[GreenLantern]

Noticed some cat4/6 LTE today in central London will post some speed tests shortly.

Was pulling 100mbit down.

[uno]

That's interesting will be interested to know speeds and locations. I cannot believe that nearly 9 months after launch Vodafone still do not publicise where they have 4G+ coverage and most staff know nothing about it.

[lightspeed2398]

I noticed that Vodafone QA's website differentiates between 4g+ and 4g. It can only be a matter of time. EE say that they'll have the whole of London done by the end of June. Vodafone say that they launched in Manchester, Birmingham and London, I wonder how much they've expanded since then, I would argue it's needed more than EE because their main frequency has only 10Mhz of bandwidth compared to EE's 20Mhz.

[GreenLantern]

Here's the two screenshots,

The second one just came off 4G+ when it was done.

This was in Shaftsbury Avenue in the middle of the day, packed.

So I'd be interested to see what it does at 4-5am.

http://imgur.com/MOdOaMf

and

http://imgur.com/n4G3ccJ

Pretty impressive for Voda really. When they struggle to hit 1mbit on 3G sometimes.

(for reference this was on an s6 edge)

[lightspeed2398]

Quote:

Originally Posted by GreenLantern

Here's the two screenshots,

The second one just came off 4G+ when it was done.

This was in Shaftsbury Avenue in the middle of the day, packed.

So I'd be interested to see what it does at 4-5am.

http://imgur.com/MOdOaMf

and

http://imgur.com/n4G3ccJ

Pretty impressive for Voda really. When they struggle to hit 1mbit on 3G sometimes.

(for reference this was on an s6 edge)

Some nice speeds there. What was the coverage like in London?

[DevonBloke]

Quote:

Originally Posted by lightspeed2398

I noticed that Vodafone QA's website differentiates between 4g+ and 4g. It can only be a matter of time. EE say that they'll have the whole of London done by the end of June. Vodafone say that they launched in Manchester, Birmingham and London, I wonder how much they've expanded since then, I would argue it's needed more than EE because their main frequency has only 10Mhz of bandwidth compared to EE's 20Mhz.

Perhaps if EE stopped farting around with 4G+ for a minute and concentrated on actually rolling out the 4G network properly (like er... my mast perhaps and oh what about the thousands of Orange masts on a go slow), they might actually have reached their 98% target last year.
Bloody annoying. At the Dartington food festival today. Cellular coverage there is dire on all networks (even my cousin was having issues on VOD 2G900),
Except Orange have had the 3G mast above Totnes since 96 and it just happens to fire it's signal through the valley to Dartington.
Usable 1-2 bars 3G outside. Problem? 0.1Mbps today so nothing working.

Honestly, the only mast covering the village is EE's and it doesn't bloody work!!

I would argue that right now a decent signal there (and everywhere else) was much more important than 300Mbps in London for God's sake.

Don't get me wrong, I'm all for progress and yes, play around with 4G+ here and there but get full coverage first before rolling out full Cities with 4G+

[Denco1]

I haven't been able to find any 2600MHz in Manchester on either network. I'm certainly not complaining mind, as average speeds everywhere except say somewhere like a football match are enough to do anything which you could do on a mobile.

I reckon Vodafone have done a bit of a u turn though. If I remember correctly the press release on 4G+ was done before EEs 4G+ announcement. Vodafone mentioned rolling out in three cities but didn't say how much, EE said they would fully rollout to London and then move elsewhere. I reckon Vodafone are trying to complete London and then continue roll outs in Birmingham and Manchester.

Also does anyone know for certain if LG phones display 4G+ in the notification bar like Samsung do? I've got a LG G4 at the moment but as they have blocked the service menu as far as I can tell I have no way of checking whether I have a cat4 or 6 connection.

[DevonBloke]

I wonder what the iPhone 6c/6s will display..
Or will we have to wait for the 7?

[GreenLantern]

I actually agree with you.

I'd rather get 10mbit everywhere than 110mbit in Piccadilly Circus and 0.5mbit everywhere else.

But this is for Vodafone I'm talking about and not EE.

EE are vastly superior (I'm with Vodafone and like them) when it comes to nationwide 3G coverage compared to Vodafone. Haven't tried 3 or O2.

I am however surprised that on a packed Sunday in the centre of town that I was easily able to pull close to and over 100mbit down on both occasions.

It was Piccadilly Circus and it was packed so again, surprised at the speeds I got. Unless Vodafone aren't putting anyone onto the 2600mhz band at all unless you're doing cat4/6 - I don't know how their band selection works.

Also I loathe EE's company and customer support staff in general, so even though their network is better right now, I'd rather be with Vodafone as at least we get decent levels of service from them (personal, I understand different people will have different views depending on who they deal with).

[DevonBloke]

Vodafone's 2600 is highest priority same as the other networks rolling it out.
Handset will always select band 7 over band 3(EE) / 20 if available.
Even if band 7 is -100dBm and you are right next to a band 20 cell.
Assuming enough capacity on the band 7 cell of course.

