeds they have currently. It's shortsighted too, because how is ATT going to sell their LTE network once it's fully rolled out if they are calling their old/current network 4G? LTE is a new network technology and will offer some tangible advances to the consumer. It's not misleading to sell it as such.
I think you are complaining about something you don't really know about. HSPA+ has been around since July. It's about 2 months older than LTE in this country. OMG! AT&T will call their 4G Network HSPA+ and LTE. They are touting themselves as the only carrier with both types of 4G networks. According to the new "rules" HSPA+ is just as much 4G as LTE is. According to the old "rules" neither is. Since the new rules were meant to appease Joe Stupid, duped by Marketing into thinking 3G is 4G, it's all disingenuous anyways.

I'm about as perturbed by the softening of the 4G standard to appease the marketers as I am the corruption of the measurement gigabyte by Apple to appease some HDD marketers.

What's next, changing everything to metric, but renaming all the names the same so we don't get confused?

1 mile = 1000 feet!

Originally Posted by Tokyo Slim

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I think you are complaining about something you don't really know about. HSPA+ has been around since July. It's about 2 months older than LTE in this country. OMG!

AT&T will call their 4G Network HSPA+ and LTE. They are touting themselves as the only carrier with both types of 4G networks.

According to the new "rules" HSPA+ is just as much 4G as LTE is. According to the old "rules" neither is. Since the new rules were meant to appease Joe Stupid, duped by Marketing into thinking 3G is 4G, it's all disingenuous anyways.

I still say there is a difference here. HSPA+ is a stop gap upgrade to the current 3G network. If they wanted to call it 3.5G or whatever, I wouldn't have a problem with it.

LTE is a new network infrastructure and is the future. LTE Advanced will be an upgrade upon it and based on the same core technology.

Also, there is a real danger to the consumer with ATT's 4G = "HSPA+ and LTE" strategy. It allows them to half ass their upgrade process while still claiming to have a large 4G network. It limits the incentive for them to roll out LTE to the masses when their customers on HSPA+ think they are already getting 4G.

Originally Posted by JMRouse

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I still say there is a difference here. HSPA+ is a stop gap upgrade to the current 3G network. If they wanted to call it 3.5G or whatever, I wouldn't have a problem with it.
You can think what you want, but you are wrong Your position doesn't make sense. Everything is a stop gap upgrage to technology that is years away.

LTE is a new network infrastructure and is the future. LTE Advanced will be an upgrade upon it and based on the same core technology.

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Yes, in the future. It's two years away from even being available, and like current LTE - who knows how long it will be until it reaches it's promised speeds. Current industy estimates are 5-8 years... LTE and WiMAX aren't much, if any faster than HSPA+ RIGHT NOW. In fact, T-Mobile's HSPA+ has proven faster than Sprint 4G WiMax in independant testing and negligably slower than LTE. It's probable that HSPA+ will be faster than WiMax and even with LTE for the next four or five years.

Also, there is a real danger to the consumer with ATT's 4G = "HSPA+ and LTE" strategy. It allows them to half ass their upgrade process while still claiming to have a large 4G network. It limits the incentive for them to roll out LTE to the masses when their customers on HSPA+ think they are already getting 4G.

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As of a couple weeks ago, they are. Before that - nobody was. Real 4G is still years away from existing here.

Originally Posted by Tokyo Slim

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I'm about as perturbed by the softening of the 4G standard to appease the marketers as I am the corruption of the measurement gigabyte by Apple to appease some HDD marketers.

What are the details on this, Slim?

Originally Posted by breakz

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What are the details on this, Slim?
Here http://www.tuaw.com/2009/08/29/snow-...r-than-before/ Technically, I suppose it was an un-corruption. But still... It changed the way computers have been reporting HDD space for... well... forever. The space itself didn't change, just the measurement.

Originally Posted by Tokyo Slim

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This is why a GB of RAM reads as 1024MB
On a PC, a 100GB drive reads as 93GB.
On a Mac a 100GB drive reads as 100GB

I'm familiar with the memory measurement issue on computers, but I'm embarrassed about missing the conversion from binary to decimal. That's shady stuff--didn't know about it.

I still remember that when Snow Leopard came out journalists were reporting they had "freed up to 7GB of memory!!"

Originally Posted by breakz

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I still remember that when Snow Leopard came out journalists were reporting they had "freed up to 7GB of memory!!"

Originally Posted by Walt Mossberg

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One delightful change: Snow Leopard takes up less than half the room on a hard disk that Leopard did, and Apple says the average user who upgrades will free up about 7 gigabytes of space. On my 2008-vintage MacBook Pro, I gained back a whopping 14 gigabytes.
^ ...and yes, before anyone jumps on my case - I used "PC" to mean a Windows based PC, though it could also mean pre- Snow Leopard Macs and a few other OS'es. I think Linux also reports in Base 10, but I'm not positive. Sorry. If you'll notice, I edited my entire post. Nobody's perfect.

