1
00:00:00,280 --> 00:00:02,840
Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.

2
00:00:03,160 --> 00:00:09,160
Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you didn't touch? With technology? With tech

3
00:00:09,200 --> 00:00:17,880
Speaker 1: Stuff from how dot com? What up, y'all and welcome

4
00:00:17,920 --> 00:00:19,800
Speaker 1: to tech Stuff. My name is Chris Poulett, and I

5
00:00:19,800 --> 00:00:22,040
Speaker 1: am an editor at how Stuff works dot com. Sitting

6
00:00:22,040 --> 00:00:24,239
Speaker 1: across from me as he always does, as senior writer

7
00:00:24,560 --> 00:00:28,240
Speaker 1: Jonathan Strickland, the telephone was ringing wildly, but without results

8
00:00:28,240 --> 00:00:30,200
Speaker 1: since there was no one in the room but the corpse.

9
00:00:32,840 --> 00:00:36,959
Speaker 1: The call is coming from down the street. Yes, and uh,

10
00:00:37,000 --> 00:00:40,240
Speaker 1: you know, we're going to cover a topic today that

11
00:00:40,479 --> 00:00:47,960
Speaker 1: is partially inspired by a little Facebook feedback you and

12
00:00:48,240 --> 00:00:51,440
Speaker 1: the Facebook feedback actually comes to us courtesy of one

13
00:00:51,479 --> 00:00:56,080
Speaker 1: of our our listeners who well, he specifically wanted to

14
00:00:56,120 --> 00:01:01,160
Speaker 1: know about why his phone had magically gone from a

15
00:01:01,320 --> 00:01:06,240
Speaker 1: three G notification to a four G notification. But that's

16
00:01:06,280 --> 00:01:12,480
Speaker 1: really beyond this podcast. We're specifically going to be talking about, uh,

17
00:01:12,520 --> 00:01:17,360
Speaker 1: the generations of cell phone standards and what's the difference

18
00:01:17,400 --> 00:01:19,760
Speaker 1: between them, because there's so much confusion there that to

19
00:01:20,000 --> 00:01:23,120
Speaker 1: address that is more important really than a phone switching

20
00:01:23,120 --> 00:01:25,280
Speaker 1: from three G three G to four G. And you'll

21
00:01:25,280 --> 00:01:27,760
Speaker 1: find out specifically, why when we get to the four

22
00:01:27,800 --> 00:01:30,840
Speaker 1: G discussion, and if it's the reason I'm thinking of,

23
00:01:30,920 --> 00:01:34,400
Speaker 1: it's remarkably simple. Yeah. Well, and this listener, by the way,

24
00:01:34,400 --> 00:01:36,800
Speaker 1: his name is Arthur, So Arthur Big shout out to you.

25
00:01:37,200 --> 00:01:41,080
Speaker 1: And uh, let's go into the generations of cell phones. Now,

26
00:01:41,120 --> 00:01:47,000
Speaker 1: you may be confused somewhat about the various generations and

27
00:01:47,040 --> 00:01:49,680
Speaker 1: what they mean and and uh, and you know why

28
00:01:49,920 --> 00:01:52,280
Speaker 1: is one phone a two G phone versus a three

29
00:01:52,320 --> 00:01:54,360
Speaker 1: G phone or maybe you've even heard of two point

30
00:01:54,440 --> 00:01:57,760
Speaker 1: five G or three point five or heaven help us

31
00:01:57,760 --> 00:02:02,120
Speaker 1: three point seven five G phones. And the reason for

32
00:02:02,160 --> 00:02:08,200
Speaker 1: this is because they're pulling, not pulling that kind of gs, no,

33
00:02:08,240 --> 00:02:11,359
Speaker 1: the G standard generations. And that's part of why it's

34
00:02:11,360 --> 00:02:13,520
Speaker 1: so confusing, is that, you know, we tend to think

35
00:02:13,560 --> 00:02:18,720
Speaker 1: of generations in terms of iterations right over time, and

36
00:02:18,919 --> 00:02:22,880
Speaker 1: so technically if something comes out after something else has

37
00:02:22,880 --> 00:02:26,600
Speaker 1: already come out, it's a later generation, right. Well. Typically,

38
00:02:26,600 --> 00:02:28,919
Speaker 1: of course, this is one of those times when marketing

39
00:02:28,960 --> 00:02:31,040
Speaker 1: also factors into that, and we could get into that

40
00:02:31,120 --> 00:02:32,960
Speaker 1: a little bit later. Not to pick on the marketers,

41
00:02:32,960 --> 00:02:36,520
Speaker 1: I used to be in marketing for wild marketers, I've

42
00:02:36,600 --> 00:02:39,160
Speaker 1: never been in marketing. Well, it's their job to sell

43
00:02:39,240 --> 00:02:42,440
Speaker 1: you the new thing. And part of the time these

44
00:02:42,440 --> 00:02:46,239
Speaker 1: generations are an actual new technology and part of them

45
00:02:46,280 --> 00:02:48,840
Speaker 1: part part of the time it's when improvements are made

46
00:02:48,880 --> 00:02:50,720
Speaker 1: to the technology to make it better. And even though

47
00:02:50,720 --> 00:02:54,120
Speaker 1: it's like quite a new generation, yeah, it's like, well

48
00:02:54,200 --> 00:02:56,280
Speaker 1: let's talk about yeah, yes, yes, that's the thing that's

49
00:02:57,040 --> 00:03:00,639
Speaker 1: there's And to add to that confusion, yes, there are

50
00:03:01,200 --> 00:03:06,720
Speaker 1: two separate lines of cell phone standards have developed over

51
00:03:06,760 --> 00:03:10,320
Speaker 1: time and and there and there are branches that come

52
00:03:10,400 --> 00:03:14,280
Speaker 1: off of those two separate lines. But in general, if

53
00:03:14,320 --> 00:03:15,760
Speaker 1: you want to go all the way back to the

54
00:03:15,960 --> 00:03:21,120
Speaker 1: one G technologies, there were there were three standards that

55
00:03:21,240 --> 00:03:24,560
Speaker 1: were more prevalent than any other. Yes, but there were

56
00:03:24,639 --> 00:03:29,440
Speaker 1: multiple standards. Now. In the United States, that standard was AMPS,

57
00:03:29,760 --> 00:03:33,960
Speaker 1: which stood for Advanced Mobile Phone System and that was

58
00:03:34,000 --> 00:03:37,400
Speaker 1: developed by Bell Labs. In Europe, you had two different

59
00:03:37,440 --> 00:03:41,760
Speaker 1: standards that were pretty popular. You had TAX, which was

60
00:03:42,480 --> 00:03:49,240
Speaker 1: t a c S Total Access Communication systema n m

61
00:03:49,400 --> 00:03:52,600
Speaker 1: T is the other that's Nordic Mobile Telephone. That's the

62
00:03:52,680 --> 00:03:57,720
Speaker 1: kind of phone that thor uses. And uh so it's

63
00:03:57,800 --> 00:04:02,240
Speaker 1: me olner Um the So these are the these were

64
00:04:02,280 --> 00:04:08,480
Speaker 1: the main standards. And these were all analog mobile phone systems. Yes. Um,

65
00:04:08,520 --> 00:04:12,120
Speaker 1: actually there's one too. There's one too, there's twelve. Um,

66
00:04:12,200 --> 00:04:16,600
Speaker 1: there's a another that we mentioned, I believe during the

67
00:04:16,600 --> 00:04:21,400
Speaker 1: the podcast when we talked about the BlackBerry mobile text. Um.

68
00:04:21,920 --> 00:04:25,200
Speaker 1: But and and these are all To think of this

69
00:04:25,240 --> 00:04:28,240
Speaker 1: as a generation compared to the the others is kind

70
00:04:28,240 --> 00:04:33,120
Speaker 1: of strange because these are all analog technologies. Um. And

71
00:04:33,160 --> 00:04:37,320
Speaker 1: we're talking, we're talking basic stuff. There's really no maximum

72
00:04:37,360 --> 00:04:40,240
Speaker 1: speed because people weren't using data on these connections. They

73
00:04:40,240 --> 00:04:42,880
Speaker 1: were they were in terms of data transmission, they were

74
00:04:42,960 --> 00:04:45,719
Speaker 1: so slow that uh uh, you know, we couldn't do

75
00:04:45,720 --> 00:04:47,200
Speaker 1: a lot of the things that we do on them now.

