Interesting People mailing list archives
Re: OpenMoko phone
From: David Farber <dfarber () cs cmu edu>
Date: Wed, 3 Oct 2007 11:51:01 -0400
Begin forwarded message: From: "Erich M." <me () quintessenz org> Date: October 2, 2007 7:47:24 PM EDT To: dave () farber net Subject: Re: [IP] Re: OpenMoko phone
From: Jonathan Corbet <corbet () killermarmot com>
The OpenMoko uses standard, off-the-shelf GSM hardware and software.There should be no problem getting it approved, it won't differ from anyother phone in that regard. The GSM stack is locked-away and proprietary, something the free software folks are not enthusiastic about - but they understand the need for it.
Jonathan, Dave and all, As to my knowledge there is no real lock on the openMoko phone. Just the possibility to have one installed if a carrier should order 10 million pieces ;) The GSM stack is always somehow a different thing to the rest of a mobile phone as you need to have it licensed by the European Telecom Standards Institute [ETSI, private institution financed by telcos and suppliers, supported by EU leaders]. Licensing there is not throat cut. The funny thing is: only unlocked GSM phones comply to the ETSI standard that covers more than 80 percent of the world market. Every GSM standardized SIM card has to be accepted in any GSM network per default. That is the point, locking is anti-standard. So the OpenMoko is extremely compliant to that. All you get until now in real life in EU is a non standard GSM handy. Hardly anybody has been buying an ETSI standard GSM phone in EU for the past years. You get the latest locked model "for free" with a 24 months contract from the operator. Voice is GSM, data is UMTS/HSPA "up to 7,2 Mbit/s" The latter denotes as follows - Forget 20 percent in the beginning. Those bits are error control & c & - by far the most of the mobile radio towers in EU are only connected by 2 Mbit/s copper or less to their respective circuit switched networks - the rest of the bandwith is being shared of all users in a cell. in metropolitan areas there is either fair UMTS connection 500 Kbit/s plus download - or none at all because the mobiles congested their networks in the urban space. On the countryside there is not much even in Austria which is a tiny, but due to topography defined as a test market for mobile providers. There are four nationwide networks by incumbent mobilkom [leader] Austria, T-Mobile, Orange and Hutchison 3G. All offer "highspeed" as said. :)For the curious, we've done a couple of looks at that phone (shipped to
us here in the US, incidentally...): http://lwn.net/Articles/247187/ http://lwn.net/Articles/251519/ [ NOTE only viewable by paid subscribers ($5/month djf]
Anybody on the list got 5 bucks or a pwd ready? ;) Just kidding is Erich Moechel
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Current thread:
- OpenMoko phone David Farber (Oct 02)
- <Possible follow-ups>
- Re: OpenMoko phone David Farber (Oct 02)
- Re: OpenMoko phone David Farber (Oct 03)
- Re: OpenMoko phone David Farber (Oct 05)