Alltel kicks off EV-DO Rev. A deployment

With LTE a few years out yet, Alltel needs something to get it over the 3.5G hump -- and seeing how it's presently a CDMA carrier, you can pretty much guess where this is going. Sure enough, Verizon's newest partner in crime has announced that the rollout of its EV-DO Rev. A upgrade is now underway, promising a bump in downlink speeds from 400-700kbps on the existing Rev. 0 network to somewhere between 600kbps and 1.4Mbps. Uplink speeds are where Rev. A really shines, though, blazing as much as ten times faster than it did before -- 800kbps on a good day with bursts of up to 1.8Mbps. Two data cards are being offered to take advantage of the service -- one from Huawei and one from UTStarcom -- while compatible handsets currently include the HTC PPC6800 and Touch. The rollout is targeted for "select markets" right now -- Charlotte, New Orleans, Phoenix and Tampa among a total of 18 -- with overall EV-DO coverage continuing to expand as well; Alltel's targeting 82 percent of its footprint to be upgraded by year's end.

[maryland157 @ Jun 23rd 2008 4:42PM]

test I like to test

[Lowest Ranked @ Jun 23rd 2008 4:46PM]

icle.

[maryland157 @ Jun 23rd 2008 4:51PM]

I'm sorry for having to do the test , I'm having issues Posting in Firefox.

[engadgetier @ Jun 23rd 2008 4:42PM]

nice.

[Alex Padilla @ Jun 23rd 2008 4:47PM]

While I don't have Alltel, I still love to see my hometown (Tampa) make it in the news.

http://www.engadget.com/2007/08/30/engadget-hd-goes-hands-on-with-the-high-def-six-oclock-news/

[Thomas Trautman @ Jun 23rd 2008 5:16PM]

Verizon and Alltel will be all hot and heavy by winter. They will need to change those commercials to have Chad giving Verizon guy a rub down.

[kjb434 @ Jun 23rd 2008 5:45PM]

Or a blow job, I think the other three guys should find Chad and Verizon guy in bed somewhere.....

That's essentially what is going to happen.

[Josh @ Jun 24th 2008 8:17AM]

Nice, glad I paid extra for my PPC6800.