76
00:04:47,240 --> 00:04:49,280
Speaker 1: But they didn't use data. In fact, they didn't even

77
00:04:49,360 --> 00:04:54,280
Speaker 1: use text. We're talking voice voice only. Yeah. They this

78
00:04:54,400 --> 00:04:56,599
Speaker 1: is when you use your cell phone to call people

79
00:04:56,800 --> 00:04:59,719
Speaker 1: the in the United States. In the United States, you

80
00:04:59,720 --> 00:05:04,000
Speaker 1: would of two carriers per region because the government said

81
00:05:04,520 --> 00:05:06,840
Speaker 1: that in order to avoid monopolies, there must be at

82
00:05:06,880 --> 00:05:11,160
Speaker 1: least two carriers, and that they would each be assigned

83
00:05:11,279 --> 00:05:15,279
Speaker 1: eight hundred and thirty two frequencies. These two carriers seven

84
00:05:15,400 --> 00:05:17,760
Speaker 1: hundred and ninety of those frequencies were for voice and

85
00:05:17,800 --> 00:05:20,719
Speaker 1: forty two for data, So forty two for data with

86
00:05:20,760 --> 00:05:23,560
Speaker 1: seven nine voice. Yeah, you couldn't really use that data

87
00:05:23,600 --> 00:05:25,880
Speaker 1: for anything. Yeah, it wasn't well that the phones, of

88
00:05:25,880 --> 00:05:29,200
Speaker 1: course themselves, were not geared toward doing this. This is

89
00:05:29,400 --> 00:05:31,640
Speaker 1: back when people used to have bag phones. And yes,

90
00:05:31,760 --> 00:05:33,880
Speaker 1: I actually did have a bag In fact, it was

91
00:05:33,920 --> 00:05:37,840
Speaker 1: a second hand bag phone when somebody else traded there's

92
00:05:37,839 --> 00:05:39,320
Speaker 1: in there were here. You want this? You know, when

93
00:05:39,360 --> 00:05:41,760
Speaker 1: you had a cell phone that looked essentially like a

94
00:05:41,839 --> 00:05:46,000
Speaker 1: cordless telephone. Yeah, and you know you didn't necessarily have

95
00:05:46,080 --> 00:05:48,080
Speaker 1: a screen or anything on there, you just you know,

96
00:05:48,320 --> 00:05:50,240
Speaker 1: you had a phone. Yeah. In fact, this, the one

97
00:05:50,279 --> 00:05:52,440
Speaker 1: that I had, was a handset that was wired to

98
00:05:52,520 --> 00:05:55,680
Speaker 1: a base and you would plug the base into the

99
00:05:55,760 --> 00:05:58,680
Speaker 1: power adapter into your car, and you know, if you

100
00:05:58,720 --> 00:06:00,719
Speaker 1: had to make a call, you'd have to on you know,

101
00:06:00,760 --> 00:06:04,960
Speaker 1: take it off the cradle. Now, with these frequencies on

102
00:06:05,000 --> 00:06:08,320
Speaker 1: an individual phone, you would actually have whenever you would

103
00:06:08,360 --> 00:06:11,040
Speaker 1: make a call, you'd have a pair of frequencies. So

104
00:06:11,120 --> 00:06:15,040
Speaker 1: you'd have one frequency for transmitting your voice and another

105
00:06:15,080 --> 00:06:16,880
Speaker 1: for receiving the voice of the person on the other

106
00:06:16,960 --> 00:06:19,960
Speaker 1: end of the phone, and together that would create what

107
00:06:20,000 --> 00:06:24,239
Speaker 1: we call a channel. So these are those old phones

108
00:06:24,240 --> 00:06:26,080
Speaker 1: where you would try and switch channels. The whole reason

109
00:06:26,120 --> 00:06:28,480
Speaker 1: for this, by the way of keeping the frequency separate

110
00:06:28,520 --> 00:06:32,880
Speaker 1: and keeping the channels discreete is to avoid interference, because

111
00:06:32,960 --> 00:06:35,279
Speaker 1: some of these old phones you could actually get interference

112
00:06:35,320 --> 00:06:38,040
Speaker 1: and start to overhear someone else's conversation that you had

113
00:06:38,080 --> 00:06:41,120
Speaker 1: no business being in in the first place. Actually, I've

114
00:06:41,120 --> 00:06:43,839
Speaker 1: been in several of those conversations as well, where I

115
00:06:43,880 --> 00:06:46,719
Speaker 1: had no business being in that conversation. But in those

116
00:06:46,720 --> 00:06:48,960
Speaker 1: cases it wasn't due to interference, was just due to chatty.

117
00:06:49,040 --> 00:06:53,159
Speaker 1: Cathy's right there, you know. An Actually, that's funny in

118
00:06:53,160 --> 00:06:55,320
Speaker 1: a way because if you think about it, it sort

119
00:06:55,360 --> 00:06:59,520
Speaker 1: of hearkens back to the time of the party line

120
00:06:59,720 --> 00:07:03,960
Speaker 1: on on wired telephones, on landlines, um, so that that

121
00:07:04,040 --> 00:07:06,960
Speaker 1: sort of lingers in the past for both technologies. So

122
00:07:07,360 --> 00:07:11,040
Speaker 1: these technologies, these these standards were pretty much the only

123
00:07:11,080 --> 00:07:14,720
Speaker 1: thing available throughout the eighties and into the early nineties,

124
00:07:15,160 --> 00:07:17,080
Speaker 1: and it was only in the early nineties when we

125
00:07:17,280 --> 00:07:21,680
Speaker 1: began to switch from analog cellular systems to digital cellular systems.

126
00:07:22,360 --> 00:07:28,200
Speaker 1: So now we had a new competing standards. I'd kind

127
00:07:28,200 --> 00:07:31,000
Speaker 1: of like to to stop here to talk about sell

128
00:07:31,120 --> 00:07:34,640
Speaker 1: phones and why they're called cell phones because, um, you know,

129
00:07:34,840 --> 00:07:39,000
Speaker 1: as you're traveling, the signal from one tower will peter

130
00:07:39,080 --> 00:07:41,680
Speaker 1: out when you get to a certain point. Um, as

131
00:07:41,720 --> 00:07:44,320
Speaker 1: long as you are within range of that tower, you

132
00:07:44,320 --> 00:07:46,800
Speaker 1: should be able to talk to somebody. But UM, the

133
00:07:46,840 --> 00:07:49,240
Speaker 1: thing is that it only works as long as you're

134
00:07:49,320 --> 00:07:52,760
Speaker 1: in range of some kind of communications based So they

135
00:07:53,320 --> 00:07:55,080
Speaker 1: put these in different areas, and of course when they're

136
00:07:55,080 --> 00:07:58,360
Speaker 1: mapping that out, UM, they're trying to get a good

137
00:07:58,400 --> 00:08:01,360
Speaker 1: idea of the coverage area is UM. And they have

138
00:08:01,480 --> 00:08:05,680
Speaker 1: to of course, uh negotiate with different property owners to

139
00:08:06,040 --> 00:08:09,560
Speaker 1: allow these towers to be built. UM. And the reason

140
00:08:09,600 --> 00:08:12,120
Speaker 1: I'm bringing that up now is this, this first generation

141
00:08:12,160 --> 00:08:14,240
Speaker 1: came to be known as cell phones because you would

142
00:08:14,240 --> 00:08:17,960
Speaker 1: travel from one cell the area of of transmission to another,

143
00:08:18,440 --> 00:08:20,840
Speaker 1: and you would hop from tower to tower. Of course,

144
00:08:21,200 --> 00:08:24,440
Speaker 1: UM handshake that would take place, that would hand you

145
00:08:24,520 --> 00:08:28,320
Speaker 1: off from one another tower exactly. And the funny thing

146
00:08:28,360 --> 00:08:32,360
Speaker 1: to me is that around the time of this second generation,

147
00:08:33,080 --> 00:08:36,320
Speaker 1: when we switched from analonger digital, I remember that a

148
00:08:36,360 --> 00:08:39,719
Speaker 1: lot of the marketing that went on was going on

149
00:08:39,880 --> 00:08:42,280
Speaker 1: was trying to say, oh, well, we're not a cell

150
00:08:42,320 --> 00:08:47,839
Speaker 1: phone provider, we're a wireless service provider. And it's it's

