[HN Gopher] Plan Ahead for Phase Out of 3G Cellular Networks and...
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Plan Ahead for Phase Out of 3G Cellular Networks and Service
Author : speedcoder
Score : 65 points
Date : 2021-12-10 12:43 UTC (10 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.fcc.gov)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.fcc.gov)
| speedcoder wrote:
| Is there any way to fix my old 3G phone to continue to work under
| 5G?
| jlarocco wrote:
| I wish.
|
| My iPhone is affected by this (or so Sprint tells me) and I'm
| holding off as long as I can. I'm seriously considering one of
| these: https://www.sprint.com/en/shop/cell-phones/sonim-
| xp3-plus-no...
|
| I won't buy an Android because I don't trust Google, and I'm
| just tired of Apple's poor quality lately.
| slaw wrote:
| The last iPhone without 4G was iPhone 4s released in 2011. If
| you have newer, but still very old phone it may not support
| T-Mobile bands.
| reaperducer wrote:
| _Is there any way to fix my old 3G phone to continue to work
| under 5G?_
|
| If you only use it around the house, you can get a picocell.
|
| I once lived in a building that was too tall for cell service
| to reach the upper floor residences, and the carriers (mine was
| AT&T) would send the residents picocells to relay the signals
| from their cell phones to the internet.
| nousermane wrote:
| Depending on your operator/locality, and whether you're okay
| with being limited to voice and barely a 100 kbit/s of data, it
| might "just work", no need to do anything special. Your 3G
| phone will happily fall back to 2G/2.75G (a.k.a.
| GSM/GPRS/EDGE), where such network is available.
|
| For example, in the Netherlands, KPN, the last operator to
| switch off 3G, is planning to do so at the end of this month.
|
| 2G, on the other hand, is still in the air, with commitments to
| keep it alive until 2025, possibly longer.
|
| Source (in Dutch): https://www.kpn.com/zakelijk/blog/de-
| toekomst-van-iot-vraagt...
| dathinab wrote:
| unlikely as long as you can't switch out the modem and antenna.
|
| So you would need:
|
| - a new antenna
|
| - a new modem
|
| - a driver working with your CPU/OS, which is likely to not be
| the case
|
| - a way to replace the parts
|
| Sometimes the modem is part of the CPU package, making it
| impossible.
|
| Driver limitations make it often even impossible to produce
| "the same phone but with just another modem", not even speaking
| about upgrading.
|
| The best chance to update to 5G is in laptops where the modem
| is on a separate Bord, but even then you have the problem of
| firmware lock-down and interface incompatibilities.
| all2 wrote:
| A single board computer could get you close to these
| requirements, as long as there are USB dongles for everything
| [0]. That takes care of 1, 2, and 4. As for drivers, I'm not
| sure if you can pipe voice calls across these (VOIP, yes, but
| cellular calls? I have no clue how that works).
|
| [0] https://www.amazon.com/4g-usb-modem/s?k=4g+usb+modem
| richardwhiuk wrote:
| with SIP ATA you can probably get it to work with enough
| work. I don't know whether any actually support enough of
| TS 24.229 to actually work with a VoLTE network.
| kingcharles wrote:
| The WiFi will still work for a long time to come. That's the
| best you can do. There are plenty of apps to call through WiFi.
| I use Skype for most of my calling. I only use the cell network
| when I'm outside the home.
| alvarlagerlof wrote:
| Interesting. VoLTE is not at all standard or on all phones over
| here due to the carriers only enabling it for the phones that
| they sell with their plans.
| londons_explore wrote:
| It's shameful that 3G wasn't designed to be supported forever,
| and be backwards compatible with 4G, 5G, 6G, etc.
|
| Just like WiFi standards are (mostly) backwards compatible
| forever.
|
| From a design perspective, all that's needed is a way to
| timeslice or frequency slice the new and old signals. Then the
| cost of supporting old 3G devices drops as fewer and fewer of
| them exist, and dynamic time and frequency allocation can give
| more and more to 4G/5G/etc.
|
| The infrastructure cost of 3G is large, but that needn't be the
| case - there are opensource projects that can run all the
| computation for a whole 3G network, auth, encryption, etc. on a
| single PC.
