Sponsored Links

Three Concerns?

Has anyone actually noticed lost of 3G signal in your area? Somewhere between the 14th of April and 14 of May, 3G signals seem to have been stopped on my local mast.

View attachment 2540
Please ignore the 3 ITA (Italy) operator, both Three and Mikrotik deny giving it this name, it is really 3 UK. Entry #1 has gone.
Nothing has changed in my area, but my local cell is rubbish
 
Having thought about this I’ve ordered some new sims to see what the signals are like in my home. I’ve ordered a Tesco Mobile PAYG, I had the, before and really liked Tesco but found the signal poor and speeds restricted, going to see of tests changes. And I’ve ordered the new £10 a month 1P Mobile sim, shame it’s only 10GB a month but it does now include unlimited calls and text and is on EE.
 
I’ve been testing lots of different sims, I am curious when Vodafone turn off the 3G, which I think they are set to do next year? Will they also offer the same benefits as the Three network with no 3G?

So far I’ve concluded Tesco Mobile has capped speeds nice app. 1P Mobile gets great signal but in a few feet it can go from great signal to none existent.
Ive also tested Voxi and Lebera, and Vodafone seem to offer a mixed bag, in my house in some places it’s alright, around 60mbps, in others it’s the same or worst then Smarty, and when out (I tested the networks when walking the dog) the speeds were around 7 to 15mbos but the pings we’re awful.
However I did get this at my workplace yesterday in the office on Voxi..
 

Attachments

  • FD756DF8-F7DB-4ED8-994D-C984FC055B77.webp
    FD756DF8-F7DB-4ED8-994D-C984FC055B77.webp
    18.2 KB · Views: 103
I plan to test them all in the Waitrose car park when I go shopping. I did have Voxi before but found the signal for voice not quit as good as 3 in some places, and I had endless error messages to do with their profile or something?
 
Sponsored Links
We talking B28 or N28 here?
 
Sponsored Links
I would not be concerned about Three turning off 3G. Most of their devices support 4G calling if sold after 2016 and Three stopped selling 3G only phones soon after. With 3G being turned off their cell sites will eventually all be swapped over to 4G. With the turn off of 3G also, one would expect at least the sites that have to be switched over to 4G to have a configuration which supports B20 and B28 (or N28) with a B32 add to supplement the small 5mhz 4G carrier if B20 only is being used. I would also hope that Three at a bare minimum adds B3 to all of the sites which don’t have B3 on them to help relieve congestion from its oversubbed cellsites.
 
I thought B3 was the base band for 3? All of their sites have B3, same for EE. Vodafone and O2 use B20 as their base band so all their sites have that as a minimum

Perhaps I’m mistaken. But I’m pretty sure there are/were some sites that only Band 20 was live on, more especially in rural areas of Northwest Scotland. If I recall when B20 was going live for VoLTE there was a lot of B20 in areas where there was no band 3.

Perhaps that has changed. I suppose it wouldn’t make sense for Band 3 not to be live on a site if the equipment is there already.

Edit: In fact… I do recall when 4G was enabled in some of the western isles (Outer Hebrides) you could get VoLTE services which only worked on band 20, however if you had a device not capable of VoLTE on their coverage map, there was no 4G service at all with band 3, so I can definitely say I think I do recall a time when Three has had no band 3 broadcasting from some of their cell sites.

Again correct me if wrong.
 
Sponsored Links
My area has gone from showing 4G on 3 to no 4G at all, then again their 4G speed was merde (0.1mbps) despite full signal bars, they tell me "there was a fault and we did some upgrade work also" speeds went down, walk to the other side of the mast....40+mbps, walk back to original side 0.1mbps
Seems they've decided not to bother fixing the issue.....
So dealing with 8-25mbps on Vodafone 4G, not bad but not great either....roll on 5G
 
Top
Cheap BIG ISPs for 100Mbps+
Community Fibre UK ISP Logo
150Mbps
Gift: None
Virgin Media UK ISP Logo
Virgin Media £22.99
132Mbps
Gift: None
Vodafone UK ISP Logo
Vodafone £24.00 - 26.00
150Mbps
Gift: None
NOW UK ISP Logo
NOW £24.00
100Mbps
Gift: None
Plusnet UK ISP Logo
Plusnet £25.99
145Mbps
Gift: £50 Reward Card
Large Availability | View All
Cheapest ISPs for 100Mbps+
Gigaclear UK ISP Logo
Gigaclear £17.00
200Mbps
Gift: None
Community Fibre UK ISP Logo
150Mbps
Gift: None
Virgin Media UK ISP Logo
Virgin Media £22.99
132Mbps
Gift: None
Hey! Broadband UK ISP Logo
150Mbps
Gift: None
Youfibre UK ISP Logo
Youfibre £23.99
150Mbps
Gift: None
Large Availability | View All
Sponsored Links
The Top 15 Category Tags
  1. FTTP (6027)
  2. BT (3639)
  3. Politics (2721)
  4. Business (2440)
  5. Openreach (2405)
  6. Building Digital UK (2330)
  7. Mobile Broadband (2146)
  8. FTTC (2083)
  9. Statistics (1901)
  10. 4G (1816)
  11. Virgin Media (1764)
  12. Ofcom Regulation (1582)
  13. Fibre Optic (1467)
  14. Wireless Internet (1462)
  15. 5G (1407)
Sponsored

Copyright © 1999 to Present - ISPreview.co.uk - All Rights Reserved - Terms  ,  Privacy and Cookie Policy  ,  Links  ,  Website Rules