AT&T was calling me to set up an interview with their CTO, but all I could hear was garbled noise on my AT&T iPhone. "I can't really hear you!" I shouted, as if volume would clear the channel. It's always been like this, in my home in San Francisco.

While the howls of iPhone 3G reception issues get louder and louder, I've always wondered if it was the network's fault, as some Swedish scientists and journalists have recently suggested. Maybe it's just new AT&T customers making the bulk of the noise. From my experience, the phone isn't blameless, but the network is a major part of the issue.

Continuing the call on an land line, I said I'd be glad to meet with John Donovan. To be perfectly honest, on a certain level, I didn't really want to ask questions. All I wanted to do was get the guy in front of me and berate him for his network's voice quality and reception, relatively slow 3G rollout and coverage. AT&T's been last in all those metrics for years (according to JD Powers) and they were still raking in the bucks as the nation's largest carrier. But after meeting him, I'm certain John Donovan has the intent the Old AT&T didn't. And a detailed plan on how to make "More Bars in More Places" less like a joke and more like a promise. In fact, Donovan surprised me when he said, "We want to be number one in all those metrics" — That's a lot of big talk when I can't even make a call from my own house right now. Here's the outline of the plan, which Donovan provided later — as well as some straight talk from an AT&T engineer on whether or not the plans will work.

•Cell site splitting. We’re deploying about 1,500 new cell sites this year. This enhances service quality in two ways – we’re expanding the geographic reach of the network, and in some places, we’re adding cell sites in existing territory to improve coverage and capacity.

•We monitor the usage for both data and voice on each and every cell site sector, combine that with our forecasts and customer feedback to target specific locations where we need to augment capacity via further cell splits.

•TDMA turndown. Earlier this year we turned down our TDMA/Analog networks. That allowed us to free up key spectrum to redeploy into the UMTS/HSPA network. Not only does that give us the opportunity to increase overall capacity on UMTS/HSPA, it enables us to deploy UMTS/HSPA at 850 Mhz (vs 1900 Mhz). This 850 spectrum provides optimum in-building coverage. We’re in the midst of turning up this spectrum on the UMTS-HSPA network across the country.

•Short measurement intervals. We’re deploying capabilities to measure network performance in much shorter intervals. This capability will be especially important to maximize service quality during major events. For example, during a Final Four or World Series game, traffic on the network will spike during time outs, or when a great play, bad call, or something else big happens. In normal circumstances, we might measure traffic and performance a few times per hour, but in these situations, we’ll monitor every few minutes to ensure maximum performance during the spikes that occur in real time.

•Wireless backhaul. We’re leveraging our U-verse and metro Ethernet fiber deployments to enhance wireless backhaul connections in many areas. We’re moving more and more of our wireless backhaul onto the 40 Gbps AT&T backbone network. So … the investments we’re making to maximize service quality on the wired side also benefit our wireless customers.

•Drive testing. AT&T technicians and other third-party vendors will drive-test its network nearly 30 million miles in the next year to improve the network’s coverage and quality.

•Hundreds of technicians from third-party testing companies, infrastructure vendors and AT&T technicians use specially designed vehicles to travel throughout the country and test the signal strength and coverage of AT&T’s ALLOVER Network.

•Along with drive-testing its own network, AT&T drive-tests competitors’ networks to ensure that its coverage and quality are equal to or better than other companies providing service in the area.

•The drive-test results help to prioritize where the company invests in new cell sites and equipment that enhances the network quality and coverage.

While a great deal of the document above is fairly obvious, there are many roadblocks to executing the plan and improving the network. Donovan's interview revealed some details of the plan above, but some engineers within the ranks gave me a great deal of insight, too.

A large part of the problem, Donovan said, is that people would complain, and yet, by all of their measurements, the user should have had full bars in the place and at the time they reported the poor coverage. Hence the need for better tools and more frequent sampling, instead of several times per hour, they'd do it every few minutes during congested periods. A great deal of that testing is done using network tools, but drive testing will help, and AT&T also tests their competitors' networks for comparison.

