Not quite true, my family in Kensington basically said that BT wanted to put the cabinets in the worst places possible and were to situate a few in row (you know the huge ones) at one location when there was other options available or slight locational change possible. No loss as mine just got fibre to their house via another operator instead of FTTC.. 100 down, 100 up

I generally agree that NIMBYS are pretty stupid and contradictory.


Same here!

Actually possible, or uninformed resident "it should be possible" even though it isn't?

The line I heard was that they wanted BT to put the equipment underground, at enormous expense and faff.


Apart from the lack of ISP choice, presumably.

There will never be a Conservative and Labour coalition.

There were a few sites that the cabinets hair couldn't go so it was actually the council suggested underground as BT had suggested it during discussions.. But then were playing hard ball expecting both to give in, in a good few locations yes they could have moved them slightly.

Yes lack of choice, but to my family & to me it wouldn't have bother me now they have FTTH.

I wouldn't rule it out.. Never underestimate the hatred of Westminster towards SNP & Greens. Lib Dems are literally gone, Can't see Labour doing a deal with UKIP so we might all be surprised. The SNP are likely to be everyone at Westminsters last choice simply for the possibility it opens up another Independence/Powers can of worms. UKIP simply as they really do want out of Europe unlike the Tory bluffing.

Yes because Conservative policy matches Labour's so perfectly.

Same could have been said aboit the Lib Dems last time..

in fairness if it hadn't been a Coalition last time we would of likely had to have another election. Plus I think the country would of been in a worse state.

Conservatives are the best out of all of them. Labour are useless and voting for the other parties is (let's be honest) wasting your vote.

Off topic much The Tories have let broadband and phone coverage plans slip.

True for England & Wales. Although itbwould be interesting if the Greens won Lib Dems votes and became more powerful in the Parliment.
Not quite the case in Scotland.. The SNP could hold quite a number of seats and power.

Anyways back on topic.

I'd say the charging of higher licensing fees has directly affected 4G roll out on all networks and to some extent 3G on O2/Voda.

I wouldn't say the current goverment is to blame for the slow FTTC/P roll out, as that is going as fast as it physically can right now in many cases. With engineers being hired all over and new trials/projects and even FTTPoD being put on hold to light up new cabinets as fast as possible. The new advert will help accelerate take up, helping claw back happen so that money can be reinvested to get the rural areas done.

Overall It's the public that have been hampering the roll out by not upgrading or assuming they are automatically upgraded as I've heard many many times so far. The building I used to live in had a petition from all residents to stick a cabinet in, showing demand. It was. However despite some of the cheapest Superfast broadband prices in Europe, up take is only 30-40% after several months. It is an area with poor ADSL speeds. Which I'm told from BT is what is roughly the case UK wide, poor take up on the commercial roll out. It has lead to them taking less risks and more reliant on Govt cash, which itself is hampered by the same issue as they can't claw back to further the BDUk projects.

The 90% obligation has now been implemented as Ofcom have changed the licences for each network to show that they must have 90% geographic voice coverage by 31/12/2017.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-31094389
http://www.mobiletoday.co.uk/news/in...-5bn-deal.aspx

In return, Ofcom will review the proposed licence charges for 900/1800 MHz to reflect the obligation and the Government will look at reforming the Electronic Communications Code to ease rollout.

Not mentioned here but for those interested in these sort of things, the thresholds they are using to judge this for each technology / band are:

2G 900/1800: -93dBm
3G 2100: -103dBm
4G 800: -115dBm

Can I sign up for the job of driving around the countryside checking signal levels?

Nope, it's based on the what the networks think their signal strength is using their own predictive models. Ofcom will probably just do a few random checks.

LOL at the BBC reporter.


I wonder why?

Three and Ofcom disagreed on the prediction model being used,

The bit being quoted says 2G coverage. Maybe I'm missing something but 3 would not appear here because they have no 2G coverage?

I guess you could count the patchy 2G roaming on EE if you wanted

I was talking about 4G specifically.

Ofcom don't quote any 4G coverage for Three either.

I hadn't fully read the BBC article when I posted. After reading it I added the Mobile one!

I guess there is confusion over Three not having 2G numbers because they don't have a 2G network and their "dodgy" 4G predictive model which didn't stand up to the real world tests Ofcom carried out on its predictions.

Even the 2G percentages quoted from the Ofcom report are not entirely relevant as they are based on a much tougher threshold of -86dBm as opposed to the -93dBm that will be used to assess the networks.

-93 is a figure traditionally used as a benchmark for decent 2G voice and was fine in years gone by and still is for simple phones. The trouble is that today, a lot of newer smartphones are notoriously crap when it comes to 2G so Ofcom used -86 in its report last year. Obviously it didn't make the cut for the new licence terms but it means the networks have less work to do now to reach 90%.

Also worth noting that signal measurements will be calculated in different ways see Table 2. Also no mention of 4G LTE on 1800MHz.


Ofcom document here:

http://licensing.ofcom.org.uk/binari...mno-variations

Or 3G on 900MHz

If a network has 3G on 900MHZ at a given location (O2 or Vodafone) could it be assumed they also have 2G on 900MHz at the same location? And if EE have 4G on 1800MHz at a given location would it mean they also have 2G on 1800MHz? If so, Ofcom don't need to mention 3G on 900MHz or 4G on 1800MHz as they will be covered by the 2G requirements.

Err true and not true. This includes all networks and Three aren't going waste any of there 1800MHz for 2G so 4G 1800MHz needed to be given as well.

I suppose they could do that to cut back on additional testing they might not think is technically necessary.

The document allows the licensee to use any frequencies and technologies available to the licensee.