| speedcoder wrote:
| What is your favorite thing that was built to last? This is,
| perhaps, a cheesy country song that speaks to the idea
| https://youtu.be/E4i2fC1U38s . Is "built to last" an obsolete
| notion?
| notinty wrote:
| This probably would have been more appropriate as an Ask HN.
|
| Editorializing the headline like that is a no-go.
| speedcoder wrote:
| Good idea. Please reply here:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29510819 .
| speedcoder wrote:
| Understood. Fixed headline.
| micromacrofoot wrote:
| Were things actually "built to last" or really "built to be
| maintained"?
| can16358p wrote:
| "T-Mobile announced that it will finish shutting down Sprint's 3G
| CDMA network by March 31, 2022 and Sprint's 4G LTE network by
| June 30, 2022."
|
| Isn't it a bit early to shut down 4G LTE? Does everyone and
| everywhere have that access to 5G now?
| nradov wrote:
| T-Mobile is keeping their own 4G LTE network for now. They're
| only decommissioning the acquired Sprint network which has
| mostly redundant coverage.
| Shadonototra wrote:
| they finally woke up after realizing china is ahead already with
| 6G in the works
|
| https://techwireasia.com/2021/09/huawei-is-charged-to-have-c...
| [deleted]
| Shadonototra wrote:
| it is linked, you just refuse to admit it
|
| this is common in the west, you try to find excuses to what
| ever agenda your government has
|
| as a result you fall behind on many fields, including
| education
|
| it's no wonder 5G still isn't the standard, and yet you try
| to find excuses
|
| that's what happen when old people rule your country and
| economy, they made decisions because they don't want to risk
| what they have for the few years they have left on this
| planet
|
| now ask yourself, why
|
| what's blocking from having 5G everywhere? despise being the
| "richest?" country on the planet
|
| what's preventing it?
|
| why are they trying to push 5G only just now?
|
| they didn't have the tech "until now"
|
| they didn't want to rely on china because they were the one
| with the tech?
|
| or it simply was just they didn't want to invest because it
| would cost too much, so they focus on selected tiny areas
| only and forget about country side because "they don't need
| it"?
|
| > debates = "flamebait that detracts from the discusion"?
|
| how come? that's because you chose to be blind that we stuck
| with 2G-3G in 2021
| OldHand2018 wrote:
| A lot of people in car forums are super upset about this and
| angry with their specific automaker. But of course, it is
| happening to all of them that haven't moved off of 3G.
|
| https://www.toyota.com/audio-multimedia/support/3g-faq/
|
| https://lexus2.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/10537/~/...
|
| https://www.subaru.com/3g-network-retirement.html?SIE=9ad00c...
|
| Etc. https://autobala.com/how-3g-shutdown-in-2022-will-ruin-
| your-...
|
| Amazing that Honda have _current_ cars affected.
| officeplant wrote:
| This reminds me of all the 90s luxury cars with analog cellular
| phones integrated into the center consoles quickly becoming
| useless in the 2000s. Except worse considering how much these
| systems are integrated into some cars.
| Snitch-Thursday wrote:
| Not to be dumb - but I don't want my car to have cellular
| connectivity, so this opens up more car purchase options for
| me once 3G goes dark. Granted, that's a tiny influx of new
| customers, but still, there's at least 1 new customer as
| result of their decision to still use 3G.
| bellyfullofbac wrote:
| In the EU new cars now are mandated to have an automatic
| way to call the emergency services after a crash, I wonder
| if the governments have a clause about what would happen if
| 3G is turned off (I guess they're not planning to do that
| for a while yet).
|
| If I were in power and I genuinely cared about saving the
| planet, I'd figure out how to make cars without this auto-
| emergency-dial system more expensive to insure; that way,
| people would look at newer cars more favorabily, and I'd
| incentivize electric cars as well. But hey, luckily the car
| lobby is still pretty strong in the France and Germany!
| [deleted]
| jtbayly wrote:
| Why use such an indirect and backwards method? If you
| were in power, you could just tax non-green cars, rather
| than promote cars that become useless in 5 years when
| technology moves on.
| treesknees wrote:
| 3G has been mainstream in the US since the mid 2000s.
| Granted it depends on when you purchase your car, but
| getting almost 20 years out of the technology is pretty
| good. Most cars will be scrap after that long. I'm not
| sure where you came up with 5 years.
