back to article EE still has fastest, fattest 4G pipe in London's M25 ring

RootMetrics has compiled a map of 4G deployments in London which includes a whopping 11,000 crowd-sourced data points and concludes that within the M25*, EE still has the fastest, and broadest, network in town. That shouldn't be very surprising as EE started a year earlier than its competitors, utilising the excess of radio …

COMMENTS

This topic is closed for new posts.
  1. Longrod_von_Hugendong

    Isnt that why...

    Kevin Bacon is plastered over everything capable of displaying a moving image telling us why EE is so good?

    Also, living 600 miles north of London, and only having 2G - i dont really give a shit.

    1. Captain Scarlet
      Coffee/keyboard

      Re: Isnt that why...

      That advert ruined a recent film I saw that I can't remember the name of, he would popup in a scene and I would think he was still doing the conga.

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    " couple of high-definition video streams is enough for any mobile user"

    Does anyone watch two video streams at once on their mobile?

    Can anyone watch two video streams.......?

    Or did the author mean the equivalent of two high-definition video streams.

    1. jonathanb Silver badge

      Re: " couple of high-definition video streams is enough for any mobile user"

      If you are using Skype or similar, that is two high definition video streams, one of you, and on of the person you are communicating with.

      1. Danny 14

        Re: " couple of high-definition video streams is enough for any mobile user"

        so a hd stream from a 1.3Mp front facing camera is a good idea because?

  3. Vortigern

    Speed is nothing

    ..without reliability!

    You're lucky to get any calls or data half the time when working in the city - it's just too congested.

    At least wifi is there for those times you have full mobile signal but nothing going either way.

  4. Atonnis

    Shite

    They claim such speeds and bandwidth is available, yet my EE 4G phone can't download an ebook in 20 minutes where my 3G phone managed it in less than a minute - at the same location on the same day.

    Really wishing I hadn't been sold this 4G crap - it, in practical everyday terms - just doesn't work.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Shite

      "Really wishing I hadn't been sold this 4G crap - it, in practical everyday terms - just doesn't work."

      The bitterness of crappy telco service remains long after the sweetness of marketing promises has been forgotten. But you'll know next time?

      Here's the list, to cut out and keep:

      1) Marketing people are liars

      2) Early adopter pricing makes your eyes water

      3) From a logical or mathematical perspective, "up to" speeds can include the number zero

      4) Twenty four month contracts last much longer when you realise you've been sold a pup.

  5. Roland6 Silver badge

    OpenSignals?

    The thing I found interesting was another organisation doing mobile data and signal testing. Remember back in 2011 the BBC used the Epitiro app to map 3G coverage and notspots nationwide. Looking at the Epitiro website it would seem that they didn't use the experience to create an on-going monitoring service.

    The crowdsourced OpenSignals is still going and includes 4G services, although neither seem to provide any data drill down (eg. number of samples, data rates etc.)

    So the question is which monitoring app should I be using: RootMetrics or OpenSignals ?

  6. No Quarter

    That's all very well...

    They probably also have 100 terabit connections in Seoul, and I can't get that either.

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    7.5 million..

    How very helpful for the 60 million people who do not live in London :)

  8. dervheid
    Mushroom

    4G? We dont need no steenkeeng 4G!

    Just a decent, strong, reliable 3G signal out of EE would be an improvement.

    Tossers.

    1. Roland6 Silver badge

      Re: 4G? We dont need no steenkeeng 4G!

      I'd be interested to see what the "normal" mode is on 4G phones and whether it is user selectable.

      Given that 4G-LTE networks currently support voice by dropping back to 3G or lower, resulting in a noticeable switching delay on many phones, it would make sense for 4G phones to normally operate in 3G/GPRS mode and only switch to 4G mode when needed either to enable video streaming or due to 3G network congestion. Also whilst in 3G mode the (GSM) phone can simultaneously maintain voice and data transfer sessions.

  9. Captain Underpants

    It's not the core focus of the story, but I figure letting it slip would be lazy - how about an explanation of that little footnote about how the EU wants to push data rates up to US levels? There's nothing in the linked article to state that prices going up is inevitable, and unless there's already an existing discrepancy what companies pay for data connection handoffs and what they charge for incoming connections from elsewhere (in which case, that discrepancy is the amount that gets folded into the bill) the actual end user shouldn't see any difference.(though, on the other hand, Three have started doing free roaming to certain countries...)

    Which sounds far too naive, so what have I missed? Other than "greedy bastids will try any excuse to claw more money out of you"?

