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Three or Vodafone in London
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jo_m1
06-09-2016
Three have frustrated me incredibly in the past with their London network and I'm thinking about terminating my contract early and moving to Vodafone's reduced 20GB plan.

Even though you might sometimes see good 50+Mbit values in outer London, in central London you will never see more than 10 Mbit and often I will have incredible problems even achieving 1-2Mbit. There have been numerous times where the congestion was so bad I couldn't even connect to WhatsApp.

Also Three's 4G footprint is so weak that even in Central London you will sometimes fall back onto 3G. In almost every London airport or train station Three only offers 3G. I had high hopes when 4G800 was launched, but since then I have connected to 4G800 one single time. There are still plenty of places where I never have signal (office, university, bars) which is incredibly frustrating on a daily basis.

Vodafone on the other hand tempts me enormously because the fact that it already supports CA of the 800 and 2600 frequencies giving it 30Mhz of spectrum in 2600 areas (all of Central London) which is double of the spectrum that Three offer. Also their recent launch of the 1800Mhz and 2100Mhz bands make me hopeful, as it could pave the way to a CA of 45Mhz. Furthermore the fact that they’ve been deploying 4G on 800Mhz for 3 years now, gives me the confidence that they will offer much better indoor coverage than Three.

Now I wanted to ask if any Three insider knows wether Three has any plans to offer CA by combining the 800 and 1800 frequencies or if they are even looking at launching 4G on the 2100 frequency anytime soon. It would also be interesting to know wether Three is going to accelerate their 4G800 rollout, eventually bringing it to all base stations ?

What would the experts recommend I do purely on technical grounds (leaving out the details of the individual plans) ? Unfortunately EE is not really an option price wise at the moment...
Denco1
06-09-2016
I don't think 800+1800 aggregation on Three would help much in terms of capacity tbh. And no, Three will not be bring 800 to every mast, there'd be no point with the site density in certain locations and the limited capacity increase it would bring.

Have you considered cash back deals on EE? BT Mobile is also worth a look at if you are a BT customer.
jo_m1
06-09-2016
Originally Posted by Denco1:
“I don't think 800+1800 aggregation on Three would help much in terms of capacity tbh. And no, Three will not be bring 800 to every mast, there'd be no point with the site density in certain locations and the limited capacity increase it would bring.

Have you considered cash back deals on EE? BT Mobile is also worth a look at if you are a BT customer.”

Well O2 are using their 5Mhz of 1800 for aggregation... You're probably right when you say it won't make sense to bring 800 to every mast, however the rollout in London so far seems to be borderline non-existent unfortunately.

Where can I find more info on those cash back deals ?
Ashley_Bradbury
06-09-2016
Originally Posted by jo_m1:
“Three have frustrated me incredibly in the past with their London network and I'm thinking about terminating my contract early and moving to Vodafone's reduced 20GB plan.

Even though you might sometimes see good 50+Mbit values in outer London, in central London you will never see more than 10 Mbit and often I will have incredible problems even achieving 1-2Mbit. There have been numerous times where the congestion was so bad I couldn't even connect to WhatsApp.

Also Three's 4G footprint is so weak that even in Central London you will sometimes fall back onto 3G. In almost every London airport or train station Three only offers 3G. I had high hopes when 4G800 was launched, but since then I have connected to 4G800 one single time. There are still plenty of places where I never have signal (office, university, bars) which is incredibly frustrating on a daily basis.

Vodafone on the other hand tempts me enormously because the fact that it already supports CA of the 800 and 2600 frequencies giving it 30Mhz of spectrum in 2600 areas (all of Central London) which is double of the spectrum that Three offer. Also their recent launch of the 1800Mhz and 2100Mhz bands make me hopeful, as it could pave the way to a CA of 45Mhz. Furthermore the fact that they’ve been deploying 4G on 800Mhz for 3 years now, gives me the confidence that they will offer much better indoor coverage than Three.

Now I wanted to ask if any Three insider knows wether Three has any plans to offer CA by combining the 800 and 1800 frequencies or if they are even looking at launching 4G on the 2100 frequency anytime soon. It would also be interesting to know wether Three is going to accelerate their 4G800 rollout, eventually bringing it to all base stations ?

What would the experts recommend I do purely on technical grounds (leaving out the details of the individual plans) ? Unfortunately EE is not really an option price wise at the moment...”

