Snap, crackle, pop. You remember those words from Rice Krispies commercials, right? Well, turns out they apply to calls made from cell phones as well. A new study said that nearly 40% of calls fall below industry minimum standards for voice quality. Is anyone surprised? I hear pins dropping...Cell phones have come a long way since the '80s. Call quality is generally decent, but sometimes -- apparently 40% of the time -- it is not. Ditech Networks studied 630 million calls from 16 different network operators spanning 12 countries, so the sampled data was large.

Here's what Ditech discovered:

• In mature markets like the U.S. and Western Europe, 23% of calls fall below industry minimum • In rapid growth markets like Middle East, India and South America, 59% of calls fall below industry minimum • Ambient noise, or noise originating in the caller's environment and entering the device's microphone, was rated "objectionable" on up to 50% of all calls in some regions • Acoustic echo, often caused by handsets/headsets, was rated "objectionable" on up to 11% of all calls in some regions • Voice level mismatch, or when a caller sounds either too loud or too quiet, was rated "objectionable" on up to 28% of calls in some regions

We've all had calls that sounded bad. Since I test phones for a living, I experience a wide range of good and bad calls. It really is amazing how different a call is from phone to phone, and network to network. Just this morning I was conducting an interview and there was a nasty echo from my end of the line. One of those ghostly things that sounds like you're talking to yourself from across the street.

J. Gerry Purdy, Ph.D., VP and chief analyst for Mobile & Wireless Communications at Frost & Sullivan, weighed in on the results. He said, "Mobile service is about making calls from almost anywhere, and users expect their carrier to deliver acceptable voice quality regardless of where the call is made or what device they're using. Even though these kinds of voice quality problems occur outside the carrier's network, users still blame their carrier and drop their service. By removing the effects of these external impairments, carriers can gain a strong competitive advantage."

His point is clear. Cell phones are first and foremost about providing voice services. It won't matter how well a cell phone browses the Web, organizes your contacts, or plays backgammon if it can't make decent phone calls.