With all the buzz last night at W.T.’s Civic Bandwidth Event, and much
discussion about both Toronto Hydro, and Bell/Rogers Wi-Max, one
sea-change was missed.
Rogers/Fido has started rolling out the latest 850mhz UTMS/HSDPA
network, that is currently sweaping the international telco community.
In fact, if you could get hold of a 850mhz 3G phone you could access it
in the down town areas. When will things get more official, and you can
buy that dick-tracy video watch, who knows.
HSDPA, which has better performance than Bell’s EV-DO service, has to be
viewed as a direct competitor to the wi-max and Toronto Hydro services.
Only this time with the advantages of compact technology and true
mobility. Overseas, in more rural areas, its is even becomming accepted
as the cost-effective solution for commercial Internet access. Far
cheaper than deploying land based solutions.
While this won’t affect Wireless Toronto, which is focused on free
access at the community level, it’s certainly going to make for fun
times at the commercial end of the market.
I think Rogers’s HSPDA rollout is about the same speed as Bell/Telus’s EV-DO network. Users seem to be reporting speeds of roughly 1-3Mbps (cite: HowardForums). It might be better to say that Rogers/Fido have finally caught up! 😉
In any case, Bell/Telus are gearing up to release EV-DO Release A this year, which will bring about 3Mbps+ speeds to CDMA users. Both HSPDA and EVDO have a healthy evolutionary path for the near future.
Yes. The theoretical peak for HSPDA is something like 3.6Mbps.
Telstra (australia), which is currently shutting down its CDMA EV-DO network, has an upgrade to its 3G network scheduled this year that will push the peak up to 14.4Mbps. Rogers will presumably follow suit; but when 🙂
I completely disagree that HSDPA or EVDO can be a competitor to the other offerings.
One reason: Cost.
Sure its cheaper to deploy than land-based services, but for you and me to USE the service is far too expensive. Rogers charges $210 per month for a measly 500 megabytes of access to HSDPA on your laptop or phone.
This wouldn’t last long for most users. That’s only HALF A GB for $210!! (Plus massive overage charges)
Of course, they also will give you an even smaller plan of 200 megabytes for $100. (Plus massive overage charges)
This cannot compete with the affordable Wi-Max or Wi-Fi prices. And, these HSDPA prices are the new improved offerings from Rogers/Fido. All the cellular carriers match their plans/prices and right now competition does not exist. When the Wi-Max started, it was called iFido and costed less. Then Rogers/Bell took over. They want to sell that, not this EVDO/HSDPA. They do not think that average consumers need data, but instead they target large corporations who will pay these astronomical prices for HSDPA/EVDO. Not to mention, they don’t want to put a dent in their home internet businesses!
I own a 850 HSDPA phone, and my conclusion is: Who cares about 3G, UTMS, HSDPA when they aren’t within reach for most people anyways? I know I’m not excited at all. I don’t want to sell the car to pay for a very easily-reachable $10,000 data bill.