What is LTE-Advanced?

Recently, several carriers around the world have begun talking about LTE-Advanced, or at least a few features of LTE-Advanced. Notably, Sprint and T-Mobile in the United States have been quick to mention that their systems for LTE being deployed offer an easy upgrade path to LTE-Advanced. But what exactly is it?

LTE-Advanced is essentially the next level of LTE. In particular, LTE-Advanced is LTE that fulfills the criteria to be considered 4G by the ITU. To be called 4G, it has to be able to fulfill the requirements set forth in the IMT-Advanced specification. To accomplish this, LTE-Advanced includes many advanced techniques, technologies, and capabilities that older wireless standards do not include.

The main goal of LTE-Advanced is to provide the IMT-Advanced functionality while retaining backward compatibility with current LTE user equipment that subscribers own. This is important because otherwise early adopters would be penalized when the carrier upgraded to LTE-Advanced on the infrastructure side. LTE-Advanced will provide 1Gbps downlink and about half that on the uplink for fixed wireless (that is, for services like Verizon Wireless’ HomeFusion), while mobile access will be about 100Mbps on the downlink and about 75Mbps on the uplink. Both forms of access will have latencies comparable to wireline (DSL, cable) broadband networks, making it an excellent substitute for wireline networks for many types of internet-based systems.

Assuming that you have already read our explanation of LTE, this will describe what LTE-Advanced adds to LTE.

3GPP Release 10 – The first stage of LTE-Advanced

The 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) develops telecommunications standards in concert with the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI), the GSM Association (GSMA), and the many telecommunications companies that are members to these organizations around the world. Newer versions of these standards are referred to as “releases” by the 3GPP. 3GPP Release 8 introduced the first final version of LTE. Release 9 adds basic voice over LTE through IMS capabilities and further enhancements to many other parts of the LTE standard.

Release 10, on the other hand, introduces all the basic features to qualify for IMT-Advanced. It also further refines other parts from Releases 8 and 9 and adds additional features. Because each specification release is quite large and broad, only the most visible or most dramatic features are being covered.

Table of contents:

1. Introduction (this page)
2. LTE-Advanced’s major new features
3. LTE-Advanced’s new device and base station configurations
   LTE Advanced’s shift towards a cleaned-up, unified wireless spectrum
   3GPP Release 11, and the future of LTE-Advanced

IMS Voice – Priority users and emergency service use

Priority users of multimedia on the IMS (IP Multimedia Subsystem) stack was added in order to bring support for first priority voice call sessions for emergencies, like with disaster response and emergency medical teams in the event of a natural disaster. Calls by those groups musthave priority over everyone else. This functionality already exists in circuit voice networks built into the 3G voice standard, it is just now being introduced ahead of VoLTE being commonly used.

IMS – Inter-Device Transfer

In Release 9, a feature called “inter-device transfer” was added to the specification. This feature added support for users who own multiple devices under a single subscriber account to be able to transfer IMS sessions among them through a form of handover that the user can control directly.

Release 10 extends this feature by adding support for transferring IMS sessions between subscriptions as well. For example: if you were watching TV on your smartphone, but arrived home and wanted to watch it on your TV instead, you could transfer the session from your mobile TV service under your mobile phone service subscription to your IPTV subscription and immediately be able to continue watching from your TV. This feature would be an invaluable feature for those subscribed to both AT&T Wireless and AT&T U-verse, in particular.

M2M – Network overload control

With 2G networks shutting down, the M2M (machine-to-machine, used for communication between specialized devices and systems) market is looking toward 3G and 4G to replace 2G communication systems.

M2M has a few requirements of its own: it must be able to handle large amounts of small data sessions, large amounts of continuous data sessions, and absolutely must minimize the amount of changes to hardware over a very long period of time.

Normally, the M2M market would just move to 3G systems and be done with it for the decade or so. However, there are several countries where 2G and 3G are being shut down, so the future of 3G is not quite so stable. Not to mention, many of these countries are ones with CDMA2000 networks, which have no future path anyway.

That being said, it becomes extremely important to ensure that M2M over LTE will not cause problems, so Release 10 introduces quite a few network-side improvements to rigorously control network quality and stability with M2M and normal subscriber usage of the network.

Femtocells

With the evolution of small cell networks (cellular networks that are comprised of large amounts of small radio stations with a short range and dedicated backhaul per cell) and hybrid macro/micro cell networks, a need has arisen for selective offloading and better management of sessions between the large network and the small cell network. Release 10 adds numerous enhancements to fix this.

