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EDGE Can Out-Perform 3G; Here's Why
goombah99 writes "Blackfriars's communications has an interesting discourse on why the practical difference between 3G and EDGE cellphone data networks is less than it appears to be based on a naive bandwidth metric. Their argument is that the user experience of TCP/HTML is much more impacted by latency, error rates, and processor speed than by bandwidth — and Edge had the edge on all three. Additionally, EDGE may consume considerably less power."
When performance testing web applications, I typically find that latency does indeed have a very significant impact. Obviously some types of application are more susceptible than others. Bandwidth is critical in data intensive applications. Latency is much more important in highly interactive applications. Rich Web 2 applications, making lots of (Ajax) calls to the server for small amounts of supplementary data are badly hit by latency problems.
So one guy who owns an iPhone (and Apple stock) writes an argument, based on his own limited experiences with an iPhone and a Nokia, without any precise measurements, concluding that EDGE is better for mobile web browsing than 3G.
Submissions to "articles" like these are making Slashdot look more and more like Digg. I don't know about the rest of you but in my opinion, that's a Bad Thing.
... but my iPhone is still slow as hell doing anything on EDGE.
:)
It was well worth the (lower) price, as 400 is what most of my phones have cost, and they last me a long time, but I get the feeling I won't have this one for very long if the 3G version comes out soon
My personal experience in Japan over the past 5 years has shown that 3G does little or nothing to address latency issues, but 3.5G (aka HSDPA/HSUPA or together just HSPA) has made a huge breakthrough in cellular latency.
I have used data services via 2G (9600bps), PHS (32-128kbps), 3G (384kbps), and now 3.5G (3.6-12mbps). While the bandwidth has gone way up and monthly charges have gone way down, everything before 3.5G had horrible latency (400-900ms), not to mention ridiculous fees (think $20/MB or more).
Now I use a 3.5G (HSDPA) cellular data service called eMobile which sprung up just over the past few months. I get about 300KB/s (bytes not bits) down and 100ms latency, unlimited use for about $50/month. Not quite as fast as the gigabit fiber I have at home for $40/month, but it certainly works well enough for a snappy browsing experience, and WoW and FPS games are perfectly playable.
The author owns Apple stock - so not only an iPhone lover.
But what he says sounds true (not sure about his Nokia phone being slowed down by too fast a transmission speed)
UMTS/HSDPA can easily hit 700kbps, as can CDMA2000 1x EV-DO. EDGE hits 180kbps on a good day. On a REALLY good day.
The "error" argument is bullshit. All digital cellular technologies have extensive error correction.
Streaming media (Verizon/Sprint/AT&T all have services), downloads, and pretty much everything else benefits from more bandwidth. There is absolutely ZERO way that your browser is going to get slower because you have a faster network link, unless your browser is a piece of crap. Your browser may not get much faster if it's CPU constrained (pages don't load any faster on my 770 using the 15Mbps campus network instead of 1.5Mbps DSL), but it's certainly not going to trip the browser up or any garbage like that.
As for battery life, yes, UMTS/HSDPA takes more power. You also spend less time downloading, because it's faster.
T-Mobile doesn't have UMTS/HSDPA in the US right now, so I use EDGE every day - on my phone or on my laptop. EDGE is slow and has horrible latency. There's simply no other way to slice it.
I have a new Treo which is dual mode: it uses both the Edge and 3G networks depending on which is available / has more signal strength. In my usage experience, the 3G network definitely runs faster both in terms of latency and bandwidth.
Because here in the Netherlands I recently got a 3G phone (Sony Ericsson W880i) and included with my subscription is ~9 channels of televsion. My TV is streamed over the 3G connection, and only buffers for about 3 seconds when I switch channels, with stereo sound too. No artifacts or funny business even with low signal strength, nor switching between cell towers (I only use the TV when travelling to and from work on the train)
Also in my subscription is a couple of free songs that I can download using the 3G. I have any downloaded song within a minute. Web browsing (on Opera Mini, with HTML and NOT mobile pages) feels nearly as fast as my computer at home. Can EDGE, at only 0.2 Mb do that????
Of course, maybe it does, as I have never used EDGE, but at least would try BOTH technologies before I claim one is better than the other.
I don't know but I looked up the author's (Carl Howe) writings on that site http://blackfriarsinc.com/blog/index.html and just about all the entries are positive comments about Apple and iPhone
Negative moral value of force outweighs the positive value of good intentions.
