the next G network

[Mathew]

Would someone know if the proposed new network has equal advantages
for city slickers as well as the country bumkins?,or is it really only a
predictable move by the Telstra CEO to get golden handshakes from
the equipment manufacturers?

I'll be intrested in your view,
Mathew

 

[Dac]

Apparently crappy DSL = G3 YAY now farmers can get 56kbyte per second
downloads.

 

[Mr.T]

Apparently crappy DSL = G3 YAY now farmers can get 56kbyte per second
downloads.

I doubt it. Where the AMPS system gave them satisfactory mobile telephony,
and the CDMA system gave them slightly dodgy mobile telephony, the new
system will give them totally dodgy telephony and even more unreliable
mobile data. I doubt many farmers can afford mobile satellite phones though
:-(

Once upon a time Telstra *improved* their services each year, then it was
deemed corporatisation/privatisation would soon fix that, and it did!

MrT.

 

[moo cow]

dont be surprised if you find lots of black holes cause i went out for
several tests on different sites and i can tell you it aint all that they
make it out to be.

moo.

btw has anyone seen the big stink up about belden patch cable?
apparently it hasnt been ACA approved for the last 2 years

 

[atec77]

I doubt it. Where the AMPS system gave them satisfactory mobile telephony,
and the CDMA system gave them slightly dodgy mobile telephony, the new
system will give them totally dodgy telephony and even more unreliable
mobile data. I doubt many farmers can afford mobile satellite phones though
:-(

Once upon a time Telstra *improved* their services each year, then it was
deemed corporatisation/privatisation would soon fix that, and it did!

MrT.

removal of the board and upper management , replacement with low salary
high profit incentive management would fix 90% of the Shiite.

 

[Mr.T]

...

removal of the board and upper management , replacement with low salary
high profit incentive management would fix 90% of the Shiite.

Not a hope now that all the engineers and techs are gone, the research labs
closed, and technical expertise is pretty much history.
Management can play all the games they want, but that won't fix the network,
even if they wanted to, and they don't.

MrT.

 

[Graham Fountain]

Would someone know if the proposed new network has equal advantages
for city slickers as well as the country bumkins?,or is it really only a
predictable move by the Telstra CEO to get golden handshakes from
the equipment manufacturers?

I'll be intrested in your view,
Mathew

Most people I talk to (myself included) would rather the money be spent
on providing greater coverage for voice.
The new 3G network is about one thing and one thing only - locking
customers into Telstra so they can claw back their monopoly. The way it
works is simple - GovCo required Telstra to share their CDMA network
with other carriers(AFAIK this requirement was made because GovCo partly
funded it). By replacing CDMA with the new 3G network, they won't have
to share the network with other carriers. The flip side of this too, is
that the network will not be handset-compatible with other carriers.
This will additionally serve to lock customers into Telstra and stop
them churning to other carriers.

Basically the whole situation has arisen because GovCo completely
screwed up when they changed Telstra from a legislated Gov owned
monopoly to the privatisation/competition shambles we have now. Telstra
should have been split in two. The infrastructure side should have
remained Gov owned and as a wholesaler only, wholesaling to privatised
retailers. Such a situation would have put all competitors on a truly
level footing, instead of having one super strong company running
roughshod over smaller competitors. Considering the mobile network, if
all the money that had been spent by Telstra on it's 4 networks thus
far, plus Optus, Voda, and the other minor players, was turned into
providing one underlying infrastructure network that was then resold,
we would have much better coverage than we do now.

 

[Mathew]

Most people I talk to (myself included) would rather the money be spent on
providing greater coverage for voice.
The new 3G network is about one thing and one thing only - locking
customers into Telstra so they can claw back their monopoly. The way it
works is simple - GovCo required Telstra to share their CDMA network with
other carriers(AFAIK this requirement was made because GovCo partly funded
it). By replacing CDMA with the new 3G network, they won't have to share
the network with other carriers. The flip side of this too, is that the
network will not be handset-compatible with other carriers. This will
additionally serve to lock customers into Telstra and stop them churning
to other carriers.

