I recently purchased a BlackBerry 8320 Curve from T-Mobile, and of all the device's features, I have one clear favorite: Wi-Fi. More specifically, I love its voice-over-Wi-Fi (VoWi-Fi), or voice over wireless local area networks (VoWLAN), functionality.
My new BlackBerry's not the first Wi-Fi-enabled smartphone I've used, but it wasn't until a couple of weeks ago, when I moved to an area with less-than-stellar network coverage, that I fully realized the benefits of dual mode cellular/ VoWi-Fi phones, or phones that can use both cellular and Wi-Fi networks for voice calls.
The first call I tried to place in my new home via cellular network dropped a minute or so after it connected. But after I setup my wireless network and switched on my Wi-Fi, my call quality was great. I've heard people complain about the quality of VoWi-Fi and other forms of voice over IP, and occasionally I get some static when I use it, but, all and all, I've been very impressed with the audio quality. That could be because I'm employing a Linksys router (802.11b, g) that's specifically meant for use with T-Mobile devices.
One issue I've had with VoWi-Fi on the Curve is switching back and forth between my personal wireless network and T-Mobile's EDGE network. The carrier says the transition should be seamless, but about half the time I drive out of range of the Wi-Fi, my call gets dropped.
Currently, T-Mobile's the only major U.S. carrier that enables VoWi-Fi functionality in its devices—at least without the use of unauthorized third-party apps. Other carriers like AT&T offer phones with VoWi-Fi capabilities, like the popular BlackBerry 8820, but they don't currently ship them with software that permits VoWi-Fi connections.
I mentioned that the Curve 8320 is not the first device I've used with Wi-Fi. A while back, just after RIM released the BlackBerry 8820 on AT&T, I got one from the company for review, only to find that I couldn't use it for VoWi-Fi—a huge disappointment, especially since I'd recently touted the device and VoWi-Fi in a blog post, and I wanted to give it a test drive.
So I started doing some research and found that many carriers are a bit hesitant, to say the least, to embrace VoWi-Fi. That's largely because they fear their customers will increasingly employ wireless hotspots instead of paying for the use of their cellular networks. T-Mobile has decided to embrace the technology and is, in effect, using it as a competitive advantage—while charging $10 extra a month for its HotSpot@Home Talk Forever Mobile service, which offers unlimited VoWi-Fi calling from home or in range of another T-Mobile Wi-Fi network.
And other wireless carriers may soon change their tunes as consumer and enterprise demand for the devices increase. The benefits of VoWi-Fi to consumers are clear from my
