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Verizon Vows To Build the First 5G Network In the US (networkworld.com)
alphadogg writes: Verizon says it will have the first 5G network in the U.S., a promise it probably can't fulfill until 2020 but will start working at this year. Verizon Chief Financial Officer Fran Shammo made the pledge Thursday on the company's fourth-quarter financial results call. He also repeated the company's plans for so-called 5G trials this year.
at $15 a gig in overages they will pay off the cost fast.
Ok, maybe I'm missing it, but 4g seems fast enough to me.
I can watch video, play games, use apps, browse the web, etc. on 4g now.
I'm struggling to imagine what I'd need another big speed boost for?
Not that I'm against it, I am just trying to see the need. If it solves other issues, such as allowing more total traffic in the same radio spectrum, then fair enough, but the summary doesn't say that.
So what are you doing with your phones that needs more speed?
It's admirable to want to develop new technology, though Verizon is quite greedy. But there's nothing close to a 5G standard yet. Sprint tried this with 4G and rolled out WiMax before everyone else started deploying 4G. Everyone else went with LTE and Sprint ended up spending lots of money on a dead end. Verizon's advantage isn't rolling out 5G before everyone else, but being able to deploy it faster and at a larger scale than their competitors. It seems like they're repeating the mistake Sprint made with 4G, and for no good reason. Wait until there's a clear standard for 5G, then deploy it, like Verizon did with 4G LTE.
Are you really blaming Verizon for shitty contractors? I sure hope I don't get blamed for all the crappy contractors I've hired over the years. Wouldn't have hired them if I knew they were shitty.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
Fast internet? You know this is verizon we're talking about, right?
I don't suffer from insanity, I enjoy every minute of it!
Speed isn't an issue for me, it's bandwidth.
With the current caps and bandwidth limits in place, adding more speed is like dropping a bigger engine in a Ferrari that can only be driven on a quarter-mile track with a giant brick wall at the end. What's the point besides getting to crash into the wall that much sooner?
However, given how bloated websites are getting due to so much javascript, shitty advertising, and other cruft, they may need the speed boost just to keep the page load times reasonable.
After my unsuccessful experience trying to get around my old Verizon smartphone's jacked up bootloader to try to get Cyanogen on it, I don't care if they have 6 or 7 G's in their network. I'm not going back to them.
Why is it called 5G? Because that's how much throughput you're allowed each month.
It's not a speed boost in most cases, but a boost in bandwidth. It's very possible that 5G will have to be rolled out alongside 4G. That's because 5G is likely to use much higher frequencies in order to achieve the higher bandwidth. As a consequence, the effective range of 5G will probably be quite a bit lower than 4G. That means more access points and towers to achieve similar coverage to 4G, which presents a lot of issues. It's far from mature, and I think Verizon is making a mistake by trying to roll out 5G so quickly (see my WiMax post below). However, 5G will greatly increase bandwidth while also probably requiring more towers and access points. That almost certainly means fewer devices will connect to each tower, probably freeing up congestion that can occur with some 4G towers. It also means that Verizon and others will probably need to raise their data usage limits, which is a good thing. If it goes from 12 GB to, say, 120 GB, it becomes a lot easier to watch videos and do other bandwidth-intensive activities (by today's standards) without risking overages. It's dangerous to predict that the added bandwidth won't be used. We really can't anticipate how bandwidth needs will grow and what new uses will be out there five or ten years from now. Let's not constrain future innovation based on our present needs and uses. That's a mistake.
5G, now with more marketing!
Because fuck everything, we're doing 5G. (Which then happened because marketers are predictable like that.)
Remember how AT&T had the first 4G network in the US but it was really 3G? Same idea.
So that they can claim "we give you 5G while everyone else is stuck on lousy 4G LTE!"
If they could figure out how to eliminate the caps and ridiculous bandwidth charges, which I don't foresee happening in my lifetime, it could be a reasonable alternative to land based Internet, or at least enough of a competitor to Comcast, et al, that they might be slightly less monopolistic in their behavior.
Although it would take a real change in how they cap and charge for bandwidth. I just checked, and I've used 2.1 TB of downloads in the last 12 months. That'd be about my mortgage payment in cellular bandwidth, if I could even figure out a way to get an LTE provider who would even let me download that much at any price.
10 years ago Verizon was selling data plan with per Kb charges. I think it was a nickel per kilobyte. 5G they will probably figure out how to cram more devices per tower and wireless will turn into the next home internet. the issue now is that at peak times my AT&T is virtually useless. i live close to a major road in NYC and during rush hour everyone is probably streaming music in their car
Re 'So what are you doing with your phones that needs more speed?"
