Verizon, 4G and iPhones 303
cgriffin21 writes "Verizon plans to launch its 4G LTE network in 38 major U.S. metropolitan areas by year's end, in an ambitious rollout that will also drape high-speed mobile broadband coverage over 60 airports." Not coincidentally, everyone and their brother is talking about
iPhone on Verizon in 2011, and what that
means to Android.
The missing piece (Score:4, Informative)
In many way this is what will allow Verizon to get the iPhone. When the iPhone 5 comes out it is bound to support 4G, so even if Verizon is not an official partner, people will be able to use the phone there.
I have never been convinced that Apple would want to add CDMA capability, just for Verizon, because of the extra licensing costs and the fact Verizon had already announced that it was putting in place a 4G GSM network. I may still be wrong about Qualcomm-CDMA support being added (CDMA is part of GSM in the form of wave encoding, not protocol), though we will see.
Re:Question (Score:3, Informative)
Well, they don't make you use V-cast or Bing on Android phones, and they let you use the Marketplace.
At least, this is true for 2 Verizon Android phones, which is how many I have experience with.
Re:The missing piece (Score:3, Informative)
No the missing piece that everyone conveniently forgets is AT&T. They have a deal with Apple that makes the iPhone exclusive to them until 2012. Until that deal is canceled or altered, there is no chance Verizon will get an iPhone in 2011. Even Verizon says that any Verizon iPhone announcement will come from Apple not from them. [pcworld.com]
Before anyone quips about how they heard it on the internet about the Verizon iPhone 2011 from a reliable source, I suggest that they trace back to the original source of the information. Almost always the source is an "analyst" not connected to Verizon, Apple, or AT&T. Most often, the source is an analyst whose livelihood relies on people paying attention to their predictions. I think it's just another example of if something is repeated enough times, people believe it's a fact. Ever since the original iPhone in 2007, there has been a rumor that there will be a Verizon iPhone next year. The year comes and goes and it gets repeated again.
High speed still with low usage caps? (Score:2, Informative)
I'm all for high-speed mobile Internet, but will they continue with their abysmally low usage caps?
WOOT! I can watch a full HD movie, streaming it almost in real-time... well, most of it anyway: capped out before the climax? Ahh well, I can finish it once my billing cycle rolls back around.
Yes, I know it's not quite that bad, but you get the point: at the same time all sorts of ISPs and mobile network operators are increasing speeds and falling all over themselves to tell you how quickly you can do stuff, they're capping out monthly transfer at cripplingly low numbers.
Re:The missing piece (Score:3, Informative)
Google is your friend [google.com]:
"at&t iphone exclusivity"
It was reported back in May 2010 by engadget, mashable, and CNN for starters. The deal was disclosed in relation to a class-action lawsuit about Apple monopoly power and illegal tying.
Re:Verizon vPhone (Score:3, Informative)
"I can easily see Verizon's version of the iPhone as being the first smartphone with bloatware on it"
You haven't been paying attention. Samsung in particular is adding plenty of bloatware to the Galaxy phones.
See? Android rules! :)
Re:It means nothing to Android. (Score:5, Informative)
While the CPU in the iPhone is an "Apple spec" CPU, most likely the radio chipset is from a third party.
Most such third parties offer roughly equivalent GSM and CDMA chipsets (In fact, probably 50%+ of the GSM/UMTS smartphone market is powered by Qualcomm chipsets, despite Qualcomm being the creator and backer of cdmaOne/CDMA2000), making it not too difficult to make a CDMA version of a phone and a GSM version.
Also, you show a fundamental lack of understanding of RF and communications engineering. New band = new antenna. Same bands but different protocol = no new antenna, just a different baseband processor. Therefore, adding T-Mobile's additional band is the least likely route for Apple to go.
Changing the iPhone from GSM/UMTS to CDMA2000 (note: UMTS uses a CDMA modulation scheme, one of the reasons Qualcomm is involved in that market despite them backing a competing protocol/air interface suite - they're good at making CDMA chipsets whether it is the UMTS protocol/air interface suite or CDMA2000) most likely entails:
1) Switch out the baseband processor chip. Note that as I said before, nearly all UMTS chipset providers also provide CDMA2000 chipsets that are very similar and require little engineering
2) Remove the now unneeded SIM slot (what was that about a packed device?)