| throwaway0a5e wrote:
| It's a balance between doing what you want and screwing
| people hard enough to get voted out or violently deposed
| (transition mechanism depends on the system of government
| in question).
| jtbayly wrote:
| Sure, but second point is that it's dumb to assume
| "smart" or "connected" cars are more green. If they are
| being obsoleted much faster than "dumb" cars, then
| whether or not they are electric makes little difference
| in the grand scheme of things.
| sircastor wrote:
| A few years back I got a handful of letters about getting my
| Nissan LEAF's radio updated from 2g to 3g. They wanted to
| charge me $200 USD for it. I didn't bother and it's ended up
| resulting in very little change for me - Mostly features I
| didn't really use.
|
| It's nice to know what just a few years later I'd be facing the
| same problem again.
| OldHand2018 wrote:
| I've been told that on my Subaru, if I subscribe to the
| services that need it, they will do the upgrade for free. But
| if I don't subscribe, they won't do it at all. I'm fine with
| that, I am unreasonably against subscriptions, lol.
| jtbayly wrote:
| I'm unreasonably against both subscriptions and cars having
| modems.
| enos_feedler wrote:
| I suppose thats fine if your car isn't doing any of the
| driving. Otherwise I might want my car talking to the
| outside world.
| btgeekboy wrote:
| Hey, look at the upside - "unplugging" your car from the
| Internet may make it more secure.
| wlesieutre wrote:
| In the Leaf's case, anyone with your VIN (ie anyone who can
| walk up to you car and look through the windshield) could
| turn on your car's AC over the internet and run the battery
| down. Whoops.
|
| https://arstechnica.com/cars/2016/02/nissans-connected-
| car-a...
| throwaway0a5e wrote:
| The 3g phaseout arguably makes all those cars more secure.
| [deleted]
| rubylark wrote:
| I worked very very briefly in the wireless service industry on
| UAPs and large scale cell antenna receivers. To me, this doesn't
| seem as much a conspiracy to obsolete old phones as a practical
| stance to not need to have two copies of antennas on every tower.
| The old antennas used in 3G don't go up to the frequencies needed
| by true 5G, so they need new ones. If they're developing new
| ones, they don't want to have to keep supporting old standards as
| well, so they don't code for it (and possibly don't even support
| it in the hardware). So now there are no more 3G receivers on any
| towers and therefore your 3G phone stops working. As a side
| effect, anyone still using a 3G device needs to buy a new one,
| but I don't think that is the main driver for the move.
| dathinab wrote:
| I think it's also about:
|
| - later recycling frequencies
|
| - reducing maintenance burden (by not maintaining 3G)
|
| - as far as I remember 3G as serious security vulnerabilities
|
| Also most smart phones only a lifetime of 3-5 years at most,
| and even then people tend to replace them early due to braking
| them and for vanity.
|
| So there are probably not too many smart phones around which do
| not support 4G and which are not a security liability. Through
| probably a bunch of fallback feature phones or other "less
| common" (then smartphones) kinds of phones.
|
| Also it differs by country.
| CountSessine wrote:
| _later recycling frequencies_
|
| Yeah this is what I would think. My understanding is that in
| North America a lot of plum 800MHz bands are currently
| occupied by 3G umts.
|
| edit - yes, both Verizon and AT&T are dedicating a single
| band of 850MHz spectrum for umts. So this would let them move
| that to 4G or 5G.
| anthomtb wrote:
| Something here doesn't make sense to me.
|
| The retired 3G spectrum will be used for 4G and 5G (per the FCC
| article) so the antennas could be reused as the carrier
| frequency will not change. For a concrete example, if you're
| running 3G at 900 MHz, why would running 5G at 900 MHz require
| a different antenna?
|
| On that note, saying the antennas don't go up to true 5G
| frequencies is a bit...misleading? Because while the frequency
| goes up, the wavelength goes down so the antenna should shrink.
| rubylark wrote:
| That's fair. Unfortunately I don't know the specifics of the
| hardware involved, and I wasn't there long enough to get a
| good understanding. I hope someone with more knowledge or
| industry experience can chime in. All I know that the company
| I worked for sold a completely new antenna assembly that
| supported 5G and that our customers were moving to using
| those antennas.