Too many users packed in using a limited amounts of bandwidth will be an issue that makes a brand look slow. To free up or allow a smarter use of a limited network options, upgrades need to try and keep pace with users needs and demands.
The options are to restrict people with expensive plans (fine if all users are wealthy or a company is paying), data caps, reduce speeds or allow slow network usability issues to spread and be commented on.
An average telco would like to add a lot more people who can pay on *any* plan to spend up more and get the feel of a good network at anytime and location.
The old days of text, low res images and voice calls are now been replaced with video streaming and larger files been sent in both directions.
Camera options might create larger RAW files too that need more bandwidth up than a text message, voice call or very low res compressed image.
Cell phones pack more hardware that can create larger HD or now 4K video files. People are streaming more from video sites for longer when connected.
Huge files, streaming more data for longer, more users, cheaper plans. Time to upgrade the network to keep up and ensure all users enjoy equal access to the media and services they want to pay for anytime they want.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
Good 3G is actually more than enough in most cases, you can stream 1080p video with it... if you are alone with a very good signal.
The only real benefit I got from 4G is access to another frequency band with more capacity in crowded areas. I think the same is true for 5G.
The massive speed argument is just marketing. Telling you that you may finally get the bandwidth that they advertised a decade ago doesn't sell as well.
4k VR Streaming.
Imagine the best heart surgeon doing emergency VR surgery on your wife from 2000 miles away.
But first it will be news and sport streamed.
saying I will be forced to start using an Area Code as of 2/20/14. Interesting. Never had to in my 14+ years of service.
I need a fifth G. I have an iPhone with a 6, which means my G's are two behind. I can tolerate maybe being one G behind, but this is getting ridiculous.
I personally have unlimited uncapped cell phone use. Costs me $100/month for me and wife.
Screw it. We are going with 6G.
How about getting 4g towers out in the rural areas that still don't have it, first...just a thought.
Perhaps they should define what 5G is before pledging to build it
What the fuck are you talking about? Verizon is in the communications biz. They don't make cars.
Don't worry about it. Remember, we are talking about the U.S. and Verizon, here.
That means that whatever they build will be called "5G" for marketing purposes, but it will only be half the speed of what the rest of the world calls 5G, and cost 6 times more.
-- I have monkeys in my pants.
Sorry, your answer doesn't count unless you show the math.
Verizon is consistently rated as having the best network in the US. That costs money to build out, maintain, and upgrade.
Currently, Sprint is losing money, T-Mo's profit margin is 1.68%, ATT's is 3.68%. Verizon's is 7.86%. Companies which don't have infrastructure of that scale to build and maintain: Apple's margin is 22.85%, MSFT 13.52%, GOOG 22.86%.
Your implication that VZW is vastly overcharging simply doesn't fit the facts, but does make a good populist sound bite.
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
If you claim you'll build it, they will come.
Don't worry about it. Remember, we are talking about the U.S. and Verizon, here.
That means that whatever they build will be called "5G" for marketing purposes, but it will only be half the speed of what the rest of the world calls 5G, and cost 6 times more.
Indeed. I would be more impressed if they actually got a 4G Network up and running. After all, I'm already paying for it. Right now it seems to be more like a 3.5-ish G. Verizon, could you please work on delivering what you already promised to us? Please?
"maybe I'm missing it"
Yep. Wireless is a shared medium, so more bandwidth allows not only higher speed for one user, but more users at the same performance. If demand stays the same, then more supply will lower prices. Just conjecture, but it may also increase battery life, since less time will be needed per bit.
Are you still happy with your 640K of memory, which should be enough for anyone?
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
I sincerely hope that you are joking!
The adjective 'fast' and the noun 'internet' don't go together, at least not in the USA
We used to be the leader of the world in terms of connectivity, but now ...
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
You are my spirit brother.
You have that backwards. It will be called "5G" because it's the 5th Generation of cellular technology. Your comment is obviously in reference to the difference between the ITU-R and carrier definitions of 4G. The ITU based its definition not on generations of technology, but on performance metrics - trading technical correctness for marketing. AFAIK, the ITU hasn't even bothered to try to define 5G. 5G has been defined by a different group though, NGMN. But they too are focused on metrics and not technical generations.
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
build a gsm, 2g, 3g or LTE network that doesn't suck first.
