My Three SIM in my OnePlus 8 Pro is now ...

... picking up LTE-A. Which it is calling 4G+.

I gather from other postings in this forum that means the mast is now providing Carrier Aggregation. Am I right?

I clocked 145Mbps indoors on the tbb speedtester earlier with my previous fastest being 81Mbps, and 162Mbps on speedtest.net, previous highest 82Mbps.

I'm happy with that.😁

I doubt if my B311 will pick it up but I don't need it to. I'll shift it to the mast end of the house later just to see, but I don't want it there anyway.

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

... picking up LTE-A. Which it is calling 4G+.

Great! LTE-A is a designation for many technologies, and the 4G+ flag is one that is sadly more marketing than technical.

I gather from other postings in this forum that means the mast is now providing Carrier Aggregation. Am I right?

In 99% of cases, yes. It would be interesting to try and find out which bands you are picking up, my guess is that Three have updated your mast to provide Band 3 (15 Mhz) and Band 1 (10 Mhz). Alternatively you could have Band 3 and Band 20 (5 Mhz).

I clocked 145Mbps indoors on the tbb speedtester earlier with my previous fastest being 81Mbps, and 162Mbps on speedtest.net, previous highest 82Mbps.

From the big jump in speed I'd expect Band 3 + Band 1. Reducing 3G capacity and moving it over to 4G.

I doubt if my B311 will pick it up but I don't need it to. I'll shift it to the mast end of the house later just to see, but I don't want it there anyway.

If it can't do CA then it will negotiate with the mast and might use Band 3 or Band 1 and can switch, so you might get higher speeds than before, but not as high as the CA device.

Here my local mast is only Band 3 on Three (15 Mhz), and gives about 40 to 50 Mbps. The same mast has EE which provides two lots of Band 3 (20 Mhz + 15 Mhz) and my EE iPhone has seen speeds upto 150 Mbps, but since the lockdown I tend to max out about 100. Too many people at home

Thanks for that .

I'm unsure how to check the bands. Unless I'm not looking close enough. LTE Discovery and Network Cell Lite only seem to report Band 3 as before. Download frequency showing as 1824.2MHz.

Signal as before hovering between -96dBm and -110dBm.

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

I'm unsure how to check the bands. Unless I'm not looking close enough. LTE Discovery and Network Cell Lite only seem to report Band 3 as before. Download frequency showing as 1824.2MHz.

Unfortunately these apps will only report the "primary" carrier, not any second carries. There is probably an engineering mode screen that might report (Samsungs have one) but I have no idea on the OnePlus range. (I have rooted mine which makes it easy, but that stops many other apps working)

I noticed this recently with my OnePlus 8 on Three.

I use an app 'Network Cell Info' and this gives me access to network configuration settings that I can't find anywhere else from the phone settings, amongst other settings it shows a 4g calling switch.

So it begs the question what is the difference between 4g calling and VoLTE ?

https://postimg.cc/gallery/1sFbtsN

In reply to a post by bingobill:

So it begs the question what is the difference between 4g calling and VoLTE ?

Consumer and technical language.

What we call 4G is actually technically called LTE (Long Term Evolution) which dropped circuit switched entirely for the first time, and moved everything to packet based. 4G Calling is making voice calls over the LTE network,so Voice Over LTE = VoLTE

It depends if your mast has been upgraded, as in a lot of the country Three doesn't yet support VoLTE on their Band 3 service, so your phone will switch to 3G for a voice call. They do support VoLTE on Band 20. In upgraded areas you'll find VoLTE on all frequencies.

My OnePlus shows a "VoLTE" logo in the top bar, amusing and a bit geeky to be honest to show that indicator. Most people don't need to know how a call works, just that it works when they need it.

When making a call it shows HD on the dialer screen but the notification symbol shows H+ so does that indicate dropping back to 3g ?

On a different point I read recently that Three will be using CityFibre for backhaul where available, I've recently had CF/VF installed and CityFibre were back last week and extended the fibre to the base of the Three mast.