151
00:08:47,840 --> 00:08:49,520
Speaker 1: funny because I think they were trying to use that

152
00:08:49,559 --> 00:08:52,520
Speaker 1: as a distinguishing difference in the technology. But if you

153
00:08:52,600 --> 00:08:56,680
Speaker 1: heard that, um, it wasn't so much that the I mean,

154
00:08:56,760 --> 00:08:59,640
Speaker 1: you're still traveling from one area of transmission to another

155
00:08:59,679 --> 00:09:02,000
Speaker 1: area transmission. It has to be handed off from one

156
00:09:02,000 --> 00:09:04,400
Speaker 1: tower to the next. But um, they wanted to call

157
00:09:04,440 --> 00:09:07,360
Speaker 1: it something different just to identify that, Hey, you're you're

158
00:09:07,360 --> 00:09:10,600
Speaker 1: on digital. Now you're on a better quality service. You

159
00:09:10,600 --> 00:09:12,440
Speaker 1: have more features and that kind of stuff. You don't

160
00:09:12,440 --> 00:09:14,080
Speaker 1: have to worry about interference the same way you did

161
00:09:14,080 --> 00:09:17,600
Speaker 1: with analog. There are a lot of differences. So in

162
00:09:17,640 --> 00:09:22,040
Speaker 1: Europe that's where Global System for Mobile began. That's g

163
00:09:22,320 --> 00:09:26,360
Speaker 1: s M, and that standard became pretty prevalent throughout Europe

164
00:09:26,400 --> 00:09:28,480
Speaker 1: and in other parts of the world as well. The

165
00:09:28,559 --> 00:09:30,679
Speaker 1: United States also got some g s M. But in

166
00:09:30,760 --> 00:09:33,200
Speaker 1: the U s the there were two other standards that

167
00:09:33,280 --> 00:09:37,920
Speaker 1: started to pop up. One was d AMPS, so Digital

168
00:09:38,040 --> 00:09:41,880
Speaker 1: AMPS system, and then there was a system from Qualcom

169
00:09:42,160 --> 00:09:47,520
Speaker 1: called i S nine five, which stands for Interim Standard. Now,

170
00:09:47,520 --> 00:09:52,440
Speaker 1: this would eventually evolve into code division multiple access phones

171
00:09:52,640 --> 00:09:56,200
Speaker 1: or c d M A, and so C d M

172
00:09:56,240 --> 00:10:00,120
Speaker 1: A phones and G s M phones are not compatible. Okay,

173
00:10:00,160 --> 00:10:02,640
Speaker 1: so we've gotten into the second generation of the standards.

174
00:10:02,640 --> 00:10:07,600
Speaker 1: But you cannot, uh, you cannot switch out the components

175
00:10:07,640 --> 00:10:09,200
Speaker 1: of a c d c d M A phone and

176
00:10:09,200 --> 00:10:10,880
Speaker 1: G s M phone and have them work. You can't

177
00:10:11,080 --> 00:10:13,440
Speaker 1: go from a c d M A network to a

178
00:10:13,480 --> 00:10:18,080
Speaker 1: GSM network or vice versa. So unless you will, you

179
00:10:18,080 --> 00:10:20,200
Speaker 1: you can if you have a phone that will do that,

180
00:10:20,240 --> 00:10:21,560
Speaker 1: but you have to have a phone that will be

181
00:10:21,559 --> 00:10:24,079
Speaker 1: able to communicate on multiple standards. The phone that does that, yeah,

182
00:10:24,160 --> 00:10:26,920
Speaker 1: has multiple chips and so, in other words, essentially a

183
00:10:26,920 --> 00:10:29,040
Speaker 1: phone that is allows you to do both c d

184
00:10:29,160 --> 00:10:32,320
Speaker 1: M A and G s M has both sets of

185
00:10:32,920 --> 00:10:35,360
Speaker 1: circuitry in the phone, right, Yeah, I just wanted to

186
00:10:35,360 --> 00:10:38,280
Speaker 1: clear that up before someone. Right, a standard phone on

187
00:10:38,280 --> 00:10:40,280
Speaker 1: one of those systems cannot cross over to the other

188
00:10:41,000 --> 00:10:44,240
Speaker 1: now and go ahead, I'm sorry. I had a the

189
00:10:44,240 --> 00:10:46,400
Speaker 1: phone I had after the bag phone was on a

190
00:10:46,440 --> 00:10:50,719
Speaker 1: competing technology to that too, which was a PCs phone. Um.

191
00:10:50,800 --> 00:10:54,720
Speaker 1: Now that was used much less on some of the others,

192
00:10:54,800 --> 00:10:56,400
Speaker 1: and these are these were the ones that were the

193
00:10:56,400 --> 00:11:00,000
Speaker 1: widespread standards. So when someone says it to G phone,

194
00:11:00,000 --> 00:11:02,640
Speaker 1: and they usually are talking about something that's running on

195
00:11:02,679 --> 00:11:05,560
Speaker 1: this old G S M or I S N five

196
00:11:05,640 --> 00:11:09,000
Speaker 1: or possibly C d um a uh the and these

197
00:11:09,000 --> 00:11:12,680
Speaker 1: standards also did not have a lot of support for data.

198
00:11:13,480 --> 00:11:16,480
Speaker 1: They had more so than the analog systems did, but

199
00:11:16,960 --> 00:11:19,679
Speaker 1: it still was not ideal. And in fact, the earliest

200
00:11:19,679 --> 00:11:22,760
Speaker 1: two G phones, the best way to send data besides

201
00:11:22,840 --> 00:11:26,480
Speaker 1: text messages was to use something called circuit switched data,

202
00:11:26,880 --> 00:11:30,080
Speaker 1: which involved actually placing a call almost like it's a

203
00:11:30,120 --> 00:11:34,559
Speaker 1: modem placing a call to another number and then engaging

204
00:11:34,640 --> 00:11:37,640
Speaker 1: this circuit switched data, which could send information at about

205
00:11:37,679 --> 00:11:40,760
Speaker 1: fourteen point four kill a bits per second h and

206
00:11:40,960 --> 00:11:44,800
Speaker 1: uh so still not a great experience if you wanted

207
00:11:44,840 --> 00:11:47,800
Speaker 1: to have something like a smartphone. It just wasn't really practical. Yeah,

208
00:11:47,840 --> 00:11:51,559
Speaker 1: the information I have says that the second generation network

209
00:11:51,960 --> 00:11:54,760
Speaker 1: second generation networks could hit somewhere in the neighborhood of

210
00:11:54,840 --> 00:12:00,640
Speaker 1: twenty kill a bits per second um maximum And then really, yeah,

211
00:12:00,679 --> 00:12:03,559
Speaker 1: and when we start talking about maximums, you guys should

212
00:12:03,600 --> 00:12:06,840
Speaker 1: know that we're talking about like in the labs, because

213
00:12:06,880 --> 00:12:09,160
Speaker 1: every time we talk about any standard and we talk

214
00:12:09,240 --> 00:12:13,839
Speaker 1: about it's maximum speed. That's almost never going to happen

215
00:12:13,920 --> 00:12:17,880
Speaker 1: in a real world test. So if you stand right here,

216
00:12:18,000 --> 00:12:20,840
Speaker 1: right next to the box, you can get oh, let's

217
00:12:20,840 --> 00:12:22,720
Speaker 1: put that down. I noticed that your pants are glowing.

218
00:12:22,840 --> 00:12:27,160
Speaker 1: But you're getting great service. Um. So next with too

219
00:12:27,160 --> 00:12:29,280
Speaker 1: close with g s M, they got a little bit

220
00:12:29,280 --> 00:12:32,120
Speaker 1: of a boost because actually quite a bit of a boost.

221
00:12:32,480 --> 00:12:37,520
Speaker 1: The General Packett Radio Service g p r S integrated

222
00:12:37,559 --> 00:12:40,800
Speaker 1: with g s M, which created the ability to have

223
00:12:40,880 --> 00:12:44,960
Speaker 1: a persistent data connection over g s M. Now again,

224
00:12:45,000 --> 00:12:48,640
Speaker 1: like that that circuit switched data approach that was not

225
00:12:48,760 --> 00:12:52,120
Speaker 1: that's not persistent, right, you have to initiate it. It's

226
00:12:52,240 --> 00:12:54,640
Speaker 1: during a live call and then you turn it off.

