Insider update

[skwon09]

aaa

 

[yankdez]

on one hand your insider is saying it likely wont have lte. on the other hand, yesterday you posted that samsung directly stated itll have lte during their earning call. which side are you with?

 

[yankdez]

didnt listen to the earning call, but i assume when they said iphone release and galaxy type lte device, they meant in the u.s. for all we know, this galaxy type lte device could be that leaked pic of the vzw epic-eqsue phone with qwerty and 4g. which brings me to another point: if they can fit an lte radio in an epic (and it didn't look fatter than sprints epic), surely they can fit it in the gs2 without causing much bulk.

 

[eksplosions]

*covers eyes and ears* lalalalalalalalala not listening!

 

[neowarcloud]

During my recent trips to Korea, I'd seen my friend's SK Telecom Galaxy S II, which was truly awesome, and I have been patiently waiting for this device for Verizon.

Though not exactly Samsung Electronics, I do have a family background with Samsung and know quite some insiders at Electronics even without going through my father's connections. I have been begging to an insider in mobile division to update me on the launch status for VZW specifically and s/he finally got back to me today telling me below:

1. As announced, the plan is to release in mid-August, but VZW is STILL giving Samsung some hard time (s/he didn't specify what it was) and Samsung may have to push the release date to late August or early September. This may only apply for VZW variant, meaning that ATT or Sprint would possibly launch ahead of VZW.

2. LTE unlikely. S/he saying unlikely would probably mean NO, since development must have been done by now and chance is very slim that Samsung will change the phone's specification a month prior to release.

3. S/he will update me further once s/he gets more information.


I regret I cannot provide more hopeful information but it is what it is and we will just have to cross fingers to get it earlier than September. Verizon seriously sucks.

LTE would be good, but I don't really care. I live in NYC and technology-unfriendly NYC subways will not have cell phone reception at least for next five years or so, hence I cannot use internet during my commute anyways.

Take my word as a grain of salt, but the person who told me this is very associated with GS2 development.

You do know that Samsung practices localization of development. Their main mobile development center is in fact in London, not in South Korea. Most of the work regarding their US releases (for better or worse) is from their facilities in Texas. While their general strategies come out of South Korea, their development, not so much...

I will take this with a grain of salt, since their aren't any other LTE enabled Galaxy series (other than Q which won't drop before holidays) that are planned...While I see it coming late August, probably the 25th. Next week we will probably see it pass the FCC.

Lastly, if it wasn't going to include LTE, why wouldn't it have passed through the FCC? If it were going to be a basic CDMA phone it would have been the first through.

 

[DolfanCole]

You do know that Samsung practices localization of development. Their main mobile development center is in fact in London, not in South Korea. Most of the work regarding their US releases (for better or worse) is from their facilities in Texas. While their general strategies come out of South Korea, their development, not so much...

I will take this with a grain of salt, since their aren't any other LTE enabled Galaxy series (other than Q which won't drop before holidays) that are planned...While I see it coming late August, probably the 25th. Next week we will probably see it pass the FCC.

Lastly, if it wasn't going to include LTE, why wouldn't it have passed through the FCC? If it were going to be a basic CDMA phone it would have been the first through.

Why would that be true? The GSM version was the first to be manufactured (as seen in the those already available overseas). I haven't seen a CDMA version anywhere, but the GSM versions exist. There would have to be a change in the device to get a CDMA version, which I would expect would cause it to be the last to get done. Of course, I'd love for them to throw in an LTE radio while they're at it.

 

[eksplosions]

neowarcloud, Sprint's version with WiMax already passed through, and AT&T's right after if I remember right. I'd say that they were all ready and submitted together, it's really just the FCC's order of approving things. It's not like they build the test units by hand, at that point they would have the manufacturing process ready to go. Whatever they decided on is already well into production if you ask me.

 

[MasterGiraffe]

It would seem very strange to me for Samsung to take the time to make the device bigger in order to support WIMAX and then not do this for LTE. Verizon is well aware of the massive demand there would be for this device if it were to incorporate LTE. I would imagine that a lot of the pressure Verizon has been putting on Samsung would be because they specifically wanted to the phone to be LTE ready. Especially since they know that the iPhone 5/4s will not have 4G it would seem like a very poor business decision on Samsung's part to not make it LTE capable considering they pretty much already did the work to make the phone larger.

 

[Castor Troy]

Chip they are using is for HSPA+ and LTE capabilities. Intel manufactures it if I'm not mistaken.