|
| As far as the size, all of the units we sold have been
| approximately the same size for quite a while. E.g. all the
| chasses varied by maybe 6-10" max between the old assemblies
| and the new. The new ones were larger (maybe more room for
| power electronics?) I don't know if there was any effort on
| our part to support 5G transition without replacing our
| antennas.
|
| Edit: I believe we were pushing new hardware because the
| services wanted to utilize the high frequency band of FR2
| 24-56Gz [1] (what I meant by "true 5G") that our old antenna
| assemblies couldn't support. I assume they couldn't support
| it because they weren't optimized for those bands at a high
| enough fidelity for good data transmission.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/5G#Frequency_range_2_(24%E2
| %80...
| KronisLV wrote:
| > As a side effect, anyone still using a 3G device needs to buy
| a new one, but I don't think that is the main driver for the
| move.
|
| Despite the positives, this feels kind of sad.
|
| If you look at software, many of the older browsers out there
| can't even open simple modern webpages. After years, i grow
| weary of the churn, i've gone from Windows 98 to Windows 10
| now, through numerous versions of Debian/Ubuntu and
| CentOS/Fedora, From Android 2.1 all the way to 10 currently. I
| have had software and even hardware be ripped out of my hands
| every few years, because someone decided to change something
| and deprecate the older stuff.
|
| But what is the alternative? Use old and sadly insecure
| hardware/software? Or keep up with everything and partake in
| more consumerism than i should?
|
| Just some musings on the topic, because watching Bryan Lunduke
| talk about old computers from another time when not everything
| old was considered "vulnerable" and "a risk" (due to not having
| much network capability at all) was interesting and enjoyable.
| I wonder what i'll be working with in 20 years and whether the
| older Debian and Windows XP versions will still hold a place in
| my heart.
| nradov wrote:
| Cell phones and mobile devices in general have always been
| disposable items with limited expected lifespans. Instead of
| worrying about keeping obsolete devices working we should
| focus on clean disposal and recycling that minimizes waste
| and pollution.
| usrbin wrote:
| > Cell phones and mobile devices in general have always
| been disposable items with limited expected lifespans.
|
| I agree with your second point, but I want to push back on
| this first point a bit. While it seems like manufacturers
| benefit from devices being disposable, I don't see a strong
| reason why they should be.
|
| The reality is that extending the lifespan of devices is
| one of the best ways to lower consumption. When it comes to
| changes like retiring 3G, we also have to weigh that
| against the environmental cost of maintaining the 3G
| network. Given the maintenance impact, it may end up being
| a net positive to retire these devices, but it's still an
| important cost to consider.
|
| To be clear, we should also improve disposal and recycling,
| but that shouldn't be to the exclusion of reducing and
| reusing.
| xwdv wrote:
| I see a very strong reason. It's not lifespan that
| matters, it's attention span.
|
| You could build a device with a 1000 year lifespan, but
| it's a waste of effort if the consumer wants a new one
| after 5 years. It's optimal to build a device with a
| lifespan that will only be as long as a consumer's
| interest in it.
| treesknees wrote:
| Keep in mind, the thread you've replied in is related to 3G
| modems on fire alarm panels. Critical safety infrastructure
| isn't the same as the latest smart gadget. As we've moved
| to putting modems on more infrastructure, it's something to
| keep in mind.
|
| I'm sure we'll see more of this post-5G. There's such a
| huge push to get 5G-connected IoT devices into every corner
| of society, we'll have to seriously reconsider how limited
| the lifespans of these technologies should be.
| reaperducer wrote:
| _Cell phones and mobile devices in general have always been
| disposable items_
|
| Only if you define "always" as post-2010.
|
| Cell phones were for a very long time considered long-term
| purchases, along the lines of washing machines and
| refrigerators. It was only when they became fashion
| accessories and certain companies started relying on
| pushing out new models every year for no reason other than
| to boost the balance sheet that they became "disposable."
|
| You're right about the recycling, though. We need more
| places to recycle e-waste.
|
| I was surprised a couple of years ago when I wanted to
| recycle an old PowerBook. I assumed that every Apple Store
| would take used gear. But it turned out that none of the
| Apple Stores near me would take it. I'd have to drive it
| four hours away to another city in order for it to be
| recycled.
