RedBoard video: Rogers LTE in action
By: calendar iconJuly 8th, 2011 a 5:02pm

As part of yesterday’s Long Term Evolution (LTE) launch in Ottawa, you may have seen some pictures of a Rogers branded LTE bus. That bus, also known as our Mobile Demo Centre, will be travelling across Canada to showcase the capabilities of LTE firsthand. This is no lab demonstration; the Mobile Demo Centre allows us to show demonstrations in a real world environment that will be comparable to actual customer experience.

As part of our RedBoard video series, I sat down with Rogers Reade Barber, Senior Director Data Product Management, to take a look at some of the demonstrations on board the Mobile Demo Centre including a speed test and video streaming.

You can learn more about Rogers’ LTE network by visiting www.rogers.com/lte or you can sign up at IwantmyLTE.ca to be notified when LTE is coming to your area.

Miranda MacDonald is a regular contributor to RedBoard

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Rating: 2.8/5 (17 votes cast)
RedBoard video: Rogers LTE in action, 2.8 out of 5 based on 17 ratings
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  1. Alph says: July 8th, 2011 a 8:27pm

    I can’t help but think that this launch would have been more interesting if you actually had some…..ummm…..phones. I’m sure this was a great launch for the 17 people that bought a 4G rocket stick.

    A question about data plans and upgrades: If I upgrade to a 4G enabled phone ( whenever you get around to actually delivering one! ), can I keep my 3G data plan? I have a 6GB for $30 deal…will it just continue to run at 3G speed?

    Also, what’s the status of multi-device data plan sharing on 4G? You’d have to agree that the current Rogers plan is wholly ridiculous for people on the 6GB/$30 plan. When are you guys going to make that plan reasonable?

    • RogersMiranda says: July 11th, 2011 a 6:19pm

      Hi Alph,

      In addition to the Rocket Stick, we also announced that by the end of this year, we’ll offer LTE-enabled smartphones from Samsung and HTC. We’ll also be adding tablets in the future.

      We’ll have more details about plans and upgrades when the devices are launched, but for now, what I can tell you is that current stick owners can upgrade to the LTE Rocket stick. Standard hardware upgrade rules apply.

      • alph says: July 12th, 2011 a 10:31am

        Hi again.

        Thanks for the response. Two things jump out at me: “we also announced that by the end of this year, we’ll offer LTE-enabled smartphones from Samsung and HTC”

        1) I was expecting that phones would be available this summer as implied in an earlier post. Now it seems there may be no 4G phone available from Rogers until after Christmas. Is this correct?

        2) Your statement only speaks to HTC and Samsung. Apple is expected to ship the Iphone5 in September. It’s pretty obvious the next iteration of iPhone will support 4G. You’re saying that Rogers will NOT be releasing the next generation Iphone? This is surprising and disappointing. Has the Rogers partnership with Apple ended?

        • RogersMiranda says: July 13th, 2011 a 12:12pm

          Hey Alph,

          Yes, you’re right. We did announce that the Samsung Infuse 4G will be coming this summer in an earlier post, but this is not an LTE-enabled phone. LTE enabled phones will be available before the end of this year.

          I wasn’t implying anything about Apple in my previous comment. Apple actually hasn’t even announced plans for a new iPhone so stay tuned!

  2. Alph says: July 9th, 2011 a 11:42am

    It appears Rogers is too sensitive to insightful but snarky comments….my first delete…yay!

    The question: I have a 3G data plan and upgrade my phone to LTE, does my data plan continue to go at 3G speeds or am I forced to upgrade to a 4G data plan. Do I get to keep my plan ( meaning the cost ) if I have to upgrade?

  3. Brad says: July 9th, 2011 a 2:37pm

    Excellent technology demo, but some major policy changes are needed for this to be successful. Rogers has announced data plans starting at $45/mo for 1.5GB of transfer. If you were to watch a streaming movie at 2mbps (as demoed) you would get about 1 hour and 40 minutes of movie before you’ve used up your data bucket. That’s a really expensive movie! That said, I’m very excited to see Rogers roll this out over the coming months.

  4. Alex Perrier says: July 11th, 2011 a 11:37am

    Speeding ticket prices. :’(

  5. Qaz says: July 11th, 2011 a 12:37pm

    Good point Brad, but better point would be them trying to highlight how you can do 4mb/s which is great quality but yeah wouldn’t even get you a full movie for $45.

    Also just running that speed test at 47mb/s for 10 seconds would be 470mb right there.

    This whole demo video and Rogers’ marketing campaign is all about being able to stream HD videos over the LTE network but they don’t even offer a price plan where that is even possible.

  6. Bob says: July 11th, 2011 a 5:51pm

    The price point seems way off for me to get really excited about this. I would love to get excited for a new high end andriod phone so I can actually remain a rogers subscriber (Which I have been for years and years) but now that bell is about to release their 3rd dual core andriod phone and I’ve seen the early pricing on LTE data I may just have to say screw it and leave. I’ve been waiting far too long for new phones to be released.

