HSDPA

Japanese carrier NTT DoCoMo is set to demonstrate a prototype handset based on high-speed wireless data technology LTE later this month, according to its handset partner, NEC.

NEC said on Monday that NTT will demonstrate the handset receiving streaming high-resolution video across an LTE network at Mobile World Congress, which kicks off February 15 in Barcelona. According to NEC, the handset uses an LTE chipset that was developed by Fujitsu, NEC, NTT DoCoMo, and Panasonic, and first sampled in October.

LTE, the "long-term evolution" of 3G, is the successor to HSDPA and is roughly 10 times faster, providing … Read more

AT&T's wireless network has just gotten a little faster.

The company announced on Wednesday that enhancements to its HSPA, or High Speed Packet Access, third-generation cellular network will allow wireless laptop users to upload and download content from the Internet faster than they can with 3G services from other carriers.

The top three major wireless operators, AT&T, Verizon Wireless, and Sprint Nextel, have been touting the speeds and feeds of their 3G wireless networks for more than a year in an attempt to lure profitable business customers to their wireless laptop services. These services, which … Read more

Update 9:52 AM ET: A typo has been fixed in paragraph 6, changing a reference of megabits per second to kilobits per second.

An AT&T executive said Wednesday that the cell phone company will offer 20Mbps downloads over its wireless network as soon as next year. But don't get too excited; the real speed will likely be a lot slower.

Still, AT&T's network upgrade plan is expected to boost speeds significantly, which means that users of the hotly anticipated 3G iPhone, which is expected this summer, will be surfing the Web at lightning … Read more

You may be able to get free Wi-Fi almost anywhere in Singapore with the Wireless@SG initiative that aims to wire the whole island state, but that's still insufficient for the true Internet junkie. While commuting each day, a Net addict has to go cold turkey as his notebook becomes nothing more than a slab of plastic and silicon without wireless access. Well, a fix has been found.

Nokia has brought Wi-Fi onto 12 buses in Singapore so that commuters can surf for free when riding them, using the existing cellular HSDPA service. The best thing is that users … Read more

LG sneakily showed off the LG CU515 last night to little fanfare, as the Venus and the Voyager took the limelight. It's a shame, because the LG CU515 is no slouch when it comes to features--not only is it packed with a 1.3-megapixel camera and a music player, it is also one of AT&T's new HSDPA phones. Clearly a successor to the LG CU500V, the LG CU515 is also compatible with AT&T's Video Share, letting customers share real-time streaming video with each other. The quad-band phone will also support AT&T'… Read more

AT&T says it has spent an additional $50 million in the months leading up to the iPhone launch to upgrade and add more capacity to its 2.5G EDGE network, but a company official said that subscribers shouldn't expect to surf the mobile Net any faster.

"We don't want to set unrealistic expectations," said Mark Siegel, a spokesman for AT&T. "We have been upgrading the network on an ongoing basis, and we've made an additional investment in anticipation of demand for the iPhone."

AT&T has spent over $… Read more

Apple will begin selling the iPhone on Friday, but I'm not buying one.

It isn't that I don't like Apple hardware. I'm typing this on a MacBook Pro I bought last November. I have a stack of older PowerBooks (literally), a couple of iPods (one dead, alas), and a Power Mac G5.

It isn't that I don't like to buy new toys. I just counted: I carry around ten battery-powered devices every day, four of which are less than six months old.

But I don't need a new phone, especially not … Read more

If you're shopping for a somewhat snazzy business-oriented notebook, HP's got some AMD-flavored newness for you. The imaginatively named HP Compaq 6515b and 6715b both support a variety of wireless protocols, including EVDO (Verizon) and HSDPA (AT&T). And, being business laptops, they're big on security, including drive encryption, an optional privacy filter for your screen, and a fingerprint reader.

We've got the smaller 14.1-inch 6515b in the CNET Labs right now, and it's actually surprisingly slick-looking for a button-down biz laptop. Both these systems will be available in late April, starting at … Read more

Sony Ericsson's first tri-band HSDPA phone for the North America market seems to have some identity issues.

At first glance it's all about looks: it comes in pink and gray--er, Rose Pink and Phantom Grey--and has a nifty exterior display that's hidden until a call or text comes in.

But inside there's a lot of smart features, like push e-mail (it's Exchange ActiveSync enabled), live scrolling RSS feeds, and the ability to do broadband-speed uploads and downloads.

There's also a 2.2-inch screen, a 2.0-megapixel camera, media player, built-in FM radio (with RDS, … Read more