Sent from my Droid

 

[Castor Troy]

This one right here

http://www.intel.com/products/wireless/mobilecommunications/platforms/xmm7060/overview.htm

 

[Castor Troy]

and for your reading pleasure

Intel Mobile Communications, a leading vendor of advanced mobile semiconductors solutions for handheld devices, today announced the compact multimode (LTE/3G/2G) platform XMM™ 7060.


The latest enhancement of the company`s comprehensive slim modem portfolio consists of the highly integrated multimode baseband processor X-GOLDTM 706 and the associated multimode RF transceiver SMARTiTM 4G. The chipset is complemented by a robust, full-featured and comprehensively validated 3GPP Release 8 triple mode protocol stack with Inter-Rat features. The new space saving platform is suitable for integration in LTE-enabled portable devices such as mobile handsets, data cards/dongles and other embedded solutions.


LTE is a fast growing market driven by the increasing demand for such mobile broadband services as multimedia broadcasting, music and video streaming and high-speed mobile Internet. It is expected to become the worldwide mobile standard for high-speed Internet due to its high data throughput and high spectral efficiency. However, LTE is faced with the challenge of a strongly fragmented regional frequency landscape. This calls for major RF innovation to create a low-power modem platform that can cover all the diverse frequency plans fitting to portable devices. Intel Mobile Communications is leveraging its proven leadership in RF and meets this challenge by offering the XMM 7060 platform.


“It is our intention to serve this growing market with a compact multimode solution equal to today’s 3G PCB footprint”, says Prof. Dr. Hermann Eul, president of Intel Mobile Communications. “The slim modem is optimized for low-power operation and has the flexibility to serve up to five LTE bands concurrently with five 3G and four 2G bands, making the dream of a real world-phone come true.”


The X-GOLD 706 baseband processor, manufactured in 40nm process technology, is based on the proven 2G/3G X-GOLD™ 626 with an integrated low power LTE L1 subsystem. Therefore smart phones and tablets based on the XMM™ 6260 2G/3G platform using the X-GOLD 626 can be easily migrated to LTE ensuring the customers a high degree of reuse of their hardware and software investment. The new baseband processor is accompanied with the SMARTi™4G, incorporating optimized building blocks of the leading-edge 2G/3G SMARTi™ UE2 and SMARTi™ LU RF transceiver -- the world’s first commercially available LTE transceiver. The 65nm CMOS RF transceiver employs a proven digital architecture that significantly reduces the number of external RF components such as power amplifiers and filters, and, hence, reduces board space, BOM and power consumption.


The XMM 7060 slim modem platform fits in less than 700mm? PCB (Printed Circuit Board) area including all necessary system components for quad band LTE, penta band 3G and quad band EDGE applications. It supports LTE category 3 (CAT-3) throughputs (100Mbps/50Mbps download/upload respectively) and is compliant to LTE Release 8 standard supporting FDD and TDD mode for all bandwidth up to 20MHz. In addition Inter-RAT handover features with 3G and 2G systems are naturally included.

 

[Castor Troy]

This is only speculation though based on tidbits of info floating around. I'm assuming based on a comment I read a while back that this is whats going into Verizons Galaxy S II/Function/Fascinate II

"Korea Telecom and Samsung move forward with Intel architecure to deliver services faster and cost effectively expand network capacity with demand"

First samples of the platform will be available by the third quarter of 2011 (Verizons GS2?) with broad market availability for devices in the second half of 2012.

Makes sense to me seeing that Verizon is the only LTE network up and running at this time. Thoughts?

 

[Serial Fordicator]

and for your reading pleasure

Intel Mobile Communications, a leading vendor of advanced mobile semiconductors solutions for handheld devices, today announced the compact multimode (LTE/3G/2G) platform XMM? 7060.


The latest enhancement of the company`s comprehensive slim modem portfolio consists of the highly integrated multimode baseband processor X-GOLDTM 706 and the associated multimode RF transceiver SMARTiTM 4G. The chipset is complemented by a robust, full-featured and comprehensively validated 3GPP Release 8 triple mode protocol stack with Inter-Rat features. The new space saving platform is suitable for integration in LTE-enabled portable devices such as mobile handsets, data cards/dongles and other embedded solutions.


LTE is a fast growing market driven by the increasing demand for such mobile broadband services as multimedia broadcasting, music and video streaming and high-speed mobile Internet. It is expected to become the worldwide mobile standard for high-speed Internet due to its high data throughput and high spectral efficiency. However, LTE is faced with the challenge of a strongly fragmented regional frequency landscape. This calls for major RF innovation to create a low-power modem platform that can cover all the diverse frequency plans fitting to portable devices. Intel Mobile Communications is leveraging its proven leadership in RF and meets this challenge by offering the XMM 7060 platform.