Notably, Release 10 adds selective IP offload to the “Home eNode B” (the term used to describe a local femtocell used at home or in a business) so that certain types of traffic will go through the femtocell while the other traffic will go through the macrocell network or vice versa. Additionally, features to improve prioritization of neighbor cells for handover are included as well.

Handover to WiFi for offloading IP traffic

As we’ve discussed before, spectrum is a huge limiting factor to network capacity. Due to increasingly scarce amounts of unused spectrum, carriers around the world are starting to push WiFi usage more and more. In particular, AT&T in the United States offers free access to its repository of hotspots for mobile subscribers with cellular data plans.

With the addition of WiFi offload support in Release 10, carriers can choose to use selective offloading with WiFi to have non-IMS traffic run through the WiFi network while IMS still runs over LTE. Of course, it could all be offloaded to WiFi, but most carriers don’t seem willing to do that.

Sponsored data connectivity and IP access policy support

This feature is something AT&T has been talking about for some time. In particular, this feature allows AT&T to offer the ability for app and service providers to “sponsor” subscriber data access in order to allow subscribers to use a particular app or service without using up part of their data allotments. For good or ill, this feature is now part of Release 10. Additionally, carriers can specify policies that augment QoS (quality-of-service) to manage network traffic.

SU-MIMO for downlink and uplink

LTE uses OFDMA with a 2×2 or 4×4 MIMO configuration for downlink and SC-FDMA with a 1×2 MIMO configuration for uplink. However, this system is unacceptable to meet the LTE-Advanced efficiency requirements. In order to fix this, higher level MIMO configurations are necessary.

Release 10 extends the downlink air interface to support SU-MIMO (single user, multiple in, multiple out) with up to eight-layer spatial multiplexing, and the uplink air interface to support SU-MIMO with up to four-layer spatial multiplexing. This extension is intended for more complex (and suitably large) devices where the spatialization of the antennae is feasible. Simpler devices (like M2M and feature phones) can continue to use simpler configurations that use MU-MIMO (multiple user, multiple in, multiple out) specified in Release 8.

By using these more complex MIMO configurations, the reliability of the connection improves considerably. Not to mention, the average efficiency of the connection increases drastically with higher order MIMO.

Relays for LTE

Release 10 adds a new LTE coverage expansion option: relays. Think of relays as a more complex form of a repeater or signal booster. The idea here is to offer a way for carriers to extend coverage further more cheaply by not requiring the deployment of a full base station/tower node system. But, because this is a wide area network, security is a concern. Not to mention that frequency usage matters as well because cellular networks operate in specifically licensed bandwidths for a given area.

Relays for LTE will offer many of the same external features of regular towers, but will not have its own backhaul. Instead, it will pull in from a neighbor cell and then push out a new signal like that one. That will allow it to extend the range of a cell much further, and extend coverage. This is more useful in rural areas, where not as much backhaul is required to support a given area.

Lots of new TDD and FDD spectrum blocks approved

Clearwire’s 2.6GHz spectrum is now officially approved for usage with TD-LTE. It is defined as LTE band class 41. This is obviously required for Clearwire to migrate from WiMAX to LTE TDD.

Dish Network’s 2GHz S-band spectrum for North America is now approved for FD-LTE usage. It is defined as LTE band class 23. This is required for Dish Network to begin the process to procure equipment to deploy LTE, should it desire to do so.

LightSquared’s 1.6GHz L-band spectrum for North America is approved for FD-LTE usage. It is defined as LTE band class 24. While this is required for LightSquared to begin the process to procure equipment to deploy LTE, it will probably never happen because of interference issues.

Europe recently released 3.4GHz-3.6GHz and 3.6GHz-3.8GHz bands for wireless broadband usage. The 3GPP has approved TDD usage on both bands as LTE band classes 42 and 43, respectively.

Sprint’s LTE deployment required a new band class to be approved, so the 3GPP approved band class 25, which includes the existing PCS spectrum (previously approved as LTE band class 2) and adds the G-block PCS spectrum. While this is approved for Release 10, Sprint is using this with Release 8 and Release 9 level specification features. This does not mean Sprint is out of compliance or anything like that, though. Sprint just has to add support for the finished features in 3GPP Release 10 to upgrade to Release 10. This band essentially supersedes the previously defined band class for PCS (band class 2).

3GPP Release 11 – Coming soon to a carrier near you

3GPP Release 10 was completed at the end of 2011, giving plenty of time for telecommunications equipment vendors to make infrastructure equipment that is Release 10 compatible, and thus be able to advertise some degree of LTE-Advanced compatibility for equipment purchased in 2012. Release 11, on the other hand, is not scheduled to be finished until the very end of 2012. That being said, there are some features of the specification worth noting.