Basically the whole situation has arisen because GovCo completely screwed
up when they changed Telstra from a legislated Gov owned monopoly to the
privatisation/competition shambles we have now. Telstra should have been
split in two. The infrastructure side should have remained Gov owned and
as a wholesaler only, wholesaling to privatised retailers. Such a
situation would have put all competitors on a truly level footing, instead
of having one super strong company running roughshod over smaller
competitors. Considering the mobile network, if all the money that had
been spent by Telstra on it's 4 networks thus far, plus Optus, Voda, and
the other minor players, was turned into providing one underlying
infrastructure network that was then resold, we would have much better
coverage than we do now.

Thank you to all contributers.
What Graham suggests makes sense.I was convinced that there where
reasons why Telstra wanted to scrapp the CDMA network.
Telstra has offered a free upgrade to the Next 3G Network.
(I'm a contracted Mobile Broadband subscriber).
The missrepresented CDMA(1xRTT/EVDO network,with it's only 9
actual national mobile broadband locations will be replaced in 2008,
according to a letter from Telstra's Executive Director,Customer Sales and
Services.There might be one or two new locations,it's too expensive to
browse Telstras extremly slow web site,to check it out.

Telstra avertised mobile broadband with its"I've been everywhere"
jingle,implying
exstensive national wide mobile broadband coverage,a discustingly deceptive
way to snare
customers ,because most of the the places mentioned in that jingle only have
ordinary
dial up speeds.Not the avertised "up to 100kb/sec bursts".I've used 3
different
locations each time within 200 meters of the transmission tower and the the
best
I can get 200k north of Brissie is 41kb/sec.This can increase to 75kb/sec at
3:30am.

The letter also said that the new network will offer faster speeds.What it
doesn't say is
that this faster speed is uniformly available.Only that " it covers 98% of
the Australian
population".And they used that same term to trick people into beliving that
mobile broadband
access is nation wide with the CDMA network.

It seems N.Z. is going the right way of splitting their Telco in two.With
the infrastructure
remaining under Gov.controll.

I now have problems beliving that Telstra is a service company,ever since
George Negus's
report on SBS on Telstras CEO.The real service seems to be to themself's.

Mathew

 

[Dave]

Graham pretty much hit the nail on the head, except for a few points I'd
like to add:

1. Telstra had contracted Nortel to manage the "core" CDMA infrastructure
on a fully maintained basis and that contract has either expired or is due
to do so soon. Hence Telstra couldn't care less about the existing CDMA
infrastructre since they would have to pay out a substantial sum to keep
operating it, upgrade it, etc.

2. Telstra didn't buy any (or at least very much) dedicated 3G spectrum
that covers the major urban areas. They would have to buy access to offer
services equivalent to "3" (for example). Telstra's policy appears to be to
never buy/rent/lease anything from a competitor.

3. By moving to a new 850 MHz infrastructure they can re-use the band they
do own and some site facilities (in remote areas) and they effectively
prevent the existing core CDMA network being re-activated and used to offer
lower cost voice/messaging in competition to their higher priced and largely
unwanted packages with "bundled content".

4. The revenue models that all the carriers seem wedded to place heavy
emphasis on the "content" services rather than the basic services. I can
imagine Telstra see their Foxtel involvement as a way of obtaining content
and double dipping into profit centres. Frankly I can't see DVB-H being all
that important in AU. With very high density population centres like Tokyo
(and in Europe) that have a huge literally captive commuter base, the
provision of DVB-H is probably a worthwhile service. But in my opinion it
will be a long time before that market matures in Au because of the hugely
different lifestyle.

5. I believe if anyone can offer a low operating cost, low priced
voice/messaging service with good coverage thay would have a good long term
business proposition. Imagine the usage that Yahoo or MSN messengers would
generate over an SMS like service that cost 1c (or less) a message. Casts
the shut down of the older CDMA network and the need to adopt a new
technology in a new light doesn't it?

 

[Allan]

Are you talking about cell-phopne network, or something else.

