AT&T 3G MicroCell: A Comprehensive Exploration
by Brian Klug on April 1, 2010 1:55 AM EST- Posted in
- Smartphones
- AT&T
- Microcell Review
- Mobile
AT&T's Femtocell
If you're already familiar with the femtocell offerings from Sprint and Verizon, you'll find the AT&T MicroCell is much the same. It's the same premise - calls and data from phones you specify are routed over your own internet connection. Except for one small distinction - AT&T's offers 3G HSPA/UMTS data up to 3.6 Mbits/s alongside voice, where the Sprint Airave and Verizon Network Extender offer 2.5G 1xRTT CDMA2000 data at 144 Kbits/s alongside voice. Of course, that means for the AT&T MicroCell to be useful, you'll need a 3G phone; the older GSM/EDGE only iPhone 2G won't see any benefit from AT&T's femtocell.
It's interesting to note that virtually all of the major carriers in the USA now offer femtocells or similar means of expanding coverage. T-Mobile is the notable exception, which foregos a femtocell in favor of Unlicensed Mobile Access (UMA) - a 3GPP standard that allows the same cellular data to be sent over any IP network, most commonly over WiFi. Let's compare the offerings from all the major providers:
| Carrier | AT&T | Verizon | Sprint | T-Mobile |
| Solution | Femtocell - "3G MicroCell" | Femtocell - "Network Extender" | Femtocell - "Airave" | UMA - "HotSpot@Home" |
| Branding | Cisco | Samsung | Samsung | NA |
| Technology | 3G UMTS/HSPA for voice and data | 2.5G CDMA 2000 1xRTT | 2.5G CDMA 2000 1xRTT | UMA voice over WiFi |
| Simultaneous Calls | 4 Simultaneous | 3 Simultaneous | 3 Simultaneous | NA |
| Standby Approved Callers | 10 | 100 | 50 | NA |
| Data Bitrate | 3.6 megabits/s (HSDPA 3.6) | 144 kilobits/s | 144 kilobits/s | NA |
| GPS Fix Required | Yes | Yes | Yes | NA |
| Upfront Cost | $150.00 or $50 with $100 rebate and $20/month unlimited calling plan | $249.99 | $99.99 | Wireless AP Cost |
| Hand-On/Hand-Off | No/Yes | No/Yes | No/Yes | Inter AP Handover/Yes |
| Coverage | 5000 square feet | 5000 square feet | 5000 square feet | WiFi AP range |
| Add Ons |
$20/month unlimited calling $10/month with AT&T DSL $0 with AT&T landline |
None |
$5/month required $10/month unlimited calling - 1 line $20/month unlimited calling - multi line |
$10/month unlimited calling |
While Sprint and Verizon are offering virtually the same Samsung-branded product, AT&T's MicroCell is a new femtocell bearing dominant Cisco branding. The same caveats apply here: the device needs to be able to get GPS fix, meaning you'll likely have to install it near a window or in the corner of your house. Also, the hardware supports handovers from the femtocell back to the main cellular network, but calls initiated outside of femtocell coverage can never migrate or hand-on to the femtocell. Range is advertised as being 5000 square feet, and the hardware is portable; you can take it on trips or to different places so long as you register the location online. You can also sell the device to someone else - it isn't forever locked to one AT&T account. AT&T stipulates that a 1.5 Mbps downstream, 256 Kbps upstream internet connection is required.
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A beautiful mind - Thursday, April 1, 2010 - link
My Nokia N900 already uses the home/office wifi connection to access the internet, with the possibility to receive/make calls from/to skype.There is absolutely no extra functionality that is provided by the femtocell approach.
softdrinkviking - Thursday, April 1, 2010 - link
For you and me, this is true.But not for everyone.
That's the really sad thing about this device. It's designed as a way to nickel and dime poor souls whose homes are in a dead zone and absolutely have to answer their phone for business.
nafhan - Thursday, April 1, 2010 - link
Great article, and you did an excellent job of diving into the tech behind the femtocell.An interesting follow up to this article might be to see what kind of results you get from purchasing an antenna and repeater. I've seen antenna/repeater setups online in the $350 and up range, and wondered how they would do. If they work OK, it might be a viable alternative, especially for people without good internet connections.
gwolfman - Thursday, April 1, 2010 - link
Where is the print article feature on the new site?Maroon - Thursday, April 1, 2010 - link
They've been sneaking these things in Apple stores. No wonder the iPhone feelgood only lasts untill you get out of the store and have to rely on the "standard" AT&T network. LOL.soccerharms - Thursday, April 1, 2010 - link
Are you kiddin' me? I am going to approach this from two angles. The first being that this article is completely fake. ITS APRIL 1st people! The tech community should have an uproar for such a device. We buy internet and it is usually our responsibility to distribute it around the house with a router for wireless and whatnot. HOWEVER, we do not buy a wireless......phone plan with the intention on increasing a carriers crappy signal in our own house out of our pocket. That's ludacris! There is another much cheaper solution...........its called a LAN line with a cordless phone HA!The only company that could profit from a device like this would be Apple. But they would have to make it a little more shiney and put that quarter eaten logo on the side :)
Let the battles begin....
Jaybus - Thursday, April 1, 2010 - link
This is like buying an airline ticket only to find there is no flight. Since they don't have a flight, the airline offers to sell you your own airplane. You have to provide your own pilot, fuel, and maintenance, but you still have to pay them the full price for a ticket whenever you fly your own airplane. So my idea is to start a car rental business that has no cars. Anyone willing to pay AT&T for a microcell that uses their own Internet connection would surely be willing to pay me a rental fee for driving their own car.HotFoot - Thursday, April 1, 2010 - link
Eh... much of this market is iPhone users - people already willing to accept the concept of ecosystem lock-in. By a similar analogy to your car rental company, they're already willing to buy a car from a company that requires that they drive only on roads built or approved by that company, buy gas only at that company's stations, and buy car insurance from that company.Why not charge them for the roadside delivery of a jerry can of gas when the customer finds out the station filled their tank with water instead of fuel?
yacoub - Thursday, April 1, 2010 - link
I give it a year or two before the first cancer danger report comes out. ;)loydcase - Thursday, April 1, 2010 - link
AT&T cell reception at my house is weak in spots. OTOH, if a femtocell allows me to rip out my landlines, it might be worth it. So I'd like to know if a femtocell would be viable for that purpose.