Extending FDD Upper 850MHz

The Cellular 850 band is unusual in that it is a American band that is used outside of the Americas as well. While PCS 1.9GHz has seen limited deployments in Asia due to CDMA One/CDMA2000 deployments there, the vast majority of CDMA One/CDMA2000 deployments were on Cellular 850. Currently, several separate band classes exist for portions of the 800MHz-900MHz range: band class 5 (Cellular 850 used in the Americas, Oceania, and South Korea), band class 6 (subset of Cellular 850 used in Japan), band class 18 (ESMR 800 used by Sprint in the US, Telus in Canada, and KDDI in Japan), and band class 19 (expanded version of band class 6 for Japan). Accordingly, the 3GPP merged band classes 5, 18, and 19 into a new global 850MHz band in order to improve economies of scale on that band. This works well with the FCC now allowing Sprint to deploy LTE on ESMR 800. This new band is LTE band class 26, and essentially supersedes all previously defined 850MHz frequency bands. No one has made equipment for the band yet.

Carrier aggregation

In order for LTE-Advanced to support larger amounts of data throughput, LTE-Advanced needs to support wider frequency bandwidths (notably 40MHz or more). In order to pull this off without losing backward compatibility, carrier aggregation was introduced in Release 10 to allow combining multiple pipelines together to create a larger single pipeline. It is essentially the same thing as channel bonding for wireline broadband networks.

While Release 10 did introduce the core specifications for this feature, Release 11 develops this feature further by defining potential band combinations and bandwidth sizes supported through aggregation. Consequently, carrier aggregation is the big target for Release 11.

AT&T, in particular, has pushed for approval of the following band combinations to be approved: Band 4 (AWS) with Band 17 (Lower 700 minus A block), Band 2 (PCS) with Band 17, Band 4 with Band 5 (Cellular 850), and Band 5 with Band 17. European network operators have pushed for Band 3 with Band 7 and Band 7 with Band 20. Verizon Wireless has pushed for Band 4 with Band 13 (Upper 700 C block) so that it can use carrier aggregation with its newly acquired AWS spectrum and its current LTE spectrum. American regional carriers are pushing for Band 4 with Band 12 (Lower 700) and Band 5 with Band 12.

AT&T is also working on getting the supplemental downlink channel in 700MHz it purchased from Qualcomm approved along with potential combinations. The current combinations suggested are with band 2, band 4, and band 5.

On the TDD side, intra-band carrier aggregation is being supported in order to allow more efficient utilization of the larger chunks of spectrum allocated in TDD bands. Europe and China have band class 38, Asia has band class 40, and Clearwire has band class 41. It is expected that 2x20MHz aggregations for LTE-Advanced will be common on TDD deployments.

Lower 850MHz band for Americas except the US

Carriers across the Americas (except the US) have spectrum on the SMR (specialized mobile radio) band and want to migrate from iDEN technology to LTE. Currently, the 3GPP is working on developing the band specification and will approve it as LTE band class 27. To be clear, this has nothing to do with the Cellular 850 spectrum, as these frequencies are below it. These were reserved quite some time ago for SMR usage, and have never been used for anything else.

Asia-Pacific Digital Dividend (700MHz)

Asia has finalized the spectrum to be freed up from the switchover to digital TV, and while the spectrum lies on the frequency range that the American bands do, it isn’t likely to be configured the same way because the 700MHz band plan for the USA is absolutely insane. No one wants to use that configuration if it can be helped. The 3GPP is working on figuring out the band plan with the various regulatory authorities in Asia.

LTE-Advanced is continuously evolving

Just like LTE, LTE-Advanced is continuously evolving to meet the needs of everyone who uses wireless broadband services. As the replacement for 2G and 3G networks that intends to unify the world under a single standard, it needs to be able to serve every possible use case. The 3GPP has a tough challenge ahead of itself. It needs to consider literally every market in the development of the standard, but it seems to be doing a good job right now.

There is more to LTE-Advanced, and more is always coming to the table. Expect far more improvements and features to come to LTE-Advanced. As an open standard with nearly infinite capabilities due to its all-IP system, anything is possible. As LTE-Advanced networks come online, we will see some truly innovative technologies develop that take advantage of these networks.

Back to the table of contents

Read: What is LTE?

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How to avoid waiting a week for AT&T to unlock your iPhone

It has now been a little over one week since AT&T announced that it would officially unlock customer’s iPhones if they met certain requirements. The resulting rush overloaded support representatives, with sources inside AT&T telling ExtremeTech that the queue exceeded 10,000 at its highest points last week. Those early adopters as a result waited nearly a week in some cases for the unlock to be authorized.

