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  • iwod - Wednesday, January 15, 2014 - link

    I was too late to ask the question in the original Altair' article.

    What is single mode LTE platform? A Modem that only support LTE? Does Qualcomm have any? Broadcom? Any advantage Altair held over these two?
  • DanNeely - Thursday, January 16, 2014 - link

    Correct, it's an LTE only modem. At a guess Qualcomm and Broadcom weren't rushing them out because they're cheaper lower profit margin chips compared to a conventional 2/3/4g modem. Also, since these modems aren't really suitable for phone use yet because until VoLTE is out you still need 2g or 3g (GSM only) for voice service; and an LTE only phone would be problematic for global roaming; are hotspot/embedded laptop data/hotspot markets even big enough for BC or QC to be putting much effort into instead of phones.
  • Brian Klug - Thursday, January 16, 2014 - link

    That's right, no 2G GSM/EDGE or 3G EVDO/WCDMA, just LTE. (multimode – more RATs, single mode – just the one RAT, oh and RAT is Radio Access Technology)

    The result is (in theory) less expensive since there's no interoperability testing with the 2G and 3G modes, no inter-RAT (cross technology) handovers, and less money spent to license the patents required for those other technologies. There are a bunch of players who only have single-mode LTE modems and are trying to move into this space with data-only devices, and hope to eventually add voice with VoLTE.

    -Brian
  • damianrobertjones - Thursday, January 16, 2014 - link

    Pretty poor machine when you look at the cost :(. 16GB eMMC ssd! 2Gb ram? No thank you. If you like it then fair enough... .
  • extide - Thursday, January 16, 2014 - link

    Yeah they need to get the price of these down to ~$250. I Could see doing $299-$320 if it had a bay trail or a big arch celeron in there, but not for just the 5250 Dual A15. 4GB of RAM would probably be beneficial too.
  • lmcd - Friday, January 17, 2014 - link

    Build quality was good apparently.

    I'd like it if they switched to the Exynos 5420 instead of the 5250 or whatever this is. Aren't those pin-compatible?

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