Spark to close its 3G network in late 2025

Forums › Spark New Zealand (including Skinny and BigPipe) › Spark to close its 3G network in late 2025

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#3056259 29-Mar-2023 17:25

old3eyes:

Oh no my hand me down phones in the cars glove boxes will have to be upgraded. Oh the cost 😂

So long as my 2g 2 factor phone on vodafone keeps working a little longer im ok.

Will be annoyed when my voice calling old android with working call recording no longer works tho, stupid google mandating their crap dialer on new phones.

Richard rich.ms

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#3056351 29-Mar-2023 21:19

CcMaN: My frustration with this 3G shutdown is the fact that I've had a number of conversations with reasonably technical people who like buying less mainstream android phones Google Pixel, OnePlus, Motorola, Sony etc who don't realise that just because their device currently works on 4G or 5G (for data) that voice/SMS is still reliant on 3G.

I have several devices in this category. It's always a risk with any phone not purchased directly from a Telco. In most cases when the device supports VoLTE and I think all those do it is usually possible to use external tools to set the correct modes for your chosen carrier. Personally I try to avoid that because maintenance problems. In two years my devices will be out of support and will no longer get updates I probably won't bother.

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#3056356 29-Mar-2023 21:31

Does Google Carrier Settings as found in the Play Store - does that address VoLTE settings?

Yes, I believe it does. The comments about baked in are incorrect. I've been on the carrier services beta for some time. I check after each update to see if it's given me VoLTE, like a hopeful cargo cult member..

But actually that's pretty silly because I'm fairly sure my Telco has not provisioned my imei whatever with VoLTE or 5G long story you can ask, and that's about all.

jonb

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#3056450 30-Mar-2023 10:38

Some of you are being blase about VoLTE issues on various handsets and people having to replace them. Only last year there were big threads here about what a shitshow VoLTE is nationally with people unable to contact emergency services despite 4bars etc. I have no idea if my current Xiaomi Note 11 does VoLTE on Spark/Skinny and would have no way of finding out. Multiply that by a million non-technical users and that is a significant issue.

My stock answer if asked by friends and relatives will be just move to another carrier if have issues after 3G switch off.

alasta

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#3056452 30-Mar-2023 10:41

Realistically how many non technical users would have these oddball devices? I get that this is a tech forum and the userbase here is likely to be experimenting with a range of devices, but people who are not tech savvy (like me) would surely just be going into the telco stores and buying standard iPhone/Samsung handsets?

CcMaN

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#3056453 30-Mar-2023 10:46

jonb:

Some of you are being blase about VoLTE issues on various handsets and people having to replace them. Only last year there were big threads here about what a shitshow VoLTE is nationally with people unable to contact emergency services despite 4bars etc. I have no idea if my current Xiaomi Note 11 does VoLTE on Spark/Skinny and would have no way of finding out. Multiply that by a million non-technical users and that is a significant issue.

My stock answer if asked by friends and relatives will be just move to another carrier if have issues after 3G switch off.

I suspect a lot of non-technical users are going to look at their phones and see 4G or 5G and not even realise that VoLTE support for their handset is also essential. I'm interested in the comments above about Google Carrier Services, is this supposed to standardise carrier profiles and VoLTE across manufacturers?

Behodar

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#3056454 30-Mar-2023 10:47

alasta:

Realistically how many non technical users would have these oddball devices? I get that this is a tech forum and the userbase here is likely to be experimenting with a range of devices, but people who are not tech savvy (like me) would surely just be going into the telco stores and buying standard iPhone/Samsung handsets?

What about people who buy a cheap imported phone off Trade Me, often not even knowing that it's a foreign model? I'd imagine that that's not an insignificant chunk.

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CcMaN

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#3056457 30-Mar-2023 10:59

alasta:

Realistically how many non technical users would have these oddball devices? I get that this is a tech forum and the userbase here is likely to be experimenting with a range of devices, but people who are not tech savvy (like me) would surely just be going into the telco stores and buying standard iPhone/Samsung handsets?

I think there are a lot more non-iPhone and Samsung devices out there than you might think. Even the main carriers were selling 4G phones (without VoLTE support) from the likes of Sony, Motorola etc not that long ago. I've also seen that over the last few years the handsets that are being sold by the NZ carriers have reduced drastically.

I get that trying to get VoLTE working on every device might be quite difficult, but the market of handsets in NZ is also very rapidly being diluted to iPhone and Samsung. I'm also not against the 3G switchoff at all, but the current state of VoLTE support means our handset choices are going to be very limited in the future, this is what concerns me.

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#3056475 30-Mar-2023 11:45

alasta:
Realistically how many non technical users would have these oddball devices? I get that this is a tech forum and the userbase here is likely to be experimenting with a range of devices, but people who are not tech savvy (like me) would surely just be going into the telco stores and buying standard iPhone/Samsung handsets?

There's a lot more Noel Leeming, Harvey Norman, Warehouse etc than telco stores.

Change is inevitable but why is there such a time spread between NZ carriers?

tripper1000

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#3056485 30-Mar-2023 12:14

boosacnoodle: Can someone explain in more detail the issues with pumping the power up on 4G? This is a geeks forum after all, rather than just “reasons”.

I agree with you. I smell a rat on this "power" subject. I'm a geek, I repair transmitters, so I reckon I have a fair chance of understanding, so explain it to me please. If true, surely it is a limitaion with Sparks hardware because it doesn't seem to hold true across the industry.

