Talk:GSM

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[edit] Headquarters of CEPT and ETSI

I took out reference to CEPT being HQed in Munich and ETSI in Dresden because a) I think it's irrelevant [it could appear on their own pages if true] and b) I can't find evidence that this is where they were. I know ETSI is now in Sophia Antipolis, but I couldn't find reference to an earlier HQ. I think this should cite references if it's included. --Phil Holmes 08:54, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Health issues

Although this topic is extremely controversial, I think it would be very opportunate to dicuss this issue here. We know that if cell phones are harmful, GSM is potentially the most harmful of all technologies. There are several serious studies about this topic, relating GSM and health issues specifically, so I think it'd be great to add this discussion in the main article about GSM. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 201.52.19.38 (talk) 03:32, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Disagree. At best, it would turn a factual article describing GSM into a flame fest on the possible health effects. And, in order to start the flame fest here, it would also be likely to put non-factual information in the article. Given that all the reputable studies of the health effects of wireless transmission have found no evidence of a mechanism or an effect, writing anything to the contrary would compromise the article.--Phil Holmes 14:53, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
Yes, I agree that it would be a very controversial point in the article, I never doubted that, but I totally disagree about the "reputable studies" part. To me it seems pretty obvious that it's something like cigarretes. If you smoke a single cigarrete a day, it is very unlikely that you'll have lung cancer or something like it. With cell phones, as users, with the unexplainably high prices practiced in the market today, we simply cannot talk in the cell phone all the day, like people who smoke a pack of cigarretes a day. It wasn't until very recently (5 years or so) that the frequencies (and the power) of electromagnetic waves got very very high (from near one to several GHz). There've been reported several cases, in the past few years, of cancer clusters around phone and power line masts, with several cases of cancer in the same street, most of them brain or pancreas cancer. That's not a irrefutable proof, I agree. But there are strong signals of the relationship out there. What can people say that it's a "reputable study" in a world that telecom companies became more powerful than old oil companies or maybe anything else? For decades all "reputable studies" showed that it was no relation between global warming (and its obvious effects) and the use of fossil fuels. The "reputable studies" attributed it to "natural cycles" or whatsoever. Scientists can be paid to say anyhing that's convenient. I'm not putting total distrust over science, but it happened not only once when rivers of money were involved. The fact (and that IS a fact) is that because of the way GSM works, it's electromagnetic waves power is 8 times higher than it'd be in other technologies. So IF there is some relationship, GSM is one of the most dangerous technologies out there, along with WiMax. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 201.52.19.38 (talk) 17:03, 30 September 2007 (UTC)
GSM's power levels are not eight times anything. GSM is only transmitting about an eighth of the time, and during those bursts is generally using less power than analog and only slightly more as CDMA based systems for the same time period, meaning both end up radiating approximately 8x as much power. Part of GSM's ability to increase capacity over analog has to do with the fact it uses less power during the times its transmitting than analog, minimizing interference.
Qualcomm has a lot to answer for, I assume "GSM uses eight times as much power" comes from their little FUD machine as there seem to be an awful lot of their shills who get really surprised when they find GSM phones generally have better battery life than their CDMA rivals. Many even think power controls is an exclusively CDMA concept.
In any case, we're talking about power levels generally no higher than half a watt. If that scares you, stay out of the sun. --Squiggleslash 16:22, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Frequencies

Is there any reason why this article doesn't mention where each frequency is used? I think that would be a useful addition to the article. Unfortunately, I can't remember the details, or I would add it myself... --Lardarse 20:56, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

It's covered in the GSM frequency bands article, which is linked to from this article. Oli Filth(talk) 21:00, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Cell Phone Makes

Would it be useful to have a list of cell phones makes that can accept GSM SIM cards when travelling overseas? I'm not knowledgeable enough to edit this page. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bruvensky (talk • contribs) 00:36, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

This list would surely be into the hundreds long; certainly not appropriate for this article. Perhaps a separate list article. Oli Filth(talk) 00:59, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] bell mobilty sim card

needs to be replaced becuase bell mobilty operates on cdma interface and that card is only a romaing card I think it would be better to put one from a compnay that operates on the gsm standard —Preceding unsigned comment added by Speer320 (talk • contribs) 00:55, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] GSM vs. CDMA

Surely someone can come up with a non-flamish comparison? I came to this article specifically for that reason and found nothing. It appears, having read many related pages, that CDMA has higher per-station utilization due to the multiplexing, and as a result a deployment is less expensive. If this is true, it should be mentioned in the article, which otherwise leaves the reader mystified why the GSM usage is 82%, and not 100%. Maury (talk) 17:52, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Apple

Removed Apple as it is a handset maker whilst the other companies on the list are GSM equipment makers..ie the base stations and routing equipment. There are hundreds of handset manufactuers, we cant keep listing them all, and even if we did, Apple is a very, very small maker. 143.167.184.204 (talk) 13:52, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

I actually agree with this but user Olli Filth has reverted your edits. Is there a standard way to reach consensus? Apple are a tiny player with a single product, whereas the rest all appear to be network equipment manufacturers. And while we're at it I've never heard of Interval and the link doesnt go to the right place (I'll remove the link in a moment). Beardybloke (talk) 22:21, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

I originally reverted the change because it was made by an IP, and wasn't accompanied by an edit summary. However, I take the point made above. Given that there's no criteria for being a member of this list, and given that it's not particularly informative, how about we remove it altogether? Oli Filth(talk) 22:23, 8 June 2008 (UTC)
Seems perfectly reasonable to me to remove the list - or if a list should exist at all to more strictly define it - I can think of oodles of companies who make things that could qualify them as a GSM manufacturer in the broadest sense, but that would just be silly to include them (ie chipset manufacturers, test kit manufacturers, and so on...) Beardybloke (talk) 22:44, 8 June 2008 (UTC)