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Sprint Details iDen Push To Talk Replacement
CDMA-Based Push To Talk Launches Q4 This Year
When Sprint recently announced they'd be spending between four and five billion dollars to retrofit all of their antenna base stations, the company noted that plan involved the slow phasing out of the formerly-Nextel iDen network, with that effort starting in 2013 and the network being shuttered completely by 2017. Today Sprint got a little more specific about the replacement for the iDen network, a press release today noting that their new "next-generation" push-to-talk platform will launch on Sprint's broadband CDMA network sometime during the fourth quarter of this year. The release notes that the launch will of course come alongside the unveiling of a slew of new chirpy phones for your contractor friends:
quote:
Sprint Direct Connect will launch with an initial portfolio of rugged devices from Motorola Mobility and Kyocera. The devices will feature most of the capabilities available on current Sprint push-to-talk phones, plus next-generation push-to-talk applications and functionality including high-speed data access, high-resolution cameras and Bluetooth. The planned portfolio will include an ultra-rugged camera flip phone and an Android Smartphone with a touch screen and a QWERTY keyboard. In 2012, Sprint expects to deepen its push-to-talk portfolio, adding more devices with new form factors and features.
According to Sprint, their Push-to-talk coverage footprint will increase to nearly 2.7 million square miles and is expected to cover a population of 309 million, up from the iDen network's the iDEN network’s 908,370 square miles covering a population of 278 million.
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openbox9
Premium Member
join:2004-01-26
71144

openbox9

Premium Member

Now if only

These PTT handsets could be confined to construction sites and emergency response scenes. Talk about annoying. I'd rather listen to ten people talking on their phones on the train than one PTT handset anywhere.

Mike_
join:2003-06-24
Philadelphia, PA

Mike_

Member

Re: Now if only

It's really not that bad.. But some people always liked to blast the volume so the entire room can here them. It'll be like it is now with regular calls - only you hear both sides of the conversation.
openbox9
Premium Member
join:2004-01-26
71144

openbox9

Premium Member

Re: Now if only

It really is that bad. Try 30 minutes in a confined space sometime. At least with normal rudeness on a standard handset, I'm only subjected to half of the conversation as you point out. Can people truly not wait for 30 minutes to have a conversation? Isn't this what SMS is for?

Mike_
join:2003-06-24
Philadelphia, PA

Mike_

Member

Re: Now if only

I agree with SMS and Google IM (on Android phones) - as I in particular utilize texting as much as possible since to me its simpler than a phone call - and in most cases, gets the point across and isn't too rude in the process.
openbox9
Premium Member
join:2004-01-26
71144

openbox9

Premium Member

Re: Now if only

Agreed. My wife and I use SMS and e-mail daily during our commutes. No discomfort to our fellow commuters and we're able to effectively communicate.
robertg1234
join:2004-04-19
Palo Alto, CA

robertg1234

Member

Re: Now if only

said by openbox9:

Agreed. My wife and I use SMS and e-mail daily during our commutes. No discomfort to our fellow commuters and we're able to effectively communicate.

I think a construction worker with a big pair of gloves having to whip out a small Blackberry to send an SMS is a little too much. PTT is still a very effective way to communicate in heavy industry. And Nextel is much better than some overcrowded cheap FRS, or much more expensive (and good) 2-way radios, and the licensing follies you have to go through.

There will be a market for Nextel for awhile. Unless somebody makes an *indestructible* and *large button* phone for those construction types ... and don't say "Jitterbug." I can squash those phones (like a "bug") with my bare hands
openbox9
Premium Member
join:2004-01-26
71144

openbox9

Premium Member

Re: Now if only

said by robertg1234:

I think a construction worker with a big pair of gloves having to whip out a small Blackberry to send an SMS is a little too much.

Please reference my original post.
fiberguy2
My views are my own.
Premium Member
join:2005-05-20

fiberguy2

Premium Member

Re: Now if only

said by openbox9:

said by robertg1234:

I think a construction worker with a big pair of gloves having to whip out a small Blackberry to send an SMS is a little too much.