[lightspeed2398]

Quote:

Originally Posted by DevonBloke

Vodafone's 2600 is highest priority same as the other networks rolling it out.
Handset will always select band 7 over band 3(EE) / 20 if available.
Even if band 7 is -100dBm and you are right next to a band 20 cell.
Assuming enough capacity on the band 7 cell of course.

Vodafone also have that TDD spectrum on 2600. Will this be set higher or lower than the 2600 FDD spectrum?

[Denco1]

Yes everyone's mileage does vary a bit with customer service. Personally I'm the opposite, I've had a much better time with EE customer service than Vodafone

I've tried all the networks in Manchester city centre, all excellent apart from 3
Wales is a completely different situation as you would expect, in Llandudno EE have 4Gd two masts along the beach which really radiate far giving me averages of 40mbps down and up. 3 while they have no 4G they are clearly making advantage of dc-hspa and I'm getting about 2mbps down and 1mbps up. O2 meanwhile were a disaster, internet was basically unusable, and in places they didn't even have 2G so my phone just went to emergency calls only. My worst speedtest which completed was 1103ms ping 0.20mbps down and 0.01mbps up, I've had better speeds on Vodafone EDGE.

[lightspeed2398]

[quote=Denco1;78214313]I've tried all the networks in Manchester city centre, all excellent apart from 3
/QUOTE]

Manchester's a mixed bag on EE for me as well, although it's much better than Three of course. When I'm deep in some of the buildings like Central Library, EE drops back to weak 2g where as I can still get 3g900 on Vodafone, although to be honest there's not much difference speed wise, because EE's still EDGE.

Three really do seem to have given up in Manchester, the 4g rollout is crap even there.

[Denco1]

Quote:

Originally Posted by DevonBloke

Vodafone's 2600 is highest priority same as the other networks rolling it out.
Handset will always select band 7 over band 3(EE) / 20 if available.
Even if band 7 is -100dBm and you are right next to a band 20 cell.
Assuming enough capacity on the band 7 cell of course.

What if band 7 was -121 (or -129 if EE) and band 3/20 was <-120dBm
Would the phone follow the same rules falling back to another signal (eg 4G>3G) once the 4G signal is too low, so falling back to the lower band 4G spectrum?
Or would it reconnect to 3G and then find the lower band 4G spectrum and reconnect?

[uno]

I spent a weekend in Birmingham a few weeks back and only found two 2600mhz enabled areas around the whole city one was near the Mailbox/Crowne plaza hotel and another near New Street station. This was on a S6

I also had my works IPhone 6 on EE which obviously does not show 4G+ or do CA but did find that they do have quite a bit of 2600mhz coverage around the city centre.

I actually went into 3 Vodafone stores in Birmingham and only one person out of 8 knew anything about 4G+ with most having never heard of or denied they had it. I do know that Vodafone have been been upgrading lots of sites across the country to 2600mhz but have not turned them on yet for example I have seen in it testing in Leicester and Coventry.

I am surprised that they take this action when they have done the upgrades as it would limit the load on 800mhz in busy areas as would just be some handsets on the 2600 and allow higher speeds

[Denco1]

[quote=lightspeed2398;78214464]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Denco1

I've tried all the networks in Manchester city centre, all excellent apart from 3
/QUOTE]

Manchester's a mixed bag on EE for me as well, although it's much better than Three of course. When I'm deep in some of the buildings like Central Library, EE drops back to weak 2g where as I can still get 3g900 on Vodafone, although to be honest there's not much difference speed wise, because EE's still EDGE.

Three really do seem to have given up in Manchester, the 4g rollout is crap even there.

I'm just don't understand how anyone in Manchester could live on Three. I also don't understand why they come out so well in rootmetrics reports 3G wise, I haven't seen average speeds like rootmetrics claim since like early 2013.

Yes my experience matches yours, deep in buildings on EE I do drop back to EDGE, but whatever 3G I'm receiving on Vodafone (I can't check whether 2100MHz or 900MHz) the browsing experience is broadly similar. Outside EE tends to be much faster on speedtests but real world usage scenarios about the same.

Edit: Awkward it looks like I'm responding to myself, I assure you I haven't lost my marbles

[Denco1]

Quote:

Originally Posted by uno

I spent a weekend in Birmingham a few weeks back and only found two 2600mhz enabled areas around the whole city one was near the Mailbox/Crowne plaza hotel and another near New Street station. This was on a S6

I also had my works IPhone 6 on EE which obviously does not show 4G+ or do CA but did find that they do have quite a bit of 2600mhz coverage around the city centre.

I actually went into 3 Vodafone stores in Birmingham and only one person out of 8 knew anything about 4G+ with most having never heard of or denied they had it. I do know that Vodafone have been been upgrading lots of sites across the country to 2600mhz but have not turned them on yet for example I have seen in it testing in Leicester and Coventry.

I am surprised that they take this action when they have done the upgrades as it would limit the load on 800mhz in busy areas as would just be some handsets on the 2600 and allow higher speeds

Vodafone don't seem to tell there staff very much
It appears they haven't been told much about Vodafone Wallet either which granted hasn't officially launched, but early on staff were giving out NFC sims by mistake.
Out of interest how do you know they are testing them? Can your phone see the frequency but not connect?

