Smaller SIM Format Standardized 83
New submitter mk1004 writes "ETSI members have approved a new, smaller SIM format. 'The fourth form factor (4FF) card will be 40% smaller than the current smallest SIM card design, at 12.3mm wide by 8.8mm high, and 0.67mm thick. It can be packaged and distributed in a way that is backwards compatible with existing SIM card designs. The new design will offer the same functionality as all current SIM cards.' Nokia is not happy about the decision, as they believe their version was superior, but they say they're prepared to license the patents essential to the standard."
So what was better about Nokia's design? (Score:2)
Re:So what was better about Nokia's design? (Score:5, Funny)
Nokia would hold the patents.
Nokia still holds the patents (Score:4, Insightful)
The new design, being really similar to the old one, also means that Nokia holds the patents for it already.
That is what Nokia is saying they are licensing out, that they were threatening not to allow licensing of before... but they will go along to move the mobile industry forward.
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And because they really need the money, since they are circling the drain.
(sort of) true but irrelevant (Score:2)
Again, Nokia would be the ones licensing out the patents either way. They truly only cared about their design being chosen because they thought it was better. Them needing money or not does not enter in as a factor.
I would not count out Nokia or Windows Mobile yet. Microsoft has too much money and needs WM to succeed too badly to give up without a huge fight. And Microsoft has only just begun, they were waiting really for alignment with Windows 8. Win or lose, the battle will be interesting.
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They first said they would not license the needed patents.
I think MS is willing to spend their war chest to make that happen, but I don't think they will continue to prop up Nokia if times get lean enough.
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I saw this mentioned in another thread about MS, but all MS has to do is just make the next ActiveSync contain a patent, and only allow Apple (who licensed AS and Exchange) and MS to use it. Next version of Exchange, have it as the only valid protocol.
Boom. Everyone else would be locked out of the Exchange ecosystem and there would be zero Google, RIM, et. al. could do about it. Antitrust? Good luck.
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Not really.
The big gorilla is Apple. The company gobbling up the majority of profits in the entire sector.
Right now, Apple's got NO patents in the ring, so to make an iPhone, they have to license it all. Their nano SIM standard is covered by an Apple patent that Apple has vowed to license for fre
Re:Nokia still holds the patents (Score:4, Funny)
The new design, being really similar to the old one, also means that Nokia holds the patents for it already.
Here's a radical idea: keep the same electrical interface with the old SIM, arrange the contact pads in a way that makes sense, and simply shrink it in size [patent pending].
Why we are unable to make the most trivial technical advances without the whole thing degenerating in a intellectual property shit throwing contest ? Does anybody still believe this state of affairs promotes the Progress of Science and useful Arts ?
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Does anybody still believe this state of affairs promotes the Progress of Science and useful Arts ?
It does if you re define useful arts to mean Lawyers.
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You joke but this is also the reason they and Apple shat all over the HTML 5 video standard using OGG.
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And now, they've "Sub-standardized".
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Nokia's design does the thing where you push it in once and locks in, and you push it in again and it pops out. The idea is that they're easier to remove.
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the microsd ports in my phones do that!
smells like prior art to me...
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As far as I'm aware, Nokia doesn't hold the patent on push-push, and if they do it's prior art because they likely made it prior art.
Two of the three designs incorporate push-push. The one which doesn't is Apple's. It requires a SIM tray, which Apple does hold a patent on.
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http://www.engadget.com/2012/03/27/apple-patent-ejectable-sim-card-tray-nano-sim-war/ [engadget.com]
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As far as I can tell, it would have been slightly smaller (about 10mm x 8mm instead of 12.3mm x 8.8mm) and would have had a different layout for the contacts. The winning design can also be jammed sideways into a 12mm wide mini-SIM slot and get stuck, which Nokia designed theirs to avoid.
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right but at the cost of it being completely incompatable with older cards, or with older devices since there was no adapter that could fit the newer cards into a older slot.
