Angus Kidman15 October 2007, 1:25 PM
Telstra says the coverage of its Next G network is now equivalent to CDMA, but the telco dominator isn't talking signal strength or price cuts just yet.
Telstra has declared that Next G's range now officially outstrips its older CDMA system and it plans to push ahead with a January 28 switch-off, but it remains conspicuously quiet on the still controversial subjects of price and signal strength.
A cheerful press release from Telstra released today decrees that Next G, first rolled out a year ago, is now "bigger, better and faster" than CDMA. While CDMA service is available to 98% of the population, Next G has now risen to 98.9%, according to new Telstra research.
"The Next G network now covers 25 per cent more territory than the published coverage of the old CDMA network, has nearly 75 per cent more towers, offers speeds up to five times faster, and roams to more than 160 extra countries for voice and SMS," executive director of Telstra Wireless Mike Wright boasted. (Those extra 160 countries aren't available at Next G speeds, we might note, but that's a side issue for now.)
Telstra has backed up that claim with a research project in which some Telstra and Ericsson staffers got to drive 120,000 kilometres while testing the network, collecting 500 gigabytes of performance data -- a bit like the Leyland Brothers, but with hard drives instead of marsupials.
That in turn has led to a plethora of statistics, though not all of them are quite what they seem. For instance, the fact that Next G has 6,000 tower sites compared to CDMA's 3,480 might sound impressive. However, given that Telstra has also boasted in the past that Next G can achieve ranges of up to 200 kilometres, one might have assumed fewer towers would actually be a better boasting point.
Despite such quibbles, the central message from Club Sol is clear: Next G is at least as available as CDMA, and as such, Telstra plans to switch off its CDMA network on January 28, a handy date for ensuring plenty of mobile phone sales this Christmas. Many consumers already seem to be convinced; in August, Telstra announced there were more Next G than CDMA customers on its network.
What does it mean?
Like many activities associated with Telstra, much of the attention surrounding Next G has focused on the regulatory soap opera surrounding it rather than the actual network and its associated services. Admittedly, the twists and turns are improbable enough to keep even a Days Of Our Lives head writer happy.
Senator Helen Coonan -- Telstra's traditional arch-enemy in matters regulatory -- stepped aside from making the decision on CDMA's future when Telstra decided to sue her over the awarding of a separate broadband data network building contract to the rival OPEL consortium.
It was Coonan's nominee, Attorney-General Philip Ruddock, who decreed in September that Telstra would have to demonstrate that Next G's coverage outstripped that of CDMA before there could be any question of switching the latter (and its associated expensive maintenance) off.
That's what today's document seeks to demonstrate, but the drama doesn't end there. Is Telstra's release of the new data tied in any way to the fact that it recently had that court action against Coonan dismissed? Or is it instead obscurely linked to the recently announced Federal election, in which both political camps seem determined to make broadband some sort of key issue regardless of whether the electorate would rather talk about hospitals?
The soap opera might be entertaining, but for the average rural user, there will be two more pressing questions: does Next G offer a better service than CDMA, and how much does it cost? Telstra's very keen to emphasise its belief that in service terms, there's no comparison. "The time is right for our customers still connected to CDMA to make the move to the Next G network, with the confidence they are choosing a bigger, better and faster mobile network that is growing all the time," Wright said.
Of course, back in 1999 when CDMA was the new kid on the block, rather similar claims were being made for it relative to the analogue network. ""At the completion of the extensive network rollout during 2000, Telstra CDMA will achieve coverage delivered to more Australians than any other cellular mobile technology," Dick Simpson, who headed up wireless at the time, boasted.
More signal, more money
But back to the future. One common complaint about Next G from regional customers is that while signals might theoretically travel faster, they also drop out more frequently.
Telstra's statement today says that Next G achieved call drop figures of under one per cent within 10 months, a level which CDMA took six years to reach. Given that CDMA was launched in 1999, however, that leaves an open question as to what's happened to network performance since 2005, when that six year milestone was reached. If it's got better, then the gap is wider than we're being led to believe. If it's got worse, Telstra's hardly been taking care of its regional customers.
In any event, a much more fundamental problem for most consumers is price. Telstra likes to brag about the extra facilities that Next G offers, but for the standard user who doesn't want features like video calling, there's no cheap exit once CDMA gets the chop.
For instance, the first CDMA prepaid handheld package, launched in November 1999, cost $99 for a handset with $35 of credit. The first Next G prepaid handheld package, which debuted in May, charged $249 for the cheapest handset. Apparently, the cost drops due to competition that everyone (sometime enemy the government included) likes to brag about have passed this section of the market by.