Adding more towers in a place is not simple. It's a local affair, requiring navigation of local building codes and politics. Somewhere like SF makes that hard, but the hilly terrain wouldn't help the situation either. And while 30 million miles of driving sounds like a good idea, the engineers I talked to insisted that drive testing is really just a final check once you've got enough towers in place. "Save the money on drive testing and build sites or improve sites we already have...[by] buying t-1s to increase capacity." He also commented that adding 1500 towers alone isn't enough to solve the problem.

Turning down analog networks sounds like a winning strategy, as long as you don't mind grandma's cell call quality being degraded. The activation of the 850MHz band will also enable better indoor reception, which is going to be critical in expanding data/voice quality as user counts go up. Donovan also said that they'd shift their allocation of bandwidth towards data from voice, which makes sense. Analog aside, the EDGE legacy is taking up resources on the towers which are shared with 3G. As one of the engineers said, having UMTS and GSM use the same antennas causes "interference and performance. It’s like putting a splitter on a garden hose the flow is still there but volume is cut in half on each side." (This is where Verizon and Sprint have an advantage.)

And as Wired has realized, 3G range being more limited, AT&T can't actually blanket a city by using the same tower locations as their EDGE counterparts. But my engineer friend also said, "We went from 2.5g experts to 3g novices." They don't have the training or experience to find or fix issues as well as they do on EDGE networks. Many in the field are also lacking the expensive test gear for UMTS to find bad channels and interference.

Why didn't AT&T make these investments in the first place, while Starbucks and T-Mobile worked on Wi-Fi hotspots and Sprint/Verizon went 3G ahead of the curve? Money.

And while AT&T's financially conservative strategies in the past have limited expansion, there's no reason they couldn't also do so in the future. I asked Donovan if caution was the overriding strategy behind waiting to match Sprint's initial 3G rollout, he replied, "I'd like to say we're deliberate. " He added that initially meeting the voice quality and data rates of Sprint's 3G network would have been both technically and financially impossible, despite the customer benefit. (One only needs to look at Sprint's financial weakness now to appreciate the wisdom of his point.) He also pointed out that by waiting, they got to leapfrog the limitations of Sprint's EVDO networks, referring to the extended data rates their network will eventually run at, at a better value. "The most astute thing you can do is be as late as possible and as fast as possible. Because it's going to cost you more if you do it too early, and if you do it too late, you don't get the features you want."

When AT&T's LTE networks do make the jump past Sprint, from 1.7Mbit to 7Mbit to 11Mbit to 20Mbit, their bottle neck will move to their backend infrastructure. To counteract that, they'll depend on their extensive wired and fiber backhauls the company has. But, in areas where the telco is owned by AT&T, AT&T wireless still has to buy lines from themselves and the budget isn’t there. According to at least one engineer, "We still operate at the field as two completely different companies. While at the top they see “ONE” we see many."

Will AT&T succeed at having the best call quality, coverage and reception? Who knows. But at least here, we have their plans on record and can hold them to the goal. After all, they're the biggest carrier — they've got a responsibility to all of us to make their network the best, no matter what the cost.

I just want to be able to hear the other person on the end of the line.

The RTR6570 will support the following technologies:
• Upcoming 700MHz wireless networks
• CDMA network from Sprint or Verizon (1900MHz EV-DO)
• HSPA or UMTS data network from AT&T or T-Mobile (850MHz, 1700MHz and 2100MHz)

Now that you're all excited, the bad news is that chip samples won't be ready until the middle of next year, and phones themselves won't hit the market potentially until 2009. But these will certainly be worth the wait: the ability to roam on all three networks means that you will never have to worry about coverage again—though God only knows what the roaming charges will do to your phone bill. [Electronista]

Just like Vertu's previous models, the Ascent Ti's chassis is worked in some pricier stuff than the usual plastic.

Looking a bit like a robot's head with that green light and the camera hole, the body is all titanium, thus the Ascent Ti, with a leather top. The keypad has a slight dip in its key shape, like a shallow V. And, if you look real close, you can make out the gold trim—another thing the Ti has in common with previous Vertus. Unfortunately, it's probably going to share the same pricetag. Vertu phones tend to run into the 4-digit range, putting even the iPhone to shame. And that's for the cheapest ones. Ever thought of paying $5,200 for a phone?

