ITU approved new standards that have smartphones running at 500 times 3G speeds

Imagine having an invisible fiber optic cable connected from your smartphone directly to the Internet backbone.  The ITU (International Telecommunication Union) has approved the specs for the next generation of smartphones to run at more than 500 times the speed of today’s 3G technology.

IMT-Advanced is the next generation (5G maybe) wireless standards for mobile and fixed networks.  The mobile standards are wireless devices in cars, trains and planes; stationary wireless connections like laptops or computers with cellular connections and people walking with wireless devices are considered fixed for practical purposes.

Both “LTE-Advanced” and “WirelessMAN-Advanced” were included under the IMT-Advanced specification.  This puzzles me.

I can see the LTE-Advanced receiving inclusion.  I cannot understand why the international body included Wireless MAN-Advanced.

Wireless MAN-Advanced is basically advanced WiMax technology.  WiMax technology is being dropped by Sprint in favor of LTE.

World-wide usage of WiMax is very low compared to LTE.  Belarus, Nicaragua Russia and South Korea have some wireless providers that use this technology.  Well, I can see the ITU supporting a nearly-orphaned technology.

Hamadoun Touré, ITU’s Secretary-General issued a statement which said in part “IMT-Advanced marks a huge leap forward in state-of-the-art technologies, which will make the present day smart phone feel like an old dial up Internet connection. Access to the Internet, streaming videos and data transfers anytime, anywhere will be better than most desktop connections today.”

Can you imagine getting a 1 Gbps download speed on your smartphone while walking down the street or sitting and watching a movie while downloading another one for later?

Of course, if the data caps stay the way they are in most wireless plans, you will just be able to reach that maximum 500 times faster.