Should I expect 5g soon ?

In reply to a post by bingobill:

When making a call it shows HD on the dialer screen but the notification symbol shows H+ so does that indicate dropping back to 3g ?

Yes, Android uses 3G/H/H+ symbols for the various types of 3G. This is normal on Three until your mast is updated to do VoLTE on Band 3.

Should I expect 5g soon ?

Unlikely - CityFibre's network for domestic FTTP users is shared (PON) and not suitable for high level business use, that Three would need for their mast (point to point).

This tweet might be of interest this week:
https://twitter.com/PedroClarke1/status/126519655055...

Hmm, plenty of reports regarding this for eg.

https://www.ispreview.co.uk/index.php/2020/02/cityfi...

Why else would they run CityFibre to the mast ?

Edited by bingobill (Wed 27-May-20 13:54:43)

Then maybe they have put in enough to do both a dedicated link as well as your VF service. A 5G mast will need a lot of bandwith, faster than 1 Gbps. Perhaps 10 Gbps or more.

In the dial pad try dialling this code with WiFi turned off

*#*#4636#*#*

My OnePlus 7 Pro shows a menu, with Phone information at the top. Tap on this and scroll down to the end, you should find a table of connectivity information.

This shows the EARFCN you are connected to, and I’m showing only 1392, and on the lookup page that confirms the main base layer for Three of 15Mhz at Band 3.

In reply to a post by jchamier:

Then maybe they have put in enough to do both a dedicated link as well as your VF service. A 5G mast will need a lot of bandwith, faster than 1 Gbps. Perhaps 10 Gbps or more.

CityFibre owns the former Torch network which was owned by Kingston - they provide "fibre ethernet" services - as in non PON based, proper fibre to places, so there's every reason to expect they're providing backhaul (and indeed they've announced it)

Don't confuse CityFibre's overall network with the CityFibre Gigabit stuff they're doing with Vodafone etc for consumer service.

In reply to a post by jchamier:

In the dial pad try dialling this code with WiFi turned off

*#*#4636#*#*

My OnePlus 7 Pro shows a menu, with Phone information at the top. Tap on this and scroll down to the end, you should find a table of connectivity information.

This shows the EARFCN you are connected to, and I’m showing only 1392, and on the lookup page that confirms the main base layer for Three of 15Mhz at Band 3.

I keep meaning to continue this, but very busy on other things.

A few days ago I did try that and it does as you say. (Not rooted). I was getting the main 1392 Band 3, and three lower power 99s (Band 1 IIRC from your link), but no indication they were in use.

A couple of days ago I got a text saying that on 3/6 and 4/6 they are working on masts covering my postcode and sorry for any inconvenience. (I get several such for Bramhall postcodes and that is miles away. Perhaps one or two of its masts I might reach to otherwise I don't see the relevance).

Thursday night (oops - very early Friday morning LOL) I found that if I changed resting elbow in bed I connected in the opposite compass direction to a 99 EARFCN.

Ten minutes later back to the usual 1392 on either elbow. (I tend to use Speedtest.com and the tbb speed test most days between 1am and 2am just for fun to see what I get via an open window when there shouldn't be much traffic).

I'm clearly insane !

I'll check again soon, also from the relevant sides of the house. I have Android "Phone signal", "Network Cell Info Lite", "LTE Discovery" and "OpenSignal" apps to play with.

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

I'm clearly insane !

Most of us are !

I'll check again soon, also from the relevant sides of the house. I have Android "Phone signal", "Network Cell Info Lite", "LTE Discovery" and "OpenSignal" apps to play with.

If you haven't, try Cellmapper as well. You can turn off the recording/uploading feature if you prefer, and it won't then contribute (anon) to the website. However the screen will show all the information it can obtain from the Android OS about the cell site you are using, and the neighbour sites.

I find cellmapper the best, non-rooted, diagnostic app. Plus it has the advantage of contributing to the website, so others can find cells in their area.