Meteor to launch 14.4 Mbps service in coming weeks..

StickyMcGinty

http://www.siliconrepublic.com/news/article/12417/comms/3g-wars-to-spark-up-as-meteor-goes-live-with-14-4mbps-mobile-broadband

3G wars to spark up as Meteor goes live with 14.4Mbps mobile broadband

04.03.2009
Meteor has started selling its 3G Broadband to Go service, which will debut as a 7.2Mbps service, but will swiftly include 14.4Mbps broadband. The company said its new Ericsson network is LTE-ready (Long Term Evolution) and deployable as a software upgrade.

Speaking ahead of today’s launch, Meteor chief operations officer Brendan Lynch told siliconrepublic.com that the existing network covers 33pc of the population, mainly in Dublin and Cork, and that by September, the service will cover 53pc of the Irish population.

The company has launched its 3G network with the Huawei E180 dongle – the world’s slimmest HSPA USB stick – which will retail for €29 on bill-pay.

Meteor’s entry into the mobile broadband space will pit the company against existing competitors 3, Vodafone and O2. Meteor, which has a 27pc share of the Irish mobile market, will be targeting a market credited with attracting over 200,000 broadband subscribers so far.

In the coming weeks, Meteor will launch the Huawei E182 dongle, which will give users 14.4Mbps speeds.

The service will cost €16.99 per month on bill-pay. Prepay users can access a €2.99 day pass or a €19.99 30-day pass.

The Eircom-owned network did a silent launch of the service in Meteor stores last Friday, and Lynch confirmed that 500 users have already signed up.

Lynch agreed that perception is vital from day one, and he was adamant that Meteor won’t fall into the same trap that has befallen some 3G broadband operators in terms of patchy network coverage.

“This is a whole new network and, in terms of technology, it’s the best that’s available. The approach we have taken is to make this a deep network. Not counting the number of sites, we are looking to build a quality indoor and outdoor experience.”

From a war room at a Meteor building in Dublin’s CityWest, site acquisition teams and engineers liaise with the company’s Service Management Centre (SMC), which monitors broadband quality and endeavours to pre-empt problems before they arise.

The Meteor SMC provides live information to staff at Meteor stores who use a Google-based mapping tool to ensure that broadband buyers will be certain their connection will work from their homes or business before they leave the store.

“The customer experience of this broadband service is important if we are to gain market share and, from the outset, we decided the best way to do this is to be simple and honest about what we do,” Lynch said.

“We’ve done a phenomenal amount of testing and believe up-to-the-second network performance from the SMC can double as an effective sales tool in our stores.”

Lynch said that because the network is brand new, upgrading to LTE will just involve a software upgrade. “Unlike our competitors, it will be a software issue, not a hardware issue.”

Asked if the company will go down the same route as other European mobile operators who are enjoying great success selling mini-notebook PCs, or netbooks, Lynch said he wouldn’t rule it out. “It is definitely something we are considering at this point.”

Very interesting play by Meteor, although I'm very sceptical about the speeds suggested. i.e. contention factors etc

Anyone using their 7.2 service yet? gotta be fast with only 500 users on board!

PogMoThoin

Its 3g, its great when Your the only one in a cell using it, thats the speed thats quoted

conolan

Great about that new speed, others might follow soon.
Like the price also. Sure beats the hell out of €30 from Voda.

kaimera

what?

14.4 isnt LTE.

it just sez in the article that it's LTE ready

Peteee

To expand on what kaimera said 14.4 Mbps is not LTE, its just an upgraded 3G service (And its not even the fastest available either, Telstra have a 21mbps network for instance)

What it does say is that the network is LTE capable with a software upgrade which (In a few years time) will allow 100+ Mbps speeds without swapping out any hardware, which makes it very easy to do.

It will also make it easier to upgrade to 21/44Mbps 3G HSPDA stuff coming down the track relatively soon.

Jonathan

Read the article and change the title.

watty

Peteee wrote: »

To expand on what kaimera said 14.4 Mbps is not LTE, its just an upgraded 3G service (And its not even the fastest available either, Telstra have a 21mbps network for instance)

What it does say is that the network is LTE capable with a software upgrade which (In a few years time) will allow 100+ Mbps speeds without swapping out any hardware, which makes it very easy to do.

