network speeds
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AT&T 4G LTE now working in parts of New York City
We got a taste of AT&T's 4G LTE action last night in the Big Apple with the introduction of its LG Nitro HD, and today, the company has apparently flipped the 4G "on" switch in the City That Never Sleeps -- confirming its promise from November. According to tipster reports, some speed tests are showing downloads as fast as 27 Mbps and uploads of 15 Mbps, confirming that the LTE network has indeed gone live in parts of New York City. Update: To be clear, this is not an official deployment of LTE in NYC by AT&T. So, if you can't get signal, or if your signal stinks, don't take it out on them. It's still in testing! [Thanks, @SamSavitt]
Apple tweaking iPhone to work better on AT&T's network
Powerpage.org cites a Wall Street Journal article reporting that Apple has worked with AT&T to "rejigger" how the iPhone works with AT&T's towers, resulting in a reduced load for some tasks. It was not clear what changes were made, but apparently a "crash course in wireless technology" allowed them to figure out how the iPhone can get along better with AT&T. Such news indicates the lengths that Apple is willing to go to in order to be a good partner with AT&T. While few people are singing AT&T's praises, apparently there is an effort within the company to improve the network in large cities to reduce the number of dropped calls. According to Powerpage, "A random performance test released in February found that AT&T's 3G network speeds had improved by 84%." The problem is that AT&T's 3G speed has never been the main issue. AT&T is, and has been, very happy to compare themselves to Verizon when it comes to 3G speed. When it comes to reliability (i.e. how well you can actually use that speed) and availability, however, AT&T's 3G has consistently come up short. Not to mention that whole tethering issue that AT&T hasn't mentioned in several months, despite having originally promised it would be available by the end of 2009. If Apple is working on a CDMA/Verizon-compatible iPhone, AT&T's efforts are probably going to be too little, too late. After almost three years of consistently disappointing iPhone users with poor 3G availability, dropped calls, late availability of MMS, and even later availability of tethering (assuming it is ever available), iPhone owners have little reason to stay with the company.
Wired.com needs your help testing the iPhone's network speeds
Sure, Apple claims the 3G is fast, but with all the problems with 3Gs connecting all over the world, just how fast is it really? The folks at Wired.com have decided to find out, and they need your help. They'd like you to test your iPhone at the TestmyiPhone.com network speed testing site, and then hit up their global ZeeMap to register your speed.Instructions are over on their website, and they're testing both Edge and 3G upload and download speeds, so you'll have to run three tests total. You'll also have to sign up for a ZeeMap account.The eventual payoff will be a relatively clear look at iPhone speeds around the world. Wired says that they'll eventually average global data, but there's a lot of things that could be done with data like this -- heatmaps? Speed per carrier? Once they get a good set of figures together, there's probably all kinds of things that can be done.