Today could could take a micro SIM out of a iPad2 and put it in your old school Nokia phone no problem with a adapter. Nokia wanted to prevent that kind of backward compatibility
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Sooner or later, we'll have to break compatibility. Apple broke compatibility with OS 9 software, DDR3 broke compatibility with DDR2, SATA broke compatibility with PATA, etc. It's great if you keep supporting older devices, but sooner or later you have to move on. Look at all of the issues Microsoft has supporting legacy apps and devices on the latest versions of Windows. Imagine how much sleeker and less buggy Windows would be if MS just said "Ok, Windows 8 will not work with any programs created for Windo
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Yes, but for what advantages? You only want to change standards when there are benefits that significantly outweigh the costs of breaking compatibility. So far, I've not heard any compelling advantage to Nokia's proposal, it appears to be changing the standard for the sake of changing the standard (or more cynically, for the purpose of establishing a new patent pool with which the IP owners can extract more money for a longer period).
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The only time I saw any advantages to SIMs is when they had a flash memory card in a SIM form factor. I thought that if this single device could be used to store both the carrier data (that activates a phone instantly) as well as basic phone data such as contacts (moving that function away from the phone so that more detailed contact lists, such as main#, home#, work#. photo of contact (if applicable) etc could be stored the way it currently is in the phone itself) and a few things one would like to keep c
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They'd sell a fraction of the copies and lose their monopoly (they might not even end up with a double digit install base). The only reason to use windows is the massive amount of pre-existing software. Take away that, and there's no reason not to use another solution, especially when those have a ton of software already written for it, and are cheap or free.
Also, your examples on hardware are just moronic. A good analogy would be dropping support for DOS and 16 bit windows apps. The OS doesn't care wha
Comes with tweezer and magnifying glass (Score:5, Funny)
Hope all phones that use these come with a tweezer and magnifying glass! This little sucker is gonna be hard to handle! lol
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Luckily, no one in their right mind handles these things more than once a year.
Re:Comes with tweezer and magnifying glass (Score:5, Insightful)
Luckily, no one in their right mind handles these things more than once a year.
I wish. Let me know when you can get reasonable rates world-wide with a single SIM card.
Re:Comes with tweezer and magnifying glass (Score:5, Interesting)
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If you're willing to sacrifice all other features, sure, go ahead. I'll stick to swapping (full-size) SIM cards in my Galaxy Nexus when I cross borders, thanks.
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OMG, you've got a phone that takes the full credit card sized SIM? Haven't seen one of those for 20 years.
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Nice, I actually had to look up what you meant :D
Guess I mean "regular-sized" ;)
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Not many phones, and the top-tier models don't support multiple SIMs. If you have a nice Galaxy Nexus (for example) and you live in Europe, changing sim cards is extremely common. I own at least 3 sim cards.
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You obviously don't travel. I've changed SIM cards a dozen times in a week when switching between the card I use for home, our corporate office, and my parent's house. For example, AT&T charges $19.97 per Mbyte for data(!!!) at my parent's house. Orange changes about as much at my house as compared to where I work. As I did one day accidentally last month, downloading a 10 Mbyte attachmen cost me nearly $200 since I forgot to switch SIM cards .
On to the real problem with SIM cards, they're horrifica
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How does authorizing a new device work with Verizon? And switching between them? As a mobile software developer I need to switch phones frequently, can I use a different one for each day of the week on the same plan? Would I be able to use a device from a different carrier?
I would much rather something that I have physical access to and can trivially swap out than have to call Verizon and ask them to activate my device....
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It's not the SIM card format that is to blame rather it is your choice of crappy phones. I have had lots of SIM based phones and have only seen the no SIM error once when the phone became damaged. This is over 7 phones and around 14 years of use. I have swapped SIMs plenty of times and it is way better for choice. You can buy a phone and use it rather than beg your carrier to accept it eventually on their network. It's called fredom of choice, something I understand you may not recognise being from the
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I have literally never heard of a malfunctioning SIM card. New (few days old), old (approaching 20 years)... SIM cards are pretty much the most reliable part of a phone.
