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So, EE’s 4G network is up and running, well, for testing anyway. But just how fast is it, and what speeds can you expect once you get a 4G phone in the palm of your hand, in the next month or so?
We already know LTE is capable of absolutely blistering speeds. In our own testing of O2′s beta network we were actually limited by the 4G modem’s speed, not the network. We pushed 80Mbps-plus at times, but the current generation of LTE should be able to hit in excess of 150Mbps. Of course, that relies on some seriously solid backhaul, and no one else using the network, so what’s actually realistic for Joe Bloggs on the street?
EE showed off some 4G-packing phones, including the Samsung Galaxy SIII and the HTC One XL, both just LTE-equipped variants of the phones we already know and love. During testing the phones managed to hit in excess of 30Mbps down, which is no slouch by any stretch of the imagination, but it’s not quite as quick as O2′s test network was.
Mind you, that was using EE’s upgraded, but existing backhaul, and it was in the centre of London with, presumably, quite a few Orange and T-Mobile customers around. Does that give us a realistic estimate of what you’ll actually get on your 4G phones? Yes, absolutely.
While it’s going to be much faster than 3G (I barely ever get more than 2Mbps here in the big smoke), with much, much lower ping times, it’s not going to beat out your fibre broadband at home. In fact, EE’s own speed estimates for consumers peg the network at between 8 and 12Mbps, or theoretically “up to 40Mbps”, with upload speeds in the range of 5-6Mbps or up to 15Mbps. You might, however, get closer to the theoretical speeds using 4G dongles, but we won’t know that until we can get our hands on one.
At any rate, it’s certainly nothing to sniff at, but don’t expect to replace your 100Mbps fibre with LTE any time soon, and maybe, unfortunately, those speeds we saw with O2 are a tad unrealistic, at least in the real world.
Yes, but what will it cost and can existing EE customers upgrade easily.
Costs, we don’t know yet — they wouldn’t tell us — upgrades, yes, but you will lose your brand/loyalty/perks.
im a bit confused, when does vodafone and o2 start rolling out 4g? or is EE getting a massive jump on them?
They won’t get it until next year once the relevant spectrum is auctioned off. EE are converting some of their existing spectrum to 4G because they effectively had spare specturm after the merger of Orange and T Mobile.
my main worry about all this is WHEN the mobile companies start adopting data plans like the ones just rolled out in the states for Verizon and AT&T. From what I remember hearing on android central, they pay something like $40 a month for unlimited calls and texts and then data starts at stupid prices from 1GB upwards.
I’d hope at least for the time being EE offers everything all in and unlimited for something sane like £50 a month, but with firms like Vodafone (part owned by Verizon I believe) starting their big red for £36 a month, I don’t think it’ll take long (if not immediately) for data to be a hefty add on for LTE customers.
For what I use though, 3G is fine and i’ll be happy if they keep these relatively cheap all in unlimited plans going for that. With Sky owning the cloud now, a WiFi connection is never far away if I need it
The reason this can happen in the US is the non interchangeable standards and frequencies used over there added to the fact that certain area’s there is only one reliable network which tends to dominate that area. Obviously if the various networks over here start operating as a cartel and fixing prices in agreement with each other then we could see this, otherwise there is just too much competition.
Is it just me or do you somehow seem more untrustworthy with the new Avatar?!
Which one, I’ve been changing all day. Back to “stock” now,
Yes it was weirding me out a bit too. At least now he’s back to “normal”.
Slightly changing the subject but I cant find out how to add a pic/avatar. Anyone point me in the right direction or shall I get me coat?
You can sign up to en.gravatar.com
From there you can upload images you can then link it to various sites like this one.
lol as Darrell has already sighed and corrected me today i can indeed point you in the right direction and that direction is Down! bottom of the page theirs a link under “how do i use this site”
here is said link – http://www.gizmodo.co.uk/2011/09/how-to-add-your-rugged-or-pretty-faces-to-your-commenting-avatars/
Network congestion could easily bring those estimated speeds down to about 5Mbps, so for a 2-3Mbps bump in speeds, is it really worth getting excited about this? My Sky wireless is a piece of shit as well, clocking 2.8Mbps even at 11PM. Merely introducing the technology might not make any difference to lifestyles. You will need a good infrastructure to support it.
Frankly I’m very skeptical. My 3G connection streams decent video and television perfectly with decent resolution fit for a mobile device. I’m just wondering, what we needed this extra speed for? I forget.
To my mind, its the ping times and response speeds. The click-to-bang time is much, much smaller on LTE than HSPDA. Less waiting, and theoretically much higher through put, even in weak signal areas.
I wouldn’t fancy trying to stream a 1080p movie on an iPad with 3G…
It’s not as fast as my 120Mb home broadband but I don’t need it to be. As long as I can get over “20Mb down” in London and over “8Mb up”, it should be perfect.
.
Netflix on 1080P needs 10mb to be watchable instantly
iPhone to be the first 4G phone available in the UK!? HELL YEAH
Does 1080p make a difference on a mobile device? And I was wondering why else apart from high res video would you need 4G?
I stream 1080P content on my phone just fine with 3G :\
From where?
Bullshit
Downloading apps, playing online games …… chatting on skype as well as playing online at the same time and downloading apps and news from rss.
Stable enough to be able to replace your home connection?
We won’t know until the network’s fully rolled out. We’ll let you know in a couple of weeks.