Vertu readying second-generation Ascent phone [Electronista]

Read on for my questions and Plummer's italicized answers—some of them direct, and some of them a little more, shall we say, courteously evasive. (Hey, he's a nice guy, but he's also a sales VP. That's why they pay him the big bucks.)

Will there really be GPS in all Nokia phones?
"You will see GPS in a broader range of devices in the future, with N Series out in front. We will also deliver a range of handsets with a range of functionality to meet a range of consumer lifestyle demands. Consumers that aren't as interested in GPS, because they are cost-conscious or primarily focused on voice, will still have non-GPS options."
So, like, more GPS but no commitment to full deployment across the board.

Why doesn't GPS navigation come free with N95?
"Turn-by-turn navigation is a service offering that does indeed require a fee. It is software we developed after our acquisition of gate5; it's a service you purchase from Nokia. Anything beyond that, the GPS functionality and the downloadable maps from Tele Atlas, that's all free. What's great is that you can get the maps for what you need. A map of your home, or any additional maps you need. You don't necessarily need the map to Crete."
Assuming you have a big enough memory card—the N76 supports MicroSD cards up to 4GB—you probably can get the whole world database in there.

How are N95 sales doing?
"We are very pleased."
We knew they wouldn't actually answer that one.

Since there are Nokia music download stores in the UK and Australia, part of Nokia's Music Recommender service, when will we see a Nokia music store in the US?
"We will be rolling out broader music services, including ways for the consumer to stream and acquire music in other markets, but I can't to speak to the timetable."
Pretty sure that means that US is on the list, but it could take years.

Are there plans to use an OS other than Symbian?
"Certainly if you look at the N800 and N770 Internet tablets, they are Linux powered devices. But from the standpoint of multimedia business, we are still very committed to Symbian and Series 60 OS on Symbian. Unlike other mobile OS's, Symbian was designed with mobile-device characteristics in mind, such as the display and the processor, from the outset. It is optimized for the mobile computing experience."
Plummer did at least support the argument with some sweet Symbian(-compatible) apps such as ComVu PocketCaster.

Why are Nokia phones still so large?
"Our answer to that is the N76. There's no 5 megapixel camera. It's for the technology stylists, people in the high-end tech community who also want to demonstrate their flair."
It's the age-old tradeoff between size and capability. Nokia did ship the N76 this week globally. There's no US arrival date yet, nor is there a price. However, we are told it will cost "under $500."

Why no QWERTY keyboard on the N Series?
"The Bluetooth keyboard is one answer to that. When I am mobile, my replies are Yes, No, Maybe. When I stop being nomadic, I whip out my Bluetooth keypad and write real emails. In the future we're bringing a range of devices with different form factors and different functionalities."
OK, so I'm reading that as a QWERTY play coming sometime soon.

When will Nokia phones be compatible with the US version of HSDPA?
"On a global basis, N Series are multiradio GSM and 3G radios, as well as wireless LAN and GPS—they are very sophisticated devices. In US bands, these run on EDGE. The change to that will be the Nokia N75, which will work on US UMTS networks. I also have to add: Watch this space."
Nudge nudge, wink wink.

Will carriers pick up the N series?
"There's a constant ongoing dialog with the carriers—a Nokia-wide dialog, but also one with the Multimedia business as well. We are working with them to help them building their understanding of the emerging mobile multimedia space, and sharing the experiences we're gathering by being first to market. Carriers are strategic partners—we're going to collaborate to address their needs and their consumer's needs as they perceive them."
Plummer also added that Nokia had divided its handset business into two separate teams. There is the "mobile phones" division, which more directly addresses the hardware needs of the carriers, and Plummer's Multimedia group, which is more focused on building new products and bringing them to early adopters, and less focused on designing something that is necessarily a perfect fit in a carrier lineup.

