Dead spot.

Was reading about 3G going in the other thread, I was aware this was happening.

Round here there is a large dead spot, where, if lucky, you may get one bar of hit and miss 3G …. this is a large residential area, and wondered what will be done to provide service to such areas going forward ?

It is for me, a pain, as I find myself working round there a lot. Not just having to move to a small way to get a useable signal, actually having to drive for a couple of minutes. No idea how folk who live there get on .

4 and 5G are prolific and good very nearby. Is there a way to register this dead spot with providers, so that they might be able to do something about it ?

It doesn't help mobile signal strength maps are not accurate, if they believe them they are never going to improve some areas.

In reply to a post by Zarjaz:

4 and 5G are prolific and good very nearby. Is there a way to register this dead spot with providers, so that they might be able to do something about it ?

Ofcom's maps might show it, but as the Govt licensed 4 physical and independent networks, the assumption from Govt is that where one or two don't cover, the others should work.

Where a friend of mine lives in Fleet, only Vodafone is workable. The other three networks (O2, Three, EE) have no signal. Crazy EE turned off a fill in mast in 2013, as the computer prediction maps thought there was plenty of signal. Their only advice to my friend was to use WiFi calling. He moved to Vodafone.

EE say that if you use their app it registers not spots. Not sure how. Some other networks take notice of Ookla speed tests.

Usually publically shaming is the only way, on things like -twit- X ; but given the money involved not usually that successful.

In reply to a post by PCJM40:

It doesn't help mobile signal strength maps are not accurate, if they believe them they are never going to improve some areas.

The networks do their own drive testing, but the maps are generated using computer prediction. Prediction technology that works well for television transmission and was used recently for the analogue TV shutdown, doesn't appear to work at the much shorter ranges used by mobile frequencies. Any frequency can be used for any "G" but its up to the opeartor to deploy it. (Ofcom lilberalised a few years ago)

A useful chart from David Wheatley:
https://mastdatabase.co.uk/gb/spectrum/

Edited by jchamier (Sun 17-Sep-23 10:36:34)

Thanks, which EE app is that ?

In reply to a post by Zarjaz:

Thanks, which EE app is that ?

"My EE" is the one I was thinking of. I read somewhere they also get stats from the Ookla speedtest.net app, so perhaps try one of those (with GPS enabled) so that 0 kbps is recorded somewhere!

Thank you, I’ll give it a go

EE should be privy to the network issues as I understand via “cell network search” / “mobile network search” data provided via iOS software location services (enabled out of the box). This means that they cannot be, in my mind, totally unaware.

As I understand the 3G areas reflect farmers who got into dispute and began refusing to host the masts as agreed, many hence didn’t get a 4G tower.

There has been a reinsurance of protests and refusal to host sites causing issues in areas such as Milton Keynes even. It can take years to get a new mast going and land owners are pulling the plug way before a strategy is in place. It’s not that common but it does occur.

In reply to a post by ukhardy07:

As I understand the 3G areas reflect farmers who got into dispute and began refusing to host the masts as agreed, many hence didn’t get a 4G tower.

In West Sussex at least two central villages have no service on any network due to 1990s era protests. The networks never came back. Now locals complain

The mast itself ("tower") is not specific to a G, neither are the antenna panels which are for a frequency, such as for EE the base 1800 MHz (Band 3) and usually they supported 2100 MHz (Band 1). For a 4G upgrade the hardware in the cabinet at the base is replaced / upgraded with radios that support the newer protocols over the existing frequencies. Sometimes these cabinets are well hidden so you may never know an upgrade has ocurred.

Unless additional capacity is deployed on say the 2600 MHz band (Band 7) , where my local mast in 2020 had a new set of antennas replacing the old ones and now has over double the capacity on 4G.

I’m not sure I agree with the premise made here. In theory possibly but in practice due to 5G leveraging AAS, for multiple antenna technology including beam forming and MIMO and being a requirement the existing antenna are not suitable in most cases. Masts get new antenna paired with the new control units.

Edit: I see this is with 4G in mind. My apologies.

Edited by ukhardy07 (Wed 20-Sep-23 20:24:53)

In reply to a post by ukhardy07:

Edit: I see this is with 4G in mind. My apologies.

With high freq 5G and active Massive MIMO panels, I fully agree. I'm unsure about low band 5G, as I think the deployments are using existing 4G passive panels, but there isn't enough about yet.

Nothing stopping Massive MIMO on low band with active antennas, other than cost!

I can confirm 700Mhz deployments are often leveraging 4G kit. The site often gets upgrades at a later date for higher frequencies and then this is sunset into the new antennas.

This is one of the reasons why 5G is often so bad at first as they only have low frequency on eg n28.

How long till we get 5G-SA?! Here’s hoping

Edited by ukhardy07 (Thu 21-Sep-23 16:52:54)

As I understand the 3G areas reflect farmers who got into dispute and began refusing to host the masts as agreed, many hence didn’t get a 4G tower.

The specific area I am on about is very residential… at a guess it’s due to being in a natural ‘trough’ in the landscape … 4 and even 5G work well around the edges of this depression. Whether locals poo-poo’d some other mast way back I don’t know.

GU15 1DW puts you on Goldney Rd, and about a half mile radius around there is all but unusable.

I hope your suggestion of such places being spotted and picked up does actually happen. But I’ll not hold my breath for this spot.