Vodafone 5G announcement - December 2019 launch

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#2371685 10-Dec-2019 12:30

freitasm:
Dear Lord. I had a read on some of the Facebook comments on the Vodafone page.

People are delusional.

That would explain the security goons outside the VF store. Have to stop the tinfoil hatters supergluing themselves to something!

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#2372017 10-Dec-2019 21:01

@jasonParis where is the speedtest!

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#2372021 10-Dec-2019 21:05

A speed test as requested. Note the upload speeds - as @sbiddle mentioned before 5G downloads are one thing... Uploads are still over 4G and a couple of years away from being fully realised as 5G.

No, I did not get a 5G phone or SIM card to test on the street 😟 @jasonparis

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#2372023 10-Dec-2019 21:10

530mbit on cband indoor with the limited amount of specturm vf have isn't too bad for NSA.

Upload is to be expected. NSA uses lte for the signaling and upload.

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#2372168 11-Dec-2019 07:36

The photo above is one that a few people took off the handset I was playing with. Vodafone didn't actually have any handsets for demo - but this one in the store on the stand was connected to 5G so I started playing with it.

Speeds were up to about 550Mbps and uploads probably averaging around 20 - 25 across probably 20 tests that I did. The store had it's own 5G site internally so had great signal strength and minimal other traffic.

WHat was intersesting was Vodafone presenting two "real world" use cases, both of which simply aren't feasible right now. They have a slick Police video showing their 5G drone in action and how this will benefit the Police streaming 4K video back to officers, and a demo of a CCTV AI solution that could show customer movements in store and customer heatmaps.

The problem is neither are possible in the real world now over 5G when 5G in NSA mode utilises 4G for upload, a critical aspect of current 5G networks that is totally lost on 99% of people talking or writing about 5G. Uploading CCTV content via 5G and not fibre is quite simply just dumb and no solution architect would ever contemplate such a terrible solution - not now, and not in the foreseeable future.

The challenges of 4G upload are a reality every day for broadcast crews around NZ (and the rest of the world) who use solutions such as LiveU to deliver both outside broadcasts and live crosses. These units bond together multiple SIM cards from different networks to aggregate bandwidth. You only need to look at the Newshub live cross to Auckland airport last night to realise the challenges - video was choppy and highly pixelated as the adaptive codec struggled with the poor bandwidth and was potentially struggling to get any more than maybe 1Mbps (target is around 3.5Mbps). While I don't know the exact setup Newhub were using it would have been a minimum of Spark and Vodafone SIM cards and possibly a 2degrees one as well (these units typically support up to 6 bonded connections).

It's just wishful thinking for Vodafone and the Police to be hyping up a 4K 5G drone and marketing something that is simply not possible is quite frankly just dumb.

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#2372181 11-Dec-2019 08:49

Where does liveU terminate their connections though?

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#2372194 11-Dec-2019 09:09

hio77: Where does liveU terminate their connections though?

Connects to a hardware or a server at the other end to spit out the video feed.

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#2372235 11-Dec-2019 10:20

Upload aside, I'm genuinely surprised by the high latency in that screen shot (55ms) - is that representative of all their 5G locations as it is now? Will a move away from NSA improve it?

On 4G (2degrees) I'm getting half that ping currently.

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#2372328 11-Dec-2019 11:49

c0ld:

Upload aside, I'm genuinely surprised by the high latency in that screen shot (55ms) - is that representative of all their 5G locations as it is now? Will a move away from NSA improve it?

On 4G (2degrees) I'm getting half that ping currently.

fast.com isn't the most reliable test - and there is also no way you can get 19ms across 4G as it's simply not possible. My test is also too high.

5G NSA latency is typically around 30ms RTT across the air interface and it's around 10ms RTT to Auckland from Wellington so that figure in the shop demo should realistically be around the 40ms mark.

The much proclaimed low latency 5G (which will deliver 2ms or so across the air interface) won't happen until we get URLLC with 5G SA.

c0ld

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#2372338 11-Dec-2019 12:03

sbiddle:

fast.com isn't the most reliable test - and there is also no way you can get 19ms across 4G as it's simply not possible. My test is also too high.

5G NSA latency is typically around 30ms RTT across the air interface and it's around 10ms RTT to Auckland from Wellington so that figure in the shop demo should realistically be around the 40ms mark.

The much proclaimed low latency 5G (which will deliver 2ms or so across the air interface) won't happen until we get URLLC with 5G SA.

Fair shout, I won't pretend to understand the ins and outs :D

So when I use something like speedtest.net app instead, is the 21ms in this example being misrepresented somehow? Do these speedtest sites show a latency which refers to one thing where as all the 5G low latency figures / the fact you say you can't get 4G latency that low talk about something else?

Hope this isn't too off topic...

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#2375764 15-Dec-2019 13:00

TL:DR

If you live in a rural area, how long is it likely to take to get 5G coverage?

ie Is it worth bothering to get a 5G phone now, for the very occasional times you're in a metro area, or just leave it 2 it 3 years?

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#2375765 15-Dec-2019 13:03

Geektastic: TL:DR

If you live in a rural area, how long is it likely to take to get 5G coverage?

ie Is it worth bothering to get a 5G phone now, for the very occasional times you're in a metro area, or just leave it 2 it 3 years?

@Geektastic I would wait 12 months

Geektastic

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#2375766 15-Dec-2019 13:06

Linux:
Geektastic: TL:DR

If you live in a rural area, how long is it likely to take to get 5G coverage?

ie Is it worth bothering to get a 5G phone now, for the very occasional times you're in a metro area, or just leave it 2 it 3 years?

@Geektastic I would wait 12 months

Thanks. Having only just about got 4G, you do wonder!