AT&T Scales Back GSM Conversion?

They're scaling back GSM's next phase. AT&T is still on track to go GSM everywhere, but the next step for data service after GSM is launched (W-CDMA) is being scaled back. The initial rollout is still scheduled as planned as far as I understand it. So here are some answers to your questions:

1. Again, not the initial rollout, but the next phase after this one.
2. Nothing will happen, and yes, the rollout will continue.
3. Not applicable. No, they are not surrendering anything. Both AT&T and Cingular are committed to get rid of the (aging) TDMA.
4. I have no idea what T-Mo will do. They seem to be slowly expanding and filling in gaps, but that's all I know. It's similar to what Sprint is doing (although Sprint does put up new towers faster and in greater quantity).

 

W-CDMA simply offers more bandwith (the W stands for "wideband"). The idea is that it will offer enough to do video on a mobile phone, possibly even live video. In comparison to GSm, it just offers more bandwith on the data side (no significant advantage on the voice side).

 

For the regular voice user W-CDMA will mean 2 potatoes. The voice side will still use GSM.

 

Hey, what's wrong with 2 potatoes? That's a good complement to dinner as far as I'm concerned!
Seriously though, like I said the voice side will stay GSM. There's not much more you can do to the voice side of cell phones now (besides incrementally increase capacity). It's already pretty clear and efficient.

 

Oh boy, I can't wait to watch MPEG files on a 3cm square screen. I can just see it now. "Wow, that's a violent movie you're watching, he's bleeding to death." "No, I think that's marinara sauce from the ziti I had for lunch."

 

Of course there's more you can do to the voice side....how about surround sound for the movie ZaphodB wants to see?

 

Actually, wCDMA completely changes the way that voice is transmitted.

 

Is WCDMA related to GSM at all? For instance, would AT&T (GSM) have an easier time upgrading to WCDMA, or would Verizon (Already CDMA) have an easier time?

 

Wouldn't that probably be because the WCDMA/GPRS/3G-GSM technology doesn't work yet? And furthermore, because it uses separate spectrum that might need to be re-allocated away from voice?

WCDMA and CDMA2000 are completely separate competing (and incompatible) systems.

Verizon, and particularly Sprint, are having an easier time upgrading to CDMA2000 than AT&T is having upgrading to WCDMA.

WCDMA (or GPRS) is the 3G system GSM carriers were planning to upgrade to (not backward compatible with GSM, and it doesn't appear to work properly yet).

CDMA2000 is the 3G system that CDMA carriers are already upgrading to (it's backward compatible with CDMA, and works great, dynamically allocating bandwidth on existing spectrum between CDMA and CDMA2000 (voice and data) as needed).

 

Well, I think thegonagle is asking who will have an easier path to WCDMA.
AT&T GSM has an easier path to WCDMA than Verizon because although WCDMA and CDMA2000 are spread spectrum air interfaces they will run on two different core networks. GSM is already on the core for WCDMA.