2DM has been reframing 3G frequenceis across to 4G for a while now. They presently have 3G and 4G carriers coexisting side by side in their rather narrow 900 MHz (B8) band (also in their wider 2100 MHz (B1) band), so clearly it isn't a one or the other other option.

The rush to close 3G in the USA has been a bit of a shambles and certainly has not lead to a better customer calling experience. There are phones still being released (eg the S22's on Vodafone) which stuggle with sub-par audio on VoLTE.

gajan

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#3056488 30-Mar-2023 12:28

tripper1000:

boosacnoodle: Can someone explain in more detail the issues with pumping the power up on 4G? This is a geeks forum after all, rather than just “reasons”.

I agree with you. I smell a rat on this "power" subject. I'm a geek, I repair transmitters, so I reckon I have a fair chance of understanding, so explain it to me please. If true, surely it is a limitaion with Sparks hardware because it doesn't seem to hold true across the industry.

2DM has been reframing 3G frequenceis across to 4G for a while now. They presently have 3G and 4G carriers coexisting side by side in their rather narrow 900 MHz (B8) band (also in their wider 2100 MHz (B1) band), so clearly it isn't a one or the other other option.

The rush to close 3G in the USA has been a bit of a shambles and certainly has not lead to a better customer calling experience. There are phones still being released (eg the S22's on Vodafone) which stuggle with sub-par audio on VoLTE.

I think you'll find that, the comment did not originate from Spark. There is no intention to alter power levels outside of what we are licensed for.

My comments and remarks are not necessarily of my employer.

tripper1000

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#3056493 30-Mar-2023 12:42

CcMaN: ....I still haven't got a clear answer why handsets that are VoLTE capable (but aren't sold by the carrier themselves) cannot be at least enabled to work (even if the carrier will never officially support them). I get that the carriers can't guarantee every handset will work on their network, but surely these should be edge cases rather than effectively blocking most handsets that the carrier themselves did not sell.....

To suppliment the answer given to this question with some back ground which helps understand the inherent deficiencies of VoLTE: there is a fundimental difference between 3G voice and 4G voice.

2G and 3G networks were designed to carry voice. Implicit in the design of the phones and networks are world wide standards on how voice is carried.

4G network was not designed to carry voice at all. It is exclusively a data network. That means that voice is an after thought and VoLTE is an adaptation. LTE/4G does not have a world wide voice standard unlike 2G and 3G.

Therefore many VoLTE networks are implimented different and the phone makers are unable to make a VoLTE phone with universal voice compatibility like they could with 2G and 3G.

It is not the same but it is similar to compairing a copper telephone to ethernet. A copper phone does voice calling well and can be switched between networks no problem. Ethernet doesn't do voice. To put voice over Ethernet you need a VoIP adaptor. Every VoIP provider has different settings, so there is no VoIP phone that will work with your privider without first entering a bunch of custom settings. VoLTE has a lot in common with VoIP in this regard.

richms

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#3056495 30-Mar-2023 12:45

tripper1000:

I agree with you. I smell a rat on this "power" subject. I'm a geek, I repair transmitters, so I reckon I have a fair chance of understanding, so explain it to me please. If true, surely it is a limitaion with Sparks hardware because it doesn't seem to hold true across the industry.

2DM has been reframing 3G frequenceis across to 4G for a while now. They presently have 3G and 4G carriers coexisting side by side in their rather narrow 900 MHz (B8) band (also in their wider 2100 MHz (B1) band), so clearly it isn't a one or the other other option.

The rush to close 3G in the USA has been a bit of a shambles and certainly has not lead to a better customer calling experience. There are phones still being released (eg the S22's on Vodafone) which stuggle with sub-par audio on VoLTE.

It's been pretty well covered, but the 700MHz 4g is not running at its max because someone decided that they are still a voice call company, and that its a bad customer experience to see bars on their phone and then miss a call because they have no volte.

Hopefully this error in judgement goes away sooner rather than later since all their customers without volte phones will be missing all their calls once 3g goes away so best get them used to it now.

Richard rich.ms

gajan

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#3056499 30-Mar-2023 13:00

richms:

tripper1000:

I agree with you. I smell a rat on this "power" subject. I'm a geek, I repair transmitters, so I reckon I have a fair chance of understanding, so explain it to me please. If true, surely it is a limitaion with Sparks hardware because it doesn't seem to hold true across the industry.

2DM has been reframing 3G frequenceis across to 4G for a while now. They presently have 3G and 4G carriers coexisting side by side in their rather narrow 900 MHz (B8) band (also in their wider 2100 MHz (B1) band), so clearly it isn't a one or the other other option.

The rush to close 3G in the USA has been a bit of a shambles and certainly has not lead to a better customer calling experience. There are phones still being released (eg the S22's on Vodafone) which stuggle with sub-par audio on VoLTE.

It's been pretty well covered, but the 700MHz 4g is not running at its max because someone decided that they are still a voice call company, and that its a bad customer experience to see bars on their phone and then miss a call because they have no volte.

Hopefully this error in judgement goes away sooner rather than later since all their customers without volte phones will be missing all their calls once 3g goes away so best get them used to it now.

Again I'm not sure where this is coming from, but this is simply not true.

My comments and remarks are not necessarily of my employer.

tripper1000

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#3056508 30-Mar-2023 13:16

Been doing a bit of Googling and aside from possible voluntary reductions in 4G power, 3G (voice) is/was more reliable than 4G. Something to do with 3G designed to be more robust and 4G designed more for speed.

Edit: ...all other factors being equal. I'm sure 700MHz 4G will give better coverage than 2100 MHz 3G).

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