| nradov wrote:
| That's simply wrong. In the US at least, prior to 2010
| cell phones were typically replaced about every 3 years.
| The Motorola Razr flip phone was absolutely a fashion
| accessory in 2004; watch some music videos from that era.
| Motorola and other brands did push out new models every
| year.
| reaperducer wrote:
| I'm not "simply wrong." I just has a cell phone long
| before you did.
| nradov wrote:
| So you're describing your own behavior, not the typical
| consumer. I'm on my 10th cell phone since 1996. Most
| other consumers are about the same.
| reaperducer wrote:
| _Use old and sadly insecure hardware /software?_
|
| I think "security" is used as a crutch and an excuse too
| much.
|
| As a retro hardware enthusiast, very often the hardware isn't
| insecure. It's just that someone somewhere got lazy or greedy
| or both and decided to do something that makes the hardware
| not work right anymore. Things like billion-dollar game
| companies that shut down servers that cost them all of $5,000
| a year to run. It's less than is spent on a single coffee
| maker, but the company decides to cut off all of its existing
| customers because they only number in the hundreds, not the
| millions.
|
| As to "security" -- Keeping financial records on a 1982
| TRS-80 is far more secure than keeping them on any modern
| laptop.
| usrbin wrote:
| > $5,000 a year
|
| > It's less than is spent on a single coffee maker
|
| I really want to try this coffee maker.
| mdasen wrote:
| > someone decided to change something and deprecate the older
| stuff
|
| I definitely understand the pain. In some cases, it's stupid
| moves. In other cases, it's about reclaiming the resources
| for something better. With wireless, should a small number of
| people who want to use old devices mean that we can't use
| those wireless frequencies for newer high-speed data? Maybe
| carriers should start pricing based no how much bandwidth
| you're using in terms of frequencies. Well, you're using a
| device that is 1/10th as efficient as a modern device so
| we're charging you many times more than what we charge
| customers with modern devices.
|
| Sometimes there's inefficient stuff that impacts whether
| others can enjoy what they want.
|
| > But what is the alternative?
|
| The alternative is that we decide that new stuff (possibly
| progress) isn't something we want. I say possibly progress
| because some stuff is questionably progress. Do we need
| YouTube, TikTok, online games, etc? No, but they can surely
| be nice. We could certainly go back to the days of 2GB
| wireless plans and live like that. Heck, we lived without
| wireless data for a long time.
|
| With some of the software churn, it just becomes hard to
| support so many different configurations and people
| concentrate on the ones that are commonly used.
|
| > keep up with everything and partake in more consumerism
| than I should
|
| Some of it is consumerism. Some of it is progress. I think
| you're slightly unfairly conflating it all as consumerism.
| The ability to offer unlimited data plans and faster data
| speeds is progress over slow, limited data plans. The problem
| you're facing is that everyone else changes and you don't see
| the point of it. Imagine everyone started speaking
| NewEnglish. You might see nothing wrong with English and it's
| not like English no longer works, but given that everyone
| else has changed, it no longer works for what you want -
| communicating with others around you.
|
| Realistically, this is part of living in a civilization. You
| have to go along with what the civilization is doing and what
| will interface with them. This isn't even a modern phenomena
| in some ways. You talk about having an old computer that you
| want to be able to interface with others safely (view modern
| web pages, keep running software, etc). I'm now thinking of
| the Reformation where literally if you didn't adopt the new
| religion you might be killed. That's an extreme example, but
| there's a lot that people must do to be a part of our
| civilization.
|
| Humans are social beings and our technology is no less
| social. It's why people have fights over things like
| programming languages. If PHP is a "dead language" it means
| that the next generation of engineers won't learn it and it
| will become less useful over time because fewer people will
| be improving it, writing libraries for it, and fewer systems
| will support it well. If a lot of people leave Android for
| iOS, there will be fewer apps for Android, fewer device
| options, etc. It's why people have fights over which next-gen
| console will win - because if they pick the losing device,
| they might not get a lot of games. I mean, if you bought a
| Dreamcast, you ended up buying something that never realized
| its potential because of the social context where game devs
| didn't make enough games for it.