It will also make it easier to upgrade to 21/44Mbps 3G HSPDA stuff coming down the track relatively soon.

100Mbps LTE needs 20MHz.

LTE on 5MHz (a 3G channel) is 21MBps.

LTE needs a new licence and new handsets and new modems.
ALSO if you switched the EXISTING channel to 5MHz LTE NONE of the existing 3G phones or modems would work.

The Bases "may" have an upgrade path. But it's nonsense with way 3, Meteor, Ericsson and Nokia 3G/HSPA systems are reported as "LTE" compatible or upgradable.

44MBps 3G/HDPA+ needs TWO Channels, 10MHz. That's not going to happen either.

With a 2km radius cell about 6.3% area can get 14.4Mbps. Even less for 21Mbps.

It's time the Advertising Standards people stopped these wild misleading claims.

In reality LTE will be using different handsets/gadgets/modems for users and the operator will have to build a new parallel network on a different band.

Do you want all your existing gear to stop working? LTE is not 3G. A 3G licence doesn't cover it.

watty

kaimera wrote: »

what?

14.4 isnt LTE.

it just sez in the article that it's LTE ready

It's easier to run your car on used chip oil. "LTE ready" is meaningless.

StickyMcGinty

jmccrohan wrote: »

Read the article and change the title.

was a typo lads, i left out the "-ready". that's what copy and pasting will do to ya. - seriously lose the attitude fella

paddyb125

conolan wrote: »

Like the price also. Sure beats the hell out of €30 from Voda.

The €16.99 per month is only till may, I'm pretty sure its going to rise to €20 but thats still pretty damn cheap!

Jonathan

StickyMcGinty wrote: »

was a typo lads, i left out the "-ready". that's what copy and pasting will do to ya. - seriously lose the attitude fella

Apologes. I was angry with the morketing nonsense..

watty

In reality Mobile Internet data is many times more expensive cost (not price) than Fixed Broadband.

Consider 100minutes of Texts and Voice for €20

• The SMS costs them almost nothing.
• If incoming calls and outgoing about the same ratio, then data for voice is x2, < 20Mbyte on their own network. Termination paid to them would then about equal termination they pay for your calls.

Consider an approximate €20 Data package

• The cap is around 10Gbyte.
• They have to pay for peering data on INEX and connecting to other backbones.
• On their own network the data should cost the same as voice data.

So 500:1 ratio. PRICE to you of 10Gbyte modem data and 20Mbyte (0.2GByte) voice +SMS is roughly the same!

Even if they make 50% profit on voice + SMS, the current data packages are at a loss. Any wonder the excess of Cap can be over €250 a GigaByte?

Meanwhile with these subsidized data prices and huge eircom line rental they get people to cancel eircom line (use mobile more for voice calls) and build 150,000 data customers locked to 1 year and 18month contracts.

€80 pm would be more realistic pricing for Mobile Data. Makes you wonder what their voice +SMS bundle profit margin is?

It's time EU competition or our own Ministers did something about this market distorting cross subsidy.

Of course it really works well here due to x2 higher line rental than most EU and over 30% of people already have no phone line (18% before eircom privatised).


LTE ready on a 3G base is like a "Windows 8 Ready" sticker on a Linux Netbook. No-one has Windows 8 and if you did have it none of your Linux programs would run on it. You are really going to buy a new Laptop for Windows 8

Oneredarmy

SO Meteor will (all other things being equal) have the highest speeds and about the lowest usage cap (5gb per month) of the mainstream wireless providers.

Progress indeed :rolleyes:

Marlow

Oneredarmy wrote: »

SO Meteor will (all other things being equal) have the highest speeds and about the lowest usage cap (5gb per month) of the mainstream wireless providers.

First of all, it's not broadband, which explains the cap and speed doesn't matter so.

And secondly, it's a mobile provider. It might be a wireless provider, but you can't call'em that. A wireless provider is a different kettle of fish.

/M

watty

It's a similar system to O2, 3 & Vodaphone.

