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AWS Private 5G

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Re: AWS Private 5G

#241
Q: What spectrum does AWS Private 5G support?

By default, AWS Private 5G uses shared spectrum like Citizens Broadband Radio Service (CBRS) in the US.

Re: AWS Private 5G

#242

How is a private 5G network different from wifi from a consumer/business perspective? Does it have a superior range? (Honest question)

5G has the ability to run on licensed and unlicensed frequencies too. Unlicensed spectrum is highly interfered and is a reason WiFi performs so poorly sometimes. Using licensed spectrum means you control the RF environment and therefore have much better control of network performance.

Re: AWS Private 5G

#243
post #21

I wonder which smart TV provider will be the first to use this instead of home wifi where people can disable or black hole connectivity.

One response to this problem is to perform mild electronics surgery and install fine copper mesh around anything that looks like it moves electrons as part of its normal function. It really doesn't take a whole lot to completely fuck up an RF signal.

Alternatively, you could maybe do the same to your drywall if you are looking at new home construction... If every room is effectively a faraday cage, you are back in control over what can talk to what on a much more granular level. This clearly creates challenges for your own wireless/mobile signals, but presumably you also have the ability to hardwire additional access points if you are going to this extent.

Re: AWS Private 5G

#244
It seems everyone here is confused. Here's the official FAQ, and it has 0 marketing garbage.

https://aws.amazon.com/private5g/faqs/

There's no "telecom as a service", and there's no "5g can be split into multiple networks" nonsense.

Amazon is just selling 5g access points and hardware (just like you would install wifi), and rents you a private connection for that hardware to AWS, and management of that network from AWS. Basically.

Re: AWS Private 5G

#245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please excuse my vast ignorance but wouldn't Tesla, Uber or whomever need to deploy a massive network of 5g towers for that? Or is more that Tesla/Uber/etc could much more easily become an MVNO-like-provider because of network slicing?

The second comment. The telecoms via 5G have been positioning themselves to rent their infrastructure on-demand. The AWS partnership is this but Amazon then re-extending it to developers on their platform as part of their "Cloud" offerings. I doubt Amazon has many towers of their own here and are almost entirely through one of the telecoms.

>I doubt Amazon has many towers of their own

Their offering page specifically says that AWS "delivers your network hardware (small cell radio base-station and servers) Attach power and internet connectivity to smart cells and servers"

They are not using telco partnerships here, or at least if they are, it's not on the level of carving out a chunk of the telco network for private use.

I struggle to see how this remains a "cloud" offering rather than a hardware rental.

Re: AWS Private 5G

#246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The 5G architecture (and LTE for the most part, but 5G was designed ground-up this way) makes very heavy use of remote resources. An actual 5G base station (and most new LTE base stations) is somewhat like an SDR with very little actual protocol logic locally, it connects to a remote controller that handles all of the "business logic." It's an important change because for various reasons, some good and some not so go…

Thanks for the clarifications! I still have questions - there is no "business logic" in my wifi router, so why would there be such a thing in a 5G base station? What is the analog to a wifi router calling out to a "remote controller" to handle "business logic"? A base station needs "support services" to function - what are those? Presumably the complexity of 5G vs Wifi comes from it's cell nature, and the nodes need…

Not only is there some additional network logic to help handoffs go smoothly, there's a lot more complicated business logic going on with cellular APs than home WiFi APs. On top of that, you're going to want to try and control potentially thousands of APs and have them orchestrate and you may not want to rely on RF links to propagate changes.

A home WiFi AP is doing a pretty straightforward relation of SSID to some Ethernet-like network. Anything talking on the Ethernet network addressing a client goes out the radio, things coming from the client to the Ethernet network goes in. Even with this, it can make sense to have the management of these systems centralized, most enterprise systems do this already.

Cellular networking gets a lot more complicated with various APNs and other advanced networking concepts. There is a lot more going on than just doing a handshake, pulling an IP address, and starting to talk networking.

Re: AWS Private 5G

#247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The 5G architecture (and LTE for the most part, but 5G was designed ground-up this way) makes very heavy use of remote resources. An actual 5G base station (and most new LTE base stations) is somewhat like an SDR with very little actual protocol logic locally, it connects to a remote controller that handles all of the "business logic." It's an important change because for various reasons, some good and some not so go…

Thanks for the clarifications! I still have questions - there is no "business logic" in my wifi router, so why would there be such a thing in a 5G base station? What is the analog to a wifi router calling out to a "remote controller" to handle "business logic"? A base station needs "support services" to function - what are those? Presumably the complexity of 5G vs Wifi comes from it's cell nature, and the nodes need…

My understanding of 5G and modern cell phone protocols is there isn't really an idea of "handoff". With CDMA multiple towers in an area all get the same signals from your phone and are all transmitting on the same frequencies as well. It is kind of a "mesh" like thing.

Re: AWS Private 5G

#248

It seems everyone here is confused. Here's the official FAQ, and it has 0 marketing garbage. https://aws.amazon.com/private5g/faqs/ There's no "telecom as a service", and there's no "5g can be split into multiple networks" nonsense. Amazon is just selling 5g access points and hardware (just like you would install wifi), and rents you a private connection for that hardware to AWS, and management of that network from A…

I'm still kinda of confused... does that mean we could say get a simcard and make voice calls via this network? insert sim card into mobile phone android/iphone and make phone calls?

Re: AWS Private 5G

#249
post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 5G isn't really like 4G upgraded. It's more its own thing. This is my understanding as well, but I have no idea about any of the details. I know there's something cool about "beams". Do you (or anyone) have a good "entry-level" article/doc that outlines some of the major features that makes it so different than 4G?

Search Massive MIMO, Beamforming ( Which isn't really new ), Small Cells, NR. That is about it really. You can ignore mmWave which is pure hype. Most of the other enhancements are on the carrier / operation side and not consumer. You can also ignore all the 5G Self Driving Vehicle crap.

>5G Self Driving Vehicle crap.

I live in a dense suburb of a large city and 5G coverage seems not that great. I'm not sure why self-driving requires or gains much benefit from 5g anyway, but I wouldn't want to rely on it. You can certainly do car-to-car communication & coordination without it, and you wouldn't want a minor network outage turning the system into chaos.

Re: AWS Private 5G

#250

What radio spectrum does it use for a private 5G network? Isn't it all expensively purchased by the phone companies already?

AFAIK, this is CBRS as a Service, which means it uses the 3.5GHz PAL.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_Broadband_Radio_Servi...

https://www.fcc.gov/35-ghz-band-overview

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