|
| Our technology is social. If you're not going along with that
| social context, you're going to miss out on things. In a
| certain way, you want everyone to support what you like even
| if it doesn't make sense for them (in terms of time and
| money).
|
| Again, I understand the pain and there is a lot of
| consumerism. However, there's also progress in the mix as
| well. As the social context of the tech changes, you have to
| keep up with it to an extent. Companies don't want to keep
| supporting a 20-year-old OS because a few people don't see
| the need for the new features introduced in newer versions.
| Should you pay for a support contract for the old OS you want
| updates for? How expensive should that be given how few
| people will be paying for the engineering time to make that
| happen? Likewise, if 3G users want to keep their network
| around, how much should they pay for their plans to
| compensate for the fact that they're using a much greater
| share of a scarce resource (wireless spectrum)? $500/mo
| rather than $50/mo? It kinda gets to the point that it's
| realistically impossible since someone isn't going to pay
| $500/mo instead of upgrading their phone. Likewise, you
| aren't going to pay thousands per year for a support contract
| on an obsolete OS.
| officeplant wrote:
| I work in the Fire Industry, we've been selling LTE communicators
| for fire panels like hotcakes these last few years. Mostly due to
| so many sites not having good enough internet connections for IP-
| DACTs, or IT refusing to deal with fire alarm panels on their
| networks like putting us on a VLAN and giving us access to the
| outside world. I understand their hesitancy, but so many panels
| have built in IP communication with useful features now.
|
| We're lucky enough that the vast majority of our clients moved
| off of 3G in this last wave of fire alarm system updates or they
| went straight from land lines to LTE as the land lines become
| less commonly used.
|
| The most annoying thing is the sheer volume of spam mail I get
| from 3G advocates trying to convince us to contact regulators to
| stop 3G sunsetting. I'm sorry angry emailer, but we've long since
| moved on just like we always have when a technology gets put to
| pasture.
| nekoashide wrote:
| Even if it cost nothing to upgrade you would have industry
| trade groups shouting from the rooftops on how terrible this is
| and how bad 4G is. In a previous job that required PCI
| compliance not even the threat of losing the ability to process
| credit cards would stop these trade groups.
| FemmeAndroid wrote:
| From the Hacker News Guidelines [1]:
|
| > Otherwise please use the original title, unless it is
| misleading or linkbait; don't editorialize.
|
| The title of the article is "Plan Ahead for Phase Out of 3G
| Cellular Networks and Service", which seems accurate. The current
| post's title is "5G obsoletes 3G? forced obsolesence [sic] for
| profit?"
|
| [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| mikewarot wrote:
| Wait, the FCC now tells me that ALL 3g is going away, T-Mobile
| made it seem like only the sprint part of the network was going
| away. So, now I have to ditch my beloved Built To Last Samsung
| T-199. 8(
|
| [Edit] Upon re-reading, maybe not?
| OJFord wrote:
| Related, 'UK to ditch 2G & 3G by 2033':
| https://eandt.theiet.org/content/articles/2021/12/uk-to-swit...
|
| (I did submit it here, but no discussion to link.)
| cdnsteve wrote:
| What about all the IoT stuff out in the field that can't be
| easily upgraded?
| criddell wrote:
| It will stop working.
| HeyLaughingBoy wrote:
| Yup. There have been warnings about this from the cell
| network providers for _years_. Anyone caught with their pants
| down has certainly been ignoring the problem.
| PaulHoule wrote:
| Newer phone networks are much more efficient than old ones. For a
| certain amount of 3G spectrum the carrier can serve more
| customers at higher data rates with 4G or 5G. From their
| viewpoint it is expensive to keep serving 3G customers.
| ClumsyPilot wrote:
| Ironically 2g will still be around forever as a fallback and so
| much industrisl equipment relies on it
|
| At least thats what uk operators told me
| majjam wrote:
| Thats good to know thank you. I like to fall back on 2G phone
| rather than a smartphone from time to time.
