[aapljack]

I went to the Apple store today and wanted to see how the EDGE network performed on the iPhone. I turned off wifi and tried browsing over EDGE. I will tell you that the result was not spectacular. Actually, hardly any pages loaded for me. I tried digg, macnn, apple.com, google and cnn. Only apple.com loaded all the way in a reasonalbe amount of time and may have been cached. MacNN loaded partly and the other didn't load at all. I also tried the google maps app and it wouldn't ever actually load any driving directions.

If this is how EDGE performs normally, I would say this may be a deal-breaker for me. Could the network be slow today, or in the specific area (Tigard, OR), for some reason or does this sound about right.

-b

[stevesnj]

Im near Philly and EDGE works great here. Its not as fast as my WiFI connection and its not fast at all but not totally unusable.

[Mrjinglesusa]

EDGE speed is going to depend on a number of factors, including network congestion, location, signal strength, etc. It's been fine for me (not fast, but usable) for mail, Google Maps, weather, etc. Web pages do load pretty slowly though.

[icruise]

How long does it take you guys to load the pages I tested in my blog? (Amazon, Engadget, MacNN, and CNN)

[Star-Fire]

Macnn is really quite slow compared to other pages, they need to cut off some of the fat

[aapljack]

I am seeing a lot of reports that EDGE is down in many areas today. Maybe that could have been the issue.

[draggerman11]

I've been getting 170 kb/second here near Fullerton, CA. Not fast, but definitely usable.

[alligator]

Hey MacNN owners - how about trimming down the MacNN site so we can use it with our iPhones? I've tried to browse this site using WiFi on my Dell Axim, and it wasn't very usable. I had planned to load it on my iPhone using EDGE, but it sounds like that won't work.

[icruise]

Well, you can view the forums OK, especially if you set a smaller number of post per page in the forum prefs. The front page takes a long time to load though.

[NateEssex]

Yeah, I link right to the forums and skip the front page.

[NateEssex]

I was getting 160s to 180s kbit/sec in the mid-NJ area. Fortunately, I have Wifi at work and home...and most relative's houses

[iREZ]

by the way everybody was complaining about edge i thought the speeds would be closer to 56k...id take 160 in a sec, although id take anything faster than that in a shorter amount of time.

[olePigeon]

EDGE has a theoretical speed of 384 kbps. However, AT&T has slowed it down significantly for some reason.

[k2director]

Edge had a system-wide crash on Monday, I wouldn't measure it by Monday's performance.

My Edge experience on my iPhone has been pretty good; it's a non-issue for sending and receiving email, and typical pages like the NY Times, CNN, Macworld, Macnn, etc. come up in about 20-25 seconds (nowhere near the slow times that David Pogue reported). Most of my tests were done in the late afternoon on a weekday in Los Angeles.

[memory-minus]

I tested it in several locations around my city this weekend and on average got around 175kbps. Very useable for light web browsing and email.

[ccrider]

Originally Posted by alligator 

Hey MacNN owners - how about trimming down the MacNN site so we can use it with our iPhones? I've tried to browse this site using WiFi on my Dell Axim, and it wasn't very usable. I had planned to load it on my iPhone using EDGE, but it sounds like that won't work.

Try this MacNN: Mobile Edition

[mduell]

Pretty slow... video of browsing the New York Times website on the iPhone set against Apple's advertisement.

[RogueSqdn]

Originally Posted by ccrider 

Try this MacNN: Mobile Edition

That woud work, or just bookmark the RSS feed (as I do).

[Phil333]

I don't think it's so bad. It's no Wi-Fi or anything but if you have a drop of patience or browse 2 different webpages at the same time, its fine.

[the_glassman]

EDGE is the deal breaker for me. I can put up with all of the other minor short comings of the iPhone, but until its 3G I'll be using something else.
How slow is EDGE? SLOW!

[LeeG]

I was using a blackberry (EDGE) on the philly AT&T EDGE netowrk prior to the Iphone - and found the iphone to work the same way as the bberry - graphics heavy web pages over edge SUCK. WAP and mobile sites are fine. the "real internet" is OK on edge, just not snappy, its bearable. Barely.

GoogleReader (RSS feeds) is AWESOME - fast, responsive, and nicely formatted - its the way to go for me, and works great on the iphone.

L

[LeeG]

I agree its slow, but to release the device Apple did - I agree with their choice. The size, and slickness could not have accommodated a 3G chipset and had ANY kind of battery life close to what thing gets - IT IS IMPRESSIVE.

Remember - its not just a cell phone, its your ipod too - one of the biggest fears people had was using their cell phone as their ipod - that they would run down the charge on their phone - the battery life DELIVERS. 3G would have killed that. Unless they thickened it up with a MASSIVE battery.

