Just to piss you off.

In reality,
It was because they wanted to differentiate themselves from the EV-DO "3G" Sprint & Verizon offered because theirs was so much faster so they called it 4G in marketing and persuaded phone manufacturers to show it instead of 3G for their network. Was quite a big uproar I think in certain circles about them just ignoring what bodies like the IMT call 4G but they were allowed to use it.

Three tried to use 3.9G for DCHSDPA a while back and got slapped down by the ASA I think .

Hmm... Its nearly Thursday, will Vodafone show any updates of any type, anywhere, in any place I live or ever go this week?
Had very little to shout about for a few months now..

Oh dear oh dear. I'm in West Wales now and I thought O2 was bad in Cornwall!!!! 4G is well, one of those new fangled technologies clearly, 3G must be as well, 2G in some parts but forget using data and be grateful if you have any bars to make a call lol

Not too much sign of things changing anytime soon in many rural areas and small towns. Cornerstone have had around 3 years since the 4g auctions and I'd say haven't really spent the time too wisely.. Sticking mainly to urban areas and in them fannying around mostly with monopoles instead of the larger masts, not exactly converting monopoles at a rapid rate and when done with upgrades not including 2600mhz to help load which has ment the 800mhz has quickly become swamped and is now creaking in many areas, not transferring the extra 5mhz over to 900mhz 3g from 2g to help data speeds when falling back from 4g, which happens often due to the low power and few sites upgraded in most areas, I can see many of these sites having to be revisited again to add 2600mhz as even the 5mhz of 2100mhz there adding from 3g isn't too much help as it doesn't carrier aggregate.
All this means they will have little time or interest in doing rural masts in the near future.

The haves will always have more the have not's will always get less and the gap between them will continue to get wider. Sadly this is the way infrastructure is rolled out in the UK.

Ctil planning apps for the big masts in South hams (Devon) going in next month including beacon Hill Totnes town and Dartmouth from my source at the ctil planning team

Well apparently CTIL are putting their equipment on the MBNL mast close to me in Wellingborough. Will boost coverage and capacity there nicely, as the Embankment mast will cover quite a large area and give good capacity to the train station and surrounding area.

Hope they put L18 and U21 on that mast though. Vodafone L26? Being a bit too optimistic, though shouldn't Vodafone be rolling out more L26?

They really should be, but they really aren't. Old habbits die hard.

Ffestiniog is getting Vodafone 4G !!

Unless it gets removed next week! 😉
There's been a few sites East of Wrexham and Shrewsbury that have been coming and then going for a few months now on the Vodafone coverage map, let hope some of these rural ones stay on and get done soon..

I know... Even O2 are doing a better job than Vodafone, at least they are actually bothering to install L18 on quite a lot of sites! Even Raunds got L18 and that's not a hugely big place. Though, apart from rural areas, L18 should be used in conjunction with L08, to avoid serious congestion issues.

I mean, rolling out UG09 and L08 only on the more rural masts for both O2 and Vodafone. Why, when they have U21 that they can use to future proof the network (and eventually refarm to L21)?

Why are Vodafone refarming their U21 to L21 at the present time, to meet demand, when they have tons of L26 that they aren't using? Using 10MHz of L21 will knock 3G down to single carrier; 900MHz 3G isn't dual carrier yet (why? Refarm the frequencies, and with U21 and U09, there won't be much of a need for G09), and the 1800MHz and 2600MHz spectrum is being totally neglected. L26 would likely match or exceed U21 coverage if on full power, so would give quite a bit of extra capacity!

VO2 should have 1800 and 2100MHz on every mast (none of this dual band low input panel nonsense, without at least one high band for 1800/2100MHz), all 1800MHz should be used as 4G, not 2G (since there is already 2G900, 3G900 and 3G2100 for voice) and any major towns and all cities should have 2600MHz (for Vodafone). With the current rollout scheme of using just 800MHz as 4G, and just 900MHz 3G on some sites, then congestion will arise (I'm sure I've already heard someone on here mention that L08 is getting overloaded in some areas) and VO2 will have to go back to the same sites and upgrade them to L18/U21/L26 etc... all whilst not even touching some of the older sites, such as the G09/G18 only site in Thrapston!

Unfortunately the UK mobile market is getting a bit screwed... with VF/O2 having many 2G only sites still to upgrade (and 800MHz 4G sites getting congested/overloaded), Three UK not rolling out 4G1800 quickly enough (or to enough sites) and BT/EE massively increasing their SIM Only prices, it sure doesn't look good...

