TECH LAB
4G phone will quickly change things
By Hiawatha Bray, Globe Staff | May 27, 2010
BALTIMORE - I'm only here for the day. No time to dine on soft-shell crab; barely enough for a glance at Camden Yards, where the Orioles play baseball. I'm a digital tourist, here mainly to stare at a glowing LCD screen.
Still, I'm enjoying the tiny view; Web pages and Internet videos downloaded at amazing speed by a device that fits into a shirt pocket, lets me shoot high-definition videos, and can still be used to call the folks back home.
It's called the EVO 4G, and it's our first glimpse at the next big thing in smartphones. When cellular carrier Sprint Nextel Corp. begins selling the EVO on June 4, it will be America's first 4G cellphone, capable of far greater speed than the 3G iPhones and BlackBerries we have come to love.
But why fly 360 miles to check it out? Because Boston doesn't have a working 4G network yet. Baltimore is one of about two dozen US cities where you can find one. Sprint says it's building more 4G coverage as fast as it can; Boston is on the list for sometime this year.
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