That's about it
Note: Right now, Apple gets their radio chipsets from Infineon, but there is a lot of evidence pointing to them moving to Qualcomm for the 5th gen iPhone, with the ability to produce a CDMA version being one of a number of reasons, Infineon getting purchased by Intel being a bigger reason - see http://touchreviews.net/iphone-5-qualcomm-radio-chip/ [touchreviews.net] - I don't know about Infineon chipsets, but it is VERY easy to make both a CDMA2000 and GSM/UMTS version of a phone if you use Qualcomm for your radio chipsets, which is why a large portion of HTC's GSM product line have near identical CDMA equivalents.
Re:Nothing? (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Nothing? (Score:3, Informative)
Well...
A) I'm not sure Apple's goal is to completely dominate the phone market.
B) I'm not sure they could have gotten a real start in the cell phone market without an exclusivity deal. Supposedly the AT&T exclusivity was the price Apple paid for making the device the way they wanted, carrier support for visual voicemail, and unlimited data plans.
C) iPhones range between $99 and $299, so I don't know where you're getting the $500 price.
D) I know many people who have said that they really really wanted an iPhone but were not willing to give up Verizon's superior coverage. I had an Android phone for a little while because I wanted to be on Verizon, but I switched back because the Droid Incredible was incredibly annoying.
E) For most practical purposes, Android is only moderately more open. The Android market's approval process is more open, but that's about it. You're still restricted in what you can do by what carriers/manufacturers will allow. Most people aren't going to want to screw around with the kernel, and those who do will basically have to hack their phone to get it installed.
Re:Nothing? (Score:2, Informative)
DroidX is locked down
Says who? You can root it, remove the bloatware and generally do whatever the hell you want with it if you are inclined to do so.
Verizon botched the Froyo rollout on it
"Botched"? They missed a deadline because of Exchange issues but the roll out did eventually happen and seems to be going just fine.
and trust me you won't like Verizon's V-Cast shovelware
Thankfully you aren't required to use it. It's just an icon on the phone. You can even remove that icon if you are inclined to do so.
Re:Question (Score:3, Informative)
Hell, didn't Verizon announce their own Android app store?
Yes, it appears as a separate tab in the Marketplace app. You can go there to install all the Vcast apps.
Who's gonna bet that the Google Marketplace app suddenly disappears from Verizon phones?
If it does, you go to a Google website and download the Marketplace app. If Verizon prevents that, then we all go find a different carrier when our contracts are up. If the Verizon app store is as closed and controlled as the Apple AppStore, I would leave.
Re:It means nothing to Android. (Score:1, Informative)
And the foxconn and other sources confirming a Qualcomm CDMA radio based iPhone are what, completely baseless?
Not that I'm convinced that a CDMA iPhone would be available on Verizon, but that's because of Verizon's CEO's comments on 9/23 about the iPhone; not because of some deluded belief that Apple wouldn't bother. As you point out, they could sell a CDMA based iPhone in China quite easily.
Re:Nothing? (Score:3, Informative)
What I mean is all the people that wanted a true smartphone got one in the past year - they got a Droid. Few will want to pay again to get an iPhone.
Disregard my previous question to you, I now have the answer. You are insane.
Re:Nothing? (Score:3, Informative)
And yet a single phone model on a single carrier still takes a huge slice of the pie which Android has only recently (this year) managed to catch up with, and only by being offered by EVERY carrier.
Exactly. In terms of sales opportunities, Android has had a clear advantage over iPhone for well over a year now, and even with that, Android is only now reaching parity in terms of new units sold.
Currently, the only things Android has going for it over iPhone that the average consumer truly cares about are carrier choice and price. This story is about alleviating one of those things. As for price, being more expensive than some MP3 players didn't seem to harm the iPod much. Once people can truly chose between Android and iPhone, we'll see how things really stack up. The only thing that will keep Android up in this game will be pricing. Specifically, as a free phone, because even with a $50 Android vs a $99 iPhone, consumers are going to chose the iPhone. It's just that up to this point, Verizon customers were not even offered this choice.