Can we stop calling it midband yet?

vibe666

I just switched from o2 to Meteor and got myself a HTC Desire HD and I've had to use the tethering on it in the office where I am today as I'm just visiting and don't have LAN access.

just did a speed test out of curiosity and here's the result.



can we stop calling it midband yet?

I realised i didn't have the HTC Sync app on my laptop to sync the phone with the laptop, so I downloaded it and it took less than 60 seconds. I didn't notice till it was finished that it was 66mb, which is what prompted me to run the speedtest on it in the first place.

also, that's with 3 people connected via wifi on their laptops and VPN'd into the office + surfing.

jor el

Moved to Midband.

113ms ping, not an always on connection, etc, means it's not broadband. Speed is only a part of the issue.

What was the speed on O2?

William Powell

Best name I've come across for Mobile Broadband other than Fraudband is more a description "Best Effort Mobile Broadband".

Its mobile, it looks a bit like broadband on a good day and on a bad day all you get is a best effort.

watty

You can get 21Mbps speed on Mobile.

But there is no economical way to ensure EVERYONE gets a minimum speed of 1Mbps never mind 3Mbps.

They would have to x5 to x8 number of base stations for everyone to have a minimum 3Mbps
See http://www.radioway.info/comparewireless/
This explains why 10% of people can have fabulous speed.

Latency is still rubbish.
Approximately Acceptable latency is < 50ms for Broadband.
Good is 25ms to 50ms
Excellent is 8ms to 25ms

It's Mobile Internet Speed is all over the place.

vibe666

jor el wrote: »

Moved to Midband.

i figured given the speed it was worthy of being in the broadband forum, but i guess not.

jor el wrote: »

113ms ping, not an always on connection, etc, means it's not broadband. Speed is only a part of the issue.

not all broadband is always on. my old man was using a usb based dsl modem with a proprietory dialler installed on his PC.

and mines on a smartphone, so it is always on, unless i specifically turn it off.

jor el wrote: »

What was the speed on O2?

I didn't ever speedtest it, but it was on an n900 which has no 4G (HSDPA afaik on the Desire HD) connection, just 3.5G (whatever that was).

it was pretty fast, but nowhere near as fast as this one is.

i'm in an office where a lot of people are visitors using 3G dongles, so the airwaves are pretty busy. i'm not sure if the 4G bandwidth is shared with the 3G or if its separate but its still faster than a lot of people's DSL connections.

ah well, i was quite impressed myself but ho hum.

just checked again and its still going very well, even with the 3 of us using it this afternoon.



ping still not exactly stellar, but it's not being used for voip or gaming, so its fine for what its being used for right now.

lynchie

Surely the upload figure of 2.67Mb is wrong as hsdpa is only rated at 384Kbps up. HSUPA would provide 2Mbit upload but I dont think its operational here anyway?

jor el

vibe666 wrote: »

i figured given the speed it was worthy of being in the broadband forum, but i guess not.

Speed does not make broadband.

vibe666 wrote: »

not all broadband is always on. my old man was using a usb based dsl modem with a proprietory dialler installed on his PC.

and mines on a smartphone, so it is always on, unless i specifically turn it off.

Broadband can be always on, a 3G connection cannot. If you chose to have a dialler on your DSL connection, that's personal choice, but DSL is an always on connection. Having the 3G connection switched on permanently on your phone will not mean that it's permanently connected. Network conditions can kick you off at random, and you'll get no choice in that. It could stay connected for minutes, or days.

lynchie wrote: »

Surely the upload figure of 2.67Mb is wrong as hsdpa is only rated at 384Kbps up. HSUPA would provide 2Mbit upload but I dont think its operational here anyway?

