Testing the Usability of the HSPA Wireless Broadband in the Middle East: Jordan and Saudi Arabia as Case Studies

The number of Wireless Internet Broadband users in the Middle East was emerged due to the advances of Mobile technologies. For example, 3.5G (beyond third generation) provides very advanced services such as high wireless internet speed and good quality video/voice telephone calls. In developing countries, this service is still at the initial phase. There are still some obstacles facing people of these countries to use this new service. This paper provides an overview about 3.5G in these countries: Jordan and Saudi Arabia as case studies. It also discusses people’s expectations about this service via conducting a questionnaire targeted Internet users. The paper also presents a network assessment experimental test carried out to evaluate the network usability and QoS at selected places of the area where this service is provided. The test was performed on three main network performance metrics: throughput, delay and packet loss. The results showed that the QoS of the network is irregular i.e. it is acceptable at some locations, whereas it is poor at other locations.