[DevonBloke]

Quote:

Originally Posted by lightspeed2398

Vodafone also have that TDD spectrum on 2600. Will this be set higher or lower than the 2600 FDD spectrum?

Now that, Sir, is a very good question.
The best person to ask is japaul.....
Mr Paul, over to you!!
Thanks

Mr Bloke.

[DevonBloke]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Denco1

What if band 7 was -121 (or -129 if EE) and band 3/20 was <-120dBm
Would the phone follow the same rules falling back to another signal (eg 4G>3G) once the 4G signal is too low, so falling back to the lower band 4G spectrum?
Or would it reconnect to 3G and then find the lower band 4G spectrum and reconnect?

You know, I've analysed and re-analysed your post and I still can't figure out exactly what you are asking.
Don't worry, it's me.. or rather, it's the Chardonnay!
japaul is the best person to ask. He's down with the band priorities (I hope his friends aren't reading this coz I've probably just lost them all for him Hahahahaha).
Basically on EE for example the band priorities are (highest to lowest) .....
4G2600
4G1800
4G800 (when they roll it out)
3G2100
2G1800

If a band is available and is within it's handover threshold you will stay on that band.
When the threshold is reached you drop to the next available band.

When dropping from 4G to 3G you will stay on 3G until the data session is idle (regardless of whether 4G is available again).

As far as I know though (and I'm sure japaul will confirm), switching bands within the various 4G bands is built into the LTE spec and so happens dynamically without interrupting the connection.

[jaffboy151]

These speeds are great, but I think the networks are starting to forget that they're running a mobile network and not a fixed line one. And so people might actually need a decent data connection on the move away from there home location!
They are missing around with installing infrastructure to provide speeds like this which the vast majority of there customers won't be aware of or care about, while vast areas of there own networks cannot even provide any usable data whatsoever, and that goes for ee almost as much as Vodafone.

[jchamier]

Quote:

Originally Posted by DevonBloke

I would argue that right now a decent signal there (and everywhere else) was much more important than 300Mbps in London for God's sake.

I was in the north east for a bit last week with some colleagues and our work phones are on Vodafone, and most of my colleagues personal phones are on O2. We were using Waze as the sat nav to find a customer and nothing worked until I used my EE phone to provide a hot spot. 18mbps download on 3G on EE and no data on GPRS with O2 and Vodafone. I found out later another colleague with 3 was working fine as well.

No point Voda doing 4G+ DC stuff for a few people and leaving out the massive parts of the country on the main roads that have GPRS or EDGE only and can't handle any data (perhaps overloaded with users). Same with O2.

[Gigabit]

I think O2 and Vodafone may as well disable data on GPRS as nothing ever flows on it in my experience. EDGE is just about okay on Vodafone, quite slow on O2.

[jchamier]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gigabit

I think O2 and Vodafone may as well disable data on GPRS as nothing ever flows on it in my experience. EDGE is just about okay on Vodafone, quite slow on O2.

In areas where 4G has been rolled out, the 3G works well and the 2G data is actually usable. but in the non-upgraded areas the whole thing falls apart. O2 wasn't usually this bad, I assume they had some local failure, as people report being able to use (very slow) data before now.

but what amazes me is driving along the A1 or M1 you get 3G 98% of the time on EE, but only 3G or 4G near towns with O2 or Vodafone still - and I'd have assumed a lot of these masts would be upgraded with the 4G project -- even if only to increase capacity for calls from passengers / truckers etc.

[Gigabit]

In areas with Vodafone 4G, Vodafone 3G performs well but in areas with O2 4G, O2 3G still sucks.

[DevonBloke]

Quote:

Originally Posted by jchamier

I was in the north east for a bit last week with some colleagues and our work phones are on Vodafone, and most of my colleagues personal phones are on O2. We were using Waze as the sat nav to find a customer and nothing worked until I used my EE phone to provide a hot spot. 18mbps download on 3G on EE and no data on GPRS with O2 and Vodafone. I found out later another colleague with 3 was working fine as well.

No point Voda doing 4G+ DC stuff for a few people and leaving out the massive parts of the country on the main roads that have GPRS or EDGE only and can't handle any data (perhaps overloaded with users). Same with O2.

Picked my kids up from Ivybridge school on Friday. They wanted to watch Wreck it Ralph on Netflix so I turned my rotating 4 quid Amazon phone holder horizontal and fired up Netflix on the iPhone 6.
They watched intently the whole way home (about 7 miles, mostly rural) without one single glitch and when home went indoors and continued on the old Amazon Fire TV stick.

Can't bloody do that on VO2.

O2 - 2G all the way home.

Vodafone - poor 3G in Ivybridge (from one of the three masts covering it) and then 2G all the way home.

EE - 15 Meg 3G from all three 3G masts in Ivybridge and 80 Meg 4G from one of them and then 10 meg 3G or higher all the way home.

The other day the two younger ones were in the back watching a film on NF on the phone and my eldest (sitting in the front) was connecting to the phone's hotspot watching a YouTube Minecraft video (as they do these days : ) with her Kindle fire.

I didn't actually think that would work but it bloody did all the way home!!!