HSPA
(High Speed Packet Access) A family of high-speed 3G digital data services provided by cellular carriers worldwide that use the GSM technology. The service works with HSPA cellphones as well as laptops and portable devices with HSPA modems. For example, the iPhone 3G transmits data over an HSDPA network, which is one of the HSPA modes (see below). See iPhone.
Falling under the UMTS umbrella, HSPA is a major enhancement of WCDMA, with more channels and different modulation and coding techniques. In addition, HSPA can recover faster from errors than WCDMA (see HARQ).
HSPA+, also called "I-HSPA" and "HSPA Evolved," supports one or two antennas (see MIMO). Following are the HSPA versions along with WCDMA for comparison. See 3GPP, cellular generations, cellular vs. Wi-Fi, WCDMA, TDMA and GSM.
Maximum Maximum
UMTS Downlink Uplink
Technology Speed Speed
(Modulation method in parentheses.)
Wideband CDMA
WCDMA 384 Kbps (QPSK) 384 Kbps (QPSK)
HSDPA means HS Downlink PA (Release 5)
HSDPA 14.4 Mbps (16QAM) 384 Kbps (QPSK)
HSUPA means HS Uplink PA (Release 6)
HSUPA 14.4 Mbps (16QAM) 5.7 Mbps (QPSK)
HSPA+ (Release 7)
Non-MIMO 14 Mbps (16QAM) 5.8 Mbps (QPSK)
Non-MIMO 21 Mbps (64QAM) 11.0 Mbps (16QAM)
MIMO 28 Mbps (16QAM) 5.8 Mbps (QPSK)
11.0 Mbps (16QAM)
HSPA+ (Release 8)
MIMO 42 Mbps (64QAM) same as Release 7
Long Term Evolution (LTE) Expected in 2010
(Based on Release 8)
115 Mbps (16QAM) 58 Mbps (16QAM)
173 Mbps (64QAM) 86 Mbps (64QAM)
