Verizon To Begin 5G User Trials in 11 Markets by Middle of Year (bloomberg.com)

Verizon will test faster fifth-generation (5G) mobile broadband service in 11 markets in the first half of this year as the nation's largest wireless carrier tries to take the lead in the 5G race. From a report on Bloomberg: Working with equipment partners including Ericsson and Samsung, Verizon will beam 5G signals to a test group of homes and businesses in Ann Arbor, Michigan; Atlanta; Bernardsville, New Jersey; Brockton, Massachusetts; Dallas; Denver; Houston; Miami; Sacramento, California; Seattle; and Washington, D.C., according to a statement released as part of Mobile World Congress, which starts this week in Barcelona. While 5G service isn't expected to be commercially available until 2020, Verizon and its closest rival, AT&T, are bringing the technology out of the lab and into the hands of actual users to spur development.

Comments

Awesome!

[Anonymous Coward]

So I'll be able to blow through my entire data plan at 5G speeds in about 700 ms and still be told that paying $5 per GB is a great deal?

Re:Awesome!

[schnell]

Whatever 5G ends up being, it won't look like a traditional cellular service. The spectrum that it uses (in the 30 GHz range) is subject to serious atmospheric signal attenuation (especially compared to the 700 MHz bands typically used for LTE) and it won't reliably penetrate walls of any thickness. So it will be largely useless for cellular phones.

Instead, imagine it as just another last mile technology for fixed wireless. You'll have a 5G receiver hung on the exterior of your house, and you will now have an alternative to [CABLE COMPANY] or [PHONE COMPANY] for your home broadband service. One of the upsides to using such high spectrum bands is that you can jam a lot more data into the frequency, so it's likely to be priced (and have caps) that look more like a cable/fiber connection rather than a cellular plan. So, not a bad thing... but not going to change the way you use your cellphone, either.

5G is for more than gaming

[GLMDesigns]

As I understand it 5G *can* provide real-time haptic feedback. It's good for gaming, yes. But more important so that little things, such VR/AR surgeries, can be done remotely.

Is this BS? I don't know.

Re:Fake news, they aren't spending billions

[BuckaBooBob]

Considering there is no Technology out there today that is actually 5G the story is full of Corporate sponsored "Facts"... The ITU is the body that helps (or forces depends how you look t it) Telecommunications systems conform to standards has not yet finished defining what is required for 5G.... The last time carriers pulled this crap was with 4G... the ITU laid out what 4G was and suddenly all of the 4G networks that carriers were advertising were actually 3G networks pushed to their limits... so they pressured the ITU to align 4G with what was already deployed..

Since they bent over backwards last time the carriers made up their own definition they are doing the same again today without a clear definition of what 5G is they are telling everyone that the 4G system they have is really a 5G network cause they want to make more money...

Verizon $28 billion in 2015, annual report

[raymorris]

If you want to know about the financials of a public company, you look at the same document the company's owners (stockholders) look at, its annual report. It's about 80 pages or so detailing how much they spent, on what, how much revenue they had from what sources, etc. Here's Verizon's:

http://www.verizon.com/about/s...

You'll see they invested $28 billion in increasing capacity. Of that, $5 billion is wireline (POTS) and $23 billion is wireless.