Upgrades may relieve Iqaluit’s cell-phone hell

If you’re a smartphone user in Iqaluit, you’re probably already familiar with a long list of complaints about the quality of service.

Maybe it’s the way incoming calls go straight to voicemail without the phone ever ringing. Or maybe it’s the way your phone acts as if it’s trying to post a message on Twitter and just never gets around to it.

Or, maybe you’re trying to call your family in another community and you have to dial five or six times before the call actually goes through.

Bell Mobility, the company that provides smartphone service to Nunavut’s capital, is hoping upgrades to their Iqaluit cell towers will take care of those problems, which have been plaguing users for months now.

“We’re hoping that this change and this upgrade will vastly improve the service quality in Iqaluit,” said Emily Younker, a spokeswoman for Northwestel, which is doing the work on behalf of Bell, its parent company.

Crews have spent the month of September upgrading two cell towers to a system called EVDO (Evolution-Data Optimized).

It’s a standard of wireless service that divides voice transmissions—phone calls—and data transmissions—apps, web browsing—into separate channels.

The upgrades should be fully installed by mid-October, Younkers said.

Users will be able to tell if their smartphone is connected to an upgraded tower if an icon in the top right-hand corner of the screen (near the bars showing signal strength) changes from “1x” to “EVDO” or “EV”.

Younkers said the new system allows Bell to use its satellite-fed Iqaluit bandwidth more efficiently.

“Basically it’s freeing traffic up from one highway onto two,” she said. “It’s increasing call quality, it’s increasing transmission speeds. People using smartphones will notice it right away.”

Younkers acknowledge that Iqaluit’s network is still limited, both by local geography, and by its reliance on the type of mobile service provided here.

Iqaluit service operates on Bell’s CDMA network, which is provided via satellite.

HSPA systems, which include Apple’s coveted iPhone, aren’t provided by satellite, Younkers said.

So don’t expect an iPhone any time soon.