Comments on: Does Apple hate Swedes?

By: dagensit

dagensit — Sat, 10 Nov 2012 20:47:42 +0000

Yes most European countries have the 1800 band. Bur almost no operators are using it for LTE yet. Instead they use 2600 and 800 MHz. The 1800 band has recently been freed up for LTE.
It would take a major investment cost to cater for Iphone 5 users. No other major LTE smart phones has the same limitation band wise. So the operators who already are in deep since flat rates are eating their profits an not likley to jump on new costly investments.
It seems like Apple developers are still looking at the navel rather than outside Cupertino and Silicon Valley. That they do that was obvious when the Ipad 3 was launched this spring. I was there and Apple product specialists present at the demos following the launch event in London truly thought that Ipad 3 had LTE capacity in Europe too.
That was the official message on Apple’s Europeans web sites as well untill two days later when they changed their texts and no longer claimed support for LTE.
It is very likely the lack of LTE support in large portions of Europe comes as an early X-mas present to Samsung and other Android vendors. And if that was the Apple’s purpose, fine. Mission accomplished.

By: Fredrik

Fredrik — Sat, 22 Sep 2012 17:16:03 +0000

Can i still use the iphone 5 when travelling to Sweden?

/A Swede that left for New York for reasons other than unsupported cell phones

By: Rodrigo Freitas

Rodrigo Freitas — Mon, 17 Sep 2012 21:21:48 +0000

Same problem in Portugal. Well, a semi-problem. Because all 3 major carriers in Portugal despite acquiring the same amount of 800, 1800, and 2600, started by implementing the 800MHz and 2.6GHz bands first. There’s a good coverage of LTE by two of those carriers (TMN and Vodafone), unfortunately the most widespread bands, are “the wrong” bands.

By: Kevin Fitchard

Kevin Fitchard — Fri, 14 Sep 2012 15:49:59 +0000

Oh, and FZ, there are two Kevins writing for GigaOM and we both cover mobile. So we made your job even harder :)

By: Kevin Fitchard

Kevin Fitchard — Fri, 14 Sep 2012 15:48:54 +0000

Thanks FZ, I really appreciate that. I definitely read all comments and I try to respond to as many as I can. BTW, in the Reuters comment, I wasn’t trying to imply Reuters rewrites press releases. I was trying to say we don’t use the same style is different from Reuters, NOR do we rewrite press releases. I wasn’t trying to link the two. I apologize if anyone got that idea.

By: Kevin Fitchard

Kevin Fitchard — Fri, 14 Sep 2012 15:40:53 +0000

Yeah, you’re right Dilip. I should have just said the next iPhone

By: Useful Design

Useful Design — Fri, 14 Sep 2012 15:32:46 +0000

Well arguably, Wikileaks supporters hate the Swedish government ATM ;-)

By: Christopher Kalie

Christopher Kalie — Fri, 14 Sep 2012 05:45:36 +0000

oops, i meant 800 Mhz

By: Christopher Kalie

Christopher Kalie — Fri, 14 Sep 2012 05:43:35 +0000

The carriers did a very brave thing in Korea – they deactivated their 2G networks and reallocated the 2G spectrum for LTE. Then they paid off the remaining few thousand 2G subscribers to switch to 3G or LTE. LG U+ – Korea’s first LTE network also went 850 Mhz and got left out in the cold

By: Stefan Brunner

Stefan Brunner — Thu, 13 Sep 2012 23:29:30 +0000

I am just coming back from my Germany trip. Most noticeable was how poorly developed data networks are in Germany. The first provider worked barely, the provider who has allegedly the fastest network in Germany, worked painfully and spotty. This was within Berlin city borders. Outside of Berlin, data was practically deaf on both providers. At the same time – voice beautifully worked essentially everywhere I went. I think Europe has to do quiet some catching up to do on their data networks. Being a German iPhone user is frustrating and painful at best – so LTE support is the least of their worries in the moment.