5G hype

[MtnMan]

Just updated my phone. New phone has 5G... which SUX.

First off, no 5G service at my home, not surprising since I live a bit off the beaten path.
Second, I didn't update my phone for 5G, but because support for my old phone has ended, and I got a new phone for under $200 with my trade in.

Every time I have been somewhere away from my Wi-Fi, and it shows I have 5G service, it absolutely sux. Several times I ran a speed test, and it came in less than 1/Mbps every time, as low as 0.1/Mbps. Went into configuration and chose 4G, and speed jumps to 10 - 15/Mbps. This has become a real PIA if I'm at a point-of-sale and have to reconfigure my phone.

Last time was buying gas at Sam's Club using their phone app, and had to reconfigured my phone for 4G to pump gas, which worked great.

I'm sure under ideal conditions/location it is great, but in real world practical usage, it blows groceries.

 

[Red Squirrel]

I think the only reason they're really pushing this is for "smart cities" and self driving cars where everything is connected. This tech will hardly benefit the end user, if anything maybe even used against us to spy on us etc... wait until 5G built into appliances is the norm. 4G and heck, even 3G works fine, and the larger wave lengths mean it goes further.

5G is a neat tech in general though but from a consumer standpoint there are no real advantages really. My phone plan is currently 4G at 3G speeds so it's nothing spectacular but when I was on a more expensive plan I was getting crazy speeds even on 4G. Of course doing a speed test twice in a month was enough to go over my cap so it's kinda pointless having these speeds on a phone.

 

[lxskllr]

5G(Tmobile) has been great around here. Dunno if it matches specs, but it's noticeably faster than 4G.

 

[Captante]

5g works well here too although 4g was also fine. (3g feels slow now though)

 

[spacejamz]

I can easily tell the difference between 4g and 5g here in North Dallas...I am using an S22+ Ultra on Red Pocket (using T-Mobile towers)...

 

[Muadib]

5G has been great here. Perhaps you have an issue with your phone?

 

[pete6032]

5G is a neat tech in general though but from a consumer standpoint there are no real advantages really.

What? When I bought a 5G phone my download speeds went from about 25 mbps on 4G to around 150 mbps on 5G and the signal consistency was far superior.

 

[Red Squirrel]

What? When I bought a 5G phone my download speeds went from about 25 mbps on 4G to around 150 mbps on 5G and the signal consistency was far superior.

What are you doing on your phone that those speeds really matter though? I do all that stuff on the computer. With data caps it's not like you can push heavy data transfers for very long.

 

[Hans Gruber]

Wireless phones are just like cable modems. The maximum speed of your 5G phone is dependent on the modem speed. The bandwidth maximum speed of the phone modem is halved just like with wifi. The newer the 5G phone, the better the speed. I have a 5G phone and have seen speeds up to 550mbps in best case scenarios. Other times it's like fast 4G LTE speeds of 60-100mbps.

 

[Tweak155]

5g has been great for me since I went back to Verizon from AT&T. I think max speed I saw on AT&T was ~150mbps but with Verizon I've hit 1.4gbps which blew me away.

It's typically over 300mbps if it is 5g Ultrawide, but around 100-150mbps on just 5g. Don't know if all carriers are the same, but I've been told 5g without the Ultrawide attached to it is really just max end of 4g LTE bandwidth / signal.

 

[Scarpozzi]

5G here is decent in my area, but 4G is much slower than it used to be. I'm assuming they're allocating more bandwidth to the 5G side because it's a bigger pipe so the 4G customers are getting the crap commodity bandwidth. When I go to the lake I use my wifi hotspot for streaming (cause I'm too cheap/poor to pay for an internet line out there), my phone flips between 4G/5G. I'm able to place my phone by a window and get 5G signal....when I do that, streaming on the smart TV works better. In some places, I just switch to 4G as the preferred network....otherwise I see it switching between 4g/5g and basically giving slow response while it's figuring things out.

 

[KMFJD]

What are you doing on your phone that those speeds really matter though? I do all that stuff on the computer. With data caps it's not like you can push heavy data transfers for very long.

lmfao

 

[pete6032]

What are you doing on your phone that those speeds really matter though? I do all that stuff on the computer. With data caps it's not like you can push heavy data transfers for very long.

Everything is faster. I don't download large files. Web pages load faster, music steaming app loads faster, email attachments load faster. The list goes on and on...

