Now that I'm floating back down to earth and going back to my Powerbook for web surfing on the couch, I'm starting to get a real sense of what EDGE means in NYC, particularly in downtown Manhattan.
I realize the amount of buildings here makes a good connection tricky, but in the past few days, my experience has been that surfing via EDGE is like riding on the back of a one winged eagle. If the wind is right, you might fly for a bit here and there, but it's mostly a series of dips and bigger dips. And lots of poop.
In my little part of town on East 18th St., I'm lucky to break 50kbps. A walk up the block sometimes yields 125, sometimes not. Various places in midtown seem to fare better at 150 to 175, but with little regularity. I have yet to break 200kbps anywhere I've been, which apparently folks get all the time in East Jibip, Kansas.
Today, for kicks, I stopped by an AT&T store, to see if there was a chance something was wrong with my phone vs. theirs. I went to iphonenetworktest.com with their display phone. It connected at 150kbps. I stayed in the same spot and tried with mine. 75kbps. Argh! I reconnected with theirs...this time 37kbps. Reconnected with mine...connection timed out. Talk about a consistency problem.
On my way out of the store, the Samsung A727 caught my eye, mostly because I had a Samsung X820 previously, which I rather liked. The A727 is basically the 3G version of the X820. But the other reason I stopped was the 3G icon on the screen.
I fired up the phone and went to iphonenetworktest.com. The browser whipped thru the test at 375kbps.
This got me to thinking. If I can load the NY Times front page at 350kbps on 3G, vs 75kbps on EDGE (a generous average I feel), I'm gonna be done loading the Times in less than 1/4 of the time it would take me on EDGE. The faster the page loads, the faster I'm done reading it and the faster I can quit Safari.
This begs the question, what's harder on the battery? A few seconds of 3G, or a few minutes of EDGE? And how much more juice is lost staring at a brightly lit blank page waiting for it to load?
I am no longer buying Mr. Jobs' line about battery consumption as being a major factor in the no-3G decision for the iPhone. I think he just wants to sell us all 3G phones next year.
(A side note... The other night I was checking my EDGE speed in my apartment. A whopping 37kbps. For fun, I popped out the iPhone SIM and put it in my trusty Nokia 6300, also an EDGE phone. The Nokia wouldn't show an E icon, only a G for GPRS. Apple touts the iPhone as being EDGE enabled, but the phone won't tell you when it's actually only connecting at GPRS speeds. Chalk one up to Nokia for accurate network status reporting in its hardware.)
I realize the amount of buildings here makes a good connection tricky, but in the past few days, my experience has been that surfing via EDGE is like riding on the back of a one winged eagle. If the wind is right, you might fly for a bit here and there, but it's mostly a series of dips and bigger dips. And lots of poop.
In my little part of town on East 18th St., I'm lucky to break 50kbps. A walk up the block sometimes yields 125, sometimes not. Various places in midtown seem to fare better at 150 to 175, but with little regularity. I have yet to break 200kbps anywhere I've been, which apparently folks get all the time in East Jibip, Kansas.
Today, for kicks, I stopped by an AT&T store, to see if there was a chance something was wrong with my phone vs. theirs. I went to iphonenetworktest.com with their display phone. It connected at 150kbps. I stayed in the same spot and tried with mine. 75kbps. Argh! I reconnected with theirs...this time 37kbps. Reconnected with mine...connection timed out. Talk about a consistency problem.
On my way out of the store, the Samsung A727 caught my eye, mostly because I had a Samsung X820 previously, which I rather liked. The A727 is basically the 3G version of the X820. But the other reason I stopped was the 3G icon on the screen.
I fired up the phone and went to iphonenetworktest.com. The browser whipped thru the test at 375kbps.
This got me to thinking. If I can load the NY Times front page at 350kbps on 3G, vs 75kbps on EDGE (a generous average I feel), I'm gonna be done loading the Times in less than 1/4 of the time it would take me on EDGE. The faster the page loads, the faster I'm done reading it and the faster I can quit Safari.
This begs the question, what's harder on the battery? A few seconds of 3G, or a few minutes of EDGE? And how much more juice is lost staring at a brightly lit blank page waiting for it to load?
I am no longer buying Mr. Jobs' line about battery consumption as being a major factor in the no-3G decision for the iPhone. I think he just wants to sell us all 3G phones next year.
(A side note... The other night I was checking my EDGE speed in my apartment. A whopping 37kbps. For fun, I popped out the iPhone SIM and put it in my trusty Nokia 6300, also an EDGE phone. The Nokia wouldn't show an E icon, only a G for GPRS. Apple touts the iPhone as being EDGE enabled, but the phone won't tell you when it's actually only connecting at GPRS speeds. Chalk one up to Nokia for accurate network status reporting in its hardware.)