227
00:12:55,600 --> 00:12:58,840
Speaker 1: But GPRS allowed for a persistent data connection so you

228
00:12:58,880 --> 00:13:01,800
Speaker 1: could send data, could be asynchronous. You no longer had

229
00:13:01,840 --> 00:13:04,600
Speaker 1: to connect directly in order to UH to be able

230
00:13:04,600 --> 00:13:06,680
Speaker 1: to get data. If you think about it, it's almost

231
00:13:06,760 --> 00:13:09,760
Speaker 1: like a DSL connection on a phone line. You can

232
00:13:09,760 --> 00:13:12,480
Speaker 1: be on the phone and on the computer at the

233
00:13:12,559 --> 00:13:15,840
Speaker 1: same time. Now, those those signals are traveling through the

234
00:13:15,920 --> 00:13:19,160
Speaker 1: same copper wire, but in a different part of it,

235
00:13:19,200 --> 00:13:21,480
Speaker 1: so they're they're as they're asynchronous you don't have to

236
00:13:21,480 --> 00:13:23,960
Speaker 1: do them at the same time. Um. One of the

237
00:13:24,000 --> 00:13:27,560
Speaker 1: things that two G UH switching over to digital too

238
00:13:28,080 --> 00:13:31,720
Speaker 1: enabled us to do was to use U UM different

239
00:13:31,760 --> 00:13:35,120
Speaker 1: features like call our I D things that weren't available before,

240
00:13:35,320 --> 00:13:38,760
Speaker 1: or voicemail and um uh you know, at least according

241
00:13:38,800 --> 00:13:42,520
Speaker 1: to the information that that I've downloaded from from Motorola,

242
00:13:42,679 --> 00:13:45,880
Speaker 1: I mean, things like push to talk um those services

243
00:13:45,880 --> 00:13:49,520
Speaker 1: were not available before. And of course the short Message service.

244
00:13:50,000 --> 00:13:52,960
Speaker 1: This is when we started texting. Of course, you know

245
00:13:53,000 --> 00:13:55,400
Speaker 1: when you're doing that with a U with a two

246
00:13:55,440 --> 00:13:57,800
Speaker 1: G cell phone, you don't have a keyboard. You are

247
00:13:57,840 --> 00:14:03,920
Speaker 1: doing this with uh, you know number four four one,

248
00:14:04,240 --> 00:14:08,040
Speaker 1: not one, but the other number. So this G p

249
00:14:08,200 --> 00:14:11,200
Speaker 1: R S integration with G s M that actually made

250
00:14:11,200 --> 00:14:14,280
Speaker 1: things a little more complicated because now you suddenly had

251
00:14:14,280 --> 00:14:18,920
Speaker 1: a standard that was faster than the other two G standards.

252
00:14:19,160 --> 00:14:22,640
Speaker 1: So why do you call it? And here the other thing,

253
00:14:23,200 --> 00:14:26,160
Speaker 1: here's the other problems that the United Nations Telecommunications Union

254
00:14:26,600 --> 00:14:30,360
Speaker 1: came up with a set of requirements that you would

255
00:14:30,400 --> 00:14:33,080
Speaker 1: have to meet in order to call your technology three G.

256
00:14:34,040 --> 00:14:36,440
Speaker 1: So in this case, it's not it's not a question

257
00:14:36,480 --> 00:14:38,360
Speaker 1: of how much time has passed it's not even a

258
00:14:38,440 --> 00:14:40,960
Speaker 1: question of whether or not it's a new technology. It

259
00:14:41,040 --> 00:14:46,120
Speaker 1: has to meet certain UM ground level requirements to qualifies

260
00:14:46,160 --> 00:14:50,160
Speaker 1: three G. Well, even with the g p r S integration,

261
00:14:50,560 --> 00:14:52,880
Speaker 1: g s M was not hitting the three G requirements,

262
00:14:52,880 --> 00:14:57,040
Speaker 1: which were at least two megabits megabits per second download

263
00:14:57,080 --> 00:15:00,840
Speaker 1: speed UM if you were stationary, so if you're if

264
00:15:00,880 --> 00:15:03,880
Speaker 1: you're staying still with a H three G set, it

265
00:15:03,880 --> 00:15:05,400
Speaker 1: had to be able to get at least two megabits

266
00:15:05,440 --> 00:15:08,000
Speaker 1: per second of data or if you were mobile, it

267
00:15:08,000 --> 00:15:11,240
Speaker 1: had to be at least three kill bits per second. Well,

268
00:15:11,280 --> 00:15:15,160
Speaker 1: GSM what GPRS could not do that. So now we

269
00:15:15,200 --> 00:15:19,280
Speaker 1: refer to that as a two point five G technology

270
00:15:19,400 --> 00:15:21,720
Speaker 1: because it's faster than two G, but it doesn't quite

271
00:15:21,760 --> 00:15:25,240
Speaker 1: meet three G requirements. This is I think too about

272
00:15:25,240 --> 00:15:28,240
Speaker 1: the time that we started talking about generations. I don't

273
00:15:28,360 --> 00:15:30,200
Speaker 1: I don't think a lot of people when I when

274
00:15:30,200 --> 00:15:33,920
Speaker 1: I heard people talking about the second generation of UH

275
00:15:34,240 --> 00:15:37,960
Speaker 1: cellular technology, I heard them calling it digital or wireless

276
00:15:38,080 --> 00:15:40,640
Speaker 1: or PCs or you know, they had some other name

277
00:15:40,680 --> 00:15:43,240
Speaker 1: for it. They weren't saying, hey, move up to two

278
00:15:43,320 --> 00:15:46,920
Speaker 1: G UM. But I think when it started UH, when

279
00:15:46,960 --> 00:15:50,040
Speaker 1: we started getting into these newer technologies as uh, the

280
00:15:50,080 --> 00:15:53,080
Speaker 1: g p R S. We started hearing, well, this is

281
00:15:53,240 --> 00:15:55,360
Speaker 1: you know, we're not at three G yet, this is

282
00:15:55,400 --> 00:15:57,880
Speaker 1: two point five G. And that's when you started hearing

283
00:15:57,920 --> 00:16:01,240
Speaker 1: it used as a public not not something that the

284
00:16:01,280 --> 00:16:04,240
Speaker 1: industry would talk about within itself, but to the public.

285
00:16:04,240 --> 00:16:06,440
Speaker 1: People said, oh, well, this is a this is more

286
00:16:06,480 --> 00:16:11,480
Speaker 1: than a second generations a shorthand really yeah, and it

287
00:16:11,520 --> 00:16:14,040
Speaker 1: gets even more complicated here. All right, So the three

288
00:16:14,080 --> 00:16:17,720
Speaker 1: G standard is set by the United Nations. Alright, So

289
00:16:18,080 --> 00:16:22,880
Speaker 1: g s MS next generation was Universal Mobile Telecommunications System

290
00:16:23,160 --> 00:16:26,680
Speaker 1: u m t S. It starts getting built out. However,

291
00:16:27,360 --> 00:16:29,760
Speaker 1: around that same time as u m t S network

292
00:16:29,800 --> 00:16:32,920
Speaker 1: start getting rolled out, another kind of network starts rolling

293
00:16:32,920 --> 00:16:35,360
Speaker 1: out called c d m A two thousands. So this

294
00:16:35,440 --> 00:16:37,920
Speaker 1: is back to the other standard, the one that's prevalent

295
00:16:37,960 --> 00:16:41,560
Speaker 1: in the United States. Yes, that goes back to two

296
00:16:41,560 --> 00:16:43,280
Speaker 1: and a half G. That's why it's even more confusing

297
00:16:43,320 --> 00:16:46,240
Speaker 1: because you have a legitimate three G network rolling out

298
00:16:46,280 --> 00:16:49,000
Speaker 1: that's u m t S, at the same time as

299
00:16:49,000 --> 00:16:51,600
Speaker 1: a legitimate three G network is rolling out at two

300
00:16:51,600 --> 00:16:53,920
Speaker 1: point five networks rolling out called c d m A

301
00:16:53,960 --> 00:16:56,280
Speaker 1: two thousand. This won't be the last time something like

302
00:16:56,320 --> 00:16:58,360
Speaker 1: this happens. No, here's another one. In fact, I'm going

303
00:16:58,400 --> 00:17:00,000
Speaker 1: to go ahead and do it now because otherwise I'm

304
00:17:00,040 --> 00:17:03,040
Speaker 1: going to lose my own mind, all right, So here's

305
00:17:03,080 --> 00:17:06,000
Speaker 1: the second one, which is the Enhanced Data Rates for

306
00:17:06,080 --> 00:17:10,680
Speaker 1: g S M Evolution or EDGE Network. Now you've got

307
00:17:10,720 --> 00:17:13,280
Speaker 1: the successor to g S M U M T S

308
00:17:13,359 --> 00:17:16,919
Speaker 1: that's rolling out. But here's the thing. Not all carriers,

309
00:17:17,080 --> 00:17:20,600
Speaker 1: not all networks, are going to be able to upgrade

310
00:17:20,920 --> 00:17:24,480
Speaker 1: at the same level of scale and speed as others.