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For me it's once a week. At least. I travel a lot for work and although you can get multi-SIM phones, most of them are terrible as actual phones (unless your idea of a 'good phone' is similar to a feature phone from circa 2003). I think people prefer to use their regular Android phone or iPhone or whatever.
Having said that, currently I'm using an iPhone and those damn microSIMs are already way to small to manipulate easily with my fat fingers. Especially since I usually do my SIM swaps while sitting on the
Re:Comes with tweezer and magnifying glass (Score:4, Interesting)
Exactly - isn't there a point of diminishing returns? Are the current ones really so huge that it's causing a noticeable impact on costs that these even smaller ones will make a difference?
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Something's very wrong with your iPhone if you are getting only thirty minutes talk time out of it...
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Ridiculous. The difference in size is 0.05ml. That's about 7mAh extra on top of a 1400-1500mAh average battery.
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But the cage and contact pins for the larger SIM also take up room. They redesigned those pieces too. Overall the new design considerably cuts down the space needed. Most importantly it creates more flexibility on internal parts, since the board you mount the contact pins to can be much, much smaller.
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it's more about shrinking them from the view that they are a component in the phone. the smaller they are the more space in the phone for other items.
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Hope all phones that use these come with a tweezer and magnifying glass! This little sucker is gonna be hard to handle! lol
The SIM cards are already too small and hard to handle. They should be made 20 percent larger.
MicroSIM did the job just fine (Score:2)
Christ. JUST as I was getting used to the new MicroSIM format that the iphone4 used. Wasn't that small enough?
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If given the choice between an ever shrinking SIM card versus the alternative of getting on my hands and knees and begging the CDMA provider to allow my handset on their network, I'll take the SIM card.
Say I find a cool phone from overseas. GSM, I can use it here in the US, although I likely will get stuck with EDGE speeds. Overseas, CDMA providers use R/UIM cards (functionally identical to SIM cards). A CDMA provider here in the US would laugh and tell me where to stuff the phone, since they likely woul
Could they have a virtual SIM card? (Score:2)
Ie, some kind of cryptographically signed "key" plus a personal passcode that you could enter into a phone that would serve the same identifying purpose as a SIM?
The signing would ensure that the key was actually issued by a carrier and the personal passcode would make sure someone wasn't hijacking your SIM key.
Of course, you'd have to set the system up so that any 'new' device automatically deactivated any other devices.
Is there any reason the SIM card would have to be physical?
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That way the operator has a somewhat more limited involvement in handset choice.
Re:Could they have a virtual SIM card? (Score:5, Informative)
Is there any reason the SIM card would have to be physical?
Yes. The SIM is a physical container that protects the computer and data inside it. Note that the SIM is actually a complete computer, not just a hunk of flash memory. When you access the SIM, the security sensitive stuff never actually leaves the SIM card. You don't have any actual access to the security sensitive stuff - the little computer inside the SIM accesses it on your behalf. If it were a software solution (virtual), you would have direct access (via a debugger or similar) to the security sensitive stuff (private keys). Since it is a very physically small hardware solution, you would have to physically disassemble it and hook up microscopic probes to the computer inside, which is very difficult.
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In other news... (Score:2)
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That's like asking why we didn't go with 13 amp electrical flex for the "standard" tow rope used by roadside assistance. The two are not similar in function.
Huh? (Score:1)
"Prepared to license the patents?"
Why is any patent licensing required to build to a standard? The standard group should say, "If you want it considered, you will give up royalties for any related patents."
Also, how is "smaller but more of the same" even patentable?
How much plastic to cut off? (Score:3)
With all the arguing you'd think there was more at stake than just how much plastic to cut off the old design.
The Virtual SIM is the way to go, why waste our (Score:1)
1) phone company lock in option (I agree , booooo), but it will be required for adoption
1a) just like phones now, companies can remove that lock after a certain period or the phone can be sold unlocked from the beginning
2) the SIM will be loaded by dongle (USB or proprietary) that has adaptable SIM tray (that handles all 4 standards)
2a) it may seem like a waste, but will allow versatility and 8 out of 10 norma