HSUPA is active on parts of the networks, but a lot of modems/phones don't support it. If you have a compatible modem, and the cell you're in has HSUP capability, then you get better upload.

vibe666

jor el wrote: »

HSUPA is active on parts of the networks, but a lot of modems/phones don't support it. If you have a compatible modem, and the cell you're in has HSUP capability, then you get better upload.

that's the one. I think HSDPA was the 3.5G one wasn't it? that was the best the n900 could manage anyway.

its a great phone tho, and nice and fast. i just wouldn't want to have to keep it away from somewhere i can recharge it tho, it's a monster for eating the battery when you're using it for stuff thanks to the 4.3" screen.

i don't mind too much tho, my work laptop has one of those "always on" usb ports so i can charge the phone from that even if the laptop is off and between the couple of dozen USB sockets on various PC's etc. at home, plug socket chargers & the car charger i'm pretty much covered.

i'll be a lot happier if one of the many new super duper battery enhancing technologies that are 'almost' here actually arrives tho.

octagon

These distinctions between 'broadband' and 'midband' sound very arbitrary and self-serving. How does 'always-on' have any bearing on whether something qualifies as broadband or 'midband'? Especially given that the transitory nature of 'midband' is largely down to the predominant use of USB dongles to connect to it.

I mean, if I leave my USB dongle plugged into my PC and connected all day every day, does that mean that my midband suddenly becomes broadband? If I purchase a router with an HSDPA interface and stick my SIM into it, does that make it broadband? Or is there some other arbitrary distinction that you guys want to make?

watty

Long ago, about 10 years ago or more, maybe 15years ago the Experts decided the difference between
Narrowband (Dialup and basic ISDN, which doesn't have to be dialup)
Midband (better than Narrowband, usually, but not always and not able to have all properties of Broadband)
Broadband.

octagon wrote: »

I mean, if I leave my USB dongle plugged into my PC and connected all day every day, does that mean that my midband suddenly becomes broadband? If I purchase a router with an HSDPA interface and stick my SIM into it, does that make it broadband? Or is there some other arbitrary distinction that you guys want to make?

No. Having the modem (radio set) always on doesn't make the connection or TCP/IP sessions be "always on". Mobile inherently doesn't work like that. It's impossible to have "always on" Mobile even if you are at one location with a decent signal.

There is now a 5th category, Fast Broadband.

VSat (two way satellite) is a category alone as it can be like Dailup, Midband and nearly like Broadband depending on the package you buy. It can't ever be actually broadband as the latency is about 20 times worse than acceptible for Broadband.

read http://www.techtir.ie/comms/mobile-vs-fixed
and
http://www.techtir.ie/forums/internet-faq

Always On:
True broadband can maintain a session. Though some DSL operators may monentarily reset the connection once a day. Many application susing TCP/IP can't survive a session termination. Mobile will disconnect you due to needing capacity for phone calls, interference, or more people joining the same mast sector with a better signal. Mobile very limited in the number of connections it can maintain. It's essentially a fast dialup.
see http://www.radioway.info/comparewireless/



While LTE (4g) Mobile doesn't suffer from cell breathing on downlink, at any economical rollout it can't deliver Broadband. Only if every street had a LTE basestation would LTE be Broadband. LTE if it gets x4 spectrum is x4 to x8 performance of 3G/HSPA. On the same spectrum it's the same performance if you are the only user and twice as good with 10 users.

Until Mobile has a Mast in every street, it will be Midband. By then all fixed Broadband will be Fast Broadband about x10 faster.

Mobile isn't even designed to deliver Broadband, especially at a fixed indoor Location. It's a Mobile Internet Access system running as a layer on a Mobile Phone system.

Yes, one Mobile user can get even 42Mbps in theory, but in the real world with more than one user on a Mast sector (and phone calls eat into the performance available for Data and shrink the cell as more added), it can easily be only basic ISDN speed, easily drop a connection (not inherently always on) and on average across the population about 1/4 to 1/5th the average Irish Broadband speed and 3 to 4 times the Irish averag Broadband Latency.

The OECD and FCC doesn't count Mobile as Broadband.

octagon

Who are these experts, watty? Because after 15 years working as an IP engineer, I have yet to come across a definition of narrowband and broadband that isn't woolly and vague enough to apply to virtually any technology. When I started working in the industry ISDN was regarded as broadband because it used er... a broader band than POTS. Which of course is the only reasonable definition and the one that sort of makes 'broadband' non-sensical as anything other than a marketing term.

And when I ask for citations, watty, I'm not asking for a plethora of links to your own websites. C/f my previous comments re: self-serving.

To be honest, I get the feeling that the moderators of this forum have allowed the subject of broadband to become politicised and dominated by a handful of so-called expert personalities to the point where any rational discourse on the subject is skewed by said personalities chiming in with their own biased opinions and outlooks.

