I'll tell you what does screws up LTE coverage.. Scaffolding near a mast. My signal level has plummeted since scaffolding has been put up on a nearby 5 story building that is between me and the nearest mast. (Its about 40m from the mast itself) 3G has taken a dive too, not so bad though probably as I'm switching to another mast. Probably seeing the worst of it because LTE only just overlaps right now rather than blanket 3G were used to.

Yeah, probably acts as a passive receiver and soaks up all the signal... Or something.

We are having loads of wind turbines going up around here and I asked one of the guys who was into all that stuff why mobile antennas are not fitted to them. Would seem ideal, some of them are going to be 300 foot tall!
He said its simply because the turbine blades (6 tons each believe it or not) wreak havoc with radio signals.
In fact I believe the networks are having to take turbines into account when planning mast locations.

Yes, until you see a turbine drive past you in bits ie one blade, I don't think anyone can fathom how massive they are, with that spinning it must be a network engineers worst nightmare.

The metal scaffolding will reflect the signal and given the chaotic pattern of scaffolding its likely to be extreme!

Here is nice list of what different things do to radio signal:

http://en.kioskea.net/contents/wireless/wlpropa.php3

Damn, better remove that bulletproof glass from my house and car then

Panic over Three seem to have sorted out the speed issues at home today

http://img26.imageshack.us/img26/856...3012319012.png

People want cheap phone prices... As the handset price is absorbed into the monthly payment.. 12 month or less contracts being the norm would see prices upfront rise to £300-600 for the latest smart phones. In fact check out the 12 month contract prices on the EE website.

What a joke. 20 gig limit at 4g speeds in laughable! it shoud be 5 times that at least in this day and age!

Why do people make a direct correlation that more speed will mean more downloads it's an odd thought pattern.

If I use 2gb now having more speed wont mean that usage becomes 5gb, just that the files I am downloading will download faster

There was you saying you dont get anywhere near my 8-10mbps, you've got 13mbps there? dont think ive ever got 13, thats mental really for 3G, got to be maxing out 3G at that speed? im not sure what the fastest recorded 3G speed is? anyone know? and im talking about here in England

erhem

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/A_G-MfaCMAA4Ym9.jpg:large

DC-HSPA+ 42mbps is rolling out on EE/Three/O2 and at the moment a compatible handset could get a theoretical speed of up to 42mbps but in reality it should max out at around 50-70% of that. So people have got 25mbps+ but it;s rare and only during off peak hours. usually you'll see between 10-20mbps on average on a DC-HSPA+ mast. At work i get around 18mbps pretty much all day.

This is one of the reasons i think 4G is not worth it at the moment if you have a DC-HSPA+ handset. Yes 4G is faster (especially the upload) and it is better indoor coverage than 3G, but its still in its infancy stage and does not cover many areas of the UK and DC-HSPA+ can be just as fast in some cases.

Plus prices are outrageous for the data you get. Especially when you can get unlimited data on 3G from £12pm on Giff Gaff, Virgin, Three etc...

That was lord Lucan that challenged the speed was it not

The main advantage is for anyone in an area where their local 3G mast is congested. Getting off that busy network onto a 4G one with bugger all users means you'll actually get the higher speeds, even an upgrade to DC-HSPA isn't going to help if the mast is already at capacity as it doesn't do much to improve efficiency.

If you're in an area where 3G isn't too busy and you're getting decent speeds that you're happy with then no doubt the premium isn't worth it.

Yes 3G (HSPA+) is easily capable of going up to nealy 20Mbps. I have an iphone 5 speed test somewhere showing 20.5.
The problem is that most cells are under load most of the time and so the speed is reduced. in South Devon i would say the average speed I get is about 7-8 Meg.
However on the industrial estate in my home town of Totnes is an MBNL 10 Metre monopole that if you catch it when it's not under load you can nearly always get 12-14 off it.
On a couple of occasions I have been going past it on my way home at some stupid hour (2-3 in the morning) it will always do 18-19.5. This is NOT DC-HSDPA either.
The cell is about 300 metres from the Totnes Exchange and has clearly been fibred! I'll see if I can find that speed test.

Correct and don't forget that once the LTE starts being used more it will offload the traffic from 3G. this will in turn speed the 3G up. Asuming fast fibre backhaul here.

http://www.mobiletoday.co.uk/News/23...ata_plans.aspx



Oh, you mean just like how EE have done - with Orange and T-Mobile being a little bit cheaper in exchange for 3G only?

Agree with Devon and elbardos. Like i said there are advantages to 4G as well as some disadvantages. For me personally DC-HSPA+ is fine for me and is quite fast most of the time. Therefore because i don't need fast upload speeds or constantly high speeds 4G is not an attractive package for me. Especially at the current price point.

But 4G will appeal to a lot of people, especially those that require the consistently faster speeds, lower ping, better coverage etc... and won't mind paying a premium to get a better phone as well.

Agreed, I don't understand these pointless "oh you can use the data limit in 0.00000001 seconds" comparisons. Maybe 500MB is rather low for the service but there are other ways to put the point across than that.

Even with 3G you can eat 1GB of data reasonably quickly yet people don't feel the need to point that out to the same extent as they have for EE/4G.

I have an 80Mbit connection at home, I don't max it out 24/7 even though I can (there is no enforced usage limit). But it is very nice to download what I do want to download, very fast.

What is the loyalty discount for?

moox snr. has been with Orange almost from the beginning (although I think he's not had the same account since then, I think somehow it changed in the late 90s) and as far as I know he doesn't get anything out of them. I think once they knocked a few quid off a bill for being with them for 10 years. Wow! The only thing he gets from them is that ancient £5 broadband deal.

His bills are not particularly cheap though.

As long as you upgrade your handset BUT stay on the same plan Orange will give you a 10% discount. Then another 5% every time you upgrade after that. Problem is you have to stay in the same plan for it to accrue. I think you can get up to 30% but on 24 month contracts you would have to be on the same plan for about 10 years. People nearly always change plans when they upgrade so you then start again.

If you had a discount (I did) then EE let you transfer it to EE from Orange when you move over..

http://shop.orange.co.uk/mobile-phones/loyalty

http://help.ee.co.uk/system/selfserv...TICLE_ID=20014

Thanks for the signal interference info



That was me, i think.

7:40am.. Hardly peak which I do believe I was talking about. I get 20+ down 4up on 3G at that time in the morning! (40+/20+ on LTE)

Yes as LTE becomes more used it will off load users however these will just be replaced by the many millions of people that have only 2G handsets upgrading to affordable 3G handsets. Many years until we see a proper offset and by that time 5G will be on the table lol.

Just think how quickly Real Racing will download over a 1GB link. Apple may need to raise the 50Meg limit though

Been consistantly getting high 20Meg download and high teens/ low 20's upload in Newcastle (where i can get 4G) So i'm happy with it so far!