2008
HSDPA
HSDPA or High-Speed Downlink Packet access is a mobile telephone protocol. It is also called High-Speed Downlink Protocol Access or 3.5G technology. It is a High-Speed Packet Access technology within the 3rd Generation or 3G. HSDPA is designed to give out faster network capacity and speedier transmission rates of data transmitted with the use of mobile phones.
The HSDPA standard is expected to offer download speeds on mobile phones with the same speeds provided to an Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line or ADSL in a home. With the HSDPA, the user can perform transfers with the use of a mobile phone without the limitations of having to use an ADSL for speedier transmission rates.
Generally, HSDPA is considered an enhancement to the WCDMA or Wideband Code Division Multiple Access. HSDPA is said to reach a maximum of 8 to 10 Mbps as opposed to WCDMA’s 2 Mbps. This protocol allows transmission of any data. However, the focus of HSDPA is on video and music streaming.
HSDPA is commonly associated with downlink transmissions. But the standard has greater transfer capacity. Transfers within HSDPA networks reach 30 GB of data per month. Mobile television viewing reaches 300 minutes. Mobile phone calls reach 1000 minutes.
There are currently 100 HSDPA-capable networks within 54 nations all over the world. Majority of these networks provide downlink speeds of 3.6 Mbps. More networks are employing faster downlink speeds reaching 7.2 Mbps. Fewer networks provide the best HSDPA speeds of 14.4 Mbps.
A competitor for HSDPA is the Evolution Data Optimized or EVDO. Code Division Multiple Access or CDMA mobile providers support the EVDO.
The future success of HSDPA is uncertain. This is because of the presence of other alternatives for high speed transmission of data. Aside from the EVDO, CDMA2000 and WiMax are considered to be potential high-speed standards as well.
The HSDPA is an improvement of the WCDMA. So where the WCDMA has not been deployed, the HSDPA won’t succeed. This only points to the idea that the success of the HSDPA as a 3.5G standard relies on the WCDMA’s success as a 3G standard.