Thanks also for the patronising tone. I understand completely how TCP sessions work. Your claim that leaving your radio modem on and attached to the network still disqualifies a connection from being 'always on' is non-sensical. Your radio modem is still sending and receiving beacons etc. in much the same way that a DSL modem maintains sync with the network.

watty

ISDN 1.5Mbps or 2.048 Mbps is the original Broadband.
ISDN B channel 64kbps and POTS dialup is Narrowband.

Always been so, since before DSL invented. I've been in Comms & Telcoms since 1978 and was designing ISDN gear from 1986.

The Radio modem can't maintain a session. Mobile isn't natively using TCP/IP. Also the basestation deliberately disconnects modems. Frequently. It has to. The mobile will also be unavailable due to cell breathing.

Primary ISDN is always on and historically Leased Lines used faster than a single B channel ISDN. I think the minimum regarded LONG AGO, before there was WWW, but bitnet, Janet, Arpanet etc existed was 4x B channels bonded to give always on 256k symmetrical connection.

There is no way whatsoever to ensure an always on connection or a minimum 1Mbps, 512k or 256k speed on Mobile. That's not in the spec and it's not technically possible.

ISDN leased lines, Primary ISDN, ADSL, DOCSIS (cable), many Fixed Wireless systems and PTP microwave links can provide inherently an always on connection to run TCP/IP on.

Mobile EDGE and 3G/HSPA can't at all ever. The inherent design of the system makes it impossible.

An Edge or 3G/HSPA modem doesn't remotely work like ADSL.

Flash-OFDM (a system similar to and preceding Wimax and LTE) is native IP and can re-establish sessions. But even it, LTE and Mobile WiMax can't guarantee this, nor provide real "always on" Broadband. The Mobile nature means that number of users can be controlled and situations easily arise where you are disconnected or can't connect. EDGE and 3G/HSPA etc are even worse as they have no native IP and are quite likely to disconnect a session even when capacity is not exhausted. On 3G systems the Cell breathing can cause disconnections or a refused connection to 1/3rd of users or more.

An ADSL connection between your Modem and DSLAM is not shared, nor does it suffer from rapid changes in channel performance. The Mobile uses shared access of a small fixed resource that on average has less capacity than an average ADSL system. CDMA (code Division Multiple access) and TDM is used to share the 3G resource. 10Mbps coax ethernet cable daisy chained is better and that is woefull with 20 users compared to a Star + switch 10Mbps etherent or 16Mbps token ring. As more users to about 10 add to 3G/HSPA the performance degrades far worse than shared CDMA (Collision Detection Multiple Access) 10Mbps ethernet coax. (Token ring of course degrades linearly simply with traffic level).

You may be more expert than me about TCP/IP. But Mobile isn't a TCP/IP system. You can even disconnect an ethernet cable briefly without losing a session. A 3G system disconnect can lose everything. It's more like Dialup than like ADSL.

No matter how much money you pay you can't get a "business class" SLA agreement with a minimum speed and maximum down time on Mobile. It's not technically possible that even if it was perfect today at 3Mbps and 150ms that it will even work at all tomorrow, or won't disconnect briefly 10 times in a day.

The system is designed for Mobility with light intermittent on the go usage. Not as Broadband or fixed system replacement. It's a retrofit layer on top of a Frame based voice network.

Mobile can't compete with ADSL for fixed usage. yet even ADSL is regarded as past its sell by date.

These articles are simplistic for casual reader interested tech stuff
http://www.techtir.ie/comms/fixed-wireless-broadband-better
http://www.techtir.ie/comms/mobile-vs-fixed

Irish Steve

Watty ,

Mobile can't compete with ADSL for fixed usage. yet even ADSL is regarded as past its sell by date.

ADSL is long past it's use by date, let alone sell by, but that's a discussion for another place

Wimax is getting close





I'd be much happier with the level of service that a former server provider in Salzburg gets, and has had for close on 10 years now,

He has fiber, into the building, 100 Mb Synchronous, for less than €40 per month. Even that's now slow for Austria, we're not even in the same ballpark yet, and won't be for a very long time to come, unless there's a dramatic change of humour from the politicians.

We can always hope

Steve