ANACOM has released its latest report evaluating the quality of mobile voice services, video-telephone services and GSM and WCDMA network coverage provided by the operators Optimus, TMN and Vodafone Portugal on Porto’s urban rail network, specifically on the Aveiro, Braga, Caíde and Guimarães lines. Field measurements for the report were taken from 2 to 11 March 2011.
The evaluation is based on the analysis of technical parameters which reflect the perception of quality from a consumer point of view. Specifically, six indicators were measured: network coverage; service accessibility; time taken to establish calls; call termination rate; call audio quality; call video quality.
According to ANACOM’s evaluation, while the mobile communication systems analysed in this study are found to have good voice service accessibility, difficulties were reported in maintaining calls, with a significant number of calls being cut off unexpectedly in mid-conversation.
In contrast, the accessibility of the video-telephone service was found to be poor. However the capacity of the networks to maintain video-telephone calls was in line with the voice service. As a result, the overall performance of this service may be considered acceptable.
As far as the networks are concerned, it was found that the GSM networks generally provided good radio coverage, whereas coverage by the WCDMA (UMTS) networks was more limited, and some areas were found with poor or even non-existent coverage.
