Subject: [NEXTEL-1] 3G "hype", consumer ignorance makes wireless hell for consumer

From: Marcel <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 05 Feb 2003 21:44:44 -0500

The holy war that
      threatens you with wireless hell

      Patrick Houston,
      Editorial Director, AnchorDesk

      Wednesday, February 5, 2003

The word is "technology," not "theology." Yet technology keeps
generating these religious debates--Apple vs. PC, Linux vs.
Windows, and so on. Before you know it, the shouting and
name-calling starts. While the zealots screech their certitudes at
each other, those of us who are agnostic are left to scratch our
heads over the real question of daily existence: What works?
Doesn't it drive you nuts? I don't care how many angels can dance
on the head of a pin. Just give me the pin. I have to sew some
clothes.

WELL, BRACE YOURSELF. You're about to witness another one of these
holy wars, this one over the standards behind new third-generation
(or 3G) high-speed data-toting networks. There are two camps in
this latest debate. One claims superior technology. The other
claims market dominance. Sound familiar?

Cellular carriers are already trying to sell you on these new
networks. If yours isn't yet, it will be soon. As you try to sort
your way through a purchase decision, your life will become a
living hell of wireless jargon, competing claims, and marketing
hype. Most of all, you will be forced to swim through a tar pit of
confusing acronyms.

Here, have a taste: What are the differences between GSM, GPRS,
EDGE, W-CDMA, and UMTS? Is your skin crawling yet? No? Try this:
What are TDMA, CDMA, CDMA2000 1xRTT, CDMA2000 1xEV-DO, and
CDMA2000 1xEV-DV?

If you're like me, you might as well have someone yammer at you in
Aramaic. Trying to understand someone speaking a dead language
couldn't waste any more of your time.

Trust me. I've spent the last couple of weeks immersed in the
fiery depths of third-generation wireless networks. It hasn't been
fun. But I've forged a basic understanding of the emerging 3G
landscape. I've approached it from a particular point of view--as
a business professional who wants to use these wide-area wireless
data services to become more productive when I'm away from the
office.

Now I'm ready to share what I've learned with you.

THE FIRST THING to remember, when someone starts throwing acronyms
at you: Your cell phone is a radio. The difference between your
phone and 50,000-watt FM station is this: The FM station has
rights to a given frequency over a large geographic area; no one
other than that station can use that frequency to broadcast. By
contrast, a cell phone shares a frequency among thousands of
broadcasters--cell phone users--over a small area.

All those acronyms I mentioned above represent nothing more than
different methods for slicing and dicing a frequency. They all
share the same single aim: to allow as many people as possible to
talk--or send data--to each other in the same area at the same
time, without interfering with each other.

Example: CDMA stands for "Code Division Multiple Access." "Code
Division" is the method, "Multiple Access" is the result. Get it?

The term "3G" was coined by the global cellular communications
industry to denote new, high-capacity mobile networks offering
advanced services. But when you hear 3G, think mainly about
speed--just as you would with a dial-up, DSL, or cable-modem Net
connection. By international agreement, a 3G network should
support data transmission speeds of between 144kbps and 2Mbps.

Important to note: Those speeds are specs in a standard, not
real-world results. Actual speeds will be less.

THERE ARE TWO basic 3G technologies being deployed around the
world. One is CDMA, the other is called GSM (which stands for
"Global System for Mobile Communications"). The biggest cellular
carriers in the U.S., Europe, Asia, and elsewhere have lined up
behind one or the other. These are the two camps between which the
holy war is being waged.

GPRS, EDGE, UMTS, and W-CDMA are all derivatives of the GSM
platform. The last three are different types of 3G. GPRS is what's
called 2.5G technology--a half-step between 3G technologies and
the 2G networks most of us still use today. CDMA has its own set
of 3G variants--CDMA2000 1xRTT, CDMA2000 1xEV-DO, and CDMA2000
1xEV-DV.

If you want to know more about these various data technologies, go
here:

http://techupdate.zdnet.com/techupdate/stories/main/0,14179,289731
3,00.html

My advice: Don't bother.

Instead of trying to fathom the arcane differences between these
various back-end technologies, you can learn more about 3G by
looking at four considerations.

: The carriers. David Chamberlain at Probe Research, a
telecommunications research firm, has done a tally of worldwide
deployments. He found that most of the biggest cell phone carriers
around the world are lining up behind GSM and its derivatives.
(That's the market dominance part I referred to up above.) This
includes T-Mobile, Cingular, AT&T Wireless, China Mobile,
Vodaphone, and NTT DoCoMo. Among the biggest CDMA adherents:
Verizon and Sprint PCS.

: The coverage. This second consideration flows out of the first.
If you're a world traveler, think GSM. If not, consider CDMA.

: What's here and now. Sprint and Verizon may be in the minority,
but their CDMA2000 1xRTT networks are true 3G and are up and
running now.

: Your needs. This is where you transcend the rhetoric. You, and
only you, can determine what you need. If you want some
rudimentary data services--alerts, short messages--then the
carriers offering slower data networks will do just fine. If you
want higher speeds for heavy-duty wireless computing, think CDMA.
(It's the supposedly superior alternative I mentioned.)

: Cost. All-you-can-eat data plans can be pricey--in the vicinity
of $100 a month. If you don't want unlimited access, you can pay
by the megabyte. But those bytes can pile up quickly. Remember the
early days of cell phones--and how surprised and shocked you were
by those months when you took your eye off the meter.

We'll be test-driving actual 3G services over the coming months.
And we'll be considering our experiences under the terms I've just
outlined here. For example, I'm currently testing Verizon's 3G
Express Network by connecting my laptop to it with a Sierra
Wireless AirCard 555. I've been able to send and receive e-mail
and surf the Internet on my daily train commute.

I'll share the results in some forthcoming columns. For now, let
me just tell you this: It's been an eye-opening experience--but
not a religious one.

http://www.zdnet.com/anchordesk/stories/story/0,10738,2910204,00.h
tml

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