* Posts by Greg Alexander

4 publicly visible posts • joined 15 Jun 2007

Telstra to KILL 2G network by end of 2016

Greg Alexander

Re: They will send SMS

It would be good if all 3 networks could agree on keeping a single 2G channel open, but I doubt it's worth it in the end. In the meantime, roaming to Optus 2G does make sense if Optus is willing, though it might be cheaper to buy the last 2G customers a new phone.

I'm more interested in what Telstra will do with their 900Mhz. I presume it'll go LTE-A though handsets will be rarer. Vodafone and Optus both use 3G 900Mhz in some areas which is common in handsets.

Aussie broadband is slower than a slow thing in a slow town

Greg Alexander

Capped speeds can't be accurately compared to uncapped speed averages

You can't compare Australia to New Zealand.

ALL New Zealand internet connections are not speed capped until at least 8Mbps (or is that now 24Mbps).

If Telstra uncapped all users, many of whom are on 1.5Mbps or 256Kbps, our average would jump considerably.

Comparing average actual speeds against a combination of actual speeds with slower arbitrarily capped speeds is foolish at best. And typical unfortunately.

AMD goes after AppleTV

Greg Alexander

Interesting - AMD's opposite thoughts to Apple?

Steve Jobs recently said that they'd thought they should use the computer(iTunes) as the base for AppleTV - but that viewers seemed to want to be able to use the AppleTV independently of the computer.

I'm not sure what that means for the next AppleTV (or software upgrades), but I expect that greater flexibility for finding net content, browsing, & buying from iTunes will appear. Why not buy directly from the AppleTV & watch as soon as you've downloaded enough?.

Greg

Steve Jobs: struggling to redefine the TV paradigm

Greg Alexander

nice analyses

More than any other Apple product, I think the future for AppleTV is quite open. Steve's comment at D ("it's a hobby") shows that it hasn't gone as he planned.

The most interesting comment was that they'd thought having iTunes as the lynchpin was the way to do it, but users wanted to bypass the computer entirely.

I think there are 3 keys that would make AppleTV successful

1) Rental (choose between DVD quality (ie better than now!) and 720p quality).

2) Rent/buy direct from AppleTV (not via PC), with ability to redownload purchased content if the AppleTV is stolen or movie accidentally deleted.

3) Agreements with the biggest ISPs so atleast the backend bandwidth is enough (my local ISP has just made an agreement with Apple for free downloads (iiNet Australia))

Wildcards that may help:

- A standard def 4:3 AppleTV

- DivX support

- Advertising support (could Apple insert ads to make our rental free?)

- Perhaps we need a way of getting existing streamed video off websites - but I think the quality may be too low for that.

- Bittorrent downloads for legal Podcasts (...independent producers can't afford the bandwidth)