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| skrause wrote:
| GSM can easily share a frequency block with LTE/5G, so it's
| much easier to keep it around. 3G needs a whole 5 MHz
| frequency block for itself, but could you use the same block
| and assign 4.5 MHz to LTE or 5G and just 0.5 MHz for a few
| GSM legacy devices. That's why it makes sense to turn off 3G,
| but keep GSM for older devices.
| anttisalmela wrote:
| That's what happening in Finland too. All operators have
| announced that 3G will be switched off in 2023.
| mdasen wrote:
| In the US, that won't be the case. AT&T shut down GSM at the
| end of 2016. Verizon will be shutting down its 2G/3G CDMA
| network at the end of 2022. T-Mobile is also slated to shut
| down its 2G GSM network at the end of 2022.
|
| As others have pointed out, 2G GSM uses less spectrum (not
| for the same usage, but as a base) with 0.2MHz channels
| rather than 5MHz channels. There's been some stuff talking
| about T-Mobile running GSM inside the guard bands of their
| LTE network (dead space between channels). Still, it seems
| like they're also going to be shutting it down.
|
| T-Mobile's GSM network is pretty limited with maybe a third
| of the coverage of their LTE and 5G networks. It doesn't use
| any low-band spectrum so it performs pretty poorly. They also
| haven't been expanding it over the past 7 years or so,
| preferring to put their effort into LTE and now 5G.
|
| They did keep GSM alive a lot longer than AT&T (6 years
| longer), but it seems like the reasons for keeping it alive
| are dwindling compared to the cost.
| ksec wrote:
| That used to be the case, ( ~2018 ) when MNO around the world
| have a similar stance, have 2G as Fall Back, and switching
| off 3G. But more and more operators are now thinking of the
| idea switching off _both_ 2G and 3G within the next 5-10
| years. So their whole network will be IP based.
|
| I think that greatly depends how much they can continue to
| milk those 2G / 3G equipment. And the pandemic has speed
| things up a little bit.
| g_p wrote:
| The UK has recently agreed with the industry to phase out 2G
| by 2033, as mentioned in another comment here.
|
| I imagine there will be a fair bit of industrial equipment
| and smart meters needing replaced as a result!
| yaantc wrote:
| In many places yes, but still with a much reduced bandwidth
| allocations.
|
| Newer generations increase the spectral efficiency, so more
| throughput can be supported on the same spectrum. So the
| operators tend to move spectrum from old to new generations.
|
| This is not immediate and there are a lot of differences from
| one operator to the next: in an area with low demand it's
| more cost efficient to keep using the old hardware as much as
| possible for example, until at some point using new more
| efficient hardware is cheaper than maintaining the old one.
| Then there are contractual obligations: some 2G is kept
| around to support industrial M2M applications with contracts
| covering 10 to 15 years of service for example.
|
| Which is why there's quite a lot of differences from operator
| to operator. Still, the trend is always there. What changes
| is the transition speed.
| wavesquid wrote:
| As far as I know, since mid-2018, all 2G networks are offline
| in Australia. I've seen similar articles for other countries.
| throwaway74737 wrote:
| I still use GSM daily in the US with a few new and classic
| phones. The technology is at just the right level with only
| calls and some texting.
| superkuh wrote:
| Yes. 4G can stuff 300% more data hertz for hertz bandwidth
| compared to 3G. But 5G only does about 15-20% more data hertz
| for hertz than 4G. It really is a very minor increase in speed.
| All advertisements about 5G speed are really advertising for
| limited availability 3.5 GHz and mm-wave deployments in new
| spectrum... but of course the telcos are now realizing this
| spectrum, even the half gigahertz they stole of C band, doesn't
| actually propagate well around Earth instead of straight up and
| down. If speed alone were the desire, upgrading to 5G standard
| would not be worth it for anyone. What it does offer is vastly
| improved minimum latency and easier modularity in network
| backends.
|
| So realistically, this shutting down of 3G should have happened
| when 4G came in if speed demands for spectrum were what
| mattered. But of course back then there weren't enough users to
| really justify it even if the speed argument applied more then
| than now.
|
| 2G and 3G standards have their place and keeping a 2 MHz
| channel open for them is not going to get in anyone's way, on
| the towers, or spectrum-wise.
| mdasen wrote:
| > 5G only does about 15-20% more data hertz for hertz than 4G
|
| At low-band, it's often quoted as 20%, but when you get to
| mid-band it's a lot more. That's one of the reasons there's
| been a mad-dash for mid-band spectrum.