  7. RogersMiranda says: July 11th, 2011 a 6:26pm

    @Brad @Qaz

    Appreciate the feedback re: pricing. With respect to the LTE-enabled Rocket stick that we announced, we introduced a new flexible rate plan with generous data allowances so customers can take advantage of LTE . Each month, the LTE Flex Rate plan begins at the lowest tier then automatically adjusts based on your actual usage. For specific plan details, check out: http://www.rogers.com/lte -> New devices

    • John says: July 11th, 2011 a 8:03pm

      NO one will want to pay that ridiculous to stream HD movies. Sorry, I’ll just go out and buy the Blue-ray version. And those are not “generous data allowances”.

    • Diane says: July 12th, 2011 a 9:21am

      We get it, RogersMiranda: Rogers won’t cut us off after 1.5 GB, but will instead automatically bill us for 3 GB (regardless of whether we actually use 3 GB).

      What we don’t get is why Rogers insists this is both “generous” and “based on (your) actual usage”.

    • Chris says: July 12th, 2011 a 1:22pm

      I know your doing your job, and I feel bad for you, these prices are insane. What is the point of releasing a new network if the price makes it so limited. For example.

      According to rogers the expected speed is between 12Mbps and 25Mbps, lets take the lower speed,

      That is 1.431Mb a second.
      At the low plan you can use 1.5gb in 17 minutes.
      At 3GB it’s 34 Minutes,
      At the higher plan of 9GB it is 107 minutes, which is 1 hour and 47 minutes of use.

      Why bother switching? I know I won’t, I don’t particularly want to spend $90 for less then 2 hours of internet, and 3G prices are already to high, why would I make it worse?

      I thank Rogers for improving their network, but for these prices I rather they just expand their 3G network so I don’t lose service so often.

      • RogersMiranda says: July 12th, 2011 a 2:09pm

        Don’t feel bad for me. I like my job :)

        I hear the concerns re: pricing loud and clear from you and others. As you’ve probably heard me or other members of the team say in the past, we’re always evaluating our plans and prices to ensure the best value for our customers so we appreciate the feedback.

  8. Alex Perrier says: July 12th, 2011 a 10:23am

    Sprint: $44.99 per month for unlimited “4G” and 3 GB of 3G Internet access

    And Rogers wants to charge us more for only 1½ GB of “4G”!?

    • RogersMiranda says: July 13th, 2011 a 12:16pm

      Hey Alex,

      The difference between the two plans you mention is that Rogers plans are for LTE and Sprint’s is not. As far as I know, Sprint has not announced any plans with respect to LTE.

  9. Mitch says: July 12th, 2011 a 2:21pm

    Sometimes you have to look at this country from a financial standpoint. In Europe or the US, you can put up a tower and cover thousands of people. That isn’t the way it works in Canada with the population density we have. Building and maintaining a network (especially one which includes new technology) is really expensive. It’s really not that difficult to see this, and it frustrates me that people continue to complain about plan prices and data caps.

    I wish people would just be grateful that Canadian carriers such as Rogers are making an effort to provide this technology. Not many countries are nearly this lucky.

    I look forward to seeing LTE in Edmonton soon!

    • Diane says: July 12th, 2011 a 4:33pm

      Mitch, I don’t get your logic. If you “put up a tower” in Ottawa or Edmonton or any of a hundred other Canadian cities, you’ll also “cover thousands of people”. That IS the way it works in Canada too. It’s the customers living in between the cities who get lousy coverage and, again, that’s true of Canada as well as Japan or India or France or most other countries, the large majority of which have more affordable Internet than Canada. There’s no justification there for prices like these.

  10. Fat Whale says: July 13th, 2011 a 2:47am

    Are the speeds going to be upgraded regularly? Cause when LTE Advanced is completed, it should be in the Gbits. It could be a 100 time faster than the current implementation or even more.

    • RogersMiranda says: July 13th, 2011 a 12:21pm

      I don’t have any details to share around LTE Advanced, but as we mentioned in our original post, the LTE Rocket stick will be capable of max theoretical download speeds of up to 75 Mbps on the Rogers LTE network. Typical download speeds can range from 12 Mbps-25 Mbps and as device selection evolves, max theoretical download speeds will increase to up to 150 Mbps.

  11. James says: July 13th, 2011 a 10:28am

    How Roger’s can keep touting their “Generous” data plans is beyond me. They (and Bell) have now defunct their Rural internet portal modems. Which offered 30gb of data for $50ish a month. That wasn’t generous either but livable for someone to actually use.

    Now they say the replacement is a Rocket Hub with ridiculous caps for ridiculous amounts of money. There is nothing “Generous” about it. Let’s get real here.

    Roger’s is touting the speed of the LTE network, allowing you to stream 1080p video but then the caps are limited to a point where that is not possible. Forget about video, just updating an iPhone to the latest OS is 700megs or updating a computer with patches can be 200-300 meg a few times a month. 1.5gig – 10 gig is nothing.

    Average internet usage is growing daily — the average low usage person could consume 20gig a month rather easily without “illegally downloading” Get with the times!

  12. John says: July 13th, 2011 a 10:00pm

    I bet Rogers went over their data cap when they streamed that 1080P video during their demo :D