Please reference my original post.

Oh get over yourself already.

PTT was never intended, nor even marketed, to the general public. It's always been a service industry service. In fact, if you recall, nextel would barely give a personal account to anyone.

It was BOOST and their lovely crowd of non-pay low life's that got into the PTT network (mostly because they stiffed other carriers on the bill) and there are SOME of them that can't contain their phone calls.

By the way, I dare you to go tell a cop what a rude jerk he or she is for their radios being loud.

Again, get over it. I think people like you are too busy looking for reasons to be offended by things that quite honestly are so not worth getting your feathers in a ruffle in the first place. What's more annoying than listening to a personal chit-chat conversation over a SPEAKER PHONE are people like you that think the world revolves around you and that it must conform to your version of standards.
openbox9
Premium Member
join:2004-01-26
71144

openbox9

Premium Member

Re: Now if only

Such misplaced hostility. First, the world doesn't revolve around me, it revolves around the Sun. Second, so you acknowledge PTT handsets shouldn't be provided to normal consumers, but rather to the ones I identified in my original post. Third, I've never heard a law enforcement officer's radio be too loud when not responding to an event, so that seems to be ok based on my original post. Lastly, seems like your feathers are quite ruffled. You may want to tale a breath and relax a little.
fiberguy2
My views are my own.
Premium Member
join:2005-05-20

fiberguy2

Premium Member

Re: Now if only

I have a serious issue when people say what should and shouldn't be issued to who and for why. I for one like the constitution, thanks. I also didn't side with you, sorry, on who should have PTT. While I find it rude that people hold casual conversations, it's not illegal nor is it my place to say what someone does, unless it's on my private property. Activities that occur in public are in the discretion of private property owners, and not the general public. If you're in a grocery store and someone's got their Nextel on speaker and volume way up, then it's up to the store to say something to their customer to stop it if they desire, not yours. Same goes with an airplane, train, bus, etc.

Is it rude? yes,.. but can you regulate morality? no.

Also, not sure where you've been, but police radios are generally always turned up where it can be heard. I've heard them in McDonalds, I've head them in grocery stores, I've heard them on the streets, ... all over the place, and in various cities.
patcat88
join:2002-04-05
Jamaica, NY

patcat88 to Mike_

Member

to Mike_
PTT is dead socially. The only reason why nextel/boost were so hot a few years ago, was, they were the only way to get "unlimited" calls with DirectConnect. Then the unlimited plans came out and now minutes are history.
moonpuppy (banned)
join:2000-08-21
Glen Burnie, MD

moonpuppy (banned) to openbox9

Member

to openbox9
said by openbox9:

These PTT handsets could be confined to construction sites and emergency response scenes. Talk about annoying. I'd rather listen to ten people talking on their phones on the train than one PTT handset anywhere.

LOL blaming a phone for people's bad behavior.
openbox9
Premium Member
join:2004-01-26
71144

openbox9

Premium Member

Re: Now if only

Not at all.

Harddrive
Proud American and Infidel since 1968.
Premium Member
join:2000-09-20
Fort Worth, TX

Harddrive

Premium Member

Pretty crappy ROI.

You're 'adding' 1.8 million square miles of coverage (double what you have now of 0.9 million) but you're only adding coverage of an additional population of 31 million (a little over a tenth of what you have now).
I guess west Texas and the high peaks of the Rockies need PTT as well.

cruz1
@sbcglobal.net

cruz1

Anon

Re: Pretty crappy ROI.

It's not a crappy ROI, all they are doing is making new phones to send their voice via little snippets of data over the existing CDMA network ... no new infrastructure... (Think of an Android App to turn it into a walkie talkie) ... maybe new phones to replace iDEN but thats about it.

Harddrive
Proud American and Infidel since 1968.
Premium Member
join:2000-09-20
Fort Worth, TX

Harddrive

Premium Member

Re: Pretty crappy ROI.

