vB Easy Archive - Why U.S. carriers have to use band 1900 for 3G?

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Why U.S. carriers have to use band 1900 for 3G?
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Posted by: herpa73229

That makes it absolutely useless to people who purchased 3G phones aboard. Although I heard (for example Cingular) already rolled out their 3G service, it's still useless because most 3G phones only support band 2100 for 3G service. Their decision of using 1900 band is absolutely a bad move.

I want to ask the users from N.A.: how do you feel of buying/owning a 902/3/4SH phone that you can't use the service here?

Also, how much does it cost for web browsing when using a U.S. phone carrier?

Posted by: Kevbodian

the 2100mhz spectrum is already in use by other forms of communication. (gov't use... am i wrong?)...

as soon as UMTS takes over in North America, we will see dual-band 3G handsets that do 1900/2100mhz. until then... your phone that you purchased from abroad will only operate on GSM HERE. after all, that handset was not designed for primary use over here.

Also, the companies have decided upon 1900 for years. That is why there was such a large push to the 850mhz frequency range of late. With so many phones primarily operating on 850, it will be cost-efficient enough for the providers to implement 3G/UMTS on the 1900mhz frequency. If they had to change all the towers to 2100mhz (layman's terms of course)... it would cost millions, if not billions. I'm sure Nortel would love it, but Cingular/Tmo wouldn't; as a result, plan prices would skyrocket.

I think they made a smart decision.

Posted by: john0213

well, look at it this way, there is a bunch of high tech, state of the art, cutting edge phones out there in asia and europe area, and these phones all comes in unlocked. to be able to protect it's own market share, it's not hard to assume that NA companies will use a band that does not temporarily work with the phones that are avalible now in asia area.

why will they make such move even though phones will become dual band 3G anywayz? because they want to have a time to pick up, the time between the release of a dual band 3G phones from a single band 3G phones, or in another way, to have it popular release in the broad market, yields time for NA companies to pick up the pace of the whole world.

remember, some countries like hongkong or britain already have 3G established over a year, and they have a very mature support in headset selections; therefore, to avoid customers to purchase these headset and use it on NA companies, it will be the most ideal move.

Imagine if all or majorities of customers bring their own phones they got from oversea, whereas the phones that these NA companies carries do not sell at all, wouldn't that impact these companies so much that the phone manufactures wouldn't develop phones for these companies anymore? imagine at that point, the 3G network wouldn't even survive.

I'm not very worry about the 3G headset line up as far as canada goes. it will take rogers at least three more months before they will officially make their release of their network, and it will take at least 6 months for these network to fix all bugs and get stable, along with the reason that it will be quite expensive when it first come out, i will not spend my money on these network until approximately 1 and a half year later, when it gets really popular and practical, this will be around 2 years later in canada, at that point, i highly estimate that Dual band 3G market in asia area will long be popularize already.

thinking and using too far ahead isn't that good, i admire the couragement to try out things and i am looking forward to the 3G technology, but my financial plan will not allow me to give me such luxuries to simply just be a test mouse for the carriers~~

so, imo, don't worry about the line ups, when canada pick up the pace with the world, we will have the choices out there already~~

Posted by: azn_boi_128

hah yea... WHEN canada pace up...

Posted by: Timsta

well.. unless you're really keen on using 3G network or get a really good deal from Rogers.. i'd imagine it'd be a buggy network even tho, rogers has been unit testing its services for awhile. it'd be interesting to see what they roll out with though..

Posted by: UncleAllEvil

There is one good side of 1900Mhz - better coverage than 2100Mhz (only few km/one tower).

Posted by: Timsta

raellly.. yeah. thats true.. if the network is sparse

Posted by: herpa73229

I wonder if the 1900 band 3G will become a success because the usage is very limited (only in N.A.). People in N.A. will not able to connect to video calling with others from the other side of the globe.

Dual band 3G....I wonder if the major phone makers will even care of adding 1900 band because no where in the world but only N.A. is using this band (correct if wrong)...unless it shows a strong sales of phones purchased aboad to be used in N.A?....

So my question what's the biggest selling point of 902/3/4SH in N.A., the camera feature?

Posted by: Desert_Fox

Can't they just buy the 2100/1700 spectrum then create a UMTS that's in line with the rest of the world?

Posted by: totaltoanage

3G is expensive, i for one is too cheap to spend my money for it. 3G is already in NA, verizon, espn, helio. Once 3G gets more popular here and companies start doing special plans, then i might consider and thats if sharp releases a dual band 900SH model. until then, im cool with my gsm 904sh.

Posted by: Kevbodian

Quote:

Originally Posted by Desert_Fox

Can't they just buy the 2100/1700 spectrum then create a UMTS that's in line with the rest of the world?

if spectrum as already been auctioned off, or purchased, it is not able to be simply sold to a provider.

also, i cant remember the exact stuff, but each frequency has pluses and minuses. i will have to ask my father (former nortel engineer).

Quote:

Originally Posted by totaltoanage

3G is expensive, i for one is too cheap to spend my money for it. 3G is already in NA, verizon, espn, helio. Once 3G gets more popular here and companies start doing special plans, then i might consider and thats if sharp releases a dual band 900SH model. until then, im cool with my gsm 904sh.

verizon and other cdma based aren't technically 3G... instead they are some high-end CDMA like evdv (if im wrong its kuz i dont follow cdma evolution).

3G aka UMTS, is w-cdma which is a different technology from what verizon and other CDMA light-weights are using.

Posted by: AL9999

Yeah nowadays 3G refers to W-CDMA networks, the ones that superceded the GSM ones. CDMA ones are just called CDMA

Posted by: john0213

well the new CDMA version of 3G is call EVDO and its very crappy~

as far as the feed back goes, telus is using it, and they get tons of people prasing how fast it is, while they were just using 1xrtt, damn they can't even get the coverage going~!!!!!

as i have said before in other post, EVDO does very crappy in backward compatibility. when network detects 1xrtt when it loss EVDO network, it will drop all calls you have and stop all email transfering you have, then resume again, but hell, how do you resume voice call!? the problem lies that it's been cut off already, so good luck to those business EVDO users, they will experience some angry customers from phone cutting~~

again, as far as the usefulness of 904 goes, as for canada, there's still some long time to stay in GSM, as far as facts tell me, i will be staying in GSM network for at least another 9 months if not more, so why not get a 904? i still see the ultility of the 904 as far as rogers 3.5G network goes.

yea rogers is slow in 3.5G(HSDPA) network, it will eventually pick up and get popularize, if the world market is pushing it, no one will stay behind, trend is unstoppable and it will force people to adopt, but i would say for canada, there's still at least one year and a half to wait before this becomes practical~

Posted by: Kevbodian

im really surprised. i never saw that rogers carries w810i. im gonna see how much i can get it for haha.

for me, the gsm network is just fine so I am already in dreamland with these sexy japanese phones on GSM networks! IF rogers rolls-out... its gonna be expensive. robbers wireless is not the brightest company.

Posted by: Timsta

w810i was released 2 weeks ago.. 299 with a 3 year contract..

Posted by: john0213

500 for no term~ that's just for reference~~

btw, on their brochure, they already announced K790i too~~

i see the wave coming in canada~

Posted by: Timsta

expensive... i hate how the entire regionw ill have the phone