L21 can be deployed on most sites (with U21 already) by just remotely sending a software update, or changing some settings due to most sites now having SDRs. 2600 on the other hand requires planning apps/coordination with O2 and new panels, feeders, RRUs, cabs etc. so is much more expensive and takes more time to deploy.

L18 is likely being ignored by Voda due to them only having 2x5MHz of 1800, so there would be little capacity gain compared to the 2x10MHz of L21.

U09 is becoming dual carrier in areas where 2G load permits but G09 won't be going anywhere any time soon, for the same reasons mentioned time and time again in the EE thread.

Like what _m said, if their base station equipment allows them to run LTE in Band 1 (i.e. 2100MHz band) where the site antennas aren't designed for 2600MHz use but are already there for 2100MHz 3G, then Vodafone can simply do a reconfiguration at ground level with minimal disruption - it might not even need a site visit if it can be controlled remotely. O2 did this quite a bit a few years ago when rolling out 3G in the 900MHz band - as long as the backhaul can handle it then you don't have to mess with new antenna setups, requiring planning permission, the engineers/technicians manpower required etc.

OTOH if the equipment as a whole isn't 2600MHz ready and you want to use that, then a physical overhaul is going to be needed.

Being a passive visitor to this thread, it seems to me that as time has went on the CTIL roll out has developed two different rates of advancement - the areas where Telefonica are responsible for upgrades appear to be rolling out coverage significantly quicker than those places Vodafone are responsible for. I know that in Northern Ireland (where Telefonica are responsible) CTIL have been busy even at a lot of rural masts getting 4G upgraded (and 3G when not previously there) at a lot of former 2G only sites - not quite EE 4G coverage levels but they're getting close, in fact I'm starting to now find spots where I can get good O2 & Vodafone 4G where there's none from EE. Also IIRC the eastern half of England is Telefonica's responsibility and coverage seems to be expanding well, whereas SW England is Vodafone's responsibility and we have more moaning here than a lesbian orgy!

Interesting thanks. Any idea on specific masts aside from Beacon? Marley Head near South Brent on the A38? That's a fairly big tower.

I see some planned VOD 3G going in down Kingsbridge way. Hopefully that'll be 4G too and it's just not showing as planned. Unless it's 3G900 to make the map look better and backhaul is not in yet.

New carrier update few days ago but no change on settings or VoLTE

Well yesterday I moved from EE to Vodafone due to the pitiful 4G EE speeds I was getting at home (2-3mbit down 1mbit up) and now at home I get a rock solid full signal and 50 down 20 up which I am well pleased with.

Signal at work is not so good but nothing is here but the speeds are comparable to EE anyway.

First time with Vodafone in about 6 years and hopefully moving forward I have made the right decision about moving away from EE.

I've been in a couple of areas where Vodafone's 4G speed has been impressive for a non LTE-A signal.

Just wish they'd roll out/enable CA in places outside of London, Manchester, Birmingham etc.

I think they will given time.

Have been very impressed with Vodafone in and around London over the past few days, good 4g lte-A coverage with great speeds even in very high load areas around financial district..
http://i.imgur.com/7acVSqf.jpg

Good service on the train route back to the north always strong 3g/4g until you cross back into the west side of the country then it's all rubbish once more whilst EE are still King..
So much work still to do in the West but it's shows it can be done in London and parts of the East..

Still no planned upgrade for the old O2 G09/G18 mast in Thrapston, Northamptonshire....

C'mon CTIL!

Meanwhile, EE and 3 both provide 3G to Thrapston....

Might not be long. CTIL are planning on a brand new mast at nearby Ringstead Farm, NN14 4DF:

http://pawebsrv.east-northamptonshir...MENT-60964.pdf

...so there is clearly activity in your area.

Ringstead isn't that far from Raunds though, and the old Vodafone 2G mast in Raunds has been upgraded to 2G/3G/4G. But apparently, 3G is showing as "ok outdoors, patchy indoors" - so a mast there wouldn't go amiss

Are you sure that a new mast there would give adequate coverage to Thrapston as well? Surely the G09/G18 mast in Thrapston also has to be dealt with in order to provide decent coverage to Thrapston? I know that EE/3 have two masts in Thrapston under MBNL.

Was in a dual carrier 900MHz area today. 7mbps on one carrier and 5mbps on the other which is not bad for an urban area.

Which reminds me: Vodafone Capacity Approaches Video

full voda test here Charlton Se7 200m from mast 900 dc-hspa 15mb 2100 dc-hspa 16mb 4G 800 - 45mb 4G- 2100 61mb 2600-121mb ca 800/2600 173mb