Vodafone Trials 4G Pretender
The next generation telecommunications network 4G may be around the corner, but that hasn’t stopped Vodafone trialing fast speeds of up to 16Mbp/s via HSPA+. HSPA+ is effectively 3.5G, not quite 4G. If you want to know more about HSPA, see the glossary of terms, but it’s there to improve speeds.
Currently, top speeds are about 7.2 Mbp/s, although its claimed that the HSDPA platform can be ramped up to 14.4Mbp/s with the wind behind it and if it’s going downhill. The HSPA+ super-fast trials were conducted alongside Ericsson, the manufacturer of telecoms infrastructure, and Qualcomm, the maker of mobile chipsets. It’s thought that speeds of up to 21Mbp/s could be reached by early 2009.
So, if speed matters, then you can look forward to HSPA+ maybe final quarter 2009, but bear in mind that you would need a new handset to take full advantage of those kind of performance figures. Ah right, another handset, of course, might have guessed that. Best send the old mobile off for cash then. But, the great advantage for the network operators, that only new software will be required to upgrade the existing network.
Now you can see why HSPA+ is so attractive as a short term measure before they have to start again with 4G networks, which are far more than just software upgrades. For all you out there that lap up all this new technology, then please note that HSPA+ is part of the 3GPP release, standard seven. Now why you’d want to know that is beyond this writer!