|
| I'd also note that the radio standards are made to evolve.
| LTE wasn't nearly as efficient as it was when it was
| introduced which is why, for a time, HSPA+ networks were able
| to compete with LTE.
|
| > but of course the telcos are now realizing this spectrum,
| even the half gigahertz they stole of C band, doesn't
| actually propagate well around Earth instead of straight up
| and down
|
| The propagation isn't really a surprise and the idea it was
| stolen is terribly biased. The incumbents on that spectrum
| were paid huge sums for it and moving expenses.
|
| It does propagate well enough that it will be very
| meaningful. T-Mobile is seeing amazing gains using the 2.5GHz
| spectrum that they got through their merger with Sprint. They
| already cover around 60% of the US population with mid-band
| 5G. 3.5GHz won't propagate as well, but there are ways to
| overcome that like having the towers transmit at higher power
| and then having lower-frequency spectrum handle the uplink
| from the handset.
|
| The three carriers didn't spend nearly $100B for something
| worthless and they aren't realizing its propagation as some
| sort of surprise.
|
| > 2G and 3G standards have their place and keeping a 2 MHz
| channel open for them is not going to get in anyone's way, on
| the towers, or spectrum-wise
|
| Running a 3G UMTS network requires 10MHz of spectrum. 10MHz
| of spectrum can be pretty meaningful. CDMA uses 2.5MHz for
| voice and 2.5MHz for data and maybe you're thinking of that,
| but it's still 5MHz to have both voice and data on a CDMA
| network.
|
| Things can certainly be kept around, but it means less for
| other stuff.
| karmicthreat wrote:
| I feel bad for some of my customers that I was shipping 3g
| routers until mid-2018. Looks like a couple automakers were
| shipping 3g equipment in 2019. I think several platforms like
| Tank Links are also going to have a purge when cheap 3g goes
| dark.
|
| I wish there were some super cheap sparse data plans that worked
| out in the middle of nowhere USA. Everything out there want 10K
| units for get good discounts.
| sharikous wrote:
| What are the technical characteristics of 3G and LTE? Will we
| lose a very useful fallback?
|
| I ask because I have a very modern device which is basically
| useless when I put there a SIM of an operator which has LTE only,
| and works well with a 3G/LTE operator. I am speaking of the
| countryside and I wonder if the problem is the operator coverage
| or the technology utilized.
| CountSessine wrote:
| Disclaimer: I'm not a dark-mage-of-the-smith-chart - I'm just a
| dude who had to take a course in EM once. Honestly, I'm pretty
| ignorant and you should take all of this with a grain of salt.
|
| My understanding is that the noise model is very different -
| that LTE/ofdm are very good at getting around radio noise by-
| frequency - ie a bunch of interference at a particular
| frequency. But 3G/umts/cdma was very good at dealing with
| multi-path distortion because of the whole chip-code-
| orthogonality property and the fact that the radio would have
| multiple time-shifted taps on the antenna. That would mean that
| in theory LTE would be better at dealing with persistent
| environmental noise, but 3G would be better in a city where the
| phone is receiving that same signal but reflected against
| buildings and slightly time-shifted.
|
| I doubt this makes any difference in your case - it's probably
| just that 3G is typically on 850MHz and that LTE is probably on
| a higher frequency like 2300MHz which wouldn't propagate as
| well.
| tomxor wrote:
| For contrast. In the UK 3G has another 12 years ahead of it [0]
|
| Not everyone uses a smartphone with the constant consumer churn.
| I've had a good quality Nokia "dumb" phone for 10 years and have
| no reason to buy a new one, I need a new PS10 battery soon and
| then it will keep going for another ten years in this country.
|
| https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-59583783
| xnyan wrote:
| >...3G has another 12 years ahead of it
| "Assembly Research founder Matthew Howett told BBC News the
| change would probably come sooner than the government's 2033
| deadline."
|
| 12 years is the deadline by which it must be done, not how long
| it will be around. 3G will be shut off in as as little as a
| year in some cases: "BT revealed plans to
| phase out 3G by 2023, and 2G later in the decade."
| tomxor wrote:
| Well that sucks.
|
| Also a strange quote from BT since they don't actually have a
| mobile network.
| markfenton wrote:
| BT bought EE in 2016
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