My view is 'why bother'. It transpires that the magic capabilities of 3G
devices haven't given anybody a long-term stiffy (apart from the initial
thrill), and all people really want to do is talk and send the occasional
text.

geoff

You know that is so Right,
If only they would get a better coverage, so when your on the country road
there is still a Signal.
Dont need Video, that's what a TV is for..
Just want to phone or Send a Text..

 

[Tsunami Australia]

Apparently crappy DSL = G3 YAY now farmers can get 56kbyte per second
downloads.

Telstra claimed to me that they are currently getting 520k (as in
slightly faster than 512k dsl) and that by time they finished the
rollout it would be up to 1400k. Another stated that with a few upgrades
after rollout completion they will have 22mb internet. I must admit
though, the wireless foxtel nearly has me interested. Went into the
Telstra store yesterday to take a look at it, and it was down. Good
advertising.

I think a lot of other farming areas will be reasonably slow to adapt to
the technology as Telstra are claiming that with the HSDPA? technology,
you no longer need a car antenna to boost the signal. This is the
biggest reason I have not downgraded yet.

 

[Ralph Garbutt]

Graham pretty much hit the nail on the head, except for a few points I'd
like to add:

1. Telstra had contracted Nortel to manage the "core" CDMA infrastructure
on a fully maintained basis and that contract has either expired or is due
to do so soon. Hence Telstra couldn't care less about the existing CDMA
infrastructre since they would have to pay out a substantial sum to keep
operating it, upgrade it, etc.

2. Telstra didn't buy any (or at least very much) dedicated 3G spectrum
that covers the major urban areas. They would have to buy access to offer
services equivalent to "3" (for example). Telstra's policy appears to be
to
never buy/rent/lease anything from a competitor.

3. By moving to a new 850 MHz infrastructure they can re-use the band
they
do own and some site facilities (in remote areas) and they effectively
prevent the existing core CDMA network being re-activated and used to
offer
lower cost voice/messaging in competition to their higher priced and
largely
unwanted packages with "bundled content".

4. The revenue models that all the carriers seem wedded to place heavy
emphasis on the "content" services rather than the basic services. I can
imagine Telstra see their Foxtel involvement as a way of obtaining content
and double dipping into profit centres. Frankly I can't see DVB-H being
all
that important in AU. With very high density population centres like
Tokyo
(and in Europe) that have a huge literally captive commuter base, the
provision of DVB-H is probably a worthwhile service. But in my opinion it
will be a long time before that market matures in Au because of the hugely
different lifestyle.

5. I believe if anyone can offer a low operating cost, low priced
voice/messaging service with good coverage thay would have a good long
term
business proposition. Imagine the usage that Yahoo or MSN messengers
would
generate over an SMS like service that cost 1c (or less) a message. Casts
the shut down of the older CDMA network and the need to adopt a new
technology in a new light doesn't it?

For all of those folk decrying the potential benefit of Telstra's Next G
network I live in regional Queensland and have recently connected to the
Next G network since my ISDN internet connection is very slow and Telstra
has no plans to upgrade the copper service in this area.

My need for internet access include both periods when I work from a home
office and periods when I am in other capital cities at standards and
industry group meetings. Prior to connection to Next G those needs were
satisfied by ISDN for the home office and Telstra's EDVO mobile broadband
when travelling.

ISDN internet cannot be termed as broadband as the following results
demonstrate.

ISDN = 130 mS Ping 124 Kb/S Download 36K b/S Upload
Next G = 95mS Ping 1368 Kb/S Download 316 Kb/S Upload

This result is with two out of five bars signal strength for Next G after
fitting Telstra's optional antenna. In terms of cost the monthly cost of
ISDN and bigpond's ISDN internet is $108.86/month plus EDVO mobile internet
at $59.95 compared to $199.00 for Next G which works both at home and when
travelling. The only downside to Next G is the 3 Gigabyte limit compared to
unlimited ISDN and unlimited ISDN.

In summary for all country people such as myself Next G is the only snesible
way forward given the size of the network, the planned network upgrades and
the superior penetration of the 850MHz signals within buildings.


Ralph