I thought voda had more than 25MHz of 2.6Ghz (2x20MHz+1x25MHz) ?
jo_m1
06-09-2016
Originally Posted by Ashley_Bradbury:
“I thought voda had more than 25MHz of 2.6Ghz (2x20MHz+1x25MHz) ?”

Yes but I think the 25Mhz of TDD-LTE are only very slowly being introduced.
Carl_Boys
06-09-2016
Try persevering with three. I mentioned before that sometimes switching 4G off in highly populated areas gives you a stable connection. If no improvements I suppose Vodafone and EE have the spectrum to be better but my work phone on voda seems to be done edge quite abit though an old iPhone 5!
Denco1
06-09-2016
Originally Posted by jo_m1:
“Well O2 are using their 5Mhz of 1800 for aggregation... You're probably right when you say it won't make sense to bring 800 to every mast, however the rollout in London so far seems to be borderline non-existent unfortunately.

Where can I find more info on those cash back deals ?”

It works for O2 as the additional 1800MHz is short range, whereas if the 2x15MHz on Three is already saturated another 2x5MHz of long range signal probably won't help much.
Cash back deals are offered through mobilephonesdirect and e2save.
dslrocks
06-09-2016
Does Three still have that requirement to have to have purchased it from the network in order to be able to access 4G800?
Denco1
06-09-2016
Originally Posted by dslrocks:
“Does Three still have that requirement to have to have purchased it from the network in order to be able to access 4G800?”

No, any iPhone compatible with VoLTE can be bought from anywhere. The Galaxy S7 can also be bought from anywhere, and a selection of handsets bought from anywhere will work with 4G Voice over ThreeinTouch
blueacid
07-09-2016
Originally Posted by Denco1:
“No, any iPhone compatible with VoLTE can be bought from anywhere. The Galaxy S7 can also be bought from anywhere, and a selection of handsets bought from anywhere will work with 4G Voice over ThreeinTouch”

Yep, I'm using an unbranded Z3 Compact and can get on L8 (4g 800) with Three.

Quick hint for those on Sony phones; *#*#7378423#*#* is the code to get into the service menu, from which you can set LTE only. 7378423 is the same keys as you'd press to type "SERVICE" on an older phone.
From there, you can set LTE only. This sticks until reboot, but it's a good way of forcing your phone onto 4g 800 if it's there but your phone insists on 3g. Voice calls don't seem to work in that mode though, so don't set it if you're expecting a call!
El Cubido
07-09-2016
I'm in a similar situation as the OP, currently on Three, just outside London. i have a Z5 Compact and have never seen 800Mhz, even the Three In Touch app doesn't give me the option of 4G calling, meaning i have no signal in most of my flat and also at my place of work (even with the Three firmware installed!)

Over the last month, i've been testing other networks and O2/Vod seem the best around where i need signal at the moment, with usable 3/4G in most places i visit around Surrey. Speeds aren't amazing, but then i mainly do web browsing, Social media etc.

I was quite keen on the Vodafone 20Gb offer until i saw the cashback deal on e2save, which works out roughly £10pm for 12 months .

Sorry Three, but in the 2 years of my contract, you've added no usable signal for calls that my phone can use. 4G 1800 is great, but data only so far...
rasseru16
07-09-2016
I too can confirm Three's 4G network within the M25 is shockingly poor! I gave up with 4G on three barely getting 1meg download in the busiest of areas, turned off 4G and used H+ instead. The Vodafone e2save cashback offer is what I've gone for but make sure that the 40% discount gets applied cause mine wasn't!
Carl_Boys
07-09-2016
I would of thought in built up areas the 4g network would be slower that the 3G. Hopefully they can refarm some of the band 1 2100 to 4G to give more efficient use of the spectrum.
jo_m1
07-09-2016
Originally Posted by rasseru16:
“I too can confirm Three's 4G network within the M25 is shockingly poor! I gave up with 4G on three barely getting 1meg download in the busiest of areas, turned off 4G and used H+ instead. The Vodafone e2save cashback offer is what I've gone for but make sure that the 40% discount gets applied cause mine wasn't!”

Both coverage and speed frustrate me so much that I'm even willing to pay over 100£ in early termination fees...

