[Thine Wonk]

Interesting, I don't think they are saying they aren't going to bid in the auction, just that they see 3G being around for a while yet and that now they have guaranteed spectrum they will plan to launch in Sept 2013 and there's less pressure on the outcome of the auction.

http://www.zdnet.com/three-uk-in-no-...te-7000007459/

Getting ready for 4G
Despite this 3G push, Dyson is pleased that Three succeeded in buying the 1800MHz spectrum from EE, ahead of next year's spectrum auction.
"If we hadn't got that spectrum, we’d have been going into the [4G] auction a bit blind in terms of what the outcome would be," he said . "Therefore our technical planning would be on hold until we knew what spectrum we would get."

"Because we are now assured that we will get the 1800MHz, we can start to develop our rollout plans around a specific frequency, which means we're getting ahead of the game now."

The company already has initial planning and work underway on the 4G network.

"We've already started to build our core network," Dyson noted. "We've got a test network in Maidenhead running on LTE. By the time we get access to the spectrum on 1800MHz, we will be able to give ourselves enough breathing space to put the kit in the ground."

The need for faster network speeds comes from the rising use of data by mobile device owners. Around 85 percent of Three's customers are smartphone owners, and monthly data usage per customer in October was just under 2.5GB, said Richard Woodward, chief financial officer at Three.

In total, more than nine million gigabytes of data passes across Three's network each month

Some very interesting bits in bold, it seems there's the have's and have nots. On O2 just under 50% of customers are smartphone users and I bet they don't get anywhere near 2.5GB of usage each.

[whoever,hey]

Three customers dont need 4G because they can already do everything on 3G.

It will help with congestion, but thats a different issue entirely.

[DevonBloke]

Originally Posted by Thine Wonk

Interesting, I don't think they are saying they aren't going to bid in the auction, just that they see 3G being around for a while yet and that now they have guaranteed spectrum they will plan to launch in Sept 2013 and there's less pressure on the outcome of the auction.

http://www.zdnet.com/three-uk-in-no-...te-7000007459/



Some very interesting bits in bold, it seems there's the have's and have nots. On O2 just under 50% of customers are smartphone users and I bet they don't get anywhere near 2.5GB of usage each.

Bloody Nora! That's 9 Petabytes isn't it??

[mashamoto79]

And when LTE switches to 3G and back it really runs your battery down. It is a big minus for me especially where I live where it is constantly switching between the two.

[DevonBloke]

Originally Posted by mashamoto79

And when LTE switches to 3G and back it really runs your battery down. It is a big minus for me especially where I live where it is constantly switching between the two.

What phone do you have?
I guess this will become less of a problem once coverage improves and the handset stays on LTE for longer. Then it will mostly only switch when a call connects.

[Aye Up]

I have Three solely for sim only ipad sim and I have to be honest with the DC-HSPA speeds I am getting I don't think there will be a need for LTE for a while yet for me at least!

The network seems to handle all the requests adequately and the coverage is brilliant, so I have no complaints. Tbh most people don't even need the faster speeds if they are just browsing facebook and what not via their phone, I mean I have an iphone and I only need 3G I couldn't even see the advantage at this current point with LTE aside from the much vaunted speed increase and reduced battery life.

On Vodafone and whilst they aren't the fastest, everywhere I do get 3G signal data throughput and speeds are always sufficient to allow me to check emails, browse the web and so on, even stream audio. Can't say the same for EE, the only Orange network was appalling and even then T-Mobile can only just about cope.

[mashamoto79]

Originally Posted by DevonBloke

What phone do you have?
I guess this will become less of a problem once coverage improves and the handset stays on LTE for longer. Then it will mostly only switch when a call connects.

iPhone 5. For example if I was going out for the day I am not sure the battery would last. It is a shame there isn`t an option of turning the LTE off if you are in an area where it switching between the two a lot.

[DevonBloke]

Originally Posted by mashamoto79

iPhone 5. For example if I was going out for the day I am not sure the battery would last. It is a shame there isn`t an option of turning the LTE off if you are in an area where it switching between the two a lot.

You can turn to off. Settings/General/Cellular there is an LTE on/off toggle. I'm on EE4G and my iPhone has this option.

[Thine Wonk]

Originally Posted by DevonBloke

You can turn to off. Settings/General/Cellular there is an LTE on/off toggle. I'm on EE4G and my iPhone has this option.

Yep and as networks are now looking at deploying VOLTE in the US there's a chance that some operators will do VOLTE from day 1.

[gold fire 201]

To be honest if they roll out DC-HSDPA properly and the back haul links to the masts are good.I dont really see the point on them spending millions of pounds on 4g when they can spend less then that on DC-HSDPA upgrades as they already have the frequency required and still can offer unlimited speeds.

[BrokenArrow]

The average of 2.5Gb/month/customer shows that plans with 0.5Gb or 1GB are just bad plans.

[Thine Wonk]

Originally Posted by BrokenArrow

The average of 2.5Gb/month/customer shows that plans with 0.5Gb or 1GB are just bad plans.

Some networks that seem to be based around mainly voice calls and texts, some of the very expensive plans come with only 750MB of data. Not really suitable for a smart phone these days if you want to take advantage of streaming or cloud services you are going to be worried about using too much one month and end up with an expensive out of allowance bill.

[DevonBloke]

Originally Posted by Thine Wonk

Yep and as networks are now looking at deploying VOLTE in the US there's a chance that some operators will do VOLTE from day 1.

Yeah and I've got an iPhone 5 so that's me stuffed Hahahah!
Seriously though, the sooner EE roll it out the quicker they can allocate more 2G spectrum to LTE assuming they can get everyone to upgrade to LTE compatible handsets of course.

[Thine Wonk]

Originally Posted by DevonBloke

Yeah and I've got an iPhone 5 so that's me stuffed Hahahah!
Seriously though, the sooner EE roll it out the quicker they can allocate more 2G spectrum to LTE assuming they can get everyone to upgrade to LTE compatible handsets of course.

Yeah that won't happen, not at those prices, nearly 50% of the country is still on 2G

[DevonBloke]

Very true. O2 not helping the cause much then!

[Martin Phillp]

For streaming, I just stick to free Wi-fi when out and about. Was a joy earlier to be able to stream using the Tune-In app at Waterloo Underground station earlier today.

[el_bardos]

Originally Posted by gold fire 201

To be honest if they roll out DC-HSDPA properly and the back haul links to the masts are good.I dont really see the point on them spending millions of pounds on 4g when they can spend less then that on DC-HSDPA upgrades as they already have the frequency required and still can offer unlimited speeds.

It's down to scalability. DC-HSDPA is basically using two carriers of UMTS simultaneously, it's increasingly difficult technically to keep combining UMTS channels and as each channel in UMTS only actually uses (if I remember correctly) 3.74MHz of the 5MHz allocated it's not that efficient anyway.

LTE can be set to fairly much any bandwidth between 1.3MHz and 20MHz. So a 20MHz service would give a bit over double the speed of DC-HSDPA - but obviously 3 would need a block of bandwidth to do that, which they don't have with their current 1800MHz spectrum from EE.

[DevonBloke]

Originally Posted by Martin Phillp

For streaming, I just stick to free Wi-fi when out and about. Was a joy earlier to be able to stream using the Tune-In app at Waterloo Underground station earlier today.

Not happening for me though. I'm mostly surrounded by fields, woodland, tractors and cows Haha
This is one reason why cellular is sometimes more important in rural areas. Up until MBNL arrived on the scene urban areas had good cellular and WiFi and rural areas had not much at all.