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May 14, 2008

Comparing WiMax with LTE

By Glenn Fleishman

Solid article in Computerworld about WiMax and cell standard LTE (Long Term Evolution): Given that LTE will be deployed by AT&T and Verizon, and WiMax by Sprint’s joint venture with Clearwire, it’s useful to study how the two standards compare. Fundamentally, LTE is an evolution of GSM, which makes it easier to deploy alongside existing GSM equipment; WiMax is all new, but it has the advantage of being ready to deploy now. The article puts mass-market availability for WiMax in the US as late 2010 (Clearwire’s estimate of 120 to 140m people passed by the end of 2010), while LTE won’t hit large populations until 2011 or 2012 in Verizon and AT&T’s plans. On the speed front, LTE has ostensibly a 100 Mpbs top while WiMax has a 70 Mbps top. In Clearwire’s deployment, noted here, the average speed will be 2 to 4 Mbps with peaks of 10 Mbps. LTE will likely have the same kind of provisioning, to allow peak usage as needed, but nowhere near the top. Also, the 70 Mbps figure for WiMax is for the largest possible profile—the biggest swath of spectrum. Clearwire isn’t deploying that profile.

Posted by Glennf at 2:58 PM | Comments (0)

May 5, 2008

T-Mobile Launches 3G in New York, Announces Plans

By Glenn Fleishman

T-Mobile launches an HSPA network in New York, with more markets to come in 2008: The company was rumored to be only offering voice over 3G and a UMTS network. The announcement today says they’ll offer full HSPA, with handsets coming later in the year for that network. For now, they have UMTS (slower) devices. That means that the network will operate at first due to device limitations just at 200 to 300 Kbps downstream. Because T-Mobile bought 1.7 GHz and 2.1 GHz spectrum, they’ll need special hardware designed for their network; 1.7 GHz isn’t used in the US previously or in Europe for 3G.

Posted by Glennf at 9:44 AM | Comments (1)