Edinborough is the latest location to be tested by Rootmetrics, this shows the biggest MBNL vs Cornerstone divide yet I think.

http://www.rootmetrics.com/uk/compar...-october-2013/

Email success rates

EE 97%
Three 98%

O2 76%
Vodafone 75%

Browsing and apps, downloading a 15k file that could be just an element of a web page.

EE 0.7
Three 0.6

O2 3.4
Vodafone 3.2

Call failures

EE 1.2%
Three 1.2%

O2 4.2
Vodafone 4.2

This is a massive difference in the grand scheme of things. Edinburgh has had 4G for over a year now though so would expect EE to perform well.

Excellent results for Three too. Is MBNL in force there yet? Not to take away from the fact that Three's network performs very well regardless of MBNL of course.

Variable stats really as there will be residential pockets without the standard microcosm and where most won't tread and sometimes not dare to tread.

Stats will show that Worcester's Virgin Cable runs at an average speed of 0 MB

Have you been to bed?

Wait.. I forgot the average download speeds in Mb/s!

EE 16
Three 7

O2 3
Vodafone 2

"To prevent bias, RootMetrics utilises a sampling methodology that randomly selects the indoor locations used for testing; drive testing takes place during travel between these random indoor locations."

Where do you think they would they "not dare to tread" in Edinburgh?

As a long-time 3 customer, I have never been able to relate to some of the negative comments about their reception elsewhere in the country.

When Root Metrics do tests they always pick the extended area, rather than just the town / city, they often go well out of the main city and do all the surrounding towns and villages. They also take the standard extended Eurostat map zones.

I guess they used a 15k file to allow for the fact O2 & Vodafone's customers spend a lot of time on 2G

Results are pretty unsurprising

..and even a tiny 15k file took 5 times longer to download on Vodafone and O2 than it did on Three and EE. I was surprised at how bad it was.

At the end of the day O2 and Vodafone are still adding customers regardless of how bad their network is. Personally im glad I left O2 for Three as its made my Smartphone usable

Problem with Rootmetrics is they make no distinction between 3G and 4G on the coverage and speed maps - this is the one thing I like least about them. Sensorly on the other hand shows you those individually but doesn't show averages.




Has been for several years. Many of the old MBNL 3 masts are being used for EE's LTE.


And strangely enough their results bear no resemblance to my personal experience, apart from EE being faster than 3, O2 is usually faster than both where I live and play. Place I went to last night had no coverage from EE at all bar a tiddum of 4G while waving the phone towards the window, full bars on O2 and a decent 10Mbps download too. Suffice to say spent most of the night with my EE phone off and my 3 SIM in my wallet.


Indeed. Though I'm personally one of those people who've learned never to rely on a single network anyhow so I'm usually contracted to two networks at a time. Both EE and 3 have faster data round about town but O2 ends up best at home and work, especially at work where 3G900 is the only 3G coverage in the building. O2 is also the only network I've been with (having had 2+ year contracts with every network recently) without any critical localized failures where I live - 3 mast went down for a week shortly after 2G fallback was switched off (so no service at all), EE mast with slow data and constantly dropping phone calls, Vodafone mast being on and off or stuck data for 6 months+ ... Obviously if you tests outside these times they might come out top but if you have to live with them constantly it's another matter.

I presume you've carried out 25,515 call, mobile internet, and text tests, covering all hours of the day and night and driven over 500 miles testing around the whole area!!

I agree with the not separating 3G and 4G, but that would mean double the amount of testing and double the cost. What it means at the moment is this is the result you'll get as a customer if you're on the best package the network offers, i.e 4G if it's available. If you exclude EE's results because of this you still get to compare the other 3 and Three came out 3-4 time better in almost every test when you do that.

If you join O2 or Vodafone in Edinburgh according to this research you're looking at 3-4 times more dropped calls and 3-4 times slower page loads.

Some people might be going back several years in the bad old days of 3, where they were pretty expensive and had a low coverage, unreliable network (possibly even back as far as the time where they offered no internet access at all!).

Or, it could be an indoor coverage issue. I get an OK 3G signal outside but inside it varies between "ok" and non-existant. No serious 2G backup either.

October is a bad month to do a comparison. Through October and into November the Beacon upgrade work has been going on in and around Edinburgh (check your spelling Thine!) meaning sites have been on reduced capacity and have in some cases been out of service while aerial replacements have been going on which puts additional strain on surrounding masts which need to pick up the slack. All of this work has an impact on overall network performance. I seek to remember EE going through the same a while ago when they did a similar job with the legacy Orange and T-Mobile sites.

The new 2/3/4G Beacon network is switched on this Tuesday for O2 and Thursday for Vodafone.