?It is our intention to serve this growing market with a compact multimode solution equal to today?s 3G PCB footprint?, says Prof. Dr. Hermann Eul, president of Intel Mobile Communications. ?The slim modem is optimized for low-power operation and has the flexibility to serve up to five LTE bands concurrently with five 3G and four 2G bands, making the dream of a real world-phone come true.?


The X-GOLD 706 baseband processor, manufactured in 40nm process technology, is based on the proven 2G/3G X-GOLD? 626 with an integrated low power LTE L1 subsystem. Therefore smart phones and tablets based on the XMM? 6260 2G/3G platform using the X-GOLD 626 can be easily migrated to LTE ensuring the customers a high degree of reuse of their hardware and software investment. The new baseband processor is accompanied with the SMARTi?4G, incorporating optimized building blocks of the leading-edge 2G/3G SMARTi? UE2 and SMARTi? LU RF transceiver -- the world?s first commercially available LTE transceiver. The 65nm CMOS RF transceiver employs a proven digital architecture that significantly reduces the number of external RF components such as power amplifiers and filters, and, hence, reduces board space, BOM and power consumption.


The XMM 7060 slim modem platform fits in less than 700mm? PCB (Printed Circuit Board) area including all necessary system components for quad band LTE, penta band 3G and quad band EDGE applications. It supports LTE category 3 (CAT-3) throughputs (100Mbps/50Mbps download/upload respectively) and is compliant to LTE Release 8 standard supporting FDD and TDD mode for all bandwidth up to 20MHz. In addition Inter-RAT handover features with 3G and 2G systems are naturally included.

This is only speculation though based on tidbits of info floating around. I'm assuming based on a comment I read a while back that this is whats going into Verizons Galaxy S II/Function/Fascinate II

"Korea Telecom and Samsung move forward with Intel architecure to deliver services faster and cost effectively expand network capacity with demand"

First samples of the platform will be available by the third quarter of 2011 (Verizons GS2?) with broad market availability for devices in the second half of 2012.

Makes sense to me seeing that Verizon is the only LTE network up and running at this time. Thoughts?

Giggidy......giggidy

 

[neowarcloud]

This is only speculation though based on tidbits of info floating around. I'm assuming based on a comment I read a while back that this is whats going into Verizons Galaxy S II/Function/Fascinate II

"Korea Telecom and Samsung move forward with Intel architecure to deliver services faster and cost effectively expand network capacity with demand"

First samples of the platform will be available by the third quarter of 2011 (Verizons GS2?) with broad market availability for devices in the second half of 2012.

Makes sense to me seeing that Verizon is the only LTE network up and running at this time. Thoughts?

Not to poke holes, but there is an LTE network in SK that launched in July 2011. Samsung makes the units that provide the backbone for both LTE and Wimax networks...I'm assuming its in reference to that launch. That said, I'm absolutely sure the Verizon's S2 will have LTE.

I'm not sure about that chip, seeing as they aren't expecting it in devices til the second have of 2012.

 

[anon(392870)]

Samsung used their own CMC220 for LTE baseband in the Charge. Would be surprised if they went a different direction.

 

[DolfanCole]

Chip they are using is for HSPA+ and LTE capabilities. Intel manufactures it if I'm not mistaken.

Sent from my Droid

Really? That brings a whole different light on it for me. Also seems quite smart if they can do it. What do you base this on?

 

[Castor Troy]

Scroll up Dolfan. Its speculation based on the info I posted above. Neo brings some interesting observations to the table as well.

Sent from my Droid

 

[Castor Troy]

Neo the chip is ready for sampling Q3 andfrom my understanding that means they use it in 1 or 2 handsets before it rolls into mass production and makes it into other handsets. I'm out of my league on this aspect so I'd rather defer to those in the know. I only have a remedial understanding of this whole thing.

Sent from my Droid

 

[neowarcloud]

Neo the chip is ready for sampling Q3 andfrom my understanding that means they use it in 1 or 2 handsets before it rolls into mass production and makes it into other handsets. I'm out of my league on this aspect so I'd rather defer to those in the know. I only have a remedial understanding of this whole thing.

Sent from my Droid

Yeah, they said second half of 2011 it would be ready for sampling...I unno...Also i'm 100 percent sure the second post you quoted was regarding Samsung partnering with a South Korean telecom to launch of LTE network...

 

[redraider133]

so CK you got any insider info on whether it will use one of these chips and have lte since the sprint version has wimax?