I have a Samsung j700 on Vodafone and have noticed that the G at the top of the screen changes to E every so often and in the book it refers to this as the Edge network. Can someone please explain what this is.

Thanks in advance

Its when the signal for the G network isnt working so switches to the much slower edge...

EDGE is a type of network the phone can connect to. It's not as fast as 3G, so the phone will only connect to it when 3G is not available.

Wrong way around E is faster than G.

The J700 is a 2G phone so it will never connect to 3G !

The G probably refers to GPRS. Comparable with dial-up internet (if anyone remembers this).

thanks for your help.My phone has recently been failing to connect to Vodafone and I was wondering if this had something to do with it.

Looks like I have to buy a new phone.

Having the E is a good sign, it means you have access to the faster EDGE connection.

EDGE is in between GPRS speeds and 3G speeds. It would be nice if they replaced all GPRS with EDGE.

When I was in the Toronto area of Canada last year my mobile had the E sign 97% of the time and 4 bars out of the 5 for signal.
Seems I was getting a better signal over there than I do here.

Darren

^^Ignore this!

GPRS is known as 2G, whereas Edge is currently known as 2.5G. It offers faster speeds than GPRS.

Looking at your location, is that a surprise?

I did see it on my N95 when I was in Canada, never seen it in the UK. AFAIK the only Edge in the UK was on O2 to support the original iPhone.

O2's EDGE coverage is very spotty. I guess they started and gave up once the iPhone 3G existed.

Orange has it in parts. I guess it depends on how easy it is to upgrade the cell to do it (which is not likely if it is old), and natural equipment replacement. No point spending too much on it when the money is better spent on 3G coverage.

Fortunately the cell I end up on when at home seems to have EDGE (3G coverage is not great).

For some cells it only required a software update, so Orange and O2 focused on those first.

As you say, O2 really gave up once the iPhone 3G was released.