311
00:17:25,200 --> 00:17:28,280
Speaker 1: But they still want to be able to have really

312
00:17:28,320 --> 00:17:30,280
Speaker 1: good service because if they don't, then they're going to

313
00:17:30,359 --> 00:17:33,360
Speaker 1: lose all their customers to networks that have better service. Right,

314
00:17:34,000 --> 00:17:35,800
Speaker 1: this is not the last time that will happen either.

315
00:17:35,920 --> 00:17:39,679
Speaker 1: So this means that there needed to be some something

316
00:17:39,760 --> 00:17:43,320
Speaker 1: in between two point five G and three G so

317
00:17:43,400 --> 00:17:48,000
Speaker 1: that these other carriers could stay afloat while they are

318
00:17:48,119 --> 00:17:51,720
Speaker 1: working on upgrading their networks. And so that was the

319
00:17:51,760 --> 00:17:54,800
Speaker 1: development of EDGE, the Enhanced Data Rates for GSM Evolution.

320
00:17:55,359 --> 00:17:59,840
Speaker 1: It was developed after three G standards were created, but

321
00:18:00,200 --> 00:18:02,520
Speaker 1: made so that it could boost two point five G

322
00:18:02,720 --> 00:18:06,600
Speaker 1: speeds enough so that people wouldn't just abandon it wholesale.

323
00:18:06,640 --> 00:18:09,760
Speaker 1: So some people will go and call EDGE a two

324
00:18:09,800 --> 00:18:13,800
Speaker 1: point seven five G, which makes you go crazy because

325
00:18:13,800 --> 00:18:16,880
Speaker 1: again it came after three G. Did. Well, let's let's

326
00:18:16,880 --> 00:18:20,040
Speaker 1: talk a little bit about the data too, because um,

327
00:18:20,160 --> 00:18:24,280
Speaker 1: the g p r S connections would average around thirty

328
00:18:24,359 --> 00:18:26,640
Speaker 1: to forty kill a bits per second, although you could

329
00:18:26,640 --> 00:18:29,440
Speaker 1: get up to about a D fourteen. Again in the

330
00:18:29,560 --> 00:18:32,679
Speaker 1: lab UM, c d M A two thousand could do

331
00:18:32,800 --> 00:18:37,560
Speaker 1: about six eight normally, but uh, uh could probably hit

332
00:18:37,600 --> 00:18:41,200
Speaker 1: around a hundred and forty four killabits per second, and

333
00:18:41,200 --> 00:18:44,920
Speaker 1: and EDGE was a step up at three and eighty

334
00:18:45,000 --> 00:18:49,639
Speaker 1: four killabits per second maximum UM. And uh, you know

335
00:18:49,680 --> 00:18:52,680
Speaker 1: the g p RS and EDGE were both uh forks

336
00:18:52,760 --> 00:18:56,000
Speaker 1: off the g s M tree. UM. And of course

337
00:18:56,000 --> 00:18:59,280
Speaker 1: c d M A two thousand was c d M

338
00:18:59,280 --> 00:19:02,199
Speaker 1: A right, yeah, the and the one that followed up

339
00:19:02,240 --> 00:19:04,520
Speaker 1: c d UM A two thousand was e v d O,

340
00:19:04,680 --> 00:19:08,800
Speaker 1: which is evolution data optimized. Well, I do have another

341
00:19:09,040 --> 00:19:11,240
Speaker 1: two point seven five which is e g p r

342
00:19:11,440 --> 00:19:16,280
Speaker 1: S two. Okay, so another another advance on the general

343
00:19:16,280 --> 00:19:20,160
Speaker 1: Packet Radio service integration exactly, but it's UM, it's only

344
00:19:20,440 --> 00:19:23,920
Speaker 1: you know, this is also a synchronous because it will

345
00:19:23,960 --> 00:19:28,600
Speaker 1: do uh four D seventy three kilobits per second upstream

346
00:19:28,680 --> 00:19:33,560
Speaker 1: and one point to megabits per second downstream. UM. That means, uh,

347
00:19:33,560 --> 00:19:36,719
Speaker 1: it's slower when it's sending data from your phone to

348
00:19:36,760 --> 00:19:39,720
Speaker 1: the network, and faster as a download, which is something

349
00:19:39,760 --> 00:19:41,879
Speaker 1: you would want. Is that that generally is a consumer

350
00:19:43,600 --> 00:19:47,600
Speaker 1: in almost every every four of network I've seen. Did

351
00:19:47,600 --> 00:19:49,240
Speaker 1: you want to talk about the features two of the

352
00:19:49,280 --> 00:19:51,480
Speaker 1: two and a half G, because this is when we

353
00:19:51,520 --> 00:19:57,480
Speaker 1: started getting MMS, the multi media mess multi media message service, UM,

354
00:19:57,520 --> 00:20:01,760
Speaker 1: basic web browsing, UM, local Asian based services, just really

355
00:20:01,800 --> 00:20:04,680
Speaker 1: basic stuff. I mean, UM, you know there are some

356
00:20:04,720 --> 00:20:07,080
Speaker 1: apps that run better because all they have to do

357
00:20:07,119 --> 00:20:09,760
Speaker 1: is send a short bit of information. So these kinds

358
00:20:09,760 --> 00:20:11,960
Speaker 1: of things started getting off the ground, but not to

359
00:20:12,000 --> 00:20:15,239
Speaker 1: the point where they are now. UM and and and

360
00:20:15,280 --> 00:20:17,680
Speaker 1: the two point seven five stepped it up a bit

361
00:20:17,680 --> 00:20:20,560
Speaker 1: in terms of speed and improvements, But three G was

362
00:20:20,680 --> 00:20:22,800
Speaker 1: really the big change. Yeah, that's where you've got the

363
00:20:22,880 --> 00:20:24,720
Speaker 1: U M T S which came first. That was the

364
00:20:24,760 --> 00:20:27,240
Speaker 1: G s M version, So G S M S U

365
00:20:27,359 --> 00:20:29,920
Speaker 1: M T S uh that that began to develop and

366
00:20:30,040 --> 00:20:33,560
Speaker 1: roll out first, and then eventually CDMA two thousand successor

367
00:20:33,800 --> 00:20:36,959
Speaker 1: e V d OH joined it. So those were the

368
00:20:36,960 --> 00:20:42,280
Speaker 1: three G standards that that really started to create the

369
00:20:42,280 --> 00:20:45,720
Speaker 1: the environment that was necessary to have a really robust

370
00:20:46,320 --> 00:20:50,679
Speaker 1: smartphone type experience. Although we can remember when the you know,

371
00:20:50,920 --> 00:20:53,840
Speaker 1: I remember when the iPhone went three G m M,

372
00:20:54,040 --> 00:20:56,399
Speaker 1: so it's kind of interesting that, you know, there was

373
00:20:56,440 --> 00:20:59,879
Speaker 1: a time where even the iPhone wasn't tapping into these

374
00:21:00,080 --> 00:21:04,000
Speaker 1: these uh these standards. Well. Of course, moving to three

375
00:21:04,040 --> 00:21:06,840
Speaker 1: G gave you full motion video, you could listen to

376
00:21:07,000 --> 00:21:11,080
Speaker 1: music online, and uh you know, gave us faster uh

377
00:21:11,160 --> 00:21:15,440
Speaker 1: internet access in general. UM. Now, as far as U

378
00:21:15,520 --> 00:21:17,840
Speaker 1: M T S, it could do about two megabits per

379
00:21:17,880 --> 00:21:21,000
Speaker 1: second UM, which is that's that's right there at the

380
00:21:21,000 --> 00:21:23,879
Speaker 1: threshold for three G. Yeah, and it's also a little

381
00:21:23,880 --> 00:21:28,320
Speaker 1: bit faster than a lot of DSL connections. You know,

382
00:21:28,440 --> 00:21:31,159
Speaker 1: I'm still pretty common in the United States anyway to

383
00:21:31,160 --> 00:21:34,120
Speaker 1: see a one point five megabit per second DSL connection

384
00:21:34,680 --> 00:21:38,200
Speaker 1: UM and uh C d M A two thousand uh

385
00:21:38,359 --> 00:21:41,280
Speaker 1: E V d O revision A would do up to

386
00:21:41,560 --> 00:21:44,879
Speaker 1: three point one megabits per second. That was a revised

387
00:21:45,000 --> 00:21:47,040
Speaker 1: version of e B d oh. Yeah. In fact, that

388
00:21:47,080 --> 00:21:51,840
Speaker 1: revision ended up causing another discussion about whether or not

389
00:21:51,960 --> 00:21:55,000
Speaker 1: that should be called three G or three point five G.

