Three 4G HomeFi

[Dave Rice]

Rule of thumb from the CCTV world, H264 FullHd @25 fps = 4.5mbps max.

[Ed P]

She was probably parroting a 4K number at 32fps. i.e multiply the resolution bits by around 4, and colour bits by another 4 (8 bpp versus 10 bpp) which would roughly bridge between her number and Dave’s.

[The Duke]

Rule of thumb 1080p is about 5meg.

[Wheels-Of-Fire]

That may well be true for a whole film. I streamed a few short UHD clips last week though and the Windows network meter only averaged 5Mbs.

The clips took a short while to start so I suppose PowerDVD could have buffered most of them first. I didnt start the meter till the clips started playing ?

[Dave Rice]

Of course streaming films with an absolute length (so can be buffered) is different to streaming a never ending feed. It’s also not a constant speed but when reference frames go through. And it’s a different protocol with different processing needs. But apart from that ? Virgin’s claims are clearly bollocks.

It will be interesting to see how 5G will change things, but it won’t be quick. Look how long 4G has taken to mature. In 5 years though we may well be getting our BB over the air and that will provide a different challenge in the location of  key pieces of kit, like routers. No longer will it be in the hall or some random ground floor location favoured by the house builders.

Perversely it may well change WiFi distribution in the house for the better as you’ll probably want your router upstairs to get the best signal as 5G penetration is poor for the highest speeds.

[PlaneMan]

The router has gone back to Amazon.

Mum had a call from Virgin offering exactly what they have now for £26  monthly for a year. Half of what they pay now.

[Dave Rice]

Just tested a Huwei E3372 USB dongle in a Draytek 2760N (their entry level £120 job, now superseded by the 2762) with a Three sim.

Performance was as expected, the same as when plugged into my PC. Router sat with an exterior wall between it and the mast, 30 down 20 up. I set up a Branch to HQ IPSec VPN, the typical scenario you would see in a small business. Absolutely flies along.

[PlaneMan]

Vodafone are joining the party. Prices are more than 3 and the cost depends on download speed. Hopefully it’s viable for me, ordered a free SIM to check what the coverage is actually like.

Virgin are trying to jack my bill up again so they can whistle. I tried to contact them yesterday for 3 hours, couldn’t get a response on the chat facility and the music when on hold makes calling a very painful and annoying business. So I’ve complained to them. Had enough, just want shot of them now.

[Dave Rice]

Just found out what I’d always suspected from your posts, you can use a phone sim in a dongle / router. Ofcom got written confirmation from Three.

This brings Smarty into play with their current unlimited offer of £18.75 and a rolling 1 month contract. Looking at the D-Link DWR-953 Wireless AC1200 for son’s house. Already checked my Draytek with a Huawei Unlocked E3372– LTE/4G 150 Mbps USB Dongle.

[JayCeeDee]

Virgin came knocking at our door the other day – they’ve been cabling up our local villages over the last year. They wanted to know whether I was interested in their service. I told them that if they thought they could leave my front drive in the same state they left the roads and pavements, they had another think coming. ??Sent him off with a flea in his ear.

[Drezha]

Dave Rice wrote:

Just found out what I’d always suspected from your posts, you can use a phone sim in a dongle / router. Ofcom got written confirmation from Three. This brings Smarty into play with their current unlimited offer of £18.75 and a rolling 1 month contract.

This is what we’ve been using at cadets for the past few month or so.

"Everything looks interesting until you do it. Then you find it’s just another job" - Terry Pratchett

[The Duke]

PlaneMan wrote:

Vodafone are joining the party. Prices are more than 3 and the cost depends on download speed. Hopefully it’s viable for me, ordered a free SIM to check what the coverage is actually like. Virgin are trying to jack my bill up again so they can whistle. I tried to contact them yesterday for 3 hours, couldn’t get a response on the chat facility and the music when on hold makes calling a very painful and annoying business. So I’ve complained to them. Had enough, just want shot of them now.

 

Many years ago u was calling bt to move my BB from wanadoo to BT, it took me that long to get hold of BT, when I did I cancelled my phone line and ended up moving everything to talk talk.

[Dave Rice]

Looking at moving the Legion to 4G as their exchange was upgraded to FTTC a year+ ago but still no timescale on the green cabinet being upgraded. There’s plenty of domestic around, including new build estates so no commercial reason not to.

They renewed the BT contract about a year ago as FTTC was looking to be any day, but they couldn’t remember exactly when nor the length of contract. Phoned BT and they couldn’t tell them! They promised to phone back but never did.

[PlaneMan]

Had some time to experiment with the Vodafone SIM today.

Gets 4G all over the house. 20 down and about 10 up with no problems. The best bit is in my preferred location (next to my multi USB charging brick) it gets 45-50 down and 15-20 up. ?

That’s in my OnePlus 5T.

Just need to get shot of Virgin now.

[Dave Rice]

Result.

[PlaneMan]

Dave Rice wrote:

Result.

Even more of a result today, shifted some stuff around to make a bit more space next to my USB charging brick and did another test.

That’s over twice as fast down and nearly 7 times as fast up as Virgin give me. ?

[Dave Rice]

Wow. I remember upgrading our first network at work to get 100mbps. Cost a small fortune.

[PlaneMan]

Finally got confirmation from the incompetent fools at Virgin Media that I’m going to free of them come the 21st of August.

Now I await a response to my complaint.

Massive headache after being on hold but it’s worth it.

Now need to track down the best deal on Vodafone Unlimited Max, currently, for me, this one.  £20 a month after the automatic cashback and a possible £20 after TopCashback and a code is applied.

[PlaneMan]

3 have announced that 5G won’t cost anymore than they currently charge.

That’s a bold move which could grab them loads of customers.

[Dave Rice]

Good for me. I see the other networks are charging a premium even though the service will be pretty much non existent. You wonder how many 4G phone owners have fallen for it?

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