AT&T/Rogers 3G-compatible Nokia N900? Not so fast…
Ahhh, the Nokia N900. You want it. You need it. You’ve got to have it. If you’re on T-Mobile you’re sitting pretty knowing that 1700 MHz is included in the N900’s three WCDMA bands, just waiting to gobble up T-Mobile’s 3G services. If you’re on AT&T in the US or Rogers up north however, the tears may still be streaming. A glimmer of hope found its way to light last week when rumors that a forthcoming 850/1900/2100 MHz WCDMA version were seemingly substantiated. We just spoke to Nokia however, and yeah… Not so much. Nokia’s official statement:
Regarding the Nokia N900, we have announced a tri-band WCDMA version that utilizes the 900/1700/2100 MHz networks. There have been no announcements regarding a version that supports the 850/1900/2100MHz bands.
As it turns out, The Nokia Blog’s tipster completely fabricated the last line of Nokia’s email — you know, the part that said, “An announcement will be forthcoming” — and the whole story is bogus. We suppose AT&T and Rogers subscribers might be able to keep hope alive considering Nokia still hasn’t flat out denied the possibility of a WCDMA 850/1900/2100 MHz version, but if you ask us it’s time to break out the Ben & Jerry’s and drown your sorrows.
Looks like they removed frequencies for the US version.
from:
http://maemo.nokia.com/n900/specifications/
GPRS class A, multislot class 32, maximum speed 107/64.2 kbps (DL/UL) EDGE class A, multislot class 32, maximum speed 296/177.6 kbps (DL/UL) WCDMA 900/1700/2100. Maximum speed PS 384/384 kbps (DL/UL) HSPA 900/1700/2100. Maximum speed PS 10/2 Mbps (DL/UL) WLAN IEEE 802.11b/g
My iPhone is just waiting to be chucked in the trash, I need this phone SO BAD!
I too would like a umts 850 fire truck. I am in Australia and the Next G nework on 850 is the only option in rural areas. Nicely written by the way
The manufacturers won’t put competitive 3G radios in the phones because the carriers and the manufacturers are too in bed with each other.
It is my belief that HTC is not making unlocked phone with 850 and 1700 3G bands in the same phone. AT&T doesn’t want their phones working on T-Mobile’s network.
This is one of those anti-competitive practices that the carriers have been doing for the past few years.
This has nothing to do with carriers and manufactures being in bed with each other. This is an unsubsidized phone and won’t ever be. Nokia knows that this phone is for the developer world and isn’t even trying to compete with subsidies or similar.
On a similar note: If you were Nokia would you pick T-Mobile as your GSM partner??? I don’t think so…
I want one
What about the AWS auctions? How were the band split and when are they going to get used? And how?
Yeah no kidding there, i’ve had it with this iphone garbage. I’m on my warranty replacement (as are two of my friends) and now the sound on two of ours is intermittent. Such poor workmanship for such a cost is downright pathetic. Actually such poor workmanship for a free phone is pathetic. My girlfriend has a three year old nokia (my iphone is only 13 months old)and it works perfectly fine.
I could care less about AT&T 3g, but will this work with AT&T edge? I’d like to swap out my gen1 iPhone and ride out the next 6mos of my contract with this mamajama and hop onto tmobile at that time. Possible?
This phone would be perfect for that Gar. It will work fine with At&t Edge and then T-mobile 3g when you switch networks.
AT&T needs to realize the market mindset of the gadget guys that stay on top of the latest technology available. I need the best hand held mobile office out there, and will do most anything to go where it is, and my research says the Nokia N900 is it and at T-Mobile. Is there is anything coming down the pike that is better? …maybe HTC’s Touch Pro2 comes close, but even this is not in the wings of AT&T. I’ve worn out my HTC Tilt, and jumped onto the Nokia E71x to realize the better quality. Oh well….
So after reading this stuff…i dug a little deeper and found that the n900 IS quadband GSM allowing 3G AT&T
Source:
http://maemo.nokia.com/n900/specifications/
Operating frequency
* Quad-band GSM EDGE 850/900/1800/1900
* WCDMA 900/1700/2100 MHz
Restores my hope in this phone!
I can confirm these specifications as well. Can anyone else confirm that this will INDEED be usable on AT&T using 3g?
In order for this phone to be usable on the AT&T 3G Network, it MUST support one of these two frequencies: 850Mhz or 1900 Mhz HSDPA/UMTS, if this phone does NOT support any of these two frequencies, then IT WILL NOT work on AT&T 3G network, sorry but I’m on the same boat. I was even willing to get me a TMO account just so I can use this phone on 3G, my city is not covered by 3G network, only EDGE
Here is latest response from Nokia about 3G
850/1900 HSDPA/UMTS.
