Speculation about 2 Degrees 3G

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ahmad

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#39307 12-Aug-2009 14:35

Can people who understand this issue help?

With 2 Degrees running on the GSM band that is the same as Vodafone's (is that GSM 900?), what is the likely 3G upgrade likely to use?

Is there are a reason that Vodafone 3G is on 2100Mhz? Like does this somehow complement their GSM band?

Can 2 Degrees go straight to a 850Mhz/900Mhz band for 3G while maintaining GSM 2G compatibility with the phones they are currently selling?

macuser

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#245612 12-Aug-2009 14:37

2D is buying Woosh, skipping 3G and going straight to Wimax.

I wish

bags1

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#245642 12-Aug-2009 15:22

2D will deploy 2100MHZ 3G. It says that on their website. Check coverage page.

ahmad

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#245649 12-Aug-2009 15:35

Hey thanks for that. Is there a relationship between the 2G band they currently use, and 2100Mhz 3G? Or it is just coincidence that this is the same upgrade path as Vodafone?

Cheers.

sbiddle

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#245692 12-Aug-2009 16:29

ahmad: Hey thanks for that. Is there a relationship between the 2G band they currently use, and 2100Mhz 3G? Or it is just coincidence that this is the same upgrade path as Vodafone?

Cheers.

2100Mhz has been the "standard" 3G band since the first WCDMA networks were deployed.

I'm not quite sure what your point is - apart from the USA and Canada virtually every country in the world that has deployed a WCDMA network has used 2100Mhz.

The use of lower band 850 and 900 networks for WCDMA is a recent thing.

ahmad

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#245695 12-Aug-2009 16:32

There is no "point". I'm asking because I don't know.

Would it have been highly unusual and/or difficult for 2 Degrees to have rolled out 3G on 850/900 instead, having opted for GSM on 2G?

freitism told me that 850 has better "characteristics" than 2100, so I'm confused as to why a newly built network would be 2100 and not 850 (or 900 which I presume has similar characteristics to 850?).

Niel

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#245712 12-Aug-2009 17:14

Depends on many factors. Different frequencies perform differently with different landscapes and climates. But a more likely reason is that older technology is cheaper.

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sbiddle

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#245720 12-Aug-2009 17:34

ahmad: There is no "point". I'm asking because I don't know.

Would it have been highly unusual and/or difficult for 2 Degrees to have rolled out 3G on 850/900 instead, having opted for GSM on 2G?

freitism told me that 850 has better "characteristics" than 2100, so I'm confused as to why a newly built network would be 2100 and not 850 (or 900 which I presume has similar characteristics to 850?).

2degrees down have management rights for both 850 and 900 spectrum - the 900 was obtained from Vodafone and the 850 from Telecom.

You are right to question why they wouldn't use 850 - I actually heard rumors at one stage they were going to either deploy GSM and 3G on both bands and obviously could have taken a lucky dip and chosen the mix they felt was best.

For whatever reason it seems that this is not infact happening and that they will only be using 2100 for 3G which does leave them with unused 850Mhz spectrum.

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zkcow

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#245722 12-Aug-2009 17:49

I guess there is also a wider selection of phones and other equipment for 2100 band 3G. Although personally I would have preferred it if 2d had gone for 850 MHz WCDMA like XT - only because of the benefits it offers. In time, prices would come down for phones on that band and the selection will increase anyway (so that's a moot point).

richms

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#245980 13-Aug-2009 11:50

Wouldnt that cause interference problems - I mean XT on a seperate pole had issues with interfering with vodafone and 2degrees - if they were on the same pole then could they even get it to work? Or is 2degrees GSM 900 gear a lot better then vodafones so may be ok with it?

Richard rich.ms

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#245987 13-Aug-2009 12:18

There is a natural law saying the lower the frequency, the higher is the range. That means a signal transmitted at 900 MHz will reach farther than a signal transmitted with the same power at 2100 MHz. So running a wireless network on a low frequency will require less base stations and so will reduce costs, while providing better coverage, especially indoors due to the better penetration characteristics.
When people started development of UMTS (that's the correct designation of the 3G-standard used in NZ and most countries of the world), most of the 900 and 1800 MHz spectrum was already assigned to GSM operators and there was no unused frequency range below 2100 MHz, which would have been wide enough for a new wirless network standard. Also UMTS requires a continious spectrum of at least 5 MHz, which a lot of operators didn't have, as their frequency portions were fragmented in several smaller pieces.
So replacing existing GSM networks by UMTS at 900 or 1800 MHz was not an option back then, because frequencies would have needed to be refarmed (= defragmented) and all phones and radio infrastructure would have needed to be replaced at once, which would have been uneconomical, especially since UMTS-hardware was immature and very expensive in the beginning. Further people believed we would need the complete 900 and 1800 MHz-spectrum for GSM and doubted in UMTS being ready for market to satisfy that demand by time.
Basicly that's why UMTS was launched at 2100 MHz.