I dread travelling to the states for fear of US broadband
You're sharing the airwaves with everyone in range of a tower. Have you ever had success getting directions, much less watching video, while at a concert or conference with thousands of people in attendance? Faster speeds mean less congestion, among other benefits.
No cell network in the United States is actually a true 4G network. Verizon, AT&T, Sprint, et al coerced the standards body to label their enhanced 3G as 4G.
There bis no way Verizon is ready to deploy avreal 4G network. My guess is another coercion to label old 4G plus a mod or two as 5G.
Hey, dumbass, guess what. Voice communication uses more data than texts or video streaming, yet they give that away for free. Of course their overcharging, it's what they do.
By the way, they hide their profits by routing overseas, so your margins are wayyyy off.
I have been worried that using encryption will attract attention of law enforcement who will know I something to hide. What a tremendous relief that I will now look just like another law abiding citizen using escrow crypto. While at the same time, I will use this escrow crypto for 99% of my communications, including my embarrassing but legal porn collection. And then, just when I hatch my evil plots, I will encrypt a small amount of data with my own crypto, before stamping escrowed one on top.
Now the government has no reason to suspect me unless they get a warrant, sift through ALL my stuff and manage to realize that a second of noise in a 2 hour movie file contains my real secrets.
I for one welcome our new technologically illiterate overlords!
If the 3G -> 4G transition fiasco is anything to go by, their 5G will just be 4G redefined so they can market it as 5G. So if 4G is sufficient then (cough) "5G" should be fine as well.
We could also get it well before 2020, depending on how up-to-speed their marketing department is.
Well that's nothing... I vow to sleep with every supermodel in California. And I think my chances are probably on par with Verizon's.
Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
Unlimited, uncapped and unthrottled LTE data that can be used with a computer?
I could see the $100 unlimited uncapped with throttling or maybe without tethering or off-phone data consumption.
Is this a commercially available plan or some legacy plan?
Citations on your margin figures please
Googletard. Check Yahoo finance.
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
So what are you doing with your phones that needs more speed?
The frame rate of webcam sites is much too slow to capture all the...uh....action.
Verizon's penetration will be much improved with 5G
Ok, maybe I'm missing it, but 4g seems fast enough to me.
Do a search on slashdot for "seems fast enough to me" for any article 5 years or older, and have a laugh.
The only thing worse than a Democrat is a Republican.
Verizon needs to charge you more money, faster
"Hey, dumbass, guess what. Voice communication uses more data than texts or video streaming,"
Hey, AC, guess what? You're extremely wrong. A full telco fidelity G.711 voice stream uses ~64 kbps (unidirectional). The recommended speech codec for VoLTE is G.722.2, which provides HD audio in <24 kbps. What video streaming are you doing in a 64 k channel? You can't even do decent stereo audio with that.
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
This is the same Verizon who promised FIOS for everyone and failed to deliver on it.
Deeds, Verizon. Not words.
That is the Penis workbench standard!
Ha ha
http://www.google.com/url?q=http://www.mensfaq.com/en/blog/page/2&sa=U&ved=0ahUKEwjrzPDvvbzKAhUW9mMKHXN1BgoQFggaMAE&usg=AFQjCNHEXN75cTy-vSYR_qZ645WzRKFb3w
Or is Verizon suggesting some shitty half-baked proprietary specification...so they can continue to be non-standard after their Qualcomm CDMA network is shutdown?
A HUGE amount of Americans have absoloutely no idea in any level of how expensive and difficult it is to maintain a quality, low to mid bandwidth cellphone network, no CONCEPT at all.
I've been seeing angry fist shaking posts about it for over a decade, "they have the audacity to charge me more than $10 for unlimited data!?!?!!?" kind of ridiculous bullshit.
Obviously companies will try to squeeze you where they can but the amount of dumb shit people do on their phone in the US is mind boggling. I'm surprised ATT is making any money with the grandfathered iPhone unlimited plans just milking many MANY gbs a month of data across their network
They seem to think that it's exactly the same as a cabled network (fibre / dsl) for maintenance and upgrades, no goddamn idea.
Hahahahahahahah. Hahahahahaha.
Allow me to translate. Tel-co promises to build new mobile phone network and call it 5G. Since there's no official rating for '5G', US companies can do what they've done before; build an incremental upgrade and label it "next generation" technology. The broad and fuzzy guidelines that describe 5G suggest a multiple of 1GB/s suitable for business use, as the minimum speed; eg. 25GB/s per line. But there's no rule saying 5GB/s, that is 5 times the maximum speed of a fixed-line 4G network, is inadequate.
