Lovely bit of 4G in Southwold in Suffolk. Must be a recent switch on as not showing on the coverage checker.

http://www.speedtest.net/my-result/a/1993183762

And up here in Sale...

http://www.speedtest.net/my-result/i/1676207394

The MBNL mast on Acre house provides superb speeds for whatever reason, normally over 60mbps on Three and also very good speeds on EE, especially when using a cat 6 handset. I wonder if there's simply very few EE and Three customers in the area?

My closest mast is on Fairy Lane. There's a new mast just been erected, not sure which network it is though. How do I find out? Anyone?

Thanks

Am I right in thinking you're talking about between the Metrolink line and farm land? I know of a MBNL mast there, and also an old Vodafone one. The panels on the MBNL were recently swapped from dual ports to quad ports, and last time I visited the Vodafone mast still hadn't been touched. Perhaps they've been back and replaced it now.

Edit: Just checked on the Trafford planning portal and there was an approval for an Arqiva smart meter mast, perhaps it is that.

Yeah, that's the one!its bizarre that you know the exact masts I'm talking about, it's a very small world! One cabinet has Three and T-Mobile labels on and you're right, the other says Vodafone. This new mast has been thrown up very quickly, I'm intrigued who's it is. Perhaps your right with the smart meter suggestion. I'm new to all this but is that normal? Is there many of those about?

On a side note, this same MBNL mast at this location has shown as having a fault according to the EE status checker and has been showing this since April. Can anyone shed some light on why it's taking so long to resolve the issue, and also what is actually wrong with it?

Haha, it's a small world indeed
Apparently the history of these sites dates back to 2003, a tower block on the other side of the M60 was demolished, so these sites were thrown up quickly at the time. There were four separate masts back then, one by Three, Vodafone, T-Mobile and Orange. The T-Mobile and Orange have of course since been removed, with EE now sharing the mast with Three.

I've never actually come across a smart meter mast before, I've only seen them in the odd couple of planning permissions. I wonder if Pedro_C knows anymore?

At a guess, the EE fault could be related to the power supply cabinet. When I was up there April/May, the lock was missing on the cabinet and the door was slightly ajar. (It wasn't me)Perhaps they are just waiting for an engineer to pass by and put a new padlock on it? I guess it may not be a priority as long as it's not affecting the power supply, so this is maybe why it's been showing as a fault for so long?
My only other guess would be that it is in someway related to the recentish antenna swap.

Wow, I pass these a couple of times every week when out running in the morning and I always wished I knew more about them. You've really surprised me! Thanks for your info!

Thank you, it's a pleasure. I've learnt such a lot of interesting facts and knowledge from this forum, so I like to do my best to help out where I can.

Smart meter mast? If memory serves me correctly I thought o2 won the contract for connecting them wirelessly?? As its an arqiva mast could this be a back door way of Vodafone and o2 adding sites to increase coverage as they recently signed a 10 year deal with Arqiva??

P.s I know EE/3 also have rights to Arqiva equipment.

Just the o2 network providing connection and the tie up with Arqiva that got me thinking

Reading more into it, it seems O2 have the smart meter contract for the southern and central parts of the UK, and Arqiva are responsible for the North of UK.

I think the existing Arqiva site access agreement may only be for their existing sites, but presumably no reason the smart meter masts couldn't be included in this.

I'm quite far out of my territory here however

A very weird planning application, I wonder if it's representative of networks being keener to work together though?
It's currently a 15 metre mast, with Three 800+1800 and EE 1800+2600. The plans are to raise the mast to 20 metres, and to move the EE and Three panels to the new 20 metres.
Vodafone will take the 15 metre position, strangely O2 have decided not to broadcast from this mast?

I wonder if Trafford Council will approve though, Manchester City Council have rejected a number of EE and Three upgrades recently.
http://planningdocs.trafford.gov.uk/...pplication/pdf

There are mentions of CTIL in there so it may well be that O2 will be on it, just they're not mentioned directly. There are no mentions of Three or MBNL in there, despite it carrying Three L08 and L18.

Interesting, EE have now added Carrier Aggregation with 1800Mhz & 800Mhz! Phone was showing as 4G+ out at Snetterton, Norfolk whilst driving along the A11 towards Norwich.

CA Screenshot: http://s33.postimg.org/ttgif274f/Scr...611_203319.png

Site: https://goo.gl/maps/MM5CwvwXX2t

Smart meter masts are out there. Built by Arqiva and use thin omni antennas

I'm guessing the 800mhz official launch is coming as soon as the VoLTE rollout is complete.

Still unable to get back onto the 800mhz site that I was able to get on a couple of months ago.

Currently not at Drownload - the place is gridlocked as no one can get on the car parks so I'm biding my time at home! EE service is excllent this year though. I doubt my mentions of it here had that much to do with it, but something has changed. In front of the arena last night while waiting for Black Sabbath I got a steady 14 down and 6 up, with no call or text problems all weekend. Fist class. Well done EE! Perhaps borrowed a CoW from Glasto! Wish the weather had gone as well....

Hopefully EE won't grind to a halt data wise in August for the BTCC.

3G didn't work at all last year but as EE now have 4G coverage I'm hoping for something. O2 had a 4G CoW last year, wonder if will return?

Yep they have 4G'ed another site earlier up the A11 too! 4G+ now all around Snetterton, Also a permanent Cornerstone 3G/4G mast now too before Snetterton.

Noticed they'd rejected a monopole near the Uni.

Went round Manc the other week with a phone set to 2600/2100/1800 LTE only on Vodafone, not much really still, don't really think they've done much more since they turned it on. EE have way overtaken them, but the 2600 does travel a fair bit from one mast.

Arqiva have agreements with some landlords that they can only have one base station on the site. Adding smart meter stuff would probably mean renegotiation.

Sorry, forget to mention that the supporting document stated O2 would not be present at the site, but could be added in the future if needed.
Three may not be mentioned as I think the mast was originally T-Mobile before it was brought into MBNL.

Yes the two city centre monopole upgrades for 2600MHz were both rejected, disappointingly. The universities made statements that the upgrade would be an eyesore being so close to a listed building, does make you wonder how the original Orange monopole was approved. Of course the students would much prefer faster speeds, but oh well
EE and Three don't seem to be having much luck with planning applications for listed buildings, I think the Uni pole was the fourth application they've had rejected in a year now.

Indeed, it does look like it's still just the one Vodafone 2600MHz mast in the city centre, and a few dotted about in Salford and Ordsall. I've counted 10 EE 2600MHz masts inside the inner ringroad and 26 EE 2600MHz masts in total, compared to the 5 Vodafone 2600MHz masts I've found. The Vodafone application I posted might well be 2600MHz though, would make sense as it would add to the 2600MHz layer already present in Salford/Ordsall.

Annoying the rejections, upgrades no need to reject at all, can understand new masts in some particular locations but they're being obtuse by doing it.

VF at Salford Uni is still the place I've had my fastest non-CA speed test. 126 early on a Sunday morning on the way into Manc.

For me on EE now not Three the priority is getting that bloody Arndale fixed, no signal in some parts of it. Rest of it, including where I work when am there is fine.

Indeed, the 2600MHz upgrades are hardly complicated, they just need a new monopole and cabinets that take up a taller space, no more pavement is lost to cabinets at all

Nice one, I think my fastest on Vodafone was about 120mbps
Yes, they need some Pico cells in it like they have done in the Trafford Centre. I think the arndale is mainly served by a mast on the printworks (eNodeb 12847) and a mast on High Street, (eNodeB 10979)