Thread: N900 and UMA on T-Mobile USA?
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scofflawMike is offline scofflawMike
2009-10-16 , 00:23
Posts: 15 | Thanked: 3 times | Joined on Oct 2009
#28
Originally Posted by egrims View Post
UMA wasn't as glamorous for me as some of you are telling. I'm glad you had good experiences but mine was pretty poor. The quality was not as good as going straight to tower, multiple drops on a very low traffic network and occasional bad static. Also I was never able to successfully switch from WiFI to Tower or vice-versa. They still have work to do with this as the technology I don't feel is polished yet. The concept however is fantastic. I was able to use it in Europe extensively to send texts for work. I was using a Curve 8320. I've since switch to an e71 and use Google Voice with Gizmo5 and works well.

Also have you noticed that there is no UMA in any of the 3G enabled phones (G1, MyTouch?). I don't have verification on this but a guy at the T-Mobile store told me the 3G and UMA functionalities(sic) conflict. Anyone else hear this?
This is correct but not for the reason the T-Mobile sales guy indicated. Its isn't a conflict with the devices so much as UMA or GAN relies upon a feature within the MSC or call server. It is more likely that the T-Mobile network topology is not configured in a way that allows a single MSC or call server to perform UMTS, 2G and UMA concurrently. The radio network be it UMTS,GSM or UMA/GAN is homed to a MSC call server that support your geographical area. UMA to GSM handovers are difficult. Put the soft handovers of UMTS on top of this and it becomes a nightmare to provide a level of service without tons of maintenance to prevent an obscene high number of call drops between radio technologies.
Don't get me wrong, we still rock a UMA enabled BB Curve and for people without even 2G coverage at their homes (like my parents in Vermont) it serves them well. I just think everyone (users and operators) is better off using SIP, Skype, or Google Talk on UMTS.