A very important event occured on Feb. 18, 2008. Most people didn’t know about it, nor did they really care.
A lot of folks know about the sign-off of analog TV as we know of in Feb. 2009. But not that many people knew that analog cell phone coverage was ALLOWED to go away starting in Feb. 2008. The FCC mandated that cell companies operate analog cell phone networks (known as AMPS - Analog Mobile Phone Service) by law until this important date.
It wasn’t a requirement to turn off, but cell companies are now allowed to turn it off.
Well, it didn’t take Verizon Wireless long to do the dastardly deed. I have several phones that can use analog mode in a pinch. None of them can receive an analog signal anymore. So VZW said “Thank God” and turned it off, reallocating that signal spectrum to their digital network.
I’m sure by this point that there weren’t too many analog users by now, but even so, it was a slap in the face.
Don’t know what AT&T (old Cingular) is doing. I heard they’ll also turn off their first generation digital (TDMA) system as well. That leaves Alltel, US Cellular and some other bit players out there. Sprint, T-Mobile and other carriers were all digital from the ground up because they came out after digital technology was invented. But I’m wondering how much longer before all those analog phones will become bricks?
At least with the TV transition, there will be converter boxes for those. But not with the phones. Yet another relic that will be sold at a flea market as an obsolete technology. One of these days the grandkids will say “Gee, you used to use that thing?”, just like vinyl records and vacuum tube technology. It lasted 25 years before it became obsolete.
Square analog TVs aren’t far behind. That will be about 55 years of use (”Compatible color” from RCA was invented in 1953, introduced in 1954). If you include the black and white era, that increases the lifespan to 68 years when the 525 line system was standardized in 1941.
Probably one of the shortest lifespans were the first generation FM radios prior to the modern 88-108 MHz band. They operated in the 42-50 MHz band and were obsolete when the FCC reallocated FM to the band we use today. Though there is digital FM (and believe it or not, digital AM), the analog stuff and digital can work side by side - in theory. But that’s another topic, another day.