How is the WiMax rollout going?
"Beginning of this year, Nokia was announced as a strategic partner with Sprint in WiMax network. We will be bringing devices in 2008 and beyond that will take advantage of that network. It's an exciting way for Sprint to be approaching the marketplace. It's an open Internet model, they build it to spec and people who have a relationship with Sprint will be able to attach a device to that network. It's akin to the fixed Internet model today. It will have a good impact on overall marketplace, allowing consumers better access to the networks, whether fixed or wireless."
We, too, like the idea of a high-bandwidth "open Internet model," but can we trust Sprint, or any carrier for that matter, to pull it off without some kind of walled-garden architecture? We'll see about that.

Plummer concluded with what he thought was the real mission of his Multimedia division, to bring the Web 2.0 experience into the real world. Why glue yourself to your computer for the latest social networks and Web apps? Eventually, we will be able to manage all of this wherever we happen to be, with GPS and 3G networks to facilitate transactions and interactions.

I have to apologize to the Glaswegians and general fans of weepy music out there: we didn't get a chance to talk about the just-announced N76 partnership with Travis. Frankly, the only Travis who entertains us is the Gizmodo associate editor, not so much the "thought-provoking and inspirational band". – Wilson Rothman

Our coverage of the N95 [Gizmodo]
All Things Nokia [Gizmodo]

More so than the Advantage, the OQO2, or the Flipstart, the Shift can serve as a substitute for a laptop when you're out of the house, away on business trips—or hell, even at home.

When we played with it last week, we found the keys very comfortable, the weight fairly light (but heavy enough to be solid), and the touchscreen responsive. Current plans has it headed for a Q3 2007 release, which honestly isn't soon enough for us. We're ready to leave our laptops at home now. – Jason Chen

HTC

Press Release [Sony Ericsson]

Lock it up tight with WEP, WPA and WPA2 security, and then you're off and running with your choice of Wi-Fi or four ports of full duplex 10/100 switches. Plus, it works like any other Wi-Fi router if you don't have a wireless broadband card plugged into it.

The D-Link 3G Mobile Router will be available in two different models, one for EV-DO (model DIR-450, available now) and the other (DIR-451, available next month) for UMTS or HSDPA networks. Unfortunately, it's not cheap; $300 takes it home. – Charlie White

Product Page [D-Link]

Product Page [Gizmodo]

Palm Treo 750 for Cingular launching at CES [Engadget]

I use T-Mobile, and say this can't happen fast enough. I'd say that they'd better start thinking about something even faster very soon, though. –Brian Lam

T-Mobile Goes 3G [CNet]

"T-Mobile will announce UMTS on 1700 MHz and 2100 MHz," said analyst Roger Entner, vice president of the London-based research and consulting company Ovum.

Our T-Mobile contact has this to say:

Leaders from Deutsche Telekom and T-Mobile USA will present and field questions on the current state of the business for DT and T-Mobile USA, as well as the recent FCC Advanced Wireless Services (AWS) auction.

All this thanks to the large chunks of spectrum they won on the 1700MHz and 2100Mhz band for UMTS use. It should take about a year and a half for deployment to be completed, but devices using 3G should show up sooner rather than later. – Jason Chen

T-Mobile to Announce UMTS, Sources Say [eWeek]

The photo is from the press conference for Into the Blue. We thought you'd like to see that more than you'd like to see execs from T-Mobile. In our minds, Jessica Alba is the new T-mobile spokeswoman, replacing aging hottie Catherine Zeta Jones. Actually in our minds Jessica Alba is the spokeswoman for just about everything.

T-Mobile Wins 3G Spectrum; Is MetroPCS Coming To NYC? [Gearlog]

The 320x240-pixel resolution screen perhaps isn't the best money can buy, but it's not necessarily a throwaway either. Look for it this week for a secret, unannounced price. – Nicholas Deleon

Introducing the New Blackberry 8707g! (similar form to rumored 8703e) [RIM Blackberry Forums - Pinstack.com]

They did have a minor issue with the keyboard but the touch-screen and scroll wheel scored high in terms of usability.

Hands on with the Sony Ericsson M600 [TechDigest]