Mobile networks are killing Wi-Fi for speed around the world Ofcom's top tech bod, Mansoor Hanif, recently gave the Wi-Fi industry a roasting, telling them to shape up to 5G or face sliding into irrelevance. New network data from around the world shows that slide has already begun. OpenSignal has found that mobile networks already outpace a customer's Wi-Fi connection, on average, in 33 …
You just described the entire State of Vermont. Which also lacks decent broadband & landlines. (Most of the State can only get DSL.)
Phones should automatically monitor the quality of all connection types they can access at a given moment, and have user settings to (1) go with the best one, (2) go with the best free one, or (3) go with a specific one.
In UK, the original Analogue cellular networks from the 80's were backronymed to 1G when Digital GSM was introduced as 2G in around 1992/3. GSM was digital duplex voice-only.
GPRS was added to that around 99/2000 to include data, but throughput was very variable maxing out at around 9KB/s in real world .
EDGE (EGPRS) was 2.5G (a data speed improvement over GPRS which boosted data to around 24-30KB/s) before the 3G (UMTS) explosion in 2003 through Orange and Three.
GPRS was added to that around 99/2000 to include data, but throughput was very variable maxing out at around 9KB/s in real world
You're close. GSM would support data (did on my old 8210), but at 9600bps. GPRS would go up to 45kbps. Given the dial-up alternatives it wasn't awful. I believe it gets about 115kbps these days, but that's still awful for modern web pages...
@ drgeoff
I hear you, but there are situations where a phone will hold onto a WiFi signal so weak that web pages won't load, so I have to switch it off to force it onto a strong 4G signal.
What costs me money is forgetting to switch WiFi back on again later.
What would be handy would a 'disable WiFi for 20 minutes' button.
"
Expanding 3G? Please. Here in the US of A, I can take you to several places where there is not 1G service. And every carrier has large areas without 1G service. Why are we bothering with 5G when the providers still haven't gotten 1G right?"
It is right - it's making them money - if you live in a not spot then that's your problem, not the operators.
While I broadly agree that carriers need to provide full coverage with a basic service, 1G, 2G and 2.5G all need to be killed off. It must be possible to provide full 3G coverage for both voice and data everywhere now?
In the UK, on Three on my personal phone, when I have a signal it is 3G and the voice quality is great, when I don't I have no service (that happens too often). On my work phone (O2), it frequently "drops back" to horrible quality on 2.5G or 2G in an attempt to keep connected.
Home broadband is predictable. LTE data isn't. Yes, you might stumble upon an urban location where high 3g/4g speeds are available. Perhaps in the middle of a car park, in a half empty business estate, after 6 pm. On one such UK location, I measured LTE upload speeds faster than my home broadband. A novelty but not all that useful.
In places where you actually spend time, so do other subscribers, and the rate drops.
flawed in so many ways that its completely meaningless
3G / LTE data is proxyed/altered ALL of the time while Wifi data only some of the time by the upstream provider e.g. DNS requests
interesting that opensignal earn money publishing it for the 3G/LTE providers though...
wifi - overshared - cheap ad ridden proxies - poor deployments at scale, can however create a private network and secure it yourself
5g - expensive - crap back haul moving bottleneck back but not eliminating it. - cant create a private network with it, security based on provider trust only.
I'm sorry I don't think 5g is in a position to start roasting yet, particularly while it remains the preserve of telco's
My unmetered 3g/4g is cheaper than my unmetered WiFi and much faster and more convenient.
However WiFi is available for everyone in the house, including guests, and all wifi devices, my SIM is locked into my phone. Now I could create a wifi hotspot, but that would require me to always have my phone in the house, at which time it becomes unpractical.
I could install a 4G -> wifi router but then the economics start to dissolve, with all connections being metered. Using a spare phone as a wifi hotspot permanently doesn't have the range of good mimo router and is probably beyond the fair use policy.
The main reason for using WiFi at home is that it uses your home broadband connection to get to the internet instead of your phone's data plan. For many folks that costs a whole lot less - e.g. almost unlimited at no extra cost for home broadband, versus limited and expensive for phone data.
Away from home it'll depend on any costs to ride on someone else's WiFi, but I expect it'll still be cheaper than phone data on many plans.
This is the case for me, and I expect for lots of other folks too.
I have data permanently off on my phone.
I use WiFi on it (late when laptop shut down) or if relative / friend /office.
That's free.
Also 10 to 50 times faster.
The peak speed of a cell is not the speed users get in busy periods in an economically used mast.
Ofcom are a lobbyist for mobile companies (see their submission about roaming charges during consultation) and like Comreg get most of their income from Mobile operators. It's nonsense.
My home broadband is a 4G connection (not via the 'phone, though I have that as emergency backup since it's on a different network). Cost is rather less than fixed line phone+broadband or a virgin cable Heisenconnection.
I shall await with interest what deals appear for 5G, and whether it becomes as ubiquitous in 'puters as wifi is today.
1) buy Android phone that does "mobile hotspot"
2) buy Three mobile payg sim.
3) buy 35-quid unlimited data + calls bundle for three mobile
That's it really, I browse - ssh, do various Linux tasks, watch iplayer, netflix etc.