That's bigger than 4!
Anyone that watches the news in IT and datacenters has seen Verizon hem and haw about selling it's existing fleet of data centers. If they do get a few billion for those assets, and only a few of the Terremark locations are really worth the $$, then that "recovered capital" can be invested in building out a 5G network.
In 2015 Verizon completed the sale on 3 major wireline properties, in Florida, Texas, and California. Perhaps that $$ will be used to buy more spectrum?
Well, my razor has 6 blades!
ITU-R has defined 5G, only they call it IMT-2020. Just like '4G' was actually IMT-Advanced, and '3G' was IMT-2000.
When you moved to 4G you also got better latency by a factor of ten, but how much you noticed that depends on your use case.
That would be great and all, except there are Verizon wireless towers here that haven't seen a maintenance truck for any repairs or upgrades in the last four years, to the point that the lock & chain they use on the security fencing is rusted shut. Please tell me more about how they spend tons of money on maintenance and upgrades.
@Mindless Drivel: 100% of Twitter posts ever Tweeted.
Obligatory
Ok, maybe I'm missing it, but 4g seems fast enough to me.
Do you need it? No. Is it nice not waiting on your phone for anything? Most definitely. I was happy with my 20/5 internet at home and 4G mobile. Moving to the Netherlands I'm super impressed about no longer having to wait for anything with 200/40 and LTE-A (4G+ as it's called here).
There's no content on the market that requires the bandwidth, but it is nice having access to everything instantly (or as fast as the phone can render the screen which is the bottleneck now for web browsing).
How quaint that you think physical site visits are the only form of maintenance. You obviously know nothing about operating communications infrastructure.
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
Verizon has been my provider ever since I bought my first bag phone 20 some years ago. But that's been more about coverage than anything else. Can't beat em for coverage. But as for any cellular network they also struggle with good data speeds in so many markets. I would rather see a commitment to a better overall data speed then worry about a few markets having 5G speed. Some areas still do not have 4G speed in a reliable way.
Personally, I don't think they can do it. After all, bandwidth is so precious that we have to try and throw out Net Neutrality and we have to throttle back abusers of the network, and to charge extremely high overage fees for people who exceed the very, very small data amounts we allow on the network. God forbid your kid visits Youtube! Yeah, I seriously doubt that Verizon has the network capacity to handle 5G ... Unless someone is lying...
Select from tblFriends where interesting >= 4;
Sorry, your answer doesn't count unless you show the math.
Ok. With Verizon, I had 4 lines of service that ran me $170 per month after all the discounts I could get. I had 4 gigs of data shared across all four lines. I also had two tablets that were $50 from T-mobile with 1 and 2 gigs of data respectively for a combined total of $220 a month in cellular costs. Verizon had a $15 per gig overage limit and also charged money in order to limit data that my kids could use.
After switching to T-mobile, the cell reception in the city remained relatively the same, voice quality improved (HD), streaming from Pandora and then ultimately Netflix/Hulu/HBO/Youtube do not count against the data usage. Our plan has 4 lines of service, with 10 gigs of data PER phone. The tablets each have 5 gigs of data and the total costs for all of this are $150 a month.
There's your math.
Smaller local companies that offers normal internet over cellphone radio waves exist. It usually seem to involve a Parabolic antenna pointed at the radio tower. And since its a parabolic antenna, it seems to be less affected by weather degrading the signal.
A friend of mine moved to the middle of nowhere, and since there was no cable laid there, they had to consider their option. Turns out the broadband provide in the next county had their broadband tower in plain sight from the house, so they contacted them and got a subscription.
Ping increase seems to be in 10-15ms, compared to 30-40 for 3G mobile broadband.
A HUGE amount of Americans have absoloutely no idea in any level of how expensive and difficult it is to maintain a quality, low to mid bandwidth cellphone network, no CONCEPT at all.
I've been seeing angry fist shaking posts about it for over a decade, "they have the audacity to charge me more than $10 for unlimited data!?!?!!?" kind of ridiculous bullshit.
Obviously companies will try to squeeze you where they can but the amount of dumb shit people do on their phone in the US is mind boggling. I'm surprised ATT is making any money with the grandfathered iPhone unlimited plans just milking many MANY gbs a month of data across their network
They seem to think that it's exactly the same as a cabled network (fibre / dsl) for maintenance and upgrades, no goddamn idea.