Why did the queue grow so big, so fast? The unlocking procedure, and AT&T’s rules on eligibility we’re told. While unlocking most phones can be done without the interference of the manufacturer, Apple does it differently. Access to the tool is limited to technical support and members of AT&T’s “unlock” team, so talking to a regular old customer support rep is not going to do you any good.

After verifying you meet the requirements, the technical support representative then enters your IMEI (the phone’s identification number) into the tool provided by Apple, which in turn activates the unlock and sends the confirmation email to the user. If you contact customer support, those representatives can only open a case ticket, which depending on workload could take days to resolve, our source says.

So what’s the quickest route to unlocked bliss? Make sure all your ducks are lined up before attempting to unlock your iPhone. The result is a much less painful process. Based on my own experience and what we’re hearing, here’s how to legally unlock your iPhone in short order:

1. Verify you’re eligible. Check your account to ensure it is paid up-to-date. Make sure the iPhone you are attempting to unlock is not attached to an account that is under contract. That basically means an old iPhone that’s under a plan which is still under contract is likely not eligible. The easiest phones to unlock will be those that are not associated with any account and over two years old, it seems. If you’re ineligible, be prepared to pay the early termination fee to unlock.

2. Make a note of your IMEI. The technical support representative will need this number, so it’s a good idea to jot it down now. The IMEI can be found by tapping Settings, then General, then About, then scrolling to the bottom. The IMEI is a 15-digit number. Write it down and place it to the side.

3. Backup your device now. If you haven’t synced in awhile, now’s the time. The unlock process requires a wipe of the device. Connect the iPhone to iTunes and allow it to back up. If you use iCloud, many of your settings and basic information is likely already backed up to the cloud, but better to be safe than sorry.

4. Call AT&T directly. Call into AT&T’s customer support. Don’t use the company’s online support system, or in-store representatives. Follow the prompts and press “2″ for Technical Support when the options for the main menu is listed. Select option “0″ to speak with a representative. Make clear that you’re attempting to unlock your eligible iPhone. If you’re not, you will need to tell them you agree to pay for the early termination fee for the right to unlock the device.

At this point, the process is in AT&T’s hands. They should process your unlock immediately since you are talking to a representative with direct access to the tool. Wait for the email to confirm the unlock has been processed.

5. Reconnect your iPhone to iTunes. After receiving the email, re-pair your device with iTunes. Under the “Summary” tab and “Version” section, click on Restore. Allow the device to restore as normal. When the restore completes, iTunes will display the message “Congratulations, your iPhone has been unlocked.” If you wish to restore your data, click “Continue,” otherwise it is safe to disconnect.

Please note that if you are taking the iPhone to a different carrier, some settings will need to be changed in order for features like web surfing and picture messaging to work. Although it varies from carrier to carrier, many are happy to provide you with the necessary settings to ensure proper operation. For example, T-Mobile has easy-to-follow directions to set up an iPhone.

Your performance may vary, and on some carriers, it still may be necessary to jailbreak in order for all features to work. For example, iPhone users on T-Mobile experience MMS receipt issues — it appears an fix only available for jailbroken phones will fix that issue according to what we’re seeing.

Either way, good luck and happy unlocking!

Source

How to avoid waiting a week for AT&T to unlock your iPhone

It has now been a little over one week since AT&T announced that it would officially unlock customer’s iPhones if they met certain requirements. The resulting rush overloaded support representatives, with sources inside AT&T telling ExtremeTech that the queue exceeded 10,000 at its highest points last week. Those early adopters as a result waited nearly a week in some cases for the unlock to be authorized.

Why did the queue grow so big, so fast? The unlocking procedure, and AT&T’s rules on eligibility we’re told. While unlocking most phones can be done without the interference of the manufacturer, Apple does it differently. Access to the tool is limited to technical support and members of AT&T’s “unlock” team, so talking to a regular old customer support rep is not going to do you any good.

After verifying you meet the requirements, the technical support representative then enters your IMEI (the phone’s identification number) into the tool provided by Apple, which in turn activates the unlock and sends the confirmation email to the user. If you contact customer support, those representatives can only open a case ticket, which depending on workload could take days to resolve, our source says.

