There's an interesting side issue at play this week as Apple launches its 3G iPhone: Is this bit of extra bandwidth really worth it?

It's an odd question, given the history of networking. When has higher bandwidth ever been viewed as anything but a slam-dunk? From dial-up to DSL, from DSL to FiOS and beyond, faster equals better.

Yet there's a bit of an undercurrent that the EDGE service supporting the iPhone 1.0 was probably sufficient, at least for core uses such as e-mail — especially when augmented by Wi-Fi — and that 3G, offering from two to five times more speed, may not be worth the extra $10 per month that AT&T is charging.

What this debate boils down to is whether 3G is really enough of a data bump to change how we use our smartphones.

From my own personal experience, I first used a Blackberry on the relatively low-speed T-Mobile data network. The price was very right, and for e-mail and text-messaging–driven instant messaging, the network gave me everything I needed. But that's all I used the device for — e-mail and IM. I tried to do a bit with RSS feeds but found it a pain, and I completely ignored the Web browser, which was essentially unusable.

Today, I use a Windows Mobile Treo on Verizon Wireless. E-mail is again completely usable (more usable? I don't think so) but I also tend to do some Web browsing, or more accurately, I use a handful of Web services such as Gmail and Google Reader using the Windows Mobile Web browser. I've downloaded every other browser on the market, and while their pan-and-scan features are cool, surfing the "tiny Web" using mid-band network speeds just isn't that useful or interesting or something I do except on rare occasion.

So if I judge by my own experience, moving from low- to mid-band wireless data resulted in a minor bump in usability, but not a huge one. A few services opened up to me, but it's important to note that those services were well-designed to work over the available bandwidth, which is just as important as the raw bandwidth available. Did I start doing everything I do on my desktop: listen to podcasts, watch videos, use AJAX-heavy Web sites and more? No. Would I want to go back to pre-3G? No as well. Once you get a taste of bandwidth, you always want more.

Which just leaves me — and other users, maybe even those with the new 3G iPhones — waiting and wishing for the even greater bandwidth offered by WiMAX and 4G.

What do you think? Are you happy with a 2G-fueled Blackberry? Looking to move to 3G? Or waiting for full broadband to the phone? Let us know what you think — and what you believe represents the true mobile bandwidth tipping point.

E-mail me at rkarpinski@telephonyonline.com.