 

[lxskllr]

I regularly download big files, and it makes everything snappy. "Unlimited" data plans are pretty common in the US. "Unlimited" is a unique description of a highly limited service, but it's unlimited for probably 75%+ of the population that do normal things with their phones.

 

[Scarpozzi]

View attachment 65452

lmfao

I'm going to mention that I used to tether my phone on 3G and had enough bandwidth to stream videos and do remote desktop. I understand we have more 4k movies and stuff now, but I still think radio speed is one thing to handle peak load for the device, but back-end bandwidth appears to be what's making 4G suck. I even have network latency on 5G these days when getting 5 bars.

 

[pete6032]

Latency on 5g is also way better. Sub 25ms.

 

[pete6032]

Good speed this morning.

 

[IronWing]

Back to the OP’s issue: my 5G iPhone has trouble switching between Wi-Fi and 5G service if the 5G signal is weak and the Wi-Fi is strong. The phone bogs down and speeds go to crap. I have to turn off the Wi-Fi and then 5G works fine.

 

[BoomerD]

Just updated my phone. New phone has 5G... which SUX.

First off, no 5G service at my home, not surprising since I live a bit off the beaten path.
Second, I didn't update my phone for 5G, but because support for my old phone has ended, and I got a new phone for under $200 with my trade in.

Every time I have been somewhere away from my Wi-Fi, and it shows I have 5G service, it absolutely sux. Several times I ran a speed test, and it came in less than 1/Mbps every time, as low as 0.1/Mbps. Went into configuration and chose 4G, and speed jumps to 10 - 15/Mbps. This has become a real PIA if I'm at a point-of-sale and have to reconfigure my phone.

Last time was buying gas at Sam's Club using their phone app, and had to reconfigured my phone for 4G to pump gas, which worked great.

I'm sure under ideal conditions/location it is great, but in real world practical usage, it blows groceries.

Where we live, not only does 5G not exist, 4G can be sporadic as hell too. At the moment, my S21 Ultra is bouncing between 1 bar and 2 on the "meter."

 

[MrSquished]

Turn off 5G on your phone and pick LTE as the preferred network. This way your phone won't even bother latching onto a shitty 5G signal. This constant seeking of a 5G network and constantly latching on and off low signal networks also wastes the battery.

 

[MtnMan]

5G has been great here. Perhaps you have an issue with your phone?

I have a Pixel 6a, wife has a Samsung S22, 4G is much faster than 5G on both, at least in the limited locations I've checked, where both were available.

Verizon.

 

[MtnMan]

I'm going to mention that I used to tether my phone on 3G and had enough bandwidth to stream videos and do remote desktop. I understand we have more 4k movies and stuff now, but I still think radio speed is one thing to handle peak load for the device, but back-end bandwidth appears to be what's making 4G suck. I even have network latency on 5G these days when getting 5 bars.

A 4K movie on a 6 inch device... why
I watch 4K movies on a 65" 4K screen.

 

[pete6032]

I have a Pixel 6a, wife has a Samsung S22, 4G is much faster than 5G on both, at least in the limited locations I've checked, where both were available.

Verizon.

Verizon is building out their 5G network on mmWave, which is extremely fast but very limited range. I am on T-Mobile, which is employing the opposite approach of building a slower 5G network but prioritizing widespread availability and signal quality. Still getting 100 mbps on 5G in most places. Would rather have a good, relatively quick 5G signal in more places than have a 1000 mbps signal but only in a few spots.

Verizon, T-Mobile defend 5G spectrum strategies

The 5G strategies of Verizon and T-Mobile couldn’t be more different, as executives from both carriers presented updates to their rollouts this week. | The 5G strategies of Verizon and T-Mobile couldn’t be more different, as executives from both carriers presented updates to their rollouts this...

www.fiercewireless.com

 

[ch33zw1z]

Posting from 5G UW, mobile never felt so good

Speedtest by Ookla - The Global Broadband Speed Test

Use Speedtest on all your devices with our free desktop and mobile apps.

www.speedtest.net

Note: I’m in a tourist area right now and pay Verizon $10 a month for traffic priority, I do not receive this in my home area

 

[Captante]

I use an MVNO called Ting that uses T-Mobile and as I mentioned earlier 5G works pretty well but it isn't a whole lot faster IRL then 4g was.