4 ms·

One thing I really appreciate about Suica is the low latency. You can tap while walking quickly and not have to slow down to get through the ticket gate. Compar

by hinoki 3y ago

One thing I really appreciate about Suica is the low latency. You can tap while walking quickly and not have to slow down to get through the ticket gate. Compared with e.g. London, where you have to almost stop because the gates take so long to open, it really makes it easy for a trainload of people to get out of a station. The name is also a bad pun; Sui-sui is onomatopoeia for smooth movement (like fish swimming), so it’s the card for moving smoothly. Also, suica means watermelon so the card is green.

bamboozled 3y ago
So I purchased an Apple watch and I was really excited to have contactless payments...it's fucking awkward with Mastercard or Visa to be standing there with your arm twisted in a strange way waiting for the payment to be approved. Kind of always seems like it's not going to work and people always have to make some type of joke to make you feel less weird about it. Suica is also available on the watch and it's much better? Why is that?
- makeitdouble 3y ago
  No network component whatsoever for Suica/Felica (or perhaps after the transaction ?), where I assume Apple Pay validate realtime the transaction.
  - manuelabeledo 3y ago
    Suica defaults to express/transit mode in Apple Pay/Wallet. Using it in your phone is as quick as using a physical card. Express mode can be configured with plenty of other cards as well, even regular credit cards. That's how it works in London. The difference in speed is because of the gates, not the payment system.
    - aikinai 3y ago
      It’s not just the gates; FeliCa is 100–200ms, much faster than all the other tap payment protocols.
      - manuelabeledo 3y ago
        That has nothing to do with the technology in the IC card. In terms of real life use, a Suica card in Apple Wallet is indistinguishable from a physical Suica card. Suica itself isn't that much different from any other prepaid transit card, so I don't get the hype. This is some early 2000s technology. Personally, I see no difference in speed when paying with either an Oyster card (London), an EZCard (Taiwan), a Suica Card, or any Apple Wallet card in transit mode.
        aikinai 3y ago
        Have other protocols somehow updated and made this chart[0] obsolete? [0] https://atadistance.net/2020/06/13/transit-gate-evolution-why-gate-speed-matters/ https://atadistance.net/2020/06/13/transit-gate-evolution-wh...
        manuelabeledo 3y ago
        I think you overestimate the advantage 100ms, tops, has in the real world. Also, NFC-F is supported in many phones already. Suica cards have no advantage over a phone wallet in terms of speed. To answer your question, yes, newer (2020s) Mifare based cards are faster than FeliCa ones.
        makeitdouble 3y ago
        the 100-200ms is a big deal, and it's not some random spec, JR made it a binding requirement to use their system after real world evaluation of the latency impact. So yes, Felica is also sub 200ms for that part. As a user, there's so much going on when touching a card at rush hour for instance, getting virtually no perceivable latency helps us to focus on the rest (distance, angle, check the screen, distance with the person ahead). As you point out in other comment, of course the design of the whole gate comes into play to help the user deal with it. It reminds me of the microsoft study on how low the latency has to be to become transparent to the user. Except JR actually cared about their results.
        3y ago
- solidsnack9000 3y ago
  Suica is a stored value card, so you don't have to do an online balance check to validate a transaction. There is also probably a practical element to it, in that Suica and other IC cards are managed by entities that are closely linked to the various train systems in Japan. The terminals are known to them, the cards were all issued by them; they can probably preload a lot of stuff at all the train stations and keep the data regarding the cards synced directly among the stations. (It's at least feasible that by the time you get to the next station, 90% of the time, the information about your card is already there.) This is in contrast to what would happen if you used Mastercard or Visa to pay for train fares, where all the data would first have to go to northern Virginia...

by hinoki 3y ago

bamboozled 3y ago

So I purchased an Apple watch and I was really excited to have contactless payments...it's fucking awkward with Mastercard or Visa to be standing there with your arm twisted in a strange way waiting for the payment to be approved. Kind of always seems like it's not going to work and people always have to make some type of joke to make you feel less weird about it. Suica is also available on the watch and it's much better? Why is that?

makeitdouble 3y ago
No network component whatsoever for Suica/Felica (or perhaps after the transaction ?), where I assume Apple Pay validate realtime the transaction.
- manuelabeledo 3y ago
  Suica defaults to express/transit mode in Apple Pay/Wallet. Using it in your phone is as quick as using a physical card. Express mode can be configured with plenty of other cards as well, even regular credit cards. That's how it works in London. The difference in speed is because of the gates, not the payment system.
  - aikinai 3y ago
    It’s not just the gates; FeliCa is 100–200ms, much faster than all the other tap payment protocols.
    - manuelabeledo 3y ago
      That has nothing to do with the technology in the IC card. In terms of real life use, a Suica card in Apple Wallet is indistinguishable from a physical Suica card. Suica itself isn't that much different from any other prepaid transit card, so I don't get the hype. This is some early 2000s technology. Personally, I see no difference in speed when paying with either an Oyster card (London), an EZCard (Taiwan), a Suica Card, or any Apple Wallet card in transit mode.
      - aikinai 3y ago
        Have other protocols somehow updated and made this chart[0] obsolete? [0] https://atadistance.net/2020/06/13/transit-gate-evolution-why-gate-speed-matters/ https://atadistance.net/2020/06/13/transit-gate-evolution-wh...
        manuelabeledo 3y ago
        I think you overestimate the advantage 100ms, tops, has in the real world. Also, NFC-F is supported in many phones already. Suica cards have no advantage over a phone wallet in terms of speed. To answer your question, yes, newer (2020s) Mifare based cards are faster than FeliCa ones.
        makeitdouble 3y ago
        the 100-200ms is a big deal, and it's not some random spec, JR made it a binding requirement to use their system after real world evaluation of the latency impact. So yes, Felica is also sub 200ms for that part. As a user, there's so much going on when touching a card at rush hour for instance, getting virtually no perceivable latency helps us to focus on the rest (distance, angle, check the screen, distance with the person ahead). As you point out in other comment, of course the design of the whole gate comes into play to help the user deal with it. It reminds me of the microsoft study on how low the latency has to be to become transparent to the user. Except JR actually cared about their results.
      - 3y ago
solidsnack9000 3y ago
Suica is a stored value card, so you don't have to do an online balance check to validate a transaction. There is also probably a practical element to it, in that Suica and other IC cards are managed by entities that are closely linked to the various train systems in Japan. The terminals are known to them, the cards were all issued by them; they can probably preload a lot of stuff at all the train stations and keep the data regarding the cards synced directly among the stations. (It's at least feasible that by the time you get to the next station, 90% of the time, the information about your card is already there.) This is in contrast to what would happen if you used Mastercard or Visa to pay for train fares, where all the data would first have to go to northern Virginia...