390
00:21:55,760 --> 00:21:58,240
Speaker 1: So eventually some people will go ahead and say that

391
00:21:58,320 --> 00:22:00,440
Speaker 1: e v d O or Revision A is three point

392
00:22:00,440 --> 00:22:03,960
Speaker 1: five G because the speeds, the increasing speed was significant

393
00:22:04,080 --> 00:22:07,400
Speaker 1: enough to boost it up beyond three G, but it's

394
00:22:07,400 --> 00:22:12,040
Speaker 1: still far as fall below what the International Telecomunsion Telecommunications

395
00:22:12,119 --> 00:22:18,199
Speaker 1: Union Radio Communications Sector specified as the requirements for four G,

396
00:22:18,359 --> 00:22:20,800
Speaker 1: which we'll talk about the second. Yeah, I also have

397
00:22:20,920 --> 00:22:23,520
Speaker 1: a e v d O or Vision B clocking in

398
00:22:23,600 --> 00:22:28,560
Speaker 1: and about forty six or so megabets per second UM,

399
00:22:28,600 --> 00:22:30,639
Speaker 1: which some people call a three point five G, and

400
00:22:30,680 --> 00:22:35,080
Speaker 1: then there's h S d P A UM. Yeah, alright,

401
00:22:35,119 --> 00:22:38,040
Speaker 1: so this this would be the three point five upgrade

402
00:22:38,080 --> 00:22:41,480
Speaker 1: to U m T S. Yes, So again U m

403
00:22:41,520 --> 00:22:45,120
Speaker 1: T S is the g S M line. Uh HS

404
00:22:45,240 --> 00:22:47,760
Speaker 1: d P A is high speed down link packet access.

405
00:22:48,200 --> 00:22:50,760
Speaker 1: They also got h S u P A upgrade, which

406
00:22:50,800 --> 00:22:54,080
Speaker 1: is high speed uplink packet access. So essentially what this

407
00:22:54,119 --> 00:22:57,080
Speaker 1: means is that the improvements to the standards allowed for

408
00:22:57,280 --> 00:23:01,840
Speaker 1: faster down download and upload speeds. So both e v

409
00:23:01,960 --> 00:23:04,959
Speaker 1: d O A, Revision A and U MTS with these

410
00:23:05,080 --> 00:23:11,000
Speaker 1: new upgrades slid into the three point five GUM designation

411
00:23:11,040 --> 00:23:13,560
Speaker 1: more or less. I mean, it's not even an official designation,

412
00:23:13,560 --> 00:23:15,800
Speaker 1: but that's kind of where we think about it, because

413
00:23:15,800 --> 00:23:18,960
Speaker 1: it's faster than the older versions. UM. Now, in March

414
00:23:19,000 --> 00:23:23,840
Speaker 1: of two thousand eight, the International Telecommunications Union Radio Communication

415
00:23:23,920 --> 00:23:28,360
Speaker 1: Sector said, here's what is required for you to call

416
00:23:28,520 --> 00:23:32,520
Speaker 1: your technology for G and they said, it needs to

417
00:23:32,560 --> 00:23:34,600
Speaker 1: be able to if you're mobile, it needs to be

418
00:23:34,640 --> 00:23:37,080
Speaker 1: able to pull down data at a hundred megabits per second,

419
00:23:37,680 --> 00:23:39,560
Speaker 1: and if you are stationary, it needs to be able

420
00:23:39,560 --> 00:23:42,879
Speaker 1: to do that at a gigabit per second, uh, which

421
00:23:42,960 --> 00:23:47,840
Speaker 1: is you know, it's pretty darned fast. And so now

422
00:23:47,880 --> 00:23:51,159
Speaker 1: we've got companies trying to develop what will become four G,

423
00:23:51,359 --> 00:23:54,679
Speaker 1: but no one has actually hit a technology that does this,

424
00:23:55,320 --> 00:23:59,520
Speaker 1: that hits that does these required standards. UM. There are

425
00:23:59,600 --> 00:24:03,040
Speaker 1: some talk about getting speeds that are close to that range,

426
00:24:03,040 --> 00:24:05,399
Speaker 1: and so the companies go ahead and neither say that

427
00:24:05,400 --> 00:24:09,880
Speaker 1: their technology is four G or it's got four G speeds. UM.

428
00:24:09,920 --> 00:24:12,119
Speaker 1: I think the first of those was probably T Mobile

429
00:24:12,240 --> 00:24:15,800
Speaker 1: USA SO, which was using HSP A plus yes, which

430
00:24:15,920 --> 00:24:20,480
Speaker 1: was another upgrade to u M T S, which could

431
00:24:20,520 --> 00:24:24,120
Speaker 1: give around six hundred megabits per second as a theoretical

432
00:24:24,240 --> 00:24:29,639
Speaker 1: top speed. Uh again theoretical. Uh, still not near the

433
00:24:29,680 --> 00:24:32,880
Speaker 1: gigabit per second range. It's just over half of that,

434
00:24:32,920 --> 00:24:36,119
Speaker 1: but not not to the full four G speed. But

435
00:24:36,680 --> 00:24:40,879
Speaker 1: because it was so much faster than previous generations, again,

436
00:24:40,960 --> 00:24:42,439
Speaker 1: what do you do? Do you say that this is

437
00:24:42,480 --> 00:24:45,560
Speaker 1: the same generation as a phone that can that works

438
00:24:45,600 --> 00:24:48,159
Speaker 1: at at a fraction of that speed. That doesn't make

439
00:24:48,200 --> 00:24:52,080
Speaker 1: sense to the consumer. Yeah, I'm I'm just as a

440
00:24:52,160 --> 00:24:55,000
Speaker 1: personal note, I'm wondering if they maybe set the bar

441
00:24:55,119 --> 00:24:57,760
Speaker 1: for what they were going to call for G a

442
00:24:57,760 --> 00:25:00,639
Speaker 1: little high. Yeah, Like the jump between three G and

443
00:25:00,640 --> 00:25:03,760
Speaker 1: four G was a little too broad. Yeah, because there

444
00:25:03,840 --> 00:25:06,840
Speaker 1: is a lot of there's a lot of opportunity for

445
00:25:07,040 --> 00:25:11,520
Speaker 1: layers within those two generations. And as a consumer, it

446
00:25:11,600 --> 00:25:14,159
Speaker 1: is confusing. If I walk into a store and I

447
00:25:14,200 --> 00:25:16,600
Speaker 1: see something labeled three G and something labeled four G,

448
00:25:16,800 --> 00:25:19,800
Speaker 1: then I just come to an that's a pretty easy conclusion.