I dont fault people for waiting for iPhone 2.0 - the 3G iphone will come, and it will be awesome, but it wont be for a year or so, and the 2.5G iphone is here - and I'm lovin it....

L

[mduell]

Apple could put a bigger battery in along with the 3G chipset.
Yes, it would make it thicker; but would you really mind? I wouldn't.

[icruise]

Depends how thick we're talking about.

[meagain]

Originally Posted by mduell 

Apple could put a bigger battery in along with the 3G chipset.
Yes, it would make it thicker; but would you really mind? I wouldn't.

I wouldn't. More than a bigger battery, I want replaceable batteries and the ability to carry a few around. I'd trade battery life for speed any day. Testing on a 3g Sprint EVDO is super fast. 596 kbps That's significantly faster than the Edge test results I've seen.

iphonenetworktest.com

[dewhast]

Good call on the Google reader, its perfect for browsing news. In fact, the .mac reader is pretty good, i find I'm surfing RSS more and more on the iPhone.

[Terrin]

I would. First, 3G isn't available by me. So, the iPhone becomes heavier, at no benefit. Second, I hardly even use Edge, so I doubt I'd use 3G that much. As you say, speed is important, but Wi-Fi is faster then both Edge and 3G. As such, I spend 99 percent of the time using Wi-Fi. I only use the carrier's network when I am in a bind (e.g. on the highway wanting directions). In such cases, I don't care that much if a Site is not supper fast.

Second, if Apple puts 3G in the iPhone (at least in the US), it will get caught up the big patent lawsuit over the technology. Accordingly, Apple is smart limiting its exposure because if it gets sued and loses, my cost goes up the next time I want to buy an Apple product.

Originally Posted by mduell 

Apple could put a bigger battery in along with the 3G chipset.
Yes, it would make it thicker; but would you really mind? I wouldn't.

[alligator]

I hate it. But be patient grasshopper, and faster internet speeds will come. 10 years from now you'll look back on this and laugh.

[icruise]

I've been using the Internet on PDAs for more than 10 years. I'm not sure that you can count my original Newton, which did have some online functionality, but I know that the Color Zaurus that I bought in 1996 (a Japanese PDA and the first with a TFT color touchscreen), had a rudimentary web browser. It only had a 2400 baud modem built-in (yeah), but could use modem PC cards for faster access. I connected it using the jacks on public telephones for on-the-go internet and email (it seemed amazing at the time). Later Zaurus models could use cellular modem cards in Japan, and I had one of those about 5 or 6 years ago. And most recently in the US, I used bluetooth with my RAZR to surf with my Palm Clie and Zaurus SL-C3100. However, they all sucked in one way or another.

The Zaurus SL-C3100 was the closest to providing a "real" browsing environment, but it was too large to actually carry around and use all the time, which largely defeats the purpose. If you can't actually carry it around, you might as well just be using a laptop. Oh, and the mail program pretty much sucked (much too slow over IMAP). I hadn't used the most recent crop of smartphones (which I'm sure are a lot better than what I used in the past), because I disliked their OSes and in general they didn't excite me. I had become kind of jaded about ever finding something that really worked well.

So in short, the part of me that started using these devices 10+ years ago is laughing at how good I have it now. Although the speeds are not great, the iPhone is the best browsing experience I've had by far. And I've been surprised at how many open wi-fi networks there are in my area, as well.

[vln2]

Originally Posted by icruise 

I've been using the Internet on PDAs for more than 10 years. I'm not sure that you can count my original Newton, which did have some online functionality, but I know that the Color Zaurus that I bought in 1996 ...
So in short, the part of me that started using these devices 10+ years ago is laughing at how good I have it now. Although the speeds are not great, the iPhone is the best browsing experience I've had by far. And I've been surprised at how many open wi-fi networks there are in my area, as well.

Thanks for sharing your experiences. I remember using one of the Zaurus models and trying to squeeze cryptic BSD on it to run WiFi card. Boy, that was some experience. Then I went through HTC, T-Mobile HP IPAQ and Blackberry (I never liked those).
It is true, web browsing on iPhone with WiFi is simply amazing.
I am used to using open WiFi networks around. I know which stores have them. I did not pay T-Mobile for data on HP IPAQ and used it for couple years on WiFi.
I hope that Apple improves WiFi setup, it is not always consistent. I was also picking up more networks on my old PDA, perhaps iPhone requires stronger signal.

[quiklee]

slower than a buffet line after a jenny craig meeting

[quiklee]

slower than bill gates sense of style