So what’s the quickest route to unlocked bliss? Make sure all your ducks are lined up before attempting to unlock your iPhone. The result is a much less painful process. Based on my own experience and what we’re hearing, here’s how to legally unlock your iPhone in short order:

1. Verify you’re eligible. Check your account to ensure it is paid up-to-date. Make sure the iPhone you are attempting to unlock is not attached to an account that is under contract. That basically means an old iPhone that’s under a plan which is still under contract is likely not eligible. The easiest phones to unlock will be those that are not associated with any account and over two years old, it seems. If you’re ineligible, be prepared to pay the early termination fee to unlock.

2. Make a note of your IMEI. The technical support representative will need this number, so it’s a good idea to jot it down now. The IMEI can be found by tapping Settings, then General, then About, then scrolling to the bottom. The IMEI is a 15-digit number. Write it down and place it to the side.

3. Backup your device now. If you haven’t synced in awhile, now’s the time. The unlock process requires a wipe of the device. Connect the iPhone to iTunes and allow it to back up. If you use iCloud, many of your settings and basic information is likely already backed up to the cloud, but better to be safe than sorry.

4. Call AT&T directly. Call into AT&T’s customer support. Don’t use the company’s online support system, or in-store representatives. Follow the prompts and press “2″ for Technical Support when the options for the main menu is listed. Select option “0″ to speak with a representative. Make clear that you’re attempting to unlock your eligible iPhone. If you’re not, you will need to tell them you agree to pay for the early termination fee for the right to unlock the device.

At this point, the process is in AT&T’s hands. They should process your unlock immediately since you are talking to a representative with direct access to the tool. Wait for the email to confirm the unlock has been processed.

5. Reconnect your iPhone to iTunes. After receiving the email, re-pair your device with iTunes. Under the “Summary” tab and “Version” section, click on Restore. Allow the device to restore as normal. When the restore completes, iTunes will display the message “Congratulations, your iPhone has been unlocked.” If you wish to restore your data, click “Continue,” otherwise it is safe to disconnect.

Please note that if you are taking the iPhone to a different carrier, some settings will need to be changed in order for features like web surfing and picture messaging to work. Although it varies from carrier to carrier, many are happy to provide you with the necessary settings to ensure proper operation. For example, T-Mobile has easy-to-follow directions to set up an iPhone.

Your performance may vary, and on some carriers, it still may be necessary to jailbreak in order for all features to work. For example, iPhone users on T-Mobile experience MMS receipt issues — it appears an fix only available for jailbroken phones will fix that issue according to what we’re seeing.

Either way, good luck and happy unlocking!

Source

Windows Phone is headed for a life of fragmentation

If you’re one of the handful who has taken a Windows Phone leap of faith, bad news: Your device is forever stuck with Windows Phone 7. People close to the company say Microsoft will only make Windows Phone 8 available on new phones that are released later this year, according to reports.

Microsoft has confirmed that WP7 apps will run on WP8, but nothing more. Why would Redmond do anything different? Think about it: Microsoft, with partner Nokia, is in the midst the biggest launch in the platform’s history with the Lumia 900. Any news that this phone will be obsolete when WP8 drops — which is just a few months away — will kill sales.

It’s not like reporters and bloggers haven’t tried to pin Microsoft down on the issue. Long-time Microsoft pundit Mary Jo Foley prodded the company for answers in March, and got the same story as everyone else. Microsoft is definitely hiding something: its “early adopters” are about to be marooned, and that nasty f-word is about to surface: fragmentation.

Android users know all about this. Google touts the latest features available on Android, but end users don’t see them because developers are too busy developing for operating system versions released two years ago. On the market right now are phones with Android 2.2 Froyo. That version of Android is now two years old, released in May 2010. Most never see an upgrade because it is the device manufacturer and carrier (not Google) who is responsible for shipping out new code. History shows Android partners do a crappy job in this department.

The developers now choose between using the latest and greatest features of Android and locking out a good portion of users, or developing applications that take into account the fact that a majority of Android users are stuck on outdated software. The lowest common denominator is always going to win as developers want their apps in front of as many people as possible.

The iOS platform is completely different, and this is due to Apple’s commitment to legacy support. The iPhone 3GS is a great example here. When launched in 2009, iOS 3 was included on the device. Today, that same 3GS can run the most current version of iOS 5 without a problem. A three-year old phone is still current, and developers are not hamstrung by a majority of users on old platforms because Apple pushes and enables users to upgrade.

Microsoft has chosen Android’s fragmented path against any good sense. While I understand this likely has to do with the drastic code changes under the hood, it still does not make sense why older legacy devices cannot be factored into the equation. Windows Phone developers must now contend with the fact that a sizable portion of the market will never be able to upgrade. Apps written for the lowest common denominator win again.

