Originally Posted by moox:
“This is a mast in a fairly rural location - it covers a village and a section of a major road. I can't imagine congestion is the problem, especially when time of day is not a factor and the performance is always universally poor.
That's probably why it doesn't have 2100MHz. I've read that Vodafone scrambled to do a lot of masts when Ofcom threatened to take action over not meeting the 3G coverage obligations in their licence. It wouldn't surprise me if they've just installed some 3G equipment very quickly, but not upgraded the backhaul. (I'm going to assume that 3G900 doesn't require them to fit new antennas - they can just plug and play, in a sense).
I'll bet that if Vodafone ever puts 4G in then it will finally get the backhaul it deserves.”
In which case, if it's a rural location, then it probably won't be congestion that is the limiting factor, although 3G900 can travel quite long distances compared to 3G2100.
If performance of such a rural mast is consistently poor, chances are it's bad backhaul that is to blame. Either its in a daisy chain of micro masts, which adversely affects performance along the chain, or it's got copper backhaul. Copper backhaul is the worst because it is only rated at 2Mbps maximum - which is likely to give 0.2Mbps to the end user (similar to EDGE speeds). I do remember the issue about Vodafone not reaching 90% UK coverage, so chances are they put 3G on the masts on 900MHz without upgrading the backhaul. They'll have reused the old antennas, since 2G is also on 900MHz.
Hopefully CTIL will come along and upgrade all of the masts that are required, to get the 98% indoor coverage that O2 requires - and when CTIL upgrade a site, they'll put both O2 and Voda on it.
(Note: "coverage" is defined here as anything that can provide a reliable service for calls, texts and data, so 3G and 4G.)
Quote:
“My understanding is that 3G is fairly inefficient, in the sense that you have to dedicate 5MHz channels to 3G usage, and there's the slight coverage unpredictability that cell breathing gives you. 2G is much more granular. (and if you have 2G for rock solid voice/text + 4G for fast data and VoLTE, what does 3G add?). There are also a lot of 2G devices out there, not just phones but for M2M applications, alarms, etc. Ideally anything fitted in the last few years would do 3G too, but apparently not. Those £10 cheap phones generally don't do anything except 2G.
But opinion is divided there. Some network operators are planning to switch off 3G first, others are switching off 2G and keeping 3G/LTE. It will be interesting to see what 3's plans are, since they don't have a 2G network - at least not unless they are allowed to absorb O2”
Personally if I was running a network, I'd do a Three UK and get rid of 2G at the earliest opportunity, or even better, not have it to begin with. I've seen reports on here of 2G using pretty poor quality for voice calls, whereas 3G has the possibility to do HD Voice (even if they don't use HD voice, it'll sound a lot better than 2G). I remember a time when I was at Leicester train station and made a phone call (this is on Virgin/EE). Usually, my phone is set to 3G only (Virgin do not offer 4G, and 2G is pointless) and all calls sound very good. However, one occasion, I made a phone call and it sounded absolutely diabolical. Reason? I had been testing an EE sim that day, and the settings had been reverted to default, to take advantage of 4G. As a result, the phone had dropped back to EDGE for a call, despite 3G being very present and very strong at that location.
I do realize that cell breathing can be an issue; however avoiding congestion (the main cause of cell breathing) would be a solution. More masts and 900/2100 would resolve that, with more capacity when required. (For example, all of EE's 1800 to 4G, so that there would be a ton of 4G available, for capacity - and 3G for calls and older phones.) You said that if you have 2G and 4G, why have 3G - however, if you have 3G for calls (at much better quality than 2G!), texts and data (my local 3G mast can provide 15-20Mbps nicely) and 4G for superfast data (EE 4G can provide up to 100Mbps on 1800MHz), then what is the need for 2G?
The only thing that 2G is useful for is, in my opinion, interfering with trying to stream media - because that's what it does if I turn it on on my S4. EDGE is barely usable. GPRS is a joke. Smart meters for gas/electricity (they use 2G, I believe) haven't really got on to everyone yet, and it'll be a while before smart meters become the norm. And I've heard complaints about smart meters not working, because of being hidden away (like normal meters) in a place that has no mobile signal. And anyway, it's not like 3G phones are expensive (like 4G phones) - you can get a cheap 3G phone
from Argos for £30. Whereas, if 3G got turned off, then many people that didn't have a 4G phone would then be without a data connection, and requiring a new 4G phone.