449
00:25:19,840 --> 00:25:21,560
Speaker 1: I'm like, oh, the four G has to be faster

450
00:25:21,600 --> 00:25:25,159
Speaker 1: because it's newer. If I see two different three G phones,

451
00:25:25,280 --> 00:25:28,960
Speaker 1: I assume, if I'm an average consumer, that they they

452
00:25:29,040 --> 00:25:32,320
Speaker 1: transmit data approximately the same speed. But as we've been

453
00:25:32,359 --> 00:25:35,639
Speaker 1: discussing if if it's a true if they're truly sticking

454
00:25:35,640 --> 00:25:40,040
Speaker 1: to three versus four. The variation within that band of

455
00:25:40,119 --> 00:25:42,840
Speaker 1: three G phones is so great that you cannot be

456
00:25:42,960 --> 00:25:44,920
Speaker 1: sure that one phone is going to transmit at the

457
00:25:44,960 --> 00:25:48,399
Speaker 1: same speed as another. And you know, it also depends

458
00:25:48,440 --> 00:25:51,080
Speaker 1: on a lot of other things too, like where you

459
00:25:51,119 --> 00:25:54,600
Speaker 1: are and the kind of phone. It is not a traffic,

460
00:25:54,680 --> 00:25:57,200
Speaker 1: that's network traffic that's going on at that time. Yeah,

461
00:25:57,240 --> 00:26:01,640
Speaker 1: I mean there are Yeah. The thing is that uh,

462
00:26:01,720 --> 00:26:05,159
Speaker 1: you know there we've talked about the different I think

463
00:26:05,200 --> 00:26:07,800
Speaker 1: we had a conversation about the Verizon iPhone a long

464
00:26:07,840 --> 00:26:11,399
Speaker 1: time ago and people compared at the time, people were

465
00:26:11,440 --> 00:26:15,000
Speaker 1: comparing the Verizon iPhone to the A T and T

466
00:26:15,400 --> 00:26:17,840
Speaker 1: iPhone and talking about the differences in speed and how

467
00:26:17,920 --> 00:26:20,320
Speaker 1: much faster it was. Well, I mean they're on two

468
00:26:20,320 --> 00:26:25,280
Speaker 1: different types of networks, um, And they've built out their

469
00:26:25,280 --> 00:26:28,080
Speaker 1: networks more, you know, in different ways and things like that,

470
00:26:28,119 --> 00:26:30,560
Speaker 1: and there are a lot of environmental factors that that

471
00:26:30,680 --> 00:26:33,840
Speaker 1: may play into the speeds. But um, yeah, the four

472
00:26:33,880 --> 00:26:37,680
Speaker 1: G what what people are building out now? As FORG networks, basically,

473
00:26:38,280 --> 00:26:40,040
Speaker 1: for the most part in the United States have been

474
00:26:40,240 --> 00:26:44,439
Speaker 1: LTE UH networks long term evolution. Yeah, for a while

475
00:26:44,520 --> 00:26:46,199
Speaker 1: it was going to it look like it was going

476
00:26:46,240 --> 00:26:49,120
Speaker 1: to come down between y max and lt E. Now

477
00:26:49,119 --> 00:26:53,480
Speaker 1: wy max is uh is technology that theoretically could have

478
00:26:53,560 --> 00:26:57,280
Speaker 1: faster speeds than LTE. UM and both of them have

479
00:26:57,320 --> 00:27:01,680
Speaker 1: been development for years. Yeah, so both and and also

480
00:27:01,720 --> 00:27:05,480
Speaker 1: I should add that neither y max nor LTE comes

481
00:27:05,520 --> 00:27:09,360
Speaker 1: close to hitting those benchmarks for a four G Even

482
00:27:09,400 --> 00:27:12,840
Speaker 1: though people have talked about LTE phones being four G phones,

483
00:27:13,440 --> 00:27:16,320
Speaker 1: they don't still don't hit the the actual benchmarks that

484
00:27:16,359 --> 00:27:21,240
Speaker 1: were set by the United Nations. So even though you've got,

485
00:27:21,320 --> 00:27:24,200
Speaker 1: you know, a phone that's much faster than previous phones,

486
00:27:24,480 --> 00:27:27,639
Speaker 1: if you're going strictly by technical specifications, they are not

487
00:27:27,800 --> 00:27:33,399
Speaker 1: truly four G phones, which is again, uh confusing. And

488
00:27:33,440 --> 00:27:36,200
Speaker 1: at this point I think the carriers and the manufacturers

489
00:27:36,200 --> 00:27:38,120
Speaker 1: have just sort of thrown their hands up and said,

490
00:27:38,240 --> 00:27:41,720
Speaker 1: forget it. We're calling it what we want yep yep. Now, Um,

491
00:27:42,560 --> 00:27:46,359
Speaker 1: part of the reason that uh uh T mobile began

492
00:27:47,080 --> 00:27:50,600
Speaker 1: the four G marketing boom was because um they did

493
00:27:50,640 --> 00:27:54,119
Speaker 1: have the hsp A network plus network and uh, you know,

494
00:27:54,200 --> 00:27:58,280
Speaker 1: it would do much faster speeds under ideal conditions than

495
00:27:58,520 --> 00:28:04,400
Speaker 1: than the typical three G networks. So basically, since they're

496
00:28:05,040 --> 00:28:07,160
Speaker 1: these things are a little on the fast and loose side,

497
00:28:07,200 --> 00:28:08,680
Speaker 1: they went ahead and said, oh, you know what, we're

498
00:28:08,720 --> 00:28:12,040
Speaker 1: four G and uh, you know, some others kind of

499
00:28:12,080 --> 00:28:14,680
Speaker 1: hollered about that and said they're not really four G.

500
00:28:14,880 --> 00:28:19,480
Speaker 1: But in general, the the consumer isn't really interested in that.

501
00:28:19,560 --> 00:28:22,280
Speaker 1: The average consumer, the average consumer ones a shorthand way

502
00:28:22,320 --> 00:28:25,800
Speaker 1: of knowing how fast the phone was and the uh.

503
00:28:26,160 --> 00:28:28,119
Speaker 1: The other thing I should mention about y MAX and

504
00:28:28,240 --> 00:28:32,399
Speaker 1: lt that's different from these earlier technologies is that neither

505
00:28:32,480 --> 00:28:39,360
Speaker 1: of them have a dedicated uh voice call bandwidth in there.

506
00:28:39,680 --> 00:28:41,200
Speaker 1: In order to make a call over l t E

507
00:28:41,520 --> 00:28:44,840
Speaker 1: or y max, you call via void, yes, voice over

508
00:28:44,880 --> 00:28:49,720
Speaker 1: Internet protocol. So that's you know, that's also different from

509
00:28:49,760 --> 00:28:53,000
Speaker 1: the previous ones. They oh, there's no h. The entire

510
00:28:53,040 --> 00:28:56,520
Speaker 1: spectrum within lt E and y max is dedicated to data.

511
00:28:56,720 --> 00:28:59,520
Speaker 1: So now we've reached the opposite of what it was

512
00:28:59,640 --> 00:29:02,840
Speaker 1: when it first started with the analog systems, where it

513
00:29:02,960 --> 00:29:07,920
Speaker 1: was almost entirely for voice and not data. Now with

514
00:29:08,080 --> 00:29:11,440
Speaker 1: the latest generations, it's all data, no voice. And part

515
00:29:11,480 --> 00:29:15,320
Speaker 1: of that is that these these lt N y Max

516
00:29:15,360 --> 00:29:20,720
Speaker 1: weren't necessarily developed as uh the newest cell phone technology.

517
00:29:20,760 --> 00:29:23,840
Speaker 1: It's just a data transmission technology that's being adopted by

518
00:29:23,880 --> 00:29:28,520
Speaker 1: the cell phone industry, right. I mean, they're there companies

519
00:29:28,560 --> 00:29:31,360
Speaker 1: within the cell phone industry that worked on developing those standards,

520
00:29:31,400 --> 00:29:34,400
Speaker 1: but uh, it was more about how do you get

521
00:29:34,880 --> 00:29:36,880
Speaker 1: data since that's the way a lot of people are

522
00:29:36,960 --> 00:29:38,760
Speaker 1: using their phones now is really they're using as a

523
00:29:38,800 --> 00:29:43,600
Speaker 1: mobile computer rather than a telephone. Um. And uh, the

524
00:29:43,880 --> 00:29:47,600
Speaker 1: as far as the some recent changes there, they were

525
00:29:47,640 --> 00:29:52,440
Speaker 1: marketing decisions made on behalf of a certain smartphone manufacturer

526
00:29:52,480 --> 00:29:56,920
Speaker 1: recently in which they basically agreed to allow their phones

527
00:29:56,960 --> 00:30:00,000
Speaker 1: to be called for g um when they weren't before

528
00:30:00,000 --> 00:30:03,240
Speaker 1: are technically and some people were kind of astonished to

529
00:30:03,240 --> 00:30:07,280
Speaker 1: find out that their phones were suddenly showing four G

530
00:30:07,800 --> 00:30:10,440
Speaker 1: on the screen. Now, mine actually does that when I travel,

531
00:30:10,520 --> 00:30:13,880
Speaker 1: if I switch, if if I'm moving to a tower

532
00:30:14,000 --> 00:30:16,600
Speaker 1: that has a slower technology, or I think what is

533
00:30:16,600 --> 00:30:18,600
Speaker 1: trying to do is tell me that the speed is different.