If I get the e2save cashback I can also make use of the 30 day return policy, right ?
david16
07-09-2016
It has to be three above vodafone as the ones to choose anywhere in the UK.
Grayburn
07-09-2016
Originally Posted by david16:
“It has to be three above vodafone as the ones to choose anywhere in the UK.”

So you're saying that if you lived somewhere in the UK and the Three signal was poor and Voda was great you'd still go with Three?
jo_m1
07-09-2016
Originally Posted by david16:
“It has to be three above vodafone as the ones to choose anywhere in the UK.”

Price wise and because of ACYE they are absolutely great. Also costumer service has always been very good for me.

But firstly their roaming offer is outdated with Vodafone giving me 4GB of real 4G data in Europe and offering me to use 4G data in many more countries for a mere 5pound a day.

And then there is the issue that even though Three might have the better 3G network and the better rural deployment, the network in central London is absolutely catastrophic...
rasseru16
07-09-2016
Originally Posted by jo_m1:
“Both coverage and speed frustrate me so much that I'm even willing to pay over 100£ in early termination fees...

If I get the e2save cashback I can also make use of the 30 day return policy, right ?”

I would think so? I mean don't quote me on that but I do not see why not. Most certainly if you're not sure you can call e2Save's customser services?

But with Three, it's all well and good having 'all you can eat data' but what for when speeds are going to be horrendous in the area(s) YOU will be using your data.

Definately either EE (1st Choice) or Vodafone for mobile data in Central London.
InfamousTeal
10-09-2016
I'm just back from a trip to London.

I live in a rural town in Northern Ireland with 4G, and have gotten 104Mbps from my mast. It's usually around 80Mbps, every time, because there are simply no users.

However in London I switched 4G off because it was so much slower than 3G.
4G gave around 0.4Mbps usually, where 3G would give around 5Mbps.

I'm happy though, as last time I was in London a couple of years ago, both 4G and 3G were unusable, whereas now only 4G is unusable
M1kos
10-09-2016
Voda is pretty good in central London lots of 4G CA 800/2600 and 2100 and I know of lots of planned masts for East London better than three definitely
jo_m1
12-09-2016
I just saw that Vodafone now even offers a deal with 25GB of data for 25pounds !

Now I wanted to ask if someone could explain to me how e2 save works ?
El Cubido
12-09-2016
I just signed up for the 20GB Vodafone sim on e2save (part of Carphone Warehouse). Should be £22pm, with cashback, works out at £10pm, add in visiting the site through Quidco, i got an additional £15 cashback, meaning if i do things right over the next 12 months, it works out at £8.75pm
jo_m1
13-09-2016
So I get myself a Vodafone SIM to test last week around the area where I live.

Speeds have been a bit weird as my phone switches around between 5 bars 4G800, 2 bars 4G2100 and 1 bar 4G2600. Generally 4G800 and 4G2600 have provided around 30-40Mbps and 4G2100 around 10Mbps.

Three on 4G1800 gave me around 40Mbps here, although this was one of the best masts I know in London.

Let's see how things go once I'll get myself the new Samsung which will give me CA.

How widespread is the use of 2 way or 3 way CA in London with Vodafone ?
binary
13-09-2016
Originally Posted by jo_m1:
“I just saw that Vodafone now even offers a deal with 25GB of data for 25pounds !

Now I wanted to ask if someone could explain to me how e2 save works ?”

For 12 month SIM-only you submit the 4th, 6th, 8th, 10th and 12th bills within 60 days - either online via the 'my account' portal on the e2save website (as a PDF or image files), or by post. Then within 8 weeks, but normally rather sooner than that, they send you a cheque.

When submitting the bills online, I have just submitted images (JPEGs) of the relevant pages they need, rather than the whole PDF with all my itemised calls (which they don't need).

There are various horror stories from the old days of cashback by redemption, where bills (or copies) had to be submitted by post in a restricted time window, and the relevant address to send them to even changed, so I was wary of the whole concept - but I think that was then and this is now, and with e2save at least I haven't had a problem.

One thing to note is that if you change your tariff with the network during the minimum term (e.g. up the tariff), then the cashback becomes null and void.
jonmorris
13-09-2016
I read the terms of the cashback on mobiles.co.uk and have to say that it sounds rather daunting, even if you do get 60 days to submit each bill.
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