“Orange – Apple’s iPhone carrier partner in France – has admitted artificially limiting the data speed to a fraction of the 3G handset’s potential,” Stephen Withers reports for iTWire.
“France Info reports that iPhone data speeds have been arbitrarily limited to 384kbps,” Withers reports.
“According to the France Info story, Orange will increase the maximum speed to 1Mbps with effect from September 15. iPhone owners will not need to do anything to get the extra speed,” Withers reports.
Full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Orange est âne” for the heads up.]
How do you say “Orange lawsuit” in French? ;o)
A phone carrier would never do that.
Procès ala orange.
(kidding)
“Orange est âne”
That’s pretty funny.
The real story has yet to come out about how limited these supposed broadband cell systems truly are. I do not believe for one minute that it is only Orange who is limiting bandwidth. I believe the iPhone will pop the bubble on this story over and over. How many people really used the broadband capability on their cell phone? Probably few until a phone came out that made surfing the web much better.
There was little reason until now for a cellular provider to have a robust system that allowed wireless web-surfing as it cost money to build out these systems. If one looks at the AT&T;3G coverage map, it is clear that AT&T;had the fewest broadband sites of all of the major carriers. As such, it does not surprise me that AT&T;would want to limit folks to using EDGE as much as possible to alleviate the overload on the minimal availability of the 3G system. This theory tracks with the reports that there are areas where the iPhone is having no problems at all.
The unfortunate side effect of this will be some damage to Apple as Apple is pretty much at the mercy of the folks at AT&T;for the system. I really like the iPhone, however, I cannot justify the cost vs. performance limitations. AT&T;should either lower the cost of the data plan, or improve their network. At a minimum, someone needs to come clean about what is really going on.
Apple would have been much wiser to vend this phone to other carriers with much greater broadband coverage. I still do not understand what the major attraction to AT&T;was, other than the name used to mean something in telecommunications 30 years ago.
Maybe AT&T;should change their advertising to “More suckers in more places, courtesy of the company with less broadband access in fewer areas than anybody else.” Of course, AT&T;will gladly blame Apple. It is the “AT&T;” thing to do.
And you thought AT&T;was bad.
Well… they are, but they’re not alone.
i hate the french
@Bill
That is only Orange that is limiting the bandwidth in France as unlocked iPhones get more than 2.5Mb/s on SFR 3G+ concurrent network. As a matter of fact, other 3G+ hanset (Nokia N95 and others) are also artificially limited to 384kb/s on Orange network. Now that a good portion of mobile users are using the iPhone, probably the most useful handset to surf the web and check mails, well… you know how Apple users are !
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Problem is, Orange never mentioned this kind of limitation in marketing materials or contracts. A big contestation is growing here and I protested officialy through Orange customer service…
Apple only makes a phone for GSM networks.
AT&T;and T-Mobile are the ONLY GSM carriers in the U.S.
AT&T;coverage is significantly larger than T-Mobile in the U.S.
…therefore, Apple chose AT&T;to be its carrier partner in the U.S.
Why is this so hard to understand more than a year after the release of the iPhone?
Clockwork Orange indeed!
Can you say “tiered pricing”?
I’m actually surprised the phone companies haven’t charged tiered pricing for 3G.
I wonder what the TRUE speed capabilities of 3G are? We may never really know.
Aldebaran, I forget, why did Apple choose GSM?
@iamji
3G has a theorical limit at 384kb/s (download)
3G+ has different (theorical) levels from 1.8Mb/s to 7.2Mb/s (maybe even more later)
Okay, I’ll say it… A lawsuit against Orange?
I’m Green with Envy
that the Orange Lawsuit
will turn Brown nosers of this company’s
faces Red with Embarrassment
and Tickled Pink that
no amount of Blackmail or
cries of scandal or Yellow Journalism
until they are Blue in the Face
will Whitewash this Scandal.
Mauve!!
@Bill
I think Bill is right.
