Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The Disappointment of 5G

circleid.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

111–120 of 175 posts

Re: The Disappointment of 5G

#111

Post by gsich »

mgrund wrote: post #105
martinald wrote: post #9

Ignoring all the hype and BS, all the cell infrastructure really comes down to a battle between user bandwidth needs and available spectrum (multiplied by spectral efficiency and density of towers). Get this wrong and customer service tanks as cell sites get congestied. There are virtually no new applications enabled IMO with 5G speeds vs LTE speeds/latency, assuming they are both not congested. 100mbit/sec LTE with…

> There are virtually no new applications enabled IMO with 5G speeds vs LTE speeds/latency, assuming they are both not congested. I think 5G latency requirements are currently very academically driven without much practical validation, see e.g. Tactile Internet.

Latency is also "only" improved to and from a tower, the rest stays the same.

Re: The Disappointment of 5G

#112

Post by littlestymaar »

WithinReason wrote: post #30
martinald wrote: post #9

Ignoring all the hype and BS, all the cell infrastructure really comes down to a battle between user bandwidth needs and available spectrum (multiplied by spectral efficiency and density of towers). Get this wrong and customer service tanks as cell sites get congestied. There are virtually no new applications enabled IMO with 5G speeds vs LTE speeds/latency, assuming they are both not congested. 100mbit/sec LTE with…

> There are virtually no new applications enabled IMO with 5G speeds vs LTE speeds/latency You can reasonably replace your home internet with 5G

You can, in the same places where you could already replace it with LTE back then, and in remote place where you couldn't already, 5G isn't going to happen anyway.

Re: The Disappointment of 5G

#113

Post by mgrund »

gsich wrote: post #111
mgrund wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There are virtually no new applications enabled IMO with 5G speeds vs LTE speeds/latency, assuming they are both not congested. I think 5G latency requirements are currently very academically driven without much practical validation, see e.g. Tactile Internet.

Latency is also "only" improved to and from a tower, the rest stays the same.

Absolutely, this is a central subject of study in Tactile Internet from what I’ve heard; next-gen backhaul/WAN technology. It starts with first hop to support local Tactile Internet networks. Private, ultra low latency 5G LANs are already being used in e.g. some production facilities.

Re: The Disappointment of 5G

#114

Post by t43562 »

ddol wrote: post #93
t43562 wrote: post #85

In the UK whenever I go to some public event - e.g. some of the anti-Brexit marches or something like the Fully Charged EV show or any other big event I start to have trouble connecting and when I am able to move away from the crowd far enough I can use my phone again. This is dangerous - when you're in a crowd you need your phone more to be able to find out what's happening and where your friends or family are if yo…

I used to have connectivity and data speed issues at music festivals and large conventions, but both permanent infrastructure at convention centres and temporary towers at parks used for festivals have mitigated this (in my experience). In both cases the event is planned many months in advance, and there are incentives for both event organisers and telcos to ensure phone subscribers have a good experience (avoids “re…

Protests are organised to do what they have to do and they're not done with oodles of cash. The marches had hundreds of thousands of people in them stretching over a long distance. It wasn't even possible to fit in the final destination.

In fact my local Turkish society shindig for April 23 had connection problems despite only having 500 people in a hall and those people are collecting for earthquake victims so there's no money for luxuries.

If, however, 5G helped make this problem go away then hurray. It would be worth it.

Re: The Disappointment of 5G

#115

Post by shever73 »

t43562 wrote: post #85

In the UK whenever I go to some public event - e.g. some of the anti-Brexit marches or something like the Fully Charged EV show or any other big event I start to have trouble connecting and when I am able to move away from the crowd far enough I can use my phone again. This is dangerous - when you're in a crowd you need your phone more to be able to find out what's happening and where your friends or family are if yo…

> like the Fully Charged EV show

Nice reference. I have had similar problems when travelling to the UK for large events. Whenever I go over for an Arsenal match (it still hurts, thank you) I have trouble just using my phone anywhere near the stadium. I haven't had that issue with similarly large events here in Dublin, so maybe we don't experience as much cell congestion.

With regard to 5G in Dublin, though, the performance has been poor. When we moved into a new apartment, a 5G router was my only option for a few months. Although I purportedly had a 5G connection, according to the router, it never worked well for video meetings or anything other than burst downloads of files.

Re: The Disappointment of 5G

#117

Post by MikeTheRocker »

WithinReason wrote: post #30
martinald wrote: post #9

Ignoring all the hype and BS, all the cell infrastructure really comes down to a battle between user bandwidth needs and available spectrum (multiplied by spectral efficiency and density of towers). Get this wrong and customer service tanks as cell sites get congestied. There are virtually no new applications enabled IMO with 5G speeds vs LTE speeds/latency, assuming they are both not congested. 100mbit/sec LTE with…

> There are virtually no new applications enabled IMO with 5G speeds vs LTE speeds/latency You can reasonably replace your home internet with 5G

I live in an older apartment complex that doesn't have the requisite connections to get wired internet from any mainstream provider in the area, so I have 5G home internet and it's quite good. No less reliable than wired was for me in the past, and I generally get speeds around 600 Gbps down/100 up.

EDIT: Mbps, not Gbps

Re: The Disappointment of 5G

#118

Post by bretticus »

Saris wrote: post #74

It's pretty funny how T-Mobile has rolled out 5G in my small town (with a single cell tower), but have not bothered to upgrade the connection to the tower so we still only get about 2mbps on a good day. Even better is the local ISP offers 10gbps fiber service and has lines directly next to the tower, but the cell tower doesn't use that, and instead has some long range microwave backhaul. I always wonder what the poin…

Marketing

Re: The Disappointment of 5G

#119

Post by andrepd »

OJFord wrote: post #26
dale_glass wrote: post #7

It's a bit of a myth of the modern age that desire is unlimited. I think this is wrong. At some point our desire can be sated. Eg, I'm pretty sure Bill Gates or Elon Musk don't buy the newest, latest phone that comes out every single time. Because at some point you find something that works well enough, and just thinking of using something else involves effort. Even if V2 is theoretically faster or has more RAM, mayb…

> Eg, I'm pretty sure Bill Gates or Elon Musk don't buy the newest, latest phone that comes out every single time. Because at some point you find something that works well enough, and just thinking of using something else involves effort. Even if V2 is theoretically faster or has more RAM, maybe you have no need for that yet. I don't think you have to look to billionaires for that - surely for the majority of HN user…

Exactly. I just upgraded against my will, as my 170€ phone from 2016 finally died for good. I bought a refurbished Pixel 4a, pretty much the only phone I could find that isn't quite a hand tablet. I will keep this as long as it lasts since I literally see zero reason why I should upgrade to any more recent handset.

Re: The Disappointment of 5G

#120

Post by 542458 »

MikeTheRocker wrote: post #117
WithinReason wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There are virtually no new applications enabled IMO with 5G speeds vs LTE speeds/latency You can reasonably replace your home internet with 5G

I live in an older apartment complex that doesn't have the requisite connections to get wired internet from any mainstream provider in the area, so I have 5G home internet and it's quite good. No less reliable than wired was for me in the past, and I generally get speeds around 600 Gbps down/100 up. EDIT: Mbps, not Gbps

> 600 Gbps down/100 up

I think you meant Mbps :)

Post reply on HN