For a 2km radius with ONE Sole user the speeds are roughly

[B]Speed   Area%[/B]
14.4	6.25
7.2	6.25
3.6	12.5
1.8	25
0.9	50

Oneredarmy

Marlow wrote: »

First of all, it's not broadband, which explains the cap and speed doesn't matter so.

And secondly, it's a mobile provider. It might be a wireless provider, but you can't call'em that. A wireless provider is a different kettle of fish.

/M

Sorry, I don't follow.

Midband/broadband/narrowband are all 'eye of the beholder' categorisations. Meteors product will, for some, be faster than many fixed line providers in many areas of the country that call themselves broadband.

My point was that compared to other similar providers (mobile telcos) its got the highest speed and the lowest cap, with no current product that gives you a higher cap.

By their nature high speed connections move large amounts of data quicker, therefore Meteor are selling a product they don't want people to use.

I don't think its beyond the realms of possibility to expect providers to increase caps in line with an increase in speed.

watty

50% of a 2km radius cell will get 1Mbps if ONE person per sector is active.

Under 100kbps if 10 people in that area are active.

It's only faster than 3.6Mbps HSDPA in 12% of the cell area!
3 will have their system with the Nokia variation of 14.4Mbps.

This is NOT the fastest system for Broadband or Wireless and for 75% of Meteor 3G Mobile users (Or for 3, Vodafone or O2) it will be slower than any real broadband product.

Average sector throughput shared for ALL users

From Nokia's LTE whitepaper. If there are 20 simultaneous data downloads you will get 100kbps on average!

The solid dark blue line is speed for a SOLE user in a sector with distance from mast (2km radius cell)

It's only 14.4Mbps at less than 500m with a perfect signal. IF it's a smaller Urban (city) cell, all the distances shrink.

The two horizontal lines are 10 user and 45 users on a 5MHz channel Fixed Wireless Provider.

The dark purple and light purple are 10 and 45 simultaneous connections on 14.4Mbps HSPA+ (ericsson/Meteor) or I-HSPA (Nokia / 3) versus distance.

The two dashed lines are how the number of users or area quadruples everytime you double distance from mast. Basic geometry.

This is all basic physics, mathematics. You can't apply pixie dust and make a mobile system work like fixed wireless. If EVERYTHING else is equal, because mobile has portable omni-directional aerials and limited modem power, but Fixed wireless has directional outdoor aerial and no USB/Battery limitation, then Fixed wireless can be 10x to 20x better cell throughput for same peak speed.

Caps.
The VERY expensive Mobile system has to have low caps. They are already giving it away. The phone calls and SMS pay for it.

€20 for phone & SMS. This costs the Mobile company about 20Mbyte of data a month ... and nothing else!

€20 for so called High Speed Data (see 3's thread, Same technology!). 5000Mbyte with Meteor or 10,000Mbyte a month approx with others... (5G & 10G).

So will we see Cap or price rising for Mobile Data?

ONLY 12% of cell area has higher speed than 3.6Mbps, typically!

The speeds of O2, Meteor, Vodafone and 3 depend MORE on how many people are in the sector which depends on ratio of Customers/Masts


These systems are for Phones, mobile gadgets and occasional use on the go. Not for Home or Work fixed Broadband.

yallingup

I was at the Meteor launch and contrary to what Silicon Republic might suggest, 14.4 wasn't promised to go live "within weeks" but rather "beginning about June" which was deliberately vague to allow Meteor an out while guaranteeing them headlines with, ahem, lenient reporting on that big figure.

Also, as you might imagine, I doubt if all the masts will go live with 14.4 immediately. Personally, I doubt they'll hit the June target at all. I'd see them concentrate on expanding their rather narrow coverage range with 7.2.

In fairness, they did say they would review the 5GB cap if it proved insufficient (read: unpopular or uncompetitive, etc).

watty

3.6, 7.2, 14.4 and 21Mbps

Each speed increase is for a smaller and smaller percentage of the cell. Going from 3.6Mbps to 21Mbps adds less than 20% real capacity and is speed increase for very few users. Its only marketing hype. As was Ericsson's / Vodafone 42Mbps HSPA+ demo. That uses 5MHz +5MHz spectrum in one sector for 3% cell area! What operator can ever dedicate that spectrum to an entire sector never mind one user!