Redmond would have been far smarter to adjust its plans for WP8 and fold its early adopters into the mix. I’m willing to bet that some of the advantage that iOS holds over Android has to do with the fact that users receive first-party support from Apple for years. Purchasing an iPhone seems like better value as a result, and the consumer is happy they still have a (somewhat) current device.

Fragmentation is never a good strategy, and especially if you’re trying to push the envelope of mobile development or make some waves in the mobile space.

Pissing off the customers who just put their faith in your platform isn’t the best way to make an impression. So why do it?

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Is the electric car dying? Only if you believe the rumors

Electric cars and plug-in hybrids took a beating on reliability, testing, and sales over the winter: $40,000 Tesla batteries bricking, a Fisker dying at the hands of Consumer Reports testers, a bit player going under, production suspended for five weeks on the Chevrolet Volt. Taken together, critics say, it proves electric vehicles (EVs) and plug-in hybrids (PHEVs) have finally been exposed as overpriced frauds.

The less sexy explanation is randomness: Stuff happens at an unordered pace, like plane crashes that come in close succession with long gaps after that. Meanwhile, new electrics (Nissan Leaf update) and plug-in hybrids (Porsche) are being announced. Here’s why the randomness answer may be the better explanation for what ails green cars.

Chevrolet Volt production suspended: They’re running out of early adopters

GM is suspending production of the Chevrolet Volt for five weeks to bring supply and demand into balance. Critics say it proves the Volt is a dumb idea. At the very least, the Volt is selling below projections: 7,671 sold in 2011 vs. 10,000 projected; 1,626 in the first two months for an annual rate of 10,000 vs. the 45,000 originally projected. “The price premium on the Volt just doesn’t make economic sense for the average consumer when there are so many fuel-efficient gasoline cars available, typically for thousands of dollars less,” Lacey Placey, the chief economist of Edmunds.com, told CBS News.

The Volt sells for $41,500 minus an available $7,500 federal tax credit, or $34,000. At today’s gas prices, you’d need 12-15 years to pay back the difference between the Volt and a roughly equivalent Chevrolet Cruze gas-engine car. A couple of battery-unit fires (since resolved) didn’t help the Volt’s reputation. A snippy Fox News story on the Volt and misstated costs of electricity for refueling (national average isn’t $1.16 per killowatt hour; it’s a tenth of that) hurt, too. What’s hurting the Chevrolet Volt most is that even in a country of 330 million people, it’s thousands not millions willing to spend an extra $15,000 up front to advance the cause of alternative energy. Many of them already bought. But if the price of gasoline hits $6 a gallon, or the Volt-Cruze differential falls to $5,000, sales will perk right up.

The verdict: Not enough early adopters for Chevrolet. It’s less cool being the second on your block driving a Volt.

Bright Automotive shuttered: Feds wouldn’t fork over $400 million

Bright Automotive had planned to produce plug-in hybrid utility vans for the commercial market starting in 2014. Like the Volt, the vans (on paper) would go 40 miles on electric power, then switch to a combustion engine. Bright sought $400 million in federal Advanced Technology Vehicle Manufacturing loans in 2008 and says it got four “near final” conditional commitment letters but no money. In February Bright said it would cease operations. The Department of Energy says it has to balance support for new technologies with the protection of taxpayer dollars (a novel concept) and offered consolation: “We understand this is a difficult day for Bright.”

The DOE this month rejected Carbon Motors’ loan request to build a high-efficiency, purpose-built police cruiser that would use BMW diesel engines. Those denied loans have expressed “outrage” and then blamed politics. It’s also possible DOE saw something that made these loans seem less desirable than loans it dished out to Ford, Nissan, Fisker and Tesla.

The verdict: Says more about staking your company to the federal piggy bank than about the future of alternative energy vehicles.

Tesla battery bricks: the $40,000 oops

A handful of owners of the all-electric Tesla Roadster have come back to their cars to find the batteries dead. Not dead as in needs a recharge, but dead as in “$40,000 worth of dead, and it’s not covered by warranty.” Many fingers have been pointed. Tesla says the manual warns you not to leave a partially discharged Tesla for long periods; owners say there’s no automatic safety disconnect to end parasitic losses when the batteries get to a critically low level. (Most laptops do that to protect your data.)

There’s now a new word in the lexicon: bricking, meaning a device lacking power that is no better than a brick. About 2,000 Roadsters were built; Tesla says fewer than 10 (by Tesla’s count) were affected. Several battery engineers told The New York Times that relatively modest design changes would have prevented the problem. A Nissan spokeswoman said the all-electric Nissan Leaf will “never means never” discharge completely.

