Comments on: How Much Is RIM To Blame For No CDMA CameraBerrys?

By: Tyler Beckett

Tyler Beckett — Sun, 12 Oct 2008 02:13:21 +0000

While I agree with no one and everyone, the name calling is ridiculous here. Here’s the way I see it:

@hellno - While GSM may or may not be better, is not necessarily going to make it more popular. Look at the similar war between VHS and BetaMAX. VHS won out, not because it was a better technology, but because the big players (movie studios, et al) backed it with advertising and products which used the format. Saying that something is better by showing that more people are using it, is not fact finding and proof of anything except that people have widely adopted something.

@gquaglia - I have used both CDMA and GSM technologies in my cell phones. I started with CDMA/TDMA and switched to GSM. I notice very little quality differences between the two and the only major difference, up till now, was the speed of data. Data provided by CDMA (EVDO) networks was far faster than the GSM (EDGE) equivalent. However, with the advent of 3G, I have noticed a significant improvement in speeds on my GSM BlackBerry 9000 (Bold).

@both - I am living in Canada, so maybe the difference is in our home countries providers. Nevertheless, I don’t see bickering on here as changing anyone’s minds and is doing really nothing more than making both of you out to look like the person who thinks they are the rocket scientist who should be running the phone companies. Have an open mind people, bickering anonymously online doesn’t change anyone’s opinion.

By: Venugopal

Venugopal — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 04:41:04 +0000

GSM is an open standard. CDMA is a proprietary one. The difference in the two standards stems from the difference in cultures of Europe and USA. Europe always believes in the public good over individual. In USA, its always I, me, myself.
Come to think of it Europeans are pretty smart becasue this culture of theirs always pays rich dividents - you can see it by the stupendous success of GSM world-wide and the rise of the Euro.

By: What’s Going To Happen With CDMA In The United States? | RIMarkable | The official, unofficial BlackBerry Weblog

Mon, 30 Jul 2007 17:43:07 +0000

[...] week I wrote a post about RIM partially being to blame for the lack of BlackBerrys with digital cameras on CDMA networks. The comments kind of morphed into something completely different, however, a very good question [...]

By: hellno

hellno — Mon, 30 Jul 2007 16:05:53 +0000

Ned,

Might be also of interest to you that Alltel also has alot of GSM coverage it maintains and even expands from time to time.

What you forgot to mention is verizon claims to be buying Rural to “save more than $1 billion through reduced roaming and operational expenses”, that Rural Cellular uses both CDMA and GSM technology separately across its five regional markets.

“Verizon Wireless plans to deploy CDMA service in Rural Cellular’s existing GSM markets and convert the GSM customers to CDMA service. Verizon Wireless, however, said it expects to maintain Rural Cellular’s existing GSM networks to continue serving roaming needs of other GSM carriers’ customers.”

Some GSM customers might drink the verizon kool-aid, others in the area will stay with GSM

“Rural Cellular reported a loss of $116 million in 2006″

Ripe for the pickin

By: hellno

hellno — Mon, 30 Jul 2007 15:54:17 +0000

good to see your starting to read, understand and learn showing the error of your previous posts gquaglia

By: hellno

hellno — Mon, 30 Jul 2007 15:52:27 +0000

by the way….. NEXT excuse to be debunked

National Security Agency (NSA) Goes Secure GSM
http://www.gsm-security.net/news/NSA_Goes_Secure_GSM.shtml

The security methods standardized for the GSM System make it the most secure cellular telecommunications standard currently available.
http://www.hackcanada.com/blackcrawl/cell/gsm/gsm-secur/gsm-secur.html

By: Ned

Ned — Mon, 30 Jul 2007 15:48:09 +0000

To those who have sounded the death toll for Verizon and CDMA networks, Verizon announced today that it was acquiring “Rural Cellular, a regional network operator covering parts of New England, the Mid West, the South and the Pacific Northwest, for $2.67 billion. Rural Cellular operates both CDMA and GSM networks to cover its 716,000 subscribers in those regions. Verizon has said that it will switch Rural’s GSM customers to CDMA technology, though it will keep the GSM networks up and running to help provide roaming coverage to other GSM carriers. Verizon also reported its second quarter earnings. It increased its ranks by 1.3 million net adds, boosting its total to 62.1 million. Of note, its data revenues (non-voice) surged 70.3%.” Source of the information: Verizon via Phonescoop.com

If VZ were really ever thinking of switching to GSM, this would be an ideal opportunity to start. Nonetheless, VZ is moving GSM subscribers to CDMA technology. Interesting.

By: gquaglia

gquaglia — Mon, 30 Jul 2007 15:47:12 +0000

@hellno
You make me laugh. Its no longer worth arguing with such a zealot.

By: hellno

hellno — Mon, 30 Jul 2007 14:31:43 +0000

Nice try on the excuses abhorredlife. All Wrong but nice try to justify your intake of cdma kool-aid. Not enough time in the day to go point by point to show you the error’s of your thinking, it’s up to you to read, learn and understand the truth, then it’s your choice to continue posting all jacked up and cdma kool-aid, while making yourself look foolish or post the truth.

There are many many reasons why RIM does not put much into it’s cdma offerings when compared with it’s GSM offerings and when one has clear knowledge of the truth it’s not only understandable, but also completely the right business move for RIM.

Recent, current Blackberry’s made for GSM in North America:
1-BlackBerry 8300 “CameraBerry”
2-BlackBerry 8800
3-BlackBerry 8820
4-BlackBerry Pearl “CameraBerry”
5-Red BlackBerry Pearl “CameraBerry”
6-White Blackberry Pearl “CameraBerry”
7-Blackberry 8707g
8-Blackberry 8705g
9-BlackBerry 8700c
10-BlackBerry 8700g
11-Blackberry 8700r
12-BlackBerry 7130c
13-Blackberry 7130g
14-BlackBerry 7100g
15-BlackBerry 7290

Recent, current Blackberry’s made for cdma:
1-Blackberry 8830
2-BlackBerry 8703e
3-BlackBerry 7130e
4-BlackBerry 7250

There is the truth and then there is cdma kool-aid. There is being a loyal RIM customer and then there is pining for RIM to spend resources on devices for service providers with less than a 1/8 the customers, using proprietary technology, that also cripple and remove functions. RIM is much better off continuing down the proven path of putting most R&D money into the Global Standard GSM devices with advanced features, while yearly throwing a bone to cdma customers with a hybrid cdma/GSM device (a trojan horse), which will make travel and the eventual upgrade to GSM much less jarring to those jacked up on cdma kool-aid.

By: Robb Dunewood

Robb Dunewood — Mon, 30 Jul 2007 12:12:38 +0000

Wow, there were lot of comments to this post over the weekend. They’ve strayed a bit from the originaly topic, however, I love it when something I write sparks this much thoughtful (sometimes heated) discussion.

To get back to my orginal post, however, I think that RIM could “wag the dog” a bit when it comes to the timing on of the release of new BlackBerry devices on U.S. carriers.

It really doesn’t matter if GSM is better than CDMA or visa versa or if CDMA is going away. Fact is that there are a heck of a lot of CDMA BlackBerry users in the U.S. that Research in Motion fully intends to support for some time to come.

CDMA may eventually be phased out, but, that isn’t happening any time soon. RIM will sell a crap load of BlackBerry Pearl II and BlackBerry Curve, and whatever else they have coming out in the near future on CDMA networks.

If it is easy to port GSM over to CDMA, why make those customers wait?