It will be interesting to see the next set of results as this is an unfair comparison in during the works.

Not to discount the fact that I'm sure during this testing that some of the tests would have been on EE's 3G network and not always 4G.

Look, if certain networks choose to not put transmitters where income and.or density is ultra low stats get totally skewed.

Therefore those stats might be irrelevant to 95% of the Edinburgh population.
But digging down solely into the area you traverse could be quite useful.

And like interactiv-uk said, a snapshot for a period of time also adds more variables.

And I wonder why the "independent" tests carried out by a partner of the MBNL networks was completed at this time.

Never take any of these results seriously, Vodafone got P3 to complete independent tests and surprise surprise they were the best.

Only way of getting a true reflection on performance is to get a few payg sims and do your own research before agreeing a contract.

No they weren't!! It was all in the wording, they never said they were the best, only in 1 place did they perform the best, all the rest of the statement was cleverly worded PR, that's why Ofcom almost fined them this month for not even having 90% 3G coverage, and why the vast majority of Root Metrics reports show them as the worst. Why do you keep repeating this when I pointed out to you last month the PR guff in those P3 reports. We never saw the full report, only a PR statement on Vodafone's website.

Rootmetrics is an American company that has a reputation for independent research, are you accusing them of somehow fraudulently changing the results? it sounds to me like you just don't like what they report and so look for ways to discredit them. The simple fact is download just a 15k file takes over 3 seconds on Vodafone vs less than 1 on EE / Three, and Vodafone users will experience 4 times more failed calls than others in Edinburgh.

Hahahahahahahahahaha...
Funniest reply for a long while on here.
I nearly spat my cup of tea all over my monitor.

Is that what you do with your phone all day? If so, then great! The results might be indicative of your usage.

Back in the real world, most people stay in the same areas and don't drive 500 miles a day with their phones, make a few phone calls and nowhere near 25,000.



Bollocks. Going into your phone menu and changing the setting from 4G to 3G does not double the cost of anything.

Remember also the majority of Rootmetrics figures are from end users doing tests on their handsets using their app. It makes zero difference in cost to them because all the tests are supplied for free. Yet if the user goes back in to look at results they only see one combined figure for 2G, 3G and 4G.

Again, other apps and companies that do exactly the same thing list results for 4G, 3G, and 2G seperately.

And again, we're talking about user supplied results that cost them nothing.


And how many people are on the best package the network offers? Again, most aren't so the results aren't representative of most people's usage.

Of course, publishing the results four days before O2 and Vodafone's 4G becomes available is also, interesting timing...


Again, useless for me when they're great everywhere except where I am.


I already joined Vodafone and O2 in Edinburgh and according to my phone logs, the research is no bloody comfort at all when I have to complain several times a week about EE and 3 constantly dropping my calls.

Personally, I'd rather have a phone that works than having to satisfying myself with the comforting thought that research says I should be getting a better service every time it cuts out.

As for faster page loads...

Three vs.EE vs O2

So perhaps while you're looking at 3-4x slower page loads, I've happily got a working service on O2.

Ehm, no.

The network was switched on over a month ago.

It gets commercially launched to the public on Tuesday for O2 and Thursday for Vodafone.



3 switched off 2G completely in Edinburgh several years ago, but some other parts of Scotland still have it.

Back in the day though, when they had the entire Orange or O2 networks for fallback there were really zero downsides to 3's coverage. Exactly the same 2G coverage as the leading GSM networks and considerably better 3G coverage - they never had "bad" coverage.

Careful qasdfdsaq, you are in danger of falling foul of the Digital Spy MBNL Love in.

Thine Wonk just cant ever accept that Three are not the best network for absolutely every living soul in these fair lands.

I have never had a call drop on Vodafone, and where i need it i can stream HD Video with no issues on Vodafone.

I tried Three and we have no usable signal at home or my place of work.

If you believe the rubbish many on here post you'd think Vodafone and O2 have no network provision at all.

As i said above, ignore what you read online and just get a sim card on PayG from each network to test yourself in your area before agreeing a contract.

LOL. Ironically I'm told they're the least chosen network by every living soul in these fair lands.

Actually I have a SIM card on contract from each network already (except Vodafone, cancelled that when they couldn't keep 3G data working more than 3 months out of the year).

For most people that advice is generally sound - everyone's mileage may vary and your only way of knowing is to try it yourself.

Personally though I walk around every day testing three phones as it is, no need for any extra PAYG SIMs :P

a few have just blown a gasket at your 3 v ee v o2

Odd then how me with my 4G phone and sim can't get a 4G connection here at the mo! The engineering work IS still happening on some of the sites, as evidenced by men in cherry pickers at some of the masts recently!