Friday, Nov 10, 2006 at 19:49
As far as I know, up till now, Telstra's 3G offering has been a tie-up with Hutchison's ("3" network). Telstra never bought any 3G spectrum with the auctions a few years back, sticking with the 850 MHz band they already owned. With the rollout of Next-G, I believe Telstra will be dropping the 3G offering. This appears to have been a clever move, as some telcos paid a fortune for their 3G spectrums and Telstra has had to spend little on 3G
infrastructure. As stated on another post here, the Next-G is really "3.5G"; ie, better than 3G. The data rate exceeds by far the opposition's rate, and software is being tested to increase it further. I read somewhere that they are also testing software to extend the range (distance) even further, tho I feel that the radio technology is being pushed to its limits here.
Also, as I understand it, Telstra has already fitted out every CDMA site with Next-G, so the cutover is pretty seamless. Quite a massive undertaking, as it was only early this year it was announced.
BUT, if Next-G is too popular, Telstra may have to purchase more spectrum, most likely in the 2GHz band to augment the limited 850MHz band, just as GSM has flowed over into the 1800MHz band. But the 850MHz band has the inherent advantage of better range, which is most likely why Telstra chose to run with this band.
Probably the main disadvantage with Next-G at present is the limited product range of handsets.
Gerry
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