There is something suspiciously close about the speed I seem to always get in Los Angeles and what Orange’s limits are.
@minime
GSM is the type of modern cellular network in use in MOST countries around the world (just not so much in the U.S.). Both Verizon and Sprint/Nextel use CDMA networks in the U.S. Apple had global intentions with the iPhone from the get-go. Maybe they could make a CDMA version for other carriers in the future, but they had to be focused to get it off the ground and around the world as quickly as possible.
@Aldebaran
You are right about the GSM. But, don’t forget that Apple offered the iPhone to Verizon first and they turned it down. Whether that means that they weren’t going down the GSM path at first or were hoping Verizon would switch over.
I knew it!
Okay ATT… Time to fess up.
@Bill
GSM/GPRS is a de facto world standard. Verizon with CDMA was given first choice but passed. Their 3G network currently averages 144Kbits/sec although the theoretical max is 2.4Gb/sec with strong signal areas getting between 300Kb to 500Kb per second. AT&T;’s 3G was 2 years behind Verizon in starting but their system has higher theoretical future maximum currently about 1.5Mb/sec, it could go as high as 45Mb/sec in a few years.
Verizon and Sprint will have to scrap their networks and start rolling out 4G or Wi Max stuff. Have you check Verizon’s data rate costs? Plans are typically higher than AT&T;’s and numerous friends of mine on Verizon’s network have began to complain of dropped calls (so much for the reliable network). As a business case if you are entering a market for the first time it makes sense to shoot for the bigger target, thats just Business 101. T-mobile is just starting to put together their GSM 3G network in the US and they are notorious for dropping calls nationwide hence they offer the cheapest voice plans with the most minutes and prop up their poor service VOIP service enabled handsets.
I can’t really support your argument with the current fact’s in place. Despite hiccups in the relationship , I think Apple made the right choice in initial partners. Verizon’s parent company Vodaphone is GSM and rumors are that Verizon may be moving in that direction. Technically CDMA may be superior in may ways to GSM (more forgiving in voice transmission, able to support more users per cell site and decent 3G performance due to Verizon’s ubiquitous cell site population).Large CDMA installation is only supported in one other country and that is Japan. AT&T;is constantly improving their network and I feel will catch and surpass Verizon sooner rather than later.
Phone companies absolutely suck. For a decade they’ve been talking about their importance in the new tech age and then, when the first mobile device that’s actually easy to use comes along, they’re caught napping. It’s f****ing ridiculous.
@Bill,
Where have you been? Apple offered the iphone to virtually all the carriers but was turned down by them. Cingular was the only company with vision & enough balls to accept Apple’s terms & conditions. AT&T;bought Cingular out or brought them in from the cold only after the shockwave of excitement & anticipation round the World made them realise thier mistake.
I presume that you are upto speed with the rest of the story.
To all of you who say you knew this was happening, congrats. Being right is great, being smart and right is better.
For you other morons, how would a company as technically creative and genius as Apple build in 3G or 3G+ and not get it right. Let us see here, place 3G/3G+ compliant chip here, screw case shut, charge battery and turn on. Yeah, as brilliant as Apple is I am sure this is how they went about their iPhone 3G plan. MORONS.
I told you all, all of you, there was no way this was Apple’s fault. Could you image the concessions Steve and Company are going to demand from this.
Life is good when you have a tyrant leading your every step. If you do it right you have nothing left for concern. If you screw it up you should pay for the mistake, it’s called being employed. You are paid to get it right, and now Apple’s partners have helped to screw up their launch (the mobileme team did the rest) could you imagine how pissed Steve is.
bobchr
My experiene with T-Mobile is just the opposite. With T-M I no longer have dropped calls like I had with AT$T. I can now sit in my home and make calls. With AT&T;I had to goout on my deck to make calls that were always dropping.
Yet another example of how Apple made the wrong choice to hand out exclusives to telcos…
I hope Steve hops onboard his private jet right now and find that Orange CEO and beat the living CRAP out of sob…….seriously!