and so unix marches on, point man Tux at the front.

That is all.

I'm not sure, is there any actual definition?

1G->2G was pretty definite, 1G was analog and essentially had no data services (you could use a modem with some but it was reliant on not having too much "hiss" in the call.)

2G->3G is ALREADY fuzzy. Originally 3G was defined as >=128kbps. CDMA 1X reached this speed (144kbps) but didn't really enable much over conventional "2G" technologies, both due to still having high latency (250ms+ ping times) and, well, just not enough speed EDGE also met the 3G original definition and is usually considered 2.5G. Some said then that 3G meant 384kbps or more. Is UMTS alone (without HSDPA and HSUPA) 3G? Maybe. (UMTS alone is 384kbps, HSDPA boosts download speeds and HSUPA upload speeds, to multimegabit per second speeds.)

Now you've got 3.5G and 4G, I haven't heard any hard number on what 4G is even considered to be.. I'm thinking LTE will be considered 4G, but who knows? Maybe it won't excite people over what HSDPA/HSUPA and EVDO Rev A already do and it'll be demoted to some fraction again, 3.5G or something. I view WiMax similarly. If deployments are way faster than existing networks I guess I"d call it 4G, if they aren't (under actual customer load, not in the lab...) then it'll be demoted to some 3.5G label.

To be honest, I have a EVDO Rev 0 (slower than the current Rev A) aircard with Verizon, I can stream youtube and do whatever no problem with it.. I'm interested in a loosening of the 5GB cap, but no so much in some additional speed I can get, it's already fast enough. 4G doesn't excite me. LTE does a bit, strictly because here in the US both the big CDMA and GSM providers plan to roll out LTE, ending the situation now where GSM and CDMA networks don't have cross-roaming agreements since they are technically incompatible*.

I'm not sure WiMax fits in the "G" scheme of things though -- it's coming from the IT side rather than the telecom side. I'm not sure if anyone plans a WiMax cell phone, certainly you could make a VOIP phone for it but it seems much more data-centric. (LTE is apparently also essentially a data carrier with VOIP for voice calls though, so it's certainly a possibility.) Sprint's rolling out a bit of Wimax, but I think at present it's strictly data, and all cellphone traffic uses the CDMA1X+EVDO network.

*2 exceptions to this technical incompatibility: 1) A few companies like Alltel run CDMA and GSM in parallel, CDMA for their own users + CDMA roamers, GSM roamer-only... out in the western desert Alltel's often the only network available so they decided to make the most of it. 2) At least 1 channel of analog coverage had to be maintained by every cell company in the 850mhz band until Feb 2008, so CDMA users could use a CDMA+analog phones to get analog roaming (and technically still can for a handful of networks that just didn't spend haven't spent the manpower to go around and shut the analog off.)