However in the past few years it became clear, that the short range of the 2100 MHz-band is problematic when it comes to covering rural areas and indoor coverage, while the demand for mobile broadband has increased. Since UMTS equipment became cheaper and the technology is quite sophisticated today, it was examined if UMTS and GSM can coexist in the same band. That actually works, but you need quite a lot of frequency spectrum. For a nationwide network you need at least 5 MHz for GSM + 200 KHz guard band + 5 MHz (continious) for 3G.
For details on UMTS900 and a comparsion to UMTS2100 check out http://www.qualcomm.com/common/documents/white_papers/UMTS900_Overview_Deployment_Guidelines.pdf

I don't know how much 900 MHz-spectrum 2degrees actually have, but I think it's not enough for UMTS and GSM parallely. Due to the low penetration of UMTS900-capable handsets among potential customers and the limited availability of such, 2degrees may have decided to use their 900 MHZ-spectrum for GSM in order every New Zealander with a GSM-phone can use their network straight away. Further by using GSM900 they can also get a portion from the (inbound) roaming business from visitors.

Since Telecom as an incumbent operator already has a huge customer base, which they can carry over to a new technology relatively easy by just supplying new handsets, you can't compare them with 2degrees. 2degrees is a new entrant with limited financial abilites, who needs to acquire new customers the cheapest way possible. They surely rely on new customers who bring their GSM-handsets instead of giving away expensive UMTS900-handsets, which makes GSM900 the best choice for their network.

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inquisitor

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#246000 13-Aug-2009 12:37

sbiddle:

2degrees down have management rights for both 850 and 900 spectrum - the 900 was obtained from Vodafone and the 850 from Telecom.

Are you sure about that? The MED website shows only spectrum on the 900, 1800 and 2100 MHz bands: click

Niel

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#246008 13-Aug-2009 13:14

There is another "natural law" that says you can transmit a lot more data in a shorter time at a higher frequency, and also do a lot more error correction. So yes higher frequency means lower penetration but if designed right it also means longer range for getting the data to the other side.

Another consideration is higher frequency has shorted wavelength and thus smaller dead spots (where resonance occurs).

So the frequency vs. range is not black + white (it is 2Degrees ;-).

You can never have enough Volvos!

langi27

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#246035 13-Aug-2009 14:37

The reason 2degrees hasn't activated 3G yet is money people.

Its going to cost them $14.5 Million to use the 2100MHz frequency.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/yvonne-tahana/news/article.cfm?a_id=345&objectid=10578437

Once the network goes live, Maori would have had to pay $14.5 million, less a discount for the spectrum rights.

However, Osborne negotiated a deal which would see 2degrees pay the fee in return for using the spectrum which is owned by the Hautaki Trust. While the auction allocation wasn't part of a Treaty settlement, specific Maori access to the spectrum was a nod to the principle of development rights.

I'd imagine they want more than half a dozen customers customers using their network on GSM (frequency they brought off Vodafone) before they start launching that kind of money.

sbiddle

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#246166 13-Aug-2009 17:41

inquisitor:
sbiddle:

2degrees down have management rights for both 850 and 900 spectrum - the 900 was obtained from Vodafone and the 850 from Telecom.

Are you sure about that? The MED website shows only spectrum on the 900, 1800 and 2100 MHz bands: click

It appears I missed the 4th Jan rights swap 2degrees did with the MED for the remaining cCrown owned 900Mhz spectrum. They previously had MR's for the 840-845 uplink and associated downlink.

2degrees still however do have MR's for a 1MHz band at 840-841 and 885-886 for the uplink, anybody know why they kept a 1MHz chunk? There isn't much you can deploy in it! (Link is here showing details)

wongtop

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#246199 13-Aug-2009 18:21

It looks like they have swapped some 850 spectrum for 900 spectrum. They originally had the top end (5 MHz) of Telecoms and the bottom end of Vodafone's spectrum (another 5 MHz), but as we know there is overlap between the spectrum that can be used for 850 downlink (cellsites transmitting) and 900 uplink (phones transmitting). It seems that they swapped some 850 upload (circa 845 MHz) for some 900 download (circa 935 MHz). This means that 2 degrees can now use the 5MHz that was for 850 downlink for 900 uplink, giving them 10 MHz of continuous paired spectrum, instead of 2 chunks of 5 MHz which they would struggle to use because the downlink and uplink of the chunks would likely interfere at circa 890 MHz.

It seems to me that the Crown only had 4 MHz to swap them with (935-939) so they did a 4 MHz swap, and are now left with a stranded 1 MHz.

That's my guess anyway.