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To: SpudFarmer who wrote (38369)	8/20/1999 2:38:00 PM
From: Ruffian	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 152472

Good Post From A Good Guy> Little boy (part II) by: Explorer_at_large (36/M/Southwest) 31979 of 31987 spending some time on the debate team are we? In the case of wireless standards, consumers really don't make the decision, at least initially. If this were the case, ATT would be up to its ass in alligators for deploying a standard with such poor voice quality (and then holding it out as high quality digital). The air interface of a cellular network is an abstraction to the consumer. Moreover, consumer priorities are NOT homogenous. Some customers prioritize voice quality and battery life. Others emphasize reliable roaming. Others are entirely driven by price. Within the context of appropriate network planning, all the digital standards can meet the consumers' requirements to some degree. The wireless operator must build a cellular infrastructure ("minute factory") to deliver the service. The financial equation is driven by the cost of the network infrastructure, the capacity obtained from this investment, the flexibility inherent in the network structure, i.e. frequency allocation, expansion, network planning etc., and the quality delivered by the infrastructure. The CDMA air interface yields better quality (voice clarity and few dropped calls), substantially higher capacity and (of increasing importance) far greater flexibility. TDMA-based technologies are poorly suited, from an architectural standpoint, to work with bursty, high speed data. This is why EDGE/GPRS are so kludgy and require so much incremental carrier investment, i.e. new infrastructure and new handsets. Thus, carriers seriously intent on providing wireless data services must migrate to CDMA. This is why, by the way, the Europeans (Ericsson and Nokia) dreamed up W-CDMA in the first place. If TDMA was the end-all-get-all that its adherents claim it to be, why did Nokia and Ericsson every let the W-CDMA genie out of the bottle? Ultimately, the efficiency and flexibility of the carrier's minute factory impacts the price that the carrier must charge for wireless services. ATT, for example, has seen its capital expenditure requirements increase asymtotically because of the poor capacity yields from IS-136. ATT is therefore at a long-term disadvantage to more carriers with more efficient minute factories, like Sprint, BellAtlantic, Airtouch and PrimeCo. This isn't a war won or lost in a day, but rather is a slow grinding battle of attrition. It is a war lost in the capital markets and investors figure out that ATT will have structually lower returns, and potentially even negative returns, as competition intensifies. If you understand the true economics, then the decision to go CDMA becomes obvious...which is why the largest, newest PCS networks (Sprint and PrimeCo) went CDMA. ATT was trapped with legacy hardware due to its acquisition of McCaw. Again, the facts are complicated and require detailed analysis not drooling textbook microeconomic techno-babble. EAL

To: SpudFarmer who wrote (38369)	8/20/1999 3:07:00 PM
From: T L Comiskey	Respond to of 152472

SF..OT......did not realize you were in San D.....where do you find a potato patch down there........??.gg,.......Called the Red Cross this am.....1-800-HELP NOW....they have an aid program set up....send checks to American Red Cross....Turkey Earth Quake Relief Effort on bottom of check...Po.Box 37243 Washington DC....20013...either that or the ADRA International the Greg M. posted earlier today...both absorb about 8% of the donation for their expenses..............Best...Tim