So, 4G then……

I’ve no opinion on this, i’m just wondering what the general feeling is.

T-Mobile/Orange are making a statement re a new brand and apparently the launch of 4G on the 11th and Apple (apparently) announce the i-phone 5 (also apparently a 4G/LTE device) on the 12th.

Soooooo, we may well be looking at an Everything Everywhere monopoly on 4G devices (whatever they may turn out to be)and possibly an exclusive on the i-phone 5 or at least an exclusive on 4G capable i-phone 5’s.

I also wonder whether there are real economic benefits. If 4G can give realistic 8-10 mbps then in a lot of cases that’s going to be faster than current fixed broadband speeds. I know the 4G trial in Cornwall that EE did meant that businesses and individuals had access to high speed connections for, in many cases, the first time.

Thoughts?

Will the iphone work on the EE 4g network following all the fun of the last ipad etc.

Unless the legal challenge from everyone else stops them switching it on EE will have the monopoly for an estimated 4-6months.

If speeds can be sustained for high demand then I would be more interested in having a 4g dongle/data package in rural areas than a phone right now.

Over here in Oz we are switching on the 4g soon and there is a 4g S3 coming out to coincide with it.

We’re already (in parts of the UK) negotiating contracts to replace DSL with 4G. We have one site in what is renowned for being one of the worst reception areas in Britain, getting 20Mb on a normal day already on 4G.

EE are using some of their combined network to allow this to happen, so I’m not sure how anyone could stop them. As far as everyone else is concerned, the auction for 4G frequencies doesn’t take place until next year, so God knows whenO2 customers like me might see a benefit. Probably when I upgrade my iP5 to an iP6, skipping the iP5s like I did the 3Gs and the 4s… 😆

Telefonica, who own O2, are thought to be threatening to take legal action to try and reverse OFCOM’s decision to allow Everything Everywhere to offer 4G LTE in the UK before the 4G auctions take place next year.

Link
They are upset that EE will get to go first and not have to buy spectrum at the auction which could be vastly expensive among other things

I do think 4G will take off in more rural areas and similar to 3G will suffer from saturation in the cities.

WiMax is still up and coming and doesn’t seem to have taken hold in the Uk but I can see it becoming more popular in metropolitan areas for the likes of O2 instead of having loads of hotspots around.

“Will the iphone work on the EE 4g network following all the fun of the last ipad etc.”

Just come back from Canada and there you can buy an iPhone 4G as well as the 4S.

The 4G out in canada doesn’t do true 4G speeds. My Iphone 4S out here in the states shows 4G as a connection speed but it doesn’t actually do the speeds. 🙁

there are also rumours that it might kill freeview as it operates in the same sort of wavebands.

there are also rumours that it might kill freeview as it operates in the same sort of wavebands.

I heard it fries chickens

I like fried chicken.

I love fried chicken

We’ll if it kills off KFC as we’ll then that isn’t a bad thing!

What I want to know, is that should I take tmobiles offer of a 4s upgrade which is free handset yet £36 a month, or await an iPhone 5? I have wifi at home and the office do my 4g use may be limited….

Either seem hard to swallow vs my current 3GS for £17 a month….

there are also rumours that it might kill freeview as it operates in the same sort of wavebands.

Yup, this is a real possibility..

So they are claiming this will be a boost in rural areas where broadband speeds are very slow, like where I am (~750mb).

But will 4G somehow be able to achieve better mobile signals than what is available at the moment?
I’d love to have a faster connection, but we don’t have mobile signal here at all – on any network.

Currently using Vodafone simply because of the suresignal.

What will the 4G data speed settle down to? I can already get 13Mb fairly consistently on Three, buy the in building signal quality its not great due to the frequency they use

It was intended that in the UK 4G (LTE) would use a different frequency to 3G and 2G, with the best being at about 800MHz where non digital TV used to sit. EE have upset the market some what by being given permission to roll it out at 1800MHz (used for 2G currently but EE have a ton of 2G spectrum already).