What part of 'they'd be spending between four and five billion dollars to retrofit all of their antenna base stations' and (if you had clicked the link to the press release) 'the plan includes a complete upgrade of Sprint’s current wireless networks accompanied by changes in device chipsets and network infrastructure' did you not understand?

Maybe reading comprehension just isn't your thing.

kpfx
join:2005-10-28
San Antonio, TX

1 edit

kpfx

Member

Re: Pretty crappy ROI.

They're not spending $4-5 Billion just to add 1.8M sq miles of Push-To-Talk service. That's just a side benefit of switching iDENT to CDMA. For that investment they're:

- Streamlining cell tower equipment and operation costs
- Reducing power consumption.
- Reduce backhaul costs.
- Making it cheaper to deploy new cell sites.
- Setting up for a speedy 4G rollout (WiMax, LTE, or both).
- Reclaiming spectrum by decommissioning iDENT.
- Improve reliability & network flexibility.

So they spend $4-5 Billion now, and are anticipating saving $10-11 Billion over the next 7 years just on cost savings. Sounds like a fair ROI to me.

Harddrive
Proud American and Infidel since 1968.
Premium Member
join:2000-09-20
Fort Worth, TX

Harddrive

Premium Member

Re: Pretty crappy ROI.

What part of 'the plan includes a complete upgrade of Sprint’s current wireless networks accompanied by changes in device chipsets and network infrastructure' did you not understand either?
moonpuppy (banned)
join:2000-08-21
Glen Burnie, MD

moonpuppy (banned)

Member

Hopefully, this will be better...

....than Verizon's try. Even the techs that had them couldn't stand them. Voices would sometimes come 45 seconds to a over a minute later.

kpfx
join:2005-10-28
San Antonio, TX

kpfx

Member

Re: Hopefully, this will be better...

Yep, the first generation of the CDMA Push-To-Talk sucked even on the Sprint side. A few years back we tried it at work with the Sanyo SCP-3100's and it just had a huge delay with making the connection.

We ended up dropping that service.
hottboiinnc4
ME
join:2003-10-15
Cleveland, OH

hottboiinnc4

Member

Already done.

This has already been done before with Sprint- Q-Chat that was quickly killed. Now you can go and download apps from Android MarketPlace and Blackberry that intergrate EVERYONE regardless of the carrier into a PPT setting and works on PCs and with Facebook. Talk about Sprint being out of the world with this one
patcat88
join:2002-04-05
Jamaica, NY

patcat88

Member

Re: Already done.

Yeah. What happened to Qchat? It worked flawlessly on the videos I saw. Sprint hiring contractors to write yet another IDEN-other network PTT system?

pokesph
It Is Almost Fast
Premium Member
join:2001-06-25
Sacramento, CA

pokesph

Premium Member

beep beep..

undone?

How will this affect the range and physical operation of the PPT network? Currently we have fantastic coverage and deep building penetration (elevators, hospitals, etc..) on the 800MHz band.

Not looking forward to this changeover, as if you actually USE this service with various others, you'll have to have 2 phones; one to cover the new, upgraded users and a second for the old iDEN users.

*sigh*
jfmezei
Premium Member
join:2007-01-03
Pointe-Claire, QC

jfmezei

Premium Member

Why move to CDMA ?

Seems odd that Sprint would *finally* make a move to merge its networks. It is a bit late in the game however to spend money to convert its customers to CDMA when CDMA itself has limited lifetime left.

It would have costed a lot less to announce that Sprint was movin to LTE, that LTE's voice (still undefined) would support PTT and that Iden customers woulfd be moved direct from iden to LTE.

By waiting a year or two, it would allow sprint to skip the conversion to CDMA.


joako
Premium Member
join:2000-09-07
/dev/null

joako

Premium Member

Will it ever die?

I thought they already replaced iDEN a few years ago with Qchat...