LTE-Advanced Testing Starts |
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Tuesday, 08 May 2012 |
LTE-Advanced Testing Starts
Shortly after CTIA
began they're already talking about LTE-Advanced testing, which is
defined as the next step from 4G LTE. To qualify as LTE-Advanced mobile
networks must be capable of 100Mbit/s downlink speeds in mobile
environments and 1Gbit/s for stationary downloads. Nigel Wright, VP of wireless marketing for Spirent, says
"We expect to be working with several chipset vendors later this year,
first on our solutions and then on some significant changes that come
from carrier aggregation," Wright says. "If you're talking to two or
three different cells, which is the primary one? Which one do you do
measurements on? We'll have new scenarios there to reflect that."
"The
infrastructure part is not so difficult," adds Mike Barrick, business
development manager for Anritsu's wireless portfolio. "Building carrier
aggregation into chipsets and devices is much more difficult." Qualcomm
is current the only vendor that will support carrier aggregation on the Gobi platform,
which will start sampling towards the end of the year. When the
technology rolls out we should start seeing LTE-A devices debuting
around 2014, so you'll have plenty of time to enjoy your 4G LTE devices
before LTE takes another giant leap.
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