Sidecut Reports

Just a quick roundup of some stories bound to be of interest to Sidecut readers. First up is a fairly well thought out bashing of AT&T’s so-called 4G rollout, from Sascha Segan at PC Mag. (Gotta love the lede: “AT&T is lying about 4G. Shamelessly.”) While we wondered why AT&T was practically silent about its “4G” coverage map debut, now it appears the muted PR was due to the fact that even if there is a 4G network, the 4G phones are being disabled. You’ve got to kind of agree with Segan — this is really no way to launch a campaign.

DATA CAPS COMING FOR AT&T DSL, U-VERSE CUSTOMERS: An exclusive from Karl Bode at DSL Reports unearthed AT&T’s plans to introduce data caps and overage fees for its DSL and U-Verse broadband customers. Not really wireless but since in the end it is all the same network this is an important story to follow.

PC WORLD TESTS 4G PROVIDERS: Our good pal Mark Sullivan over at PC World teamed with the folks at Novarum to do some testing of 4G services across the country. While we like stats in any shape or form we are not sure the final conclusions are bulletproof, since the “average” totals include tests from markets where not all the providers have a 4G service operating, so those 3G speeds brought down some of the final total calculations. (And since AT&T’s 4G services aren’t apparently very live it’s questionable how much this is a cross-provider 4G test since 4G really isn’t available everywhere from everyone.) Still, the numbers are fun to look at especially in city comparisons.

When AT&T announced the availability of the HTC Inspire last month I thought it was kinda funny that nobody picked up on the fact that AT&T was selling what it called a “4G smartphone” but wouldn’t tell anyone where the company’s “4G” HSPA+ service was up and running. Without any fanfare, press release or even a list, all that has apparently changed now since AT&T’s 4G promo page now lets you drill down to see very detailed network-coverage maps showing live HSPA+ services in several big cities, including Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, Dallas and Boston, among a few others.


AT&T 4G coverage map screenshot, showing a live market in San Francisco.

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The tweets were direct and to the point — “HTC Inspire 4G will be available on Feb. 13 for $99.99 with contract!,” said the corporate feed from AT&T. While that seems like an aggressive price for such a full-featured smartphone (humongous screen, Android 2.2, all the assorted bells and whistles), you really have to dig deep to try to find out where you might actually be able to experience AT&T’s version of “4G” speeds — and then be prepared to dig deeper to find out how much you will actually have to pay to enjoy such service.

Let’s start with the 4G coverage issue — as you may recall back at CES AT&T jumped onto the 4G marketing bandwagon with both feet, by proclaiming that not only would its later-in-the-year LTE network be a “4G” entity, but that it was also claiming its ongoing rollout of HSPA+ services also qualified for the 4G label. We will put aside for now the argument about whether or not HSPA+ is really a big step forward and ask a simpler question: Where can customers actually get HSPA+ services from AT&T?
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