By AT&T makes up the last of the US carriers to announce plans to launch their “4G-but-not” networks, with T-Mobile, Verizon, and Sprint already planning to or already having launched HSPA+, LTE, and WiMax, respectively. John Stankey – AT&T’s CEO – tells us that AT&T aims to cover nearly 75-million people by the time 2012 comes around, though they’ll continue to expand their current HSDPA network simultaneously (with 600 new radios coming to one of their problem areas – San Francisco – October 1st.)
They expect to spend $700 million to build their LTE network for the remainder of 2010 alone to get started, and will spend much more than that throughout 2011. They’ll even be upgrading their network to HSPA+ for the many people who won’t be getting a phone with hardware necessary to take advantage of LTE. It may have sounded like AT&T would be lagging behind in this data network upgrade race, but it seems they’ve had their head on straight all this time. Now we’ll just have to wait and see what they’ll do device wise: it’s possible that we may not even see an Android phone to take advantage of HSPA+ or LTE for a long while.
[via Fierce Wireless]
HMMMM Mid 2011 you say what else happens mid year for AT&T, how about the iPhone 4G. I called it, Apple is so simple minded lol.
SINGULAR used to be my carrier when the name was changed to AT&T ….CRAP.
Are they going to screw it up with limits and tiers like they do with everything else? T-Mobile for the win.
yeah people will be blowing through their 2GB cap in 2 hrs
Tiers are the future. Get over it. Give T-mobile a year: either their speeds will stay static at current HSPA+ speeds, or they’ll tier. Offering pseudo-free bandwidth is not a real business model with superphones becoming the next big force.
And what does this have to do with Android?
As long as they let me keep my unlimited plan, I don’t care when they do the upgrade. Otherwise, I’m a free agent and probably headed back to Sprint.
Big game coming from At&t, especially considering Sprint should have those totals by the time At&t even gets started. What makes them think they can show up 2 years later and eclipse their totals in 1 year??
i would like to see a side-by side on this. im curious about the 4G technologies. specifically compatability and similarity. ie, as it stands, tmo and att phones are compatible with either network, same same for sprint and verizon. so, with att and the big VD both going to LTE does that mean than now those 2 will be cross compatible(once they are fully LTE)? if att is doing hspda as well and tmo is going that route are they remaining compatible with tmo? i would love to see a day when im not nailed down to any particular carrier by the phone in my pocket, or nailed down to a particular phone because of the carrier im with.
@john the lesser, yes once VZW and ATT get the LTE network then the 4G device will be compatible on both except that you must buy their 4G SIM cards. 4G SIM of VZW will be different from ATT 4G SIM card.
@John
yes once the Verizon completely switches to LTE, potentially they will be cross compatible with ATT and T-Mo. LTE is essentially a GSM standard.
well att and verizon bandwidths will be different with LTE.. they will be running in different Mhz so who knows if the phones the manufacturers make will be cable in running in both frequencies..
what really ticks me off is the fact that you’re probably going to have to pay EVEN more for a LTE phone whether you’re in a LTE market or not…
Keep me on 3G until LTE is everywhere, thank you
I don’t get those people defending tiered data plans. I, the user, don’t give a !@#$% about provider’s network problems. All I care about is reliability as they advertised before I decided to sign 2y contract. They’re getting paid for the service, and their job is to maintain that infrastructure, so it can support growing bandwidth usage. Lack of implementing new technologies in time to keep up with this growth proves bad management. There is no justification for raising my bill because some greedy f… decided to pay out higher dividend. ATT will learn it the hard way once iphone implements CDMA radio. People will walk away from them like flies from dried out shit, and other providers will learn the lesson on how NOT to tier their data plans.
It’s not just their network infrastucture that’s screwed up. I tried for 6 months to get a competetive quote for our company’s 140 cell phones and AT&T business sales never returned any of my calls. Verizon and Sprint not only responded with a quote, but also offered to install a in-building repeater system at no cost.
@comment 6 this has everything to do with Android being Androids are on every carrier aggressively like totally. ..and so 4g means what like 40%+ or maybe even fifty precent Android…lol or maybe even more then that
U.S. Cellular also announced plans to deploy LTE, they are the 5th largest wireless carrier in the US.
All Steve Jobs has to say is that the next iphone will be 4G supported. AT&T will then hop on his nutts and get 4G ready!!!!