I can only offer the complaint that when using the telephony ability of the handset, the wifi throughput tends to degrade to the point of unusablity.
An oft overlooked benefit of this approach is entirely battery powered nature of the endeavour.
@sed gawk - I used to run my home broadband like this from a Samsung S4mini, but with the data usage I had while working from home and the phone being plugged in to charger all the time, I went through one battery every nine months! They expanded to the point of near explosion (hence icon) and popped the back of the phone casing off!
Also, range was pants. In the study it was fine, but more than one room away and there was no WiFi. I had Netgear 13-amp plug range extenders, but so many problems.
The speed was great on Three 3G (8.5 mbps down, 1.6 mbps up) when the village was on pre-FTTC ADSL (at dial-up speeds) until end of 2016. Since FTTC, it's been a no-brainer to go to a "proper" home broadband package and internal WiFi coverage is rock solid.
>does that three sim have a acceptable use limit?
Go check the price plans - Three has a SIM only deal for £27 with unlimited data, which includes tethering (aka personal hotspot)
However, if you move fast Three are offering an Unlimited Data/Minutes/Texts SIM for £20pm as a Black Friday deal. In theory you should be able to drop that SIM into your MiFi.
@Danny14
I've watched an entire boxset on it over an month without problems, YMMV but I think that I could saturated the bandwidth all month with only speed throttles as penalty.
I don't feel short changed, I still prefer good old wired connectivity but TV is the only time I miss a fixed line connection, and a quick ssh tunnel through a server with a fixed connection provides a decent enough buffer that it's perfectly fine for watching e.g. IPlayer etc.
>1) buy Android phone that does "mobile hotspot"
This approach works when you only need to connect a few devices (typically up to 4) and they all effectively reside within your own personal cloud (ie. within circa 6m of the phone).
Back in circa 2006, the poor mobile signal meant I had to put an external antenna on the roof, which in turn meant sourcing 3G dongles that supported an external antenna.
Interestingly, whilst I have upgraded to FTTC, The 'ancient' Three system is still my DR option, as whilst its headline connection speed is significantly less than what my EE 4G handset claims it is getting, when it comes to reliably downloading stuff it outperforms the EE connection; but then that was to be expected, EE upgraded the local mast with 4G radio's, but it continued to use the 1Mbps backhaul...
Was staggered how fast a 4G connection is at St Pancras station, massively beats my home WiFi/router/BTcopper-cos-sod-you-Sir. A fair bit slower in most provincial towns, but still comparable.
Home 4G is a bit weak and consequently stutters/cuts out a lot, so can't really judge its native speed.
Seriously considering giving myself a 4G through-the-wall thingy for Christmas. If I scrap my copper archaeology it'll pay for itself in a couple of years at most.
> Built a new house on established plot. Telco wanted 4000AUD to dig a new cable across the road to my kerb. I said f'dat, bought a 4G modem and never looked back.
In the UK, at least, when you build a new home BT Openreach *have* to subsidise your copper connection up to £3,000, so all you then pay is their "new connection fee" of <£200 (I don't know what it is, as when I attempted this, BTOpenreach couldn't pull it's finger out despite 3 months+ notice and 2 missed appointments, so I got FTTP from another supplier instead)
"Wifi offers smartphone users a faster experience in countries where fixed networks are relatively strong"
So what is being measured here isn't "WiFi" v. 4G but something quite different.
Once you start questioning the findings, you very rapidly realise this report has been written by someone with an LTE/4G agenda.
Now perhaps Mansoor Hanif will do the honest thing and instead of giving yet more spectrum over to the mobile operators and make it free access...
Yes, let's have fibre to the premises and then Mobile will be x2 to x5 faster for those users that actually are not in a premises compared to today.
Mobile is SHARED spectrum and is massively slower when it has users that could be using WiFi connected to VDSL, Fibre, Cable (HFC). Let's not have fake comparisons with a WiFi point on the end of 3km of aluminium twisted pair in Milton Keynes!
>Let's not have fake comparisons with a WiFi point on the end of 3km of aluminium twisted pair
Agree, however, it is valid to do the comparison in countries without a well developed fixed infrastructure ie. those who are effectively going from zero directly to mobile with wireless backhaul - where wireless is not the same as WiFi. But this approach probably doesn't provide the OTT soundbites that the hype merchants like.
True, but every bit of bandwidth is shared regardless of the medium and to varying degrees.
BT used to have a contention of 50:1 on the ADSL product - not sure what it is now or what it is on different products but probably a lot less. At various points you'll get contention on any connection.
BT used to have a contention of 50:1 on the ADSL product - not sure what it is now or what it is on different products but probably a lot less
There is no longer a fixed ratio. Hasn't been since ADSL Max was launched because it becomes impractical when different customers on the same product can have different maximum speeds. These days providers manage capacity according to whatever performance/end-user experience they are targeting. Cheaper ISPs tolerate/allow more congestion than the expensive ones.
But basically it comes down 'If a link is not performing adequately then upgrade it'. The difference between ISPs is how they define 'performing adequately' ;)
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