While I do agree with you that unlimited data needed to go away I think the big issue was how they removed it. They put up limits of around 1 or 2 GB at the same price as what people did pay for unlimited and acted like we should be grateful. They should have offered something reasonable for that price and not a slap in the face which is what it felt like. As someone who used very little data typically between 1 and 2 GB per month on unlimited the new plans became more expensive for a lot less service.
Yes I know many people fully utilized the unlimited plan that was a remnant from when speeds were slower but they hurt everyone that had an unlimited plan with such a drastic change and left a bad taste.
I'd much prefer no caps as opposed to faster internet. I'll even take really high caps over the craziness we have now.
If we labeled home broadband the same way as cellular broadband, we'd be calling it 9G or something. And it would mean just as little to the consumer. It makes it harder to compare speeds/carriers. Just call it by what it is, peak speeds you're allowed to pull on their network.
It also seems that 5G can be arbitrarily defined. Whatever Verizon wants to call 5G, they can. Marketing.
That another company is going to beat VZ and their 5G, it's going to be called 1H.
...they bastardized the 4G spec within the last decade simply because "4G is more than 3G" and it became a selling point without really being "4G". But it was "4G-ish" so it was close enough, I suppose. Marketing departments shouldn't be allowed to rewrite functional specifications. That said, this is just another one of those. Say it with me, "Whoop-dee-do." Moving on.
So when they selling off their FIOS division....
I imagine they are looking to target wireless internet as a replacement for cable/fiber/etc. I imagine the infrastructure is a good bit cheaper to service an area compared to running cable. And given people's solid hatred of cable companies, they might be able to make some serious inroads. Isn't that part of the reason they've stopped rolling out FIOS?
Now to seriously compete, they're going to have to seriously bump data allowances because I don't give two shits how fast your data is if I'm paying $100/month for never to no capacity.
I don't think most people in this thread understand the difference between 4G and 4G LTE. I know typing the three extra letters is a pain in the ass, but it makes me believe these people think 4G is the latest and greatest standard when it isn't.
Do a search on slashdot for "seems fast enough to me" for any article 5 years or older, and have a laugh.
While that is a totally fair point, it is also reasonable to ask when something really IS good enough...
The joke, of course, is "640K ought to be good enough for anyone"... which he claims he never said...
How about 640TB of RAM? Would that be good enough for anyone (personal use computer)?
There has to be some number where it becomes true
---
Car example:
My 2014 Ford Taurus has a 3.5L V6 engine that makes 290HP, it does zero to 60 "fast enough".
They make an SHO version with a Twin Turbo version of that engine that makes even more. It is nice, but not needed.
You could say "yea, but next year we're going to 500HP!"
Great... why do I need 500HP in that car? Answer: I don't... and no one else does either.
Oh sure, someone wants to have it so they can show off or do runs at a drag strip or something, but that is like 1/10 of 1% maybe.
I asked "what do I need the speed for?". Not "I want to brag about having it".
3G wasn't fast enough to watch 1080p video, it wasn't fast enough to upload 1080p videos that I took in a reasonable time.
4G is. I just had lunch with my son today, I shot a video of him on my iPhone 6 and sent it to multiple people. They had it within a minute.
That is "good enough". I can facetime in good quality, I can open web pages as fast as the browser can render them.
More speed is "nice", but it isn't needed. I'm asking, "what in the future will we NEED it for?"
It is an honest question.
i mean, it's not like they have broken any promises before.
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
Assuming that's a 175 GB monthly usage
$710 for 100GB data only plan (highest plan listed on verizon's site)
$1125 for 75GB overage @ $15/GB
$20 for device access
So your bill should be around $1,855/mo How much is your mortgage payment?
Minimum threshold fixed. Thanks!
Why yes it would be nice if any other company would would be willing to so much as TAKE my money years ago I was paying wildblue $79.99/mo for internet out at the house for 1.5mbps down 256 up (17GB down 5GB up). Unreliable and the 500ms ping makes a lot of things unusable. Then I moved to twin unlimited alltel aircards for $59.99/ea (total 119.98 pretax) roughly the same speed much more reliable and most things are still usable with a 150 ms ping.
Since then verizon bought alltel and i've dropped a 3g aircard.
Now I have Twin vzw 4g lte unlimited aircards and a 3g unlimited aircard for backup. This runs me about $189.97/mo ($196.57 after taxes and fees)
Is Anyone willing to run service out to my house for that price? Hell no. My only options at home remain cellular or satellite. And while most wouldn't call cellular reliable it still beats the shit out of a satlink for reliability. So until something else comes along ill just be glad verizon will still take my money for an old unlimited plan.