534
00:30:18,640 --> 00:30:21,560
Speaker 1: But um, you know it will say two G or

535
00:30:21,600 --> 00:30:25,480
Speaker 1: three G when it drops down. But um, um you know,

536
00:30:25,520 --> 00:30:29,160
Speaker 1: of course that's also because um, the earlier standards of

537
00:30:29,240 --> 00:30:31,720
Speaker 1: G S M and C D M A are you know,

538
00:30:31,760 --> 00:30:35,400
Speaker 1: compatible so you can move from one to another? Um,

539
00:30:35,440 --> 00:30:37,920
Speaker 1: I think four G networks are are going to require.

540
00:30:37,960 --> 00:30:40,040
Speaker 1: I mean, these are not branches of those trees, these

541
00:30:40,080 --> 00:30:43,840
Speaker 1: are brand new trees. So yeah, that's that's important to

542
00:30:43,880 --> 00:30:46,200
Speaker 1: point out. And also if you do have a phone

543
00:30:46,200 --> 00:30:48,720
Speaker 1: that allows you to switch from one like three G

544
00:30:48,960 --> 00:30:53,120
Speaker 1: two two G. Uh, that's you might wonder why that

545
00:30:53,280 --> 00:30:54,880
Speaker 1: why you would ever want to do that. I'll tell

546
00:30:54,920 --> 00:30:57,600
Speaker 1: you why you want to do that. Okay, Let's say

547
00:30:57,640 --> 00:31:00,320
Speaker 1: that you are at some major event like don't know,

548
00:31:00,440 --> 00:31:03,840
Speaker 1: consumer Electronic show C S and UH, and you want

549
00:31:03,840 --> 00:31:06,760
Speaker 1: to try and check your email and you pop on

550
00:31:06,800 --> 00:31:11,120
Speaker 1: that three G network and there are two other people

551
00:31:11,120 --> 00:31:13,920
Speaker 1: trying to pop on that three G network. Popping over

552
00:31:13,960 --> 00:31:16,960
Speaker 1: to the two G network and using that older technology

553
00:31:17,040 --> 00:31:21,320
Speaker 1: sometimes is much faster because the network traffic is not

554
00:31:21,400 --> 00:31:25,000
Speaker 1: as severe. And I would often switch over specifically to

555
00:31:25,080 --> 00:31:28,400
Speaker 1: that because it would also drain my battery less as

556
00:31:28,520 --> 00:31:32,000
Speaker 1: my phone no longer had to try and and keep

557
00:31:32,080 --> 00:31:35,040
Speaker 1: pinging towers to see if it had a true connection

558
00:31:35,080 --> 00:31:40,120
Speaker 1: to download any recent data. UM. Yeah, so hopefully we

559
00:31:40,240 --> 00:31:46,000
Speaker 1: have confused you beyond all measure because accomplished. Yeah, because

560
00:31:46,040 --> 00:31:48,520
Speaker 1: this is this is definitely a confusing subject just because

561
00:31:48,560 --> 00:31:54,320
Speaker 1: the fact that it did not progress linearly either. You know,

562
00:31:54,400 --> 00:31:58,320
Speaker 1: you had you had companies that would develop a technology

563
00:31:58,360 --> 00:32:00,720
Speaker 1: that would be in a generation ahead, then go back

564
00:32:00,800 --> 00:32:04,240
Speaker 1: and develop technologies that fill in gaps, and it wasn't

565
00:32:04,240 --> 00:32:07,680
Speaker 1: necessarily like if you go chronologically, it doesn't quite match up.

566
00:32:07,720 --> 00:32:10,600
Speaker 1: And and the fact that you have two different standards,

567
00:32:10,680 --> 00:32:13,000
Speaker 1: two different lines of standards that are battling it out,

568
00:32:13,080 --> 00:32:15,920
Speaker 1: makes it even more confusing. So yeah, it's that's why

569
00:32:15,920 --> 00:32:18,400
Speaker 1: it's such a mess, and why you know, calling something

570
00:32:18,400 --> 00:32:22,320
Speaker 1: three G or four G is and and it was

571
00:32:22,600 --> 00:32:26,680
Speaker 1: arguably somewhat meaningless. You know what, we didn't touch on

572
00:32:26,680 --> 00:32:30,200
Speaker 1: one one thing. I think the reason why, because you

573
00:32:30,280 --> 00:32:31,880
Speaker 1: may be saying, okay, well, if they had three G,

574
00:32:32,000 --> 00:32:34,200
Speaker 1: why didn't they just go ahead and build an LTE

575
00:32:34,320 --> 00:32:37,200
Speaker 1: network instead of you know, playing with all these other

576
00:32:37,240 --> 00:32:41,120
Speaker 1: interim standards, I think that's because the hardware, you know,

577
00:32:41,240 --> 00:32:45,600
Speaker 1: they could make improvements to those technologies without having to

578
00:32:45,640 --> 00:32:48,200
Speaker 1: spend as much money as building a whole new tower

579
00:32:48,280 --> 00:32:51,880
Speaker 1: with whole new equipment. Um, So they could make improvements

580
00:32:51,920 --> 00:32:55,000
Speaker 1: to their equipment and offer that to their customers without

581
00:32:55,040 --> 00:32:58,280
Speaker 1: having to spend the money to invest in a new technology,

582
00:32:58,360 --> 00:33:01,720
Speaker 1: especially if it wasn't ready yet. Um. And you know,

583
00:33:01,800 --> 00:33:07,080
Speaker 1: the cell phone business is pretty competitive. So yeah, so

584
00:33:07,240 --> 00:33:10,240
Speaker 1: people want to you know, if you'll excuse the pun

585
00:33:10,360 --> 00:33:12,479
Speaker 1: for once. Um, you know, people want to find an

586
00:33:12,560 --> 00:33:15,160
Speaker 1: edge over their competitors, and so they're gonna say, oh,

587
00:33:15,200 --> 00:33:18,239
Speaker 1: we have slightly faster technology than they do, and then

588
00:33:18,280 --> 00:33:21,239
Speaker 1: they the others leap frog and it just keeps you know,

589
00:33:21,320 --> 00:33:26,000
Speaker 1: they keep updating firmware and switching out wires and changing

590
00:33:26,000 --> 00:33:29,680
Speaker 1: a broadcast tower. You know that that's less expensive than going, hey,

591
00:33:29,760 --> 00:33:34,800
Speaker 1: let's build a whole new network while it's expensive. Good times. So,

592
00:33:35,120 --> 00:33:37,880
Speaker 1: if you guys have any subjects about which you would

593
00:33:37,880 --> 00:33:40,360
Speaker 1: like to be further confused, let us know. You can

594
00:33:40,440 --> 00:33:43,280
Speaker 1: send us a message via email or adjust it's text

595
00:33:43,320 --> 00:33:47,200
Speaker 1: stuck at Discovery dot com, or you can contact us

596
00:33:47,240 --> 00:33:50,080
Speaker 1: on Facebook or Twitter. Are handled. There is tech stuff

597
00:33:50,360 --> 00:33:53,240
Speaker 1: hs W and Chris and I will talk to you again,

598
00:33:53,800 --> 00:33:59,200
Speaker 1: maybe on the phone really soon. Be sure to check

599
00:33:59,240 --> 00:34:02,360
Speaker 1: out our new video podcast, Stuff from the Future. Join

600
00:34:02,440 --> 00:34:04,960
Speaker 1: How Stuff Work staff as we explore the most promising

601
00:34:05,040 --> 00:34:09,640
Speaker 1: and perplexing possibilities us tomorrow. The house Stuff Works iPhone

602
00:34:09,680 --> 00:34:17,440
Speaker 1: app has arrived. Download it today on iTunes. Brought to

603
00:34:17,440 --> 00:34:20,560
Speaker 1: you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera. It's ready,

604
00:34:20,719 --> 00:34:21,120
Speaker 1: are you