Cellular network providers have been touting their new technology for over a year now, including promoting the fact that they are first to provide 5G service in the country. The question is, how much of what is being said about 5G is accurate and how much of it is marketing hype? I plan to address the facts of 5G in this week’s article and let the reader decide.
First of all there are three different types of 5G being built in the U.S., including low-band, mid-band, and high-band mmWave implementations. The term mmWave refers to the radio frequency band between 30 Ghz and 300 GHz, which falls right in the middle of microwave signals. This radio frequency band is used primarily for satellite communications and infrared signals used for short distance communications like your TV remote control. This frequency band provides a solid carrier signal for high speed internet communications, but the frequency is too high to carry audio signals.
The first technology, which provides the fastest service, is the high-band 5G adopted primarily by AT&T and Verizon, with a few market areas from T-Mobile. This technology is about ten times faster than the current 4G technology in widespread use today. It also has very low latency, which means the message gets sent nearly instantaneously, but the downfall is that for the maximum speed out of the network, you have to be standing very near a cellular tower. In the best case scenario, you could download a standard definition full length movie in 32 seconds, compared to over five minutes on today’s networks. However, you would have to be within 80 feet of a tower to achieve those transfer speeds.
The mid-band technology in use by Sprint is about six times faster than 4G; it has a longer range than high-band 5G but is still much smaller than 4G. What this means is that there will need to be nearly twice as many towers installed to provide 5G service to all the same areas that receive 4G today, increasing the overall power consumption of cellular providers.
The low-band 5G in use by T-Mobile and AT&T only achieves 20 percent performance increase over 4G technologies. The low-band solution has nearly the same coverage area as 4G per tower, making the expense of rolling out low-band 5G much less expensive. This is likely the type of 5G networks we will see in our area.
Secondly, you cannot purchase a phone today that will support all three technologies, so your awesome new 5G cellular phone is likely to only work on your provider’s towers at 5G speeds and prevent data roaming due to incompatibilities in the technologies. This turns out to be a problem not only for you as an end user of the technology, but also for the providers of the technology. The only way to keep compatibility for roaming is to keep 4G transmitters and receivers in operation, increasing the cost of both the provider gear and consumer cellular phones.
Lastly, every provider has their own approach to providing 5G services, using a mix of technologies. This creates problems both for companies in regards to data roaming and for end users in regards to being locked in to not only a provider, but also a geographical area.
T-Mobile has a nationwide low-band 5G network and a smaller but much faster high-band 5G network in six major U.S. cities. There currently is only one phone that works on the high-band network, and it will not work on the low-band network. The two phones they release for low-band also will not work on the high-band network, so their service is localized based on the 5G phone model that you own.
Sprint is in the process of building their mid-band network in parts of nine U.S. cities. You are stuck with a limited choice of four devices that will operate on their network, one data device and three phones.
AT&T has low-band networks in 20 markets for “consumers” and high-band networks in small areas of 35 markets focused primarily on providing service to businesses. AT&T currently sells only two phone models and a single wifi hotspot device that can utilize this new network. AT&T is claiming to offer 5G today in all markets, but is actually just upgrading its existing 4G networks.
Verizon is working on building out the largest high-band 5G network. It is currently providing service in 40 markets, but you need to be within 80 feet of a tower to get a 5G connection, and they charge extra for 5G access.
I guess ultimately what I am saying is that 5G is currently a mess for consumers, leaving us somewhat in the dark as to the best choices for future cellular phones and plans. Both Samsung and Apple have planned releases as early as February 11, 2020, that are expected to support all three network types and configuration. These new 5G phones will solve a lot of the consumer based issues with 5G, and we can expect wireless network speed to improve drastically in the coming months.
No comments:
Post a Comment