150Mbps

Two '150Mbps' stories August 2014 - October 2014

Sprint will begin sales of iPad Air 2, the first iPad w/ Spark support, & iPad mini 3 this week

Sprint announced today that it will begin selling cellular versions of Apple’s new iPad Air 2 and the iPad mini 3 this week following pre-orders of the device kicking off through Apple, AT&T on Friday. Sprint also noted that the iPad Air 2, which includes support for 20 LTE bands and speeds up to 150Mbps over LTE, will be the first iPad that supports its high-speed Spark LTE network.

Sprint Spark delivers average wireless speeds of 6-15Mbps and peak wireless speeds of 50-60Mbps today on capable devices, with increasing speed potential over time. Sprint is on track to reach 100 million Americans by year-end with Sprint Spark.

The iPad mini 3, however, doesn’t support the Sprint Spark network and will instead be limited to Sprint’s normal 4G LTE network.

Sprint will have the iPad Air 2 and iPad mini 3 later this week online and in-stores. Sprint customers can add the new tablets to a Family Share plan for $10/month per tablet, but the carrier is waiving the fee through December 2015 for customers with a 20GB Family Share plan or higher. It also has a limited time 100MB of data for $10 in addition to its normal tablet plans.

Apple is already taking orders for the iPad Air 2 and iPad mini 3 that ship with its new universal SIM with support for AT&T, Sprint, and T-Mobile out of the box. Apple is expected to start shipping the new tablets this week.

Today’s sketchy rumor: iPhone 6 to offer 150Mbps but not 300Mbps on LTE-Advanced networks

Carriers have started rolling out faster LTE-Advanced networks, also known as LTE-A and LTE+. If today’s rumor is correct, the iPhone 6 will be able to take advantage of these faster networks, but will top out at 150Mbps rather than the maximum 300Mbps supported by LTE-A.

GforGames is citing a Geekbar post, suggests that the LTE modem in the iPhone 6 will be the Qualcomm MDM9625, which supports LTE-A but only up to 150Mbps.

To put the speeds into perspective, the LTE modem used in the iPhone 5s and 5c tops out at 100Mbps, so we’d see a 50 percent increase in speed rather than a 200 percent one.

It should be noted that the source of the rumor is the same one which yesterday got its NAND and its DRAM confused, and has a record of mixed reliability. However, it wouldn’t be a surprising decision by Apple. LTE-A is at a very early stage, with limited network roll-out and only a few handsets supporting it. Apple generally prefers to wait for a technology to mature before adopting it.

We shouldn’t have long to wait to find out, with Apple expected to officially launch the iPhone 6 at a media event on 9th September.

Recent claimed leaked parts appear to show tapered edges on the display panel and the power button moved from the top to the side of the phone; a raised camera cutout; a single, circular True Tone flash; and the logic board assembly – with far fewer leaks for the 5.5-inch model, perhaps lending weight to rumors that it will go on sale later than the 4.7-inch one.