[Ben]

http://www.reghardware.co.uk/2008/11/14/3_hsdpa_hsupa_rollout/

Faster HSDPA and HSUPA 3G speeds will be rolled out in the UK’s big cities in 2010, network operator 3 has promised.

The company will initially give customers in London and other major metropolitan areas access to HSDPA speeds of up to 14.4Mb/s by Q3 2010.

It’s also promised that big cities will get 5.7Mb/s HSUPA speeds at the same time.

However, senior 3 executive Hugh Davies couldn’t confirm how long it will be before customers living in more rural areas of the country get the same HSDPA and HSUPA speeds.

3 has already completed a rollout to give more than 95 per cent of the UK's population access to 3.6Mb/s HSDPA. It hopes to raise that speed to 7.2Mb/s by 2010 – the same time that the big cities get 14.4Mb/s HSDPA and 5.7Mb/s HSUPA
The map by 2010 looks good, I have to say. Ambitious, perhaps, but good. I really hope they keep pushing the build-out hard, it's the only chance they have of sticking around for the foreseeable future IMHO.

[getti]

T-Mobile have 3.6mb and are already rolling out 7.2mb already and have HSUPA on the whole 3G network. Next step will be 14.4mb

[gorilla]

Didn't I read somewhere that t-mobile were going to commit to LTE and this would mean they would enter the 4g market in a few years time?

Also RIM are supposed to be developing a LTE phone, to make sure they don't make the same mistake they did with 3g.

All this speed will be great, but only if there are consumer friendly tariffs to go along with it.

[Ben]

AFAIK any network using WCDMA/UMTS 3G is committed to LTE. We should start seeing LTE activity/4G from the mobile networks around 2012, depending on demand I guess.

[miffed]

Not sure what we're supposed to do with it though :D - I can see modem access would be great , but in terms of mobile phones - I feel I have the best device on the market , and it already struggles to keep up with my connection speed !
(i.e. If I am connected at 1 Mbps - I can browse quickly , but the rendering etc seems to be the "slow" link - I can't see that upping the connection speed is going to make much difference )
OK ,so I suppose I could download songs & movies quicker - but TBH it's rare that I download on the fly anyway !

I can see that these speeds will probably open doors that I haven't even considered - But I think in terms of Mobile phones , we'll see a diminishing return on what it actually MEANS for the customer - And I suspect this may equate to a lack of enthusiasm from the Networks and manufacturers

[Ben]

I kind-of agree. Once we get to the stage of a few Mbps being available in a way that's stable to, oo, 97% of the population then adding more megabits on top isn't going to make a fat lot of difference.

There's a shift away from networks as the bottleneck, IMHO, towards handset technologies, particularly battery life and OS software, being the next obstacles to overcome.

[Hands0n]

Higher and more reliable network speeds are vital to an "unwired" society, one in which we are able to access information as and when we need it. What will we do with this great Internet in the sky? Probably everything we do now. I am not expecting too much in the way of advancement given the traditional mobile operator's predispostion to crushing development by charging premium rates for anything other than voice and SMS text messages.

A case in point might be Videocalling that is all but obsoleted by its tariff. No one is going to pay 50p to 60p per minute, it is not a premium service in people's eyes and so they won't pay a premium price. It will remain as obscure as SMS once was when it, too, was priced at 60p a pop.

[3GScottishUser]

Looking forward to seeing this happen.

I did a couple of speedtests yesterday with my 3 USB mobile broadband stick and was getting about 160Kbs!! That is about 1/3rd of what you would expect a 3G network to achieve and the software interface was showing I had HSDPA connectivity!!

Tried later in a different room in the same building and managed 1.5Mbs.

It is very variable and can be good sometimes and dreadful at others. In summary, currently a very frustrating user experience.

[Ben]

I don't think in-building coverage will improve until better (i.e. more penetrative) spectrum is used. :(