Thank you for e-mailing the Nokia Care Contact Center. We are glad that you have chosen the Nokia N95 as your preferred device.
With regard to your concern on the N900, I would like to inform you that as of the moment, we do not have any information if we will be releasing N900 version that would support 850/1900 frequencies. What I can suggest you is to keep track of our website http://www.nokiausa.com for updates and latest releases of our products. You can also try calling our Sales Department at at 1-866-596-6542. Operating hours are from Monday-Friday, 9:00am-9:00 pm EST and Saturday from 10:00am-7:00pm EST to check for the availability. The Sales Department is more than willing to assist you with that.
I hope the information provided proves useful.
If you have any additional questions, please don’t hesitate to contact us again. To ensure proper handling of your case, kindly continue using the current subject line.
Thank you very much for your email. Have a great day!
Kind regards,
Penelope S.
E-mail Specialist
Nokia Inc.
I just sent an email to Congress asking them to change the wireless market, and Free Our Phones so we can shop around for the phone we want, and the service deal we want. Would you take a minute to do the same?
Just go to Consumers Union’s special action page at http://cu.convio.net/FreeYourPhone to send an email. A few years ago consumers’ outrage forced the industry to let us take our cell phone numbers with us when changing companies. Let’s use our voice once again to Free Our Phones from exclusivity deals.
I’m really pi**ed off to Nokia, how they operate their U.S. operations. I have spend high dollars for nokia phones, transferred from verizon to at&t to use these devices on 3G and now this! I travel a lot and verizon 3g is by far the best, i’m using AT&T 3g right now, and it’s ok. I will not change carrier to crappier t-mobile 3G network, just to get this N900!, sorry nokia, you lost one loyal customer (5 different Nokia phones in our family!) Time to look other brands!
I actually switched from AT&T to T-Mobile in anticipation of getting an N900. I didn’t even make it 24 hrs before going back to AT&T. Between poor customer support and no service inside the office, I had no choice but to call AT&T and beg them to take me back.
Looks like I may have to cancel my N900 pre-order and stick with my E71. The N900 has a lot going for it, but if the price includes going back to GSM/EDGE data rates, it may be too high.
3G also means WCDMA (or HSPDA) and it lists the WCDMA frequencies of 900/1700/2100 MHz, which AT&T does not support. AT&T supports 850MHz and 1900MHz – which means that the n900 will work on the GSM, GPRS and EDGE networks of AT&T and not the 3G network.
this is the phone for me…since my K850i 2 years ago, ive been waiting for the one. this is it…please make the bands compatible with Rogers 3G up here in canada, because this is the phone to get! the only way that i would change this phone is to make the keyboard a little bigger and spread out the keys like the HTC pro touch 2. (maybe add optical zoom on camera) and it is perfect. cmon Nokia…work with rogers here!!!!!!!
There certainly is a conflict of interest here if you have ATT. You can get one of the best phones on the market and take a hit on internet speed or wait and see if Nokia steps up and makes an alternative N900 to accommodate us ATT guys.
There is always the expensive option of carrying around a mobile wimax device that will allow the phone to connect at 4G speeds using the n900’s wireless 802.11B frequency to get around it, but unless you willing pay an additional monthly fee for wimax it might not be all that practical for most.
ATT has got to be aware of the N900 and it’s popularity amongst popular tekie junkies and if I know ATT they have a battle plan. I imagine they will petition Nokia to develop a hybrid unit to accommodate the ATT 3G network. It would be a win win situation. Think about it, Nokia would get more sales and ATT would have a phone to market to it’s high end users. It is a decision that I imagine is being contemplated.
The only problem I for see is that ATT does not like O/S on phones that are open source. I do not totally understand the exact reasoning behind it, but I imagine it probably has to do w/ the free apps developers make that limits ATTs ability to up sell apps to customers that cuts in on the profit margin. Another reason is less control of what happens with phones on their network.
Hopefully ATT will not feel that the needs of the high end clients will outweigh ATTs paranoia regarding devices with open source operating systems. I really hope I am wrong on this one because I really would like to use the phone at 3G speeds with a reliable carrier.
ATT will you make an exception for us ??
What a bummer ! Best phone on the market, but if it doesn’t work on WCDMA/UMTS 850mhz it’s no good to me. Next G claims 98% of Australia covered, tell another lie Telstra and thanks for nothing Nokia.