Oh, yes, that does explain a lot Tim
I'm always confused about this stuff! What I'd like to know is, if I get my dream ipad2 and go with T-mobile, what would that give me, just 3G or just 2G or both? I'm getting really confused!
from Somerset UK on my iPad using IPF app
In the UK the licences to operate mobile services were awarded by the Government of the day in several phases. If we ignore the very first 1G licences (analogue phones that most people have never known) we have an initial award of 2G licences and a later award of 3G licences. (For those who want to be pedantic there are some caveats here to do with the award on 1800 MHz).
Those operators that had 2G licences (they give you GPRS or EDGE) also bid for the 3G licences. Newcomers, like '3', who didn't have a 2G licence also bid for 3G licences.
So we have a situation now where the older providers - such as Vodafone - have both a 2G and a 3G licence. They have upgraded their urban basestations to 3G so, typically, in an urban area you'll get 3G on your iPad but in a rural area you'll get 2G. You'll notice this on your iPad because it will either display 3G or EDGE or an O - which represents GPRS.
GPRS was an early development of data services on 2G.
EDGE was a later development of data services on 3G and gives better data rates than GPRS.
Both GPRS and EDGE are compatible with 2G and require a relatively minor upgrade to the equipment in the 2G basestations, so it's cost effective for the mobile service provider.
Newcomers, like '3', however had to deploy an entirely new network and so their network is entirely 3G - no EDGE or GPRS.
A 2G network cannot be upgraded or easily modified to 3G; it requires an entirely new communications infrastructure.
Just to complicate the picture even further, there are now some inter-operator roaming agreements in the UK so that two service providers have a joint agreement to allow each other's customers to roam onto their respective networks.
It's also worth noting that 3G is really an 'umbrella' term that covers a number of underlying communications standards - so you'll see terms such as HSDPA and 3.5G mentioned.
The clever thing about most of the 3G standards is that they're adaptive - they measure the quality of the radio link between your iPad and the basestation continuously and modify the transmission parameters on a second-by-second basis to optimise the data rate, so that you always get the best data rate that the radio link will support.
And all of this technology so you can read iPad Forum on your iPad..
Tim
