I won’t do any iPhone 3G S and Palm Pre comparisons in this posting because there are just so many articles floating around about why one is better than the other.

However, I will point out that AT&T Mobility is upgrading its network to deal with the 3G media congestion highlighted by SlingPlayer. AT&T had to remove the SlingPlayer’s 3G access from the iPhone. According to AT&T the SlingPlayer application ate up too much bandwidth over the current AT&T 3G network. This issue resulted in AT&T’s announcement that it was upgrading its network to High Speed Packet Access technology.

The HSPA technology is really a protocol. In fact HSPA is two protocols; High Speed Downlink Packet Access (HSDPA) and High Speed Uplink Packet Access (HSUPA). HSPA extend and improve the performance of existing WCDMA protocols. The WCDMA protocol is the underlying radio interface of UMTS

A further standard, Evolved HSPA (also known as HSPA+), is soon to be released.

HSPA improves the end-user experience by increasing peak data rates up to 14 Mbps in the downlink and 5.8 Mbs in the uplink. HSPA is designed to reduce latency and provide up to five times more system capacity in the downlink and up to twice as much system capacity in the uplink; this reduces the production cost per bit compared to original WCDMA protocols.  This is all good for AT&T but the real issue is the execution plan.  How much capacity is being installed?

My other question is: Has AT&T Mobilty taken into account the video streaming impact that the iPhone 3G S will have on the wireless network? The iPhone 3G S will likely cause drastic increases in traffic in the AT&T network. Did AT&T take this into account when it decided to pull 3G access for the iPhone’s (non iPhone 3G S) SlingPlayer media application? Something to think about.

The whole matter of AT&T having to upgrade its network is embarrassing. What in the world was management or the engineering department thinking when they started marketing the 3G version of SlingPlayer’s video application on the iPhone? Back in my day, a network capacity error of this magnitude and embarrassment would have resulted in someone being fired. In fact a lot of people would have seen their careers come to screeching halt.

Hopefully the new network upgrades take into account a probable permanent surge in traffic, otherwise AT&T will be looking silly.