Hasta La Gadget!

Wasn’t long ago that we found hard evidence of a WiMAX-capable MiFi from Novatel in the FCC — and now, we might have the first press shot of it. Of course, press shots are always prettier than the actual devices, but even if you beat this image with the ugly stick for a minute or two, we’re pretty sure it’d still be a good deal more handsome than the first-gen 3G MiFi that Sprint, Verizon, and others are using currently. No word on when this might launch, but with FCC certification under its belt, it’s plausible that we’ll see it next week at CES — probably without the tipster’s own professionally-Photoshopped status light below the battery indicator, we’d bet.

[Thanks, r0fl]

Sprint’s 3G / 4G MiFi 4082 revealed? originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 30 Dec 2010 12:19:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Technically speaking, it’s not actually the 28th of December in the Bay Area yet, but Sprint’s already out in front with its announcement that WiMAX connectivity has been activated in and around the city of San Francisco. We were promised this development exactly three weeks ago, back when Los Angeles and Washington DC were first familiarizing themselves with the glorious new speed, and today the Bay Area, which also includes San Jose, Palo Alto and Oakland, adds to a total of 71 metropolitan markets that have been lit up with Sprint’s finest wireless offering. Guess Verizon had better start fast and keep running if it wants to keep up, eh?

Continue reading Sprint adheres to its roadmap, turns on WiMAX in San Francisco Bay Area

Sprint adheres to its roadmap, turns on WiMAX in San Francisco Bay Area originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 28 Dec 2010 02:40:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Though it’s standing firm on the definition of its original 4G specification — IMT-Advanced — which only WiMAX 2 and LTE-Advanced are currently capable of meeting, the ITU is easing off its earlier rhetoric, admitting that the term “4G” realistically could apply “to the forerunners of these technologies, LTE and WiMAX, and to other evolved 3G technologies providing a substantial level of improvement in performance and capabilities with respect to the initial third generation systems now deployed.” The whole dust-up started when carriers around the world deploying LTE and WiMAX networks (ahem, Sprint and Verizon) were throwing the “4G” term around very, very loosely — and to their credit, the networks are indisputably a generation beyond CDMA2000 and UMTS / HSPA, so if anything, we’d fault the ITU for leaving today’s modern networks without a generation to call their own. The “evolved 3G technologies” verbiage in the ITU’s statement would seemingly even leave room for T-Mobile USA’s claim that its 21Mbps HSPA+ network constitutes 4G… so yeah, score one for marketing campaigns. Of course, none of these carriers had ever planned to bow to the ITU’s recommendations anyway, so the ruling has little practical relevance — just know that the true 4G speeds are still a few years off.

[Thanks, Nate]

ITU capitulates, admits that the term ‘4G’ could apply to LTE, WiMAX, and ‘evolved 3G technologies’ originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 18 Dec 2010 17:35:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We can’t begin explain our exasperation at running a Samsung Galaxy Tab on Sprint’s 3G, knowing full well the WiMAX airwaves floating just overhead could make our experience speedy. Thankfully, we won’t have to dwell on our frustration for long, because a Sprint executive told Forbes that a 4G tablet will arrive in 2011. Sprint’s Paget Alves, president of business markets, wouldn’t say where it would be made, but hinted that the company intends to sell tablets running different operating systems — so it’s probably not another Android device. What could it be, then? We can’t say, but paired with the knowledge that Verizon also plans to debut LTE tablets in 2011 — possibly including one Motorola Stingray — it seems like 2011 will be a fine year for goodies on CDMA.

[Thanks, Stephen]

Sprint: 4G tablet coming in 2011 originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 09 Dec 2010 20:44:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Looks like the Motorola i1 Android set (not pictured above) will stand as the highest-end Nextel phone ever — Sprint just announced that it’s phasing out the iDEN network sometime in 2013 as it begins a new four to five billion dollar network enhancement project called “Network Vision.” We’ve expected this for a while — the Sprint / Nextel merger has been beset by subscriber losses and rumors of a breakup for years now — but this is the first time we’ve gotten a date. Sprint’s rolling out push-to-talk on its own network to support its 10.6 million Nextel customers, but we don’t have a schedule for that yet. Sprint’s also announcing vendors for Network Vision: Alcatel-Lucent, Samsung, and Ericsson will each handle a region and be tasked with expanding and fortifying Sprint’s existing 1900MHz 3G network while buying 800MHz, 1900MHz, and 2.5GHz spectrum for future use. Interestingly, Sprint’s definitely hedging its WiMAX bets a little — it can upgrade its new gear to LTE with swapping in a baseband card and issuing a software patch, which certainly gives the company some 4G flexibility should Clearwire not pull things together. We’ll see what happens — the underdog’s making some moves.

Sprint phasing out Nextel’s iDEN network, selects vendors for $5b network upgrade project originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 06 Dec 2010 13:22:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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