The verdict: Tesla seems to be the only car company with bricking issues. If simple design changes could have saved these batteries, Tesla cut one corner too many to rein in costs.

Fisker Karma dies at the hands of Consumer Reports: Ridden too hard or built too sloppily?

Probably the worst news for the EV/PHEV market is the death of a Fisker Karma during testing by Consumer Reports, which bought the car for $108,000 (equal to 3,700 one-year subscriptions, less whatever they get back selling the Karma used). The magazine’s testers ran the brand new, 5,400-pound Karma up to 65 mph for speedometer calibration, got an error message, coasted to a stop, and after that the best they could do was let it sit, restart and move the vehicle, then see it lock again. It had to be flatbedded to the local Fisker dealer where the battery and inverter cable were both were replaced (a multi-thousand-dollar repair).

CR wrote, “In fairness, the challenges Fisker has surmounted in going from a start-up to a bona fide automaker over a short period are monumental. Some birthing pains are not unexpected, especially as it is presumed the company faced significant timeline challenges to reach milestones necessary to obtain funding. Further, the Karma is a leading-edge car. Check the reliability track record for other companies pushing tech boundaries (ahem, Mercedes-Benz) and you will often find hiccups.”

Fisker CEO Tom LaSorda in an open letter said the car performed exactly as it was supposed to when it encountered a fault. But nonetheless there was a fault. LaSorda used a variation on the previous-generation Jaguar defense: Sure, we had an electrical problem or two, but wasn’t the dealer grand in fixing it this time, and the next time as well? And there’s likely to be a next time. In its most recent blog post, CR said, “Just this weekend, for example, the speedometer and energy meter display disappeared when driving, on top of having several other rogue warning indicators appear last week. It is expected we’ll be revisiting the dealership soon. We’ve had cars in the past that have been troublesome, but never anything like this.”

The verdict: Lots of things can go wrong for a startup tech company building cars, and most of them have. The running gear isn’t all that different, conceptually, from a Chevrolet Volt, so the culprit may be how Fisker is dealing with the complexity. The biggest loser is the publishing business, which can’t seem to write a headline more original than “bad Karma.”

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Cadillac CUE raises the bar with capacitive touch, haptic feedback, dual-screen display

Will capacitive touch controls and a user-configurable LCD instrument panel make Cadillac the Cadillac of cars again? That’s the hope of the flagship brand for General Motors with the Cadillac User Interface, or CUE. Cadillac aims to blend technology, ease of use, and luxury in hopes of cracking the top three in sales among luxury cars. After working with one of GM’s cockpit simulators it’s clear that Cadillac is on the right track even as it’s likely to have the teething pains BMW and Audi went through in developing their signature human-machine interfaces. Early adopters of CUE who didn’t study at Georgia Tech may find Rev 1.0 to have a bit too much in-your-face in the interface. Four years of focus groups, research, and design may not be enough for GM to realize how uncomprehending mainstream users can be when it comes to new tech.

CUE faces two challenges: Capacitive touch looks cool in the showroom but it’s a bear to use on bumpy roads. Cadillac probably went overboard in jettisoning switches and knobs in homage to capacitive touch sliders. Drivers will ask, “Hey, where’s the volume knob?” Also, some features are going to take training, such as flicking (the gesture) a piece of info from the 8-inch center stack screen and making it land on the drop-dead gorgeous 12.3-inch LCD display that is the instrument panel. You can think of the displays being like a PC with a dual screen extended display, except the displays are separated by almost a foot so it’s not immediately clear one is an extension of the other when you move a panel with smartphone-like gestures (tap, flick, swipe and spread). When a Cadillac expert ran CUE through its paces, everything worked quickly and smoothly. But it’s the kind of interface — sorry, Cadillac — that isn’t going to be learned without an hour or two of dealer training.

Make that three challenges: CUE’s voice controll likely won’t be as good as Siri. iPhone users who shop the new Cadillacs are going to wonder why something that costs 100 times as much isn’t as smart as an iPhone. Cadillac’s answer is going to be that they’re using the same underlying Nuance voice recognizer as much of the rest of the industry, which is true, but Nuance is also what Apple starts with, too.

Here’s the background on CUE. Cadillac is bringing out two new sport sedans this year, the full-size XTS and the compact ATS, as well as refreshing the SRX crossover (tall wagon). All get CUE along with the OnStar telematics system and a host of optional driver aids (lane departure warning, adaptive cruise control, head-up display). CUE starts with an 8-inch LCD touchscreen in the center stack (the middle of the dash where the radio goes). The center stack is a capacitive touch panel, meaning it’s a membrane with virtual buttons that registers your touch and has haptic feedback, or the ability to vibrate or pop back to let you know your input registered. The center stack LCD has the same capacitive touch and haptic feedback. (The instrument panel LCD is look but don’t touch.)