It's time the consumer is protected from this misleading technobabble. It's Mobile Internet. Even LTE isn't real broadband, because it's Mobile, though better than 3G/HSPA.

yallingup

By the way, Meteor are not kidding when they say 3G midband available only in Dublin (and Cork). I'm just over the county border and can't even get an EDGE signal unless I stand in my driveway.

Peteee

watty wrote: »

100Mbps LTE needs 20MHz.

LTE on 5MHz (a 3G channel) is 21MBps.

LTE needs a new licence and new handsets and new modems.
ALSO if you switched the EXISTING channel to 5MHz LTE NONE of the existing 3G phones or modems would work.

Yes, it obviously needs a different spectrum, licenses and handsets and it needs new spectrum to work.

Just like 3G and GSM, a new parallel network will need to be build.

The Bases "may" have an upgrade path. But it's nonsense with way 3, Meteor, Ericsson and Nokia 3G/HSPA systems are reported as "LTE" compatible or upgradable.

I'm not sure what base stations they are using, but I know the latest RBS's have an extremely efficient upgrade route to LTE. The RNC's should be s/w upgradeable, though i'm open to correction on that.

44MBps 3G/HDPA+ needs TWO Channels, 10MHz. That's not going to happen either.

This is multi-carrier right? As far as I know no hardware supports this yet anyway. And wouldn't the two adjacent cells be using different portions of spectrum offset by (At least) 5Mhz anyway? So yes while it does use 10MHz its taking 5MHz off each cell.

With a 2km radius cell about 6.3% area can get 14.4Mbps. Even less for 21Mbps.

Yes, because 21mbps requires 64QAM which doesn't really happen in real world conditions.

It's time the Advertising Standards people stopped these wild misleading claims.

Correct, all these speed increases are largely dick waving contests.

In reality LTE will be using different handsets/gadgets/modems for users and the operator will have to build a new parallel network on a different band.

Do you want all your existing gear to stop working? LTE is not 3G. A 3G licence doesn't cover it.

LTE will of course require new handsets etc, its just that the core operator networks don't require all that much retooling to make the jump to LTE, and a lot can be done with s/w upgrades.

As for the graphs and the user figures, are these users all simultaneously downloading content? Obviously most traffic is going to be bursty in nature, and the system will be able to allocate the resources that each user needs on a quickly changing basis.

These systems are for Phones, mobile gadgets and occasional use on the go. Not for Home or Work fixed Broadband.

I agree completely.

Feel free to correct any misconceptions/wrong stuff I might have

Peteee wrote:

To expand on what kaimera said 14.4 Mbps is not LTE, its just an upgraded 3G service (And its not even the fastest available either, Telstra have a 21mbps network for instance)

This is indeed quite poorly worded. I wasn't trying to say that LTE is "an upgraded 3G service", because its not.

What I was trying to say is that 14.4 mbps is an upgraded 3G service over 7.2, which is what the other operators have.

watty

You have a very good grasp.

Yes, the core for the operator for I-HSPA or HSPA+ may be the same and the HW in base identical (for LTE, except the Duplex filters etc are for 2100MHz not 2600MHz!), this as you grasp, doesn't mean anything for anyone getting a 3G modem or 3G handset. It's irrelevent to the public.

An interesting point about using 2x 5MHz channel between masts. However the signal would be too poor to get more than 1 to 2Mbps from each. At sector over lap on one mast, within 500m, the trick would work (hadn't thought of that).

So if you have a handset/Modem (that doesn't exist retail) and there is NO-ONE else on 2/3rds of the mast and you can see the rivits, there is some spin to be got out of claiming your mast is 42Mbps...

I've worked with Fixed Wireless broadband as well as mobile. It's marketing, not real sustainable speed.


Re graphs:
Ever seen youTube, BBC iPlayer or know people into P2P? Yes. The graphs are the worst case for Fixed and Mobile. Sobering when vendors and operators insist on Peak speeds as if there is one user or everyone is reading my longer posts rather than madly downloading


Nice to meet someone that can see past the Hype. Too much hype kills decent useful technology. Remember the early WiMax Blogging hysteria of 100Mbps at 100km? (For everyone else, it should be obvious now from this thread you can have 100Mbps OR 100km but not both from Wireless!)