    1. James 51

      There's far better competition here than in the US mobile market. If they all got together to agree to not compete on their data tariffs, I am sure that would interest the regulators. Besides, every time I’ve heard an industry talking head complaining about driving down roam costs the person held up as paying more in the end are usually people from outside the EU who are roaming within it.

      It's probably just a lazy and baseless swipe at the EU in general.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Facts required

      I'm on all you can eat data for £13pcm on 3, they sent me an email to let me know if I have a phone which accepts 4G then I will get 4G all you can eat data at no extra cost.

      I'm getting a Xperia Z1 and have been told the All you can eat data on the plan includes 4G when they role it out in my area.

      Sure 3's telephone support is painfull in the extreme, but the shop staff are good and the website is better than Vodafone's and O2's (haven't touched EE for years).

  10. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I've been using VF 4G for a few weeks now (I had it in time for launch on my HTC ONE), and I've managed a maximum of 64.8Mbps in Finsbury Park, and I have the screenshot to prove it (I really ought to add the Rootmetrics app, clearly). The more important thing I've found, though, is that 4G is vastly more reliable than 3G in the City and West End in particular - I've never had a decent fix on 3G in my office (near Liverpool Street), while 4G worked from the off.

    1. dervheid

      So VF were no better than EE

      on 3G, by the sound of things.

      Too busy spending dosh on / promoting 4G perhaps?

  11. M E H
    Happy

    Don't use it - please!

    In contrast to EE's lamentable 3G reliability at the weekends when I would regularly get DNS errors I've found their 4G service fast and rock solid.

    On Sunday I was watching the cycling on the Embankment and my Lumia 820 would load websites really quickly whereas Mrs MEH's iPhone 4 on EE's 3G service would struggle to open a page.

    I was flogged a good package when I upgraded as well.

    However, as I don't want to the hoi polloi clogging up the network, I'll claim it is rubbish and not worth upgrading to!

  12. Bunbury
    Stop

    Not a Ring

    The M25 is a horseshoe, as any fule kno. The bit by the Dartford crossing is the A282. Which seems to be there mostly so bicycles can use the Dartford Crossing. Or something.

    1. Dave Stevenson
      Thumb Up

      Re: Not a Ring

      You beat me to it! It's one of those useless pub quiz bits of trivia.

      Not just bicycles, but any vehicle that is prohibited from motorways (eg tractors).

  13. Joe Gurman

    Erm

    Your WiFi is slower than 79.9 Mbps? Really? Haven't you lot heard about 802.11ac?

    1. Danny 14

      Re: Erm

      my s2 craps out at 65Mbs. Cant say it has EVER been an issue for me. Cant say ive noticed when ive been on the fringe of the wifi coverage down in the 11Mbs region either.

  14. Jonnyp

    4G is great but everything else is crap

    I've been having probs with 3G signal and making (and receiving) phone calls.

    Just saw they're being called out for just that on Watchdog today. Dropped calls, calls going to answering machine.

    The article's right- the 4G is amazingly fast, but if you actually need a phone i would use another network until they sort it out.

  15. Antony Riley

    "redundant Wi-Fi networks"

    Even a piss poor WiFi setup usually proves more reliable than 3G / 4G. Lower latency, packet loss. Far less issues with network contention (mostly due to covering a much smaller area per transmitter). Even if it's a little slower on paper than the fastest 4G which you'll never actually get in reality, there are more metrics to network quality than just burst speed.

  16. Henry Wertz 1 Gold badge

    Jealous

    Jealous 8-). Verizon LTE, I have huge amounts of coverage (last 1000 mile road trip, I had about 950 miles 4G, about 40 miles 3G, and this one valley road had no service for a good 10 miles or so.)

    But, the speeds... I just ran a speedtest and got 7.2mbps down and 5mbps up, and have seen 3mbps down and 1mbps up a few times. That's not terrible but not great for 4G. You'll hit one site and get like 20mbps and the next, not so much; VZW is running their LTE on a single 700mhz 2x10 channel right now, with AWS (1700/2100) being rolled out for capacity. They said a while ago 60% of their data traffic was going over LTE.

  17. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Just to be clear

    1. Despite pressure on the ITU to allow the use of the term and aggressive marketing, it's not 4G. it's 3.9 at best.

    2. Currently theres no voice on LTE. You need to use CSFB

    3. CSFB onto 3G is no good if the 3G network has no bloody coverage

    4. It's still not 4G

    BTW, EE offer ~50Mbps with 20GB quota for £51. SKY offer Fibre upto 38Mbps with no Quota at £34.50 (£20+line rental), excluding 6 months free offer.

    Not cheap this Mobile broadband lark.

This topic is closed for new posts.

Other stories you might like