You’ll see about 20 buttons on the center stack. The hazard warning flasher and stability control are toggled by mechanical switches; everything else is virtual and capacitive touch. Reduced button count is generally good. Five years ago Acura crammed more than 60 buttons on the Acura TL center stack, messing up an otherwise tech-savvy car, and that 60 included a control knob like BMW iDrive or Audi MMI that’s supposed to reduce knob-and-button count.

The CUE instrument panel behind the steering wheel will be a 12.3-inch high-res 1280×480 LCD display. Cadillac says it’s user-configurable. Translation: You can pick from four display options called Simple (above), Enhanced, Balanced, and Performance. Then you can modify the screens by moving info such as a music display over from the center stack to the instrument cluster. I found this similar to the MyFord Touch instrument panel that has a pair of user-configurable 4-inch LCDs flanking a traditional mechanical gauge package. Cadillac’s version is much higher tech, but as far as getting phone info, music info, or simplified navigation instructions right in front of you, the effect is the same.

Don’t get any ideas about custom designing your own screen layout. That’s something Cadillac isn’t going to let you do anytime soon. I found the Performance layout seemed more the vision of a design student than a hard-core enthusiast but if Cadillac gets mixed feedback, it’s easy (for Cadillac) to make a change. You want a 3-inch circular speedometer with 65 mph a the top of the circle and a 2-inch digital speedo inside that? Sorry, that’s Cadillac’s call, not yours.

GM says it spent four years talking to prospective owners as it went about designing CUE and, as is the fashion of automakers, assigning personas and composite photos to eight user types. So the CUE user might be a Driving Enthusiast, Gadget Girl, Show Off, Deejay, Basic Family Transporter (the artist formerly known as Soccer Mom), On-the-Go Working Mom, Communications Extremist, or Commute Time Organizer. The common threads are clear: a phone or smartphone plays into the equation and there’s music and Bluetooth involved. More advanced users want texts or email read or displayed. The Gadget Girl persona appears to be saying that if navigation costs too much (it probably will), she’ll bring a portable GPS and she wants a bin to hide it in when parked. Cadillac is one of several car companies now allowing smartphone apps to be controlled by the car, starting with Pandora and Stitcher. Cadillac says it’s an open API but what that means, as with other cars, is that it will show up on the driver’s center stack display only if Cadillac allows it.

It’s unclear how GM spent four years developing the low-button-count center stack and didn’t hear or figure out: Capacitive touch volume controls are a likely to be a disaster when the car is moving on all but a glass-smooth surface, since there’s no surface to hold your wrist against while your finger slides the volume control. This has already been proven with the capacitive control on Lincolns with MyLincoln Touch. GM will probably tell whiny customers what Lincoln does now: “Use the steering wheel volume buttons.” Customers will probably tell GM: “They’re pretty small and they’re impossible when I’m wearing gloves.”

Cadillac and Lincoln/Ford are placing their bets on touchscreens and voice input. Audi, BMW, are Mercedes-Benz are betting on cockpit control wheels (MMI, iDrive, Comand contoller) and voice input. Generally speaking, touchscreens are easier to comprehend and master than control wheels. Skilled users who bother to read the owner’s manual will find the control wheel faster over time. Repeatedly extending your right arm to tap the LCD display is a minor annoyance and displays are moving higher in the center stack in response to driver distraction concerns (the driver has to glance over, not over and down). I found the current-generation Cadillac SRX design (pre-CUE) requires most drivers to move their right shoulders forward from the backrest to reach the display. Over time, drivers may switch from hand control to voice input once they master the vocabulary. Cadillac says it has a natural language interface and also notes some commands will require a specific syntax; Siri pretty much understands what you want no matter how you say it.

The center stack screen has a simplified display most of the time; a proximity sensor adds more choices as your hand draws near. It’s a nice touch but not first-ever (Cadillac’s claim notwithstanding) since Bose did the same thing five years ago and it has been used by Ferrari in production cars.

It’s hard to judge how good CUE will be until it’s actually in a production car, not a cockpit simulator, and you can’t rate voice input quality from tests in a crowded ballroom or convention floor. CUE appears to be a big leap ahead for Cadillac, which is the only American automaker currently able to challenge the high-end Automakers from Europe and Japan (Lexus, Infiniti).

For more, check out the CUE website or watch the video below.