Based on the O2 trials, that speed will only be achievable in the real work if you are sitting on the mast.
If you are outside a 50m radius, or inside a building, you won’t even be able to pick up a signal let alone get a decent speed.
P.S. Sam are you still on Three? Since switching to them a few months back, I’ve been getting much better speeds in London. I normally get at least 4-5Mbps down but it has been as high as 11 on HSPA+ with uploads a bit slower around 2Mbps. Just checked now and I’m getting 6.89 down 2.09 up.
I switched to GiffGaff as Three in West London was just terrible. Full bars, nothing coming down. I get a solid 1-2Mbps now and never have that over-subscribed, nothing coming through issue.
Weirdly I had the same problem in central london on GiffGaff. I got the same speeds as you but had a lot full bars/no connection – it was almost constant around Liverpool Street, but not a problem with Three.
Ha, how weird. I switched after I had a word with some of O2′s engineering team. They’d put quite a lot of investment in my major routes, so tested it and found it was a lot better. Sometimes, I know it sounds a little crazy, but different phones work better on different networks. Had an Android test phone, worked great on Three, but my iPhone sucked.
at liverpool street why not just hop on the free virgin wifi
My reasons are twofold:
Firstly, it is run by Virgin.
Secondly, it works ok on the underground but not so much once you’re off the tube platforms, and certainly doesn’t work on my overgrough platforms.
Sounds like they are taking it away in any case now the summer is over, or at least going to probably charge for it
Incidentally, the speed with which EE has managed to roll this out suggests they must have started work well before they were certain they’d get approval from Ofcom… Pretty ballsy move.
I think all the networks have been investing in LTE towers etc in the knowledge that one way or another they’re going to get a licence for 4G, either through the auction or like this.
Sat here on my Home connection of 2Mbps in the evening and 5Mbps during the day and cursing every last one of you
IF you have to pay for tethering and there’s a data cap then it’s pointless. Hopefully they wont do that otherwise I’ll wait for Three to get it.
Surely 23mbps is basically 230mb broadband and 60 ping isn’t bad so really most people could do without their home broadband and just tether their mobile with them speeds.
On Three’s 3G I get 7mbps which is nearly as fast as my Virgin 120mb line that I get 12mbps.
If you’re getting 12Mbps on a 120Mbps line, then harass Virgin.
If you’re getting 12MBps on a 120Mbps line, then allowing for other network traffic, overheads and the fact that most people are on 110,000,000kbps, rather than 120,000,000, you’re almost right on the connection limit!
Im using mb as bit and mbps as bytes.
So what are they saying that they’re only downloading at 2 megabytes per second with LTE? Or are they saying they’re downloading at 23 megabytes?
Cause if it’s only 2 then I get better than that on my 3G.
I would suggest that over your Three 3G connection you are getting 7Mbps, equating to a file transfer speed of roughly 0.9MB/s.
As I said before, if you’re comparing your 3G connection to VM’s XXL 120Mbps broadband and the 3G is faster, then talk to VirginMedia.
I would expect that you’d theoretically max out the VM connection at roughly 12MB/s versus the 0.9MB/s of the 3G.
Megabits! Holy cow.
Speedtest.net BY DEFAULT gives its speeds in megabits per second. Advertised speeds are always in megabits per second.
You’re totally crazy and totally confused. Virgin’s 120Mbps (that is the correct notation for megabits per second) you should be seeing speeds of a maximum 15MB/s (that’s megaBYTES per second).
The rest of the world is using MB/s as bytes, and Mbps as bits.
No network speed assessment will use megabytes as the unit.
The speed tests of >30Mbps, will equate to a file transfer speed of roughly 3.8MB/s.
I dunno it’s just how I type it out personally.
That is shit slow, my download speed on Three is 7MB/s as you type it and 2 up.
So if this is LTE then I’ll live without it just nicely. I can download movies from torrents on my phone in minutes.
I reckon that Author is mixing up bytes and bits because 2mbps on 3G would be so slow if he was talking bits.
Which phone are you using and where? To achieve 7MB/s down, you would have to be on roughly a 60Mbps connection, and then about 18Mbps up….
I’ve just run a SpeedTest.net check over my mobile connection, in a 3G area, with mostly full HSPA signal, and I’m getting 2.7Mbps down and 1.4Mbps up.
I think the fastest you can get on mobile net in this country (pre LTE) is DC-HSDPA which tops out at 42Mbps. I seriously doubt you are getting 7MB/s on Three. I get around 7Mbps with full bars!
I might not understand you correctly but usual notation is Mb = megabits, MB is megabytes (that B is case sensitive ;P) and Mbps is Megabits per second. First two measures data size third measures rate at which said data is transfered. What you’re suggesting is using meters per second to measure distance lol. To get MegaBytes from Megabits just divide by 8 XD
Interesting, but this is pretty much guaranteed to have weird hamstringing conditions built into it. With hugely fast speeds, this would be perfect for streaming e.g. HD video. But that would kill the whole network if everyone did it, so it’ll have to be cripplingly expensive or capped one way or the other.
My current GSIII doesn’t support it, but to be honest, I’m entirely happy with HSPA anyway.
It isn’t real till you are downloading HD porn in a field somewhere.
Where can I see a map of the supported area, as I’m right on the border between what constitutes London and what constitutes Surrey.
I hardly get above 3 mbps lmao i’d take anything i could get.
I don’t need 40mb+ on my phone anyway