Originally Posted by Tokyo Slim

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You can think what you want, but you are wrong

Your position doesn't make sense. Everything is a stop gap upgrage to technology that is years away.



Yes, in the future. It's two years away from even being available, and like current LTE - who knows how long it will be until it reaches it's promised speeds. Current industy estimates are 5-8 years... LTE and WiMAX aren't much, if any faster than HSPA+ RIGHT NOW. In fact, T-Mobile's HSPA+ has proven faster than Sprint 4G WiMax in independant testing and negligably slower than LTE. It's probable that HSPA+ will be faster than WiMax and even with LTE for the next four or five years.



As of a couple weeks ago, they are. Before that - nobody was. Real 4G is still years away from existing here.

Not sure if you are just playing contrarian or not, but I will try and explain my issue with this again.

HSPA+ is an upgrade upon the 3G network. It's pretty much a dead end technology. Once LTE is deployed they won't keep upgrading it. LTE is the future here in the US. Three of the major carriers are backing it and their has been hints that Sprint may be open to it instead of putting all their eggs in the WiMax basket. Again, if they want to call HSPA+ 3.5G or whatever, that's fine, but it is not a new generation of network technology. Calling it a 4G network is misleading.

LTE in it's current form as being deployed may not be at it's full potential yet, but it is a new generation network. HSPA+ may currently be able to reach or slightly beat it in certain circumstances, but that's irrelevant. LTE Advanced will be built upon the currently being deployed LTE network. Even if LTE's speeds don't match what was originally called for with a "4G" network, it will be there in the future with LTE Advanced.

It's great that ATT is upgrading their networks and HSPA+ will be a nice boon to their customers. I'm an ATT customer and I look forward to the day I will be able to get an iPhone with HSPA+ built in even if LTE is not mature enough. My issue is simply with the fact ATT is choosing to call HSPA+ 4G.

Originally Posted by JMRouse

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Not sure if you are just playing contrarian or not, but I will try and explain my issue with this again. HSPA+ is an upgrade upon the 3G network. It's pretty much a dead end technology. Once LTE is deployed they won't keep upgrading it. LTE is the future here in the US. Three of the major carriers are backing it and their has been hints that Sprint may be open to it instead of putting all their eggs in the WiMax basket. Again, if they want to call HSPA+ 3.5G or whatever, that's fine, but it is not a new generation of network technology. Calling it a 4G network is misleading.
4G isn't what you think it is then, because HSPA+ is just as "4G" as LTE. Neither are technically 4G by the old definition. They are both well above 3G performance. HSPA+ is currently, and for the foreseeable near future, is the more capable network. The only benefit of LTE over HSPA+ right now is the promise of potential performance increases past the potential performance increases of HSPA+, and that sometime in the future, they may upgrade the system. But they aren't planning to do that for years. You may be misleading yourself.

LTE in it's current form as being deployed may not be at it's full potential yet, but it is a new generation network. HSPA+ may currently be able to reach or slightly beat it in certain circumstances, but that's irrelevant. LTE Advanced will be built upon the currently being deployed LTE network. Even if LTE's speeds don't match what was originally called for with a "4G" network, it will be there in the future with LTE Advanced.

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You didn't read anything I wrote. It being a "new generation network" is what's largely irrelevant. HSPA+ is a new generation network too. That has nothing to do with being 4G. 4G is a rating granted by a committee - that up until last month - nobody came close to meeting the conditions of. Not a technological definition of new hardware. And when the rating standard was lowered, LTE, WiMAX, and HSPA+ all became 4G. You cannot claim LTE is 4G and not the others. They either all are, or none of them are. HSPA+ is (theory aside) just as fast as LTE, and will be for a while. It just happens to use the same packet protocol and bandwidth as the old system. It's not like they just added a stick of RAM and said, "Bam, now it's faster!". You are arguing that the promise of theoretical increased future performance is more "official" than actual performance, which is, in your argument, irrelevant.

It's great that ATT is upgrading their networks and HSPA+ will be a nice boon to their customers. I'm an ATT customer and I look forward to the day I will be able to get an iPhone with HSPA+ built in even if LTE is not mature enough. My issue is simply with the fact ATT is choosing to call HSPA+ 4G.

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They didn't "decide to" do anything. HSPA+ officially became 4G last month. Before that, they were pretty adamant that the other companies calling their services 4G were misleading people. They were calling their system 3.5G for a while. Then the standards were lowered, making their system officially 4G. They changed their marketing to reflect this. They'd be idiots not to.