T-Mobile readies 3G for Dream's arrival

Today T-Mobile announced that its 3G network will be available by mid-October, roughly the same time the HTC Dream Android phone is expected to go on sale.

T-Mobile will be premiering the world's first Android phone in just five days; the 3G device is presently without an official sale date and price. Unofficial reports have placed availability between October 13 and October 21, and though today's announcement from T-Mobile does not provide any further information on dates, its "mid-October" availability of 3G services is in keeping with that timetable.

Twenty-seven major US markets will have T-Mobile 3G by the end of the year, the company said today, and expansion will continue through 2009. Work on the network began in 2006.

Deployment is currently complete in Austin, Baltimore, Boston, Dallas, Houston, Las Vegas, Miami, Minneapolis, and the New York metropolitan area, just short of the 20 that were expected in the spring, but the German mobile carrier says that Atlanta, Chicago, Los Angeles, Orlando, Philadelphia, Sacramento, San Francisco, and Seattle will be switched on in October.

A further six markets -- Birmingham, Denver, Detroit, Kansas City, Memphis, and Tampa -- are expected to be receive UMTS/HSDPA connectivity before 2009.