As far as better reception goes, that will depend on where the base stations are – probably on existing masts as it’s a ball ache to get planning to shove more up. That said it’s a basic rule of physics that says for a given signal strength a lower frequency will propogate better through ‘stuff’ (e.g. a house or building) than a high frequency. That means that 1800MHz 4G should be a bit better at indoors than 2600MHz 3G but not as good as 800MHz 4G.

All of this talk of replacing home broadband with 4G is basically tosh tho (at least in the short term) – that would require that the base stations have a lot of what is referred to as ‘backhaul’ (the connection from the base station into the ‘core’ network and then onto the internet proper). For places out in the sticks this is normally done via microwave dishes which in general don’t have a enough bandwidth to allow every tom dick and harry to sit on the net all day streaming dr who. This is why mobile data contracts still have data caps (even if they say they don’t) and why the data is sometimes traffic managed (e.g. bit torrent is given lower priority).

So whilst in theory you can use 4G LTE to provide broadband to rural areas (e.g. this is done in Aus and a bit in germany) it won’t be broadband in the normal sense of the word (i.e. like Virgin 30mbs service) as you’ll zip through the data allowance in 30 minutes if you get a quick connection.

On the other points, whilst the next iphone might support 4g in principal there is no guarentee that it’ll support UK 4g – the biggest market is the states and IIRC they’re operating at 700MHz for LTE. They’d need to add in a fancy multi band antenna and other bits of kit that will drain the battery and not be cheap – the market in the UK is non existant and even combined with aus and europe it’s probably still not compelling. You never know tho…

FYI 4G in Canada is normally what we would call 3G (HSPDA+ variant) which can actually go quite quick if set up correctly (like 24MBs in practice). Various telcos round the world argue that since this is as fast as some installs of proper 4g (i.e. LTE) that it’s not a marketing trick to sell it as 4G….

Edit: Apologies for the essay! Guess what I do!

We get the HSPDA+ in Oz and It’s great where you get it. The Point about frequency is fair too as our UK phones will only pick up the fast signal on Telstra and can’t pick up the other networks. We also have the I-blah claiming then not working on the 4g stuff.

Ewan, great post

I’m not really bothered by the 4G stuff just yet. I think it’ll be a similar scene to the propagation of 3G here in the UK … i.e. it’ll take a good few years.

Its really only in the last 12 months that 3G ahs become a reliable signal with a decent coverage for O2 in my area. OK, three is better, but even still.

And at that, 3G speeds are more than enough for my needs personally when on the go.

I was going to write a long comment from an industry point of view, but Ewan beat me to it.

4G is a very misused term – there are official definitions (ITU/GSMA?) as to what can be called “4G” but they are widely ignored. According to these LTE isn’t 4G – but LTE Advanced is.

4G coverage will be limited at the start, and HSDPA+ gives very good download speeds already. 4G does give a leap in upload speeds, and latency is much better.

Considering we’re still waiting for 3G to arrive here in the rural South Lakes (which is something in the order of 7-8 years since 3G services started if my quick googling is accurate), i’m not going to start worrying about 4G.

Don’t get 3g here in North Devon, also have you seen the price of data on O2? If 4G is alot cheaper I’d like to know why!

I assume i’m not the only one to have noted that the new iPhone 5 won’t work on the 4g spectrum of the other networks?

(http://www.apple.com/iphone/LTE/ reveals that the model on sale in the UK will be support LTE bands 1 (2100MHz), 2 (1800MHz) and 5 (850MHz).

The auction bands are going to be at 800MHz (and not at 850MHz) and 2600MHz, so the iphone 5 isn’t going to work with anyone elses network (unless they’re just rebranding EEs network)…

Aye:

EE screams UK iPhone 4G exclusive, rest of pack sobs quietly
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/09/13/4g_iphone/