No I have no idea what the costs are compared to running a wired service but I do remember at&t http://tech.slashdot.org/story... Wanting to abandon their wired connections and go full wireless (from what I hear the margins are better.) So it must be cheaper and/or more profitable. Annnnd I remember verizon halting their fios rollout to spend more money on the more profitable wireless service http://tech.slashdot.org/story...
As for wireline providers in town (I don't live in town) I have the option of three:
Suddenlink has made no upgrades to their service in years their cable internet service maxes out at 15mbps (however their flyers say their speeds start at 50mbps)
At&t has upgraded their dsl service to a proprietary version of adsl2+ so you can't use any other modem but theirs speeds max out at 18mbps if you happen to live across the street from the hub.
The city has built a fiber network hoping to draw big industry afaik its still struggling but its speeds max out at 50mbps.
Full disclosure I supposedly could get 10mbps service from a local wisp for the low low cost of $15,000 for a tower so I could get the signal to the tower on the other side of the hill and then just $99.95/mo thereafter.
I don't think declining to provide wired service because more expensive wireless service is available and then complaining that wireless doesn't have as much bandwidth capacity is ok. But it's apparently an excellent business plan.
Minimum threshold fixed. Thanks!
Verizon is still using 4G LTE, which does not always qualify as true 4G spec.
-Turkey
Right around that amount.
What's amusing is that it would be cheaper to buy a second device than to pay the overages. Either load balance across both devices simultaneously or just watch the data consumption and switch over to the second device.
Across 3 unlimited lines I used an average of 270GB last month That's a bit higher than normal but it is worth noting that not one line used less than 100GB.
If I were to switch to a current plan and keep my current layout
$2,130 for 3 accounts with 100GB
$7,500 for 500GB overage
$60 for 3 devices
=
$9690 for last month
If I did as you suggested I would need
$6,390 for 9 accounts 100GB
$180 for 9 devices
=
$6570
Keep in mind the 3 unlimited lines only cost $2279.64/yr
Even a year of service for the whole account with all the limited phones is only $3911.52/yr
I like to think of it this way: I saved so much last month that at least the next year of service is effectively free even in the best case scenario. Well unless verizon has higher plans they don't offer on their website or the rates jump again.
Minimum threshold fixed. Thanks!
I'm asking, "what in the future will we NEED it for?"
It is an honest question.
Then honestly, you are asking the wrong question. Verizon and other cellular providers don't worry about your personal satisfaction, they're thinking about all of their clients who they want to provision. Who in some areas may be having congestion issues or other performance problems. Or if not now, soon.
In any case, Tianhe 2 is sitting at over 1000 terabytes of memory. The second computer on the top 500 list is at around 640 though, not sure about the rest.
And the world? Think about how much it is using. On the aggregate scale, it is vast.
Especially if the NSA has to mirror everything.
You don't have 4G yet. You have LTE. 10% of 4G. Let's get 4G before we try 5G?
VZW, like ATTW, plays games with their profitability by using lease agreements to shift liabilities between the wireless and wireline side of their business, because the regulated nature of the wireline side allows them to account for costs differently. There is a huge push to block regulators access to deployment numbers and revenues from "special access" facilities, which are what is used by the wireline carrier to provide backhaul for the towers; an FCC rule change allows them to report bogus numbers since roughly 2000.
So the backup generators they seem to put at every site don't require fuel or preventative maintenance?
They don't. And 5G is marketing hype. There's no such thing. LTE is called "long-term" for a reason.
If the federal government had not dropped helicopter money on Verizon to upgrade their fiber backhaul I would be more sympathetic.
I think a better analogy is a 500 HP engine with a one-gallon fuel tank and special fuel that costs $1000 a gallon.
LTE networks are useful for more than "consuming content". The reason these networks aren't used more widely in an infrastructure setting is that their reliability is poor and they are expensive currently, so you see custom wireless solutions a lot, which ironically are often cheaper than what the telco provides once you account for bandwidth charges. There's a huge untapped market that is very elastic to price. In the US the major players are protected by fences of regulation, so they aren't interested in aggressive expansion, which carries risk. So they sell this line that people don't really want or need fast wireless internet.
If 5G will allow more devices to work from the same tower at the same time, due to faster burst, then that would be a reasonable answer to my question.
It doesn't help me specifically, but if it allows far more people without congestion, then that does help me in the long run.
I just didn't see a need for it personally, but that answer makes sense.
Isn't it more likely they'll just redefine the meaning of 5G?