When Nexus 4 came out everybody was angry that it lacked LTE. Users had every right to do that since almost all smartphones released this year were featuring LTE. The turn came this week, when some users from XDA Developers Forums managed to somehow use the LTE on a Nexus 4 phone in Canada.
It all started one week ago when AnandTech reported that “Band 4 (AWS) could essentially be supported with the power amplifiers and transceiver that already are onboard the Nexus 4, but again it ultimately comes down to a particular OEM choice whether these get supported”. And now after AnandTech finished their tests we know for sure that Nexus 4 supports LTE on Band 4.
AnandTech explained that a LTE device should have “the cellular baseband to support it must be present and loaded with the appropriate software, the transceiver must be the appropriate kind, and finally the right power amplifiers (PAs) have to be in place for the wider channel bandwidths that LTE brings (up to 20 MHz) over WCDMA (5 MHz)”. Nexus 4 has the hardware needed for LTE, the only thing that is missing, is inside the software(Android).
I now firmly believe that Google acted smart. Both AT&T and T-Mobile have plans to deploy LTE on Band 4(AWS) in the U.S. so there’s only a matter of time until users could root/officially use Nexus 4 LTE feature. I now remember that when Google was asked why Nexus 4 is lacking LTE, they answered that LTE could drain battery and that carriers forced Google’s hand. For the U.S. users this was a sad news that came from a company that wants to innovate the future and invests in projects like Glass, Fiber or TV.
Now, when everything about Nexus 4 and its LTE feature got a major twist, it’s not hard to understand what Google did. They were actually somewhere between carriers and users. Fortunately, they were more close to their users rather than carriers. I’m curious to see if Google has something to declare about this discovery.
Related Links: XDA Developers Forums, AnandTech