BTW, TCP retransmissions are poison to radio networks. That's why HARQ is used in HSDPA and upcoming standards to prevent TCP retransmissions i.e. if the packet didn't arrive correctly, the PHY layer handles the retransmission (not even the complete TCP packet but just the invalid part to make it simple).
I think bad network coverage is not a reason to rant a radio system. Complain to the network operator . Please understad that it takes time and money to build the network. It may even be that the network gear manufacturers are not able to deliver the needed equipment.
Check out 3GLTE for good Interweb experience, it is coming out in couple of years (www.3gpp.org).
I have to post anonymously because I am working for one of the companies producing network equipment and mobile phones. But I can state two things:
Having used both EDGE and 3G (I'm posting this over an EDGE connection), I can say with great certainty that 3G beats the crap out of EDGE.
3G is rubbish here in Ireland, where people desperate for broadband have bought 3G data modems for internet access. The problem is that the system is not very scalable, and it is too expensive and slow for the operator to upgrade capacity to provide more service. The bandwidth they advertise for example (as "up to 3 Mbs") is shared for each cell - so even just two people using it solidly means half the bandwidth - but in city areas it means that the conditions can be worse than fixed-line dial-up.
From what I gather, EDGE is nice and cheap and can be more easily scaled. I believe O2 are now planning to roll it out in Ireland despite having a 3G network already.
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I have a motorola razor v3xx wich is 3g (the 3.6mbps version) and I can select the networks manually. I get faster speeds on edge then I do on 3g. I don't know why but I do. I think its because att doesnt really care about 3g.
I'm from the UK you insensitive clod!
"Real world conditions" is that the train is stopped in the middle of nowhere because the rail system is being run at 150% capacity and if one train has to slow down (because, e.g. some slippery leaves have fallen on the track; its a bit windy; its a bit sunny; we've had the "wrong type of snow" or the embankment has collapsed because the cut down all the trees to stop the leaves falling on the line...) the entire rail system gridlocks (usually shortly followed by the mobile phone system collapsing as everybody tries to phone home).
OK, that's slightly cynical, but...
In a survey of 100 programmers, 111111 thought that duck-typing was a good idea.
I'm the author of the original article on Blackfriars Marketing, and the title of this thread is misrepresenting that article. The original title is "Why EDGE versus 3G matters less than you think.", not why EDGE is getter than 3G. I've posted a followup to the article today here. It's not nearly as inflammatory as implied here.
Like many engineering issues, this is one of balance.
It's not that Edge has any advantages when it comes to processing efficiency, it's that to take advantage of 3G's greater bandwidth you need more processor bandwidth than you can get today in a reasonable mobile package.
If you take a Dodge Neon on the autobahn, you don't enjoy the unlimited speed offered by the highway very much. If you are making frequent side trips, you might do better with a slower road with more frequent exits.
In the end, there is no single thing as "speed" when it comes to networking. There are several, such as bandwidth, response time, and latency. If I had my choice, 3G would be my choice for applications that have to deliver large volumes of bits at a consistent rate. That doesn't describe most web use by a long shot. It does describe streaming high quality video to a device that can display it, but has limited buffering capacity. If you think about that, in mobile applications that's a rather narrow niche in which to have a killer advantage.
It comes down to balance. Does 3G widen the narrowest bottleneck in my mobile network use? If not, then it's advantages don't mean much to me. It may be that other bottlenecks have to be widened before anybody needs 3G's peculiar advantages.
Coming back to TFA, it may be that the iPhone would be better suited to exploit 3G's advantages than other phones. But you can't get an iPhone on 3G, so it's an academic question. The practical question is whether the less powerful devices on a 3G network can exploit that network well enough to outweigh the iPhone's attractions?
Personally, it doesn't matter to me one way or the other, because nobody has good enough coverage to render that issue irrelevant. I don't care how "fast" a network is unless I can reach it every place I have to go. If I lived and worked in Manhattan, this might not be an issue, but then I'd have better things to do with my time than watch videos on my phone.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
That doesn't make any sense. In the US anyway, 3G HSDPA degrades to EDGE and then down to GPRS data.
My other car is first.
All correct, the EDGE upgrade is a software upgrade of the 2G GSM cells in most situations, but because of the size and complexity of the networks, this can be enough of a challenge for operators not to do it as for most of the time, they don't get any money out of it.
From their point of view: "Faster access for the customer, more network utilisation for us, no more money for us, costs us money as we have to run a large project to do the upgrade.... Hmmm, how about we go do something that makes more money?"
With the iPhone release and everything else, O2 basically got pushed into doing the roll out. They figured that now they have the financial incentive to do so.
Curiosity was framed; ignorance killed the cat. -- Author unknown