[LINK] Don’t believe the hype: We’re a long way from 5G

[Scott Howard]

On Thu, May 31, 2018 at 5:03 PM, David <dlochrin at key.net.au> wrote:

> So what are we supposed to be doing on our mobile "devices" or widescreen
> TV which needs a bandwidth of 100 Mbit/s, let alone 400 Mbit/s, and
> justifies the considerable cost of implementation?
>

5G isn't about mobile devices.

It's about self-driving cars. And TV broadcasting.  And football stadiums.
And IoT.  And countless other things that likely haven't been even dreamed
of yet...

As an example, consider these guys - https://phantom.auto/
They provide a solution to handle the corner cases where your self-driving
car can't handle whats in front of it (roadworks, weather, etc).  They can
take over the driving of the car remotely for the short time it's needed.
But to do that they need high bandwidth, low latency communications.
Whilst 4G might be enough in some cases, in a more general sense it isn't.

Or TV Broadcasting.  I'm sure you've seen the trucks pull up with the
satellite dish on it and take 30 mins to get setup.  No longer needed -
just use 5G.

Or football stadiums.  4G simply doesn't work well when 40,000 people are
all trying to tweet and live-stream the try that just happened.  (OK, so
maybe 5G is a bit about mobile devices)

I was at the GITEX expo in Dubai a few months back where they were demoing
5G technology.  One of the demos was using 5G for remote robotic surgery.
This ins't exactly new, and can be done today without 5G, but the lower
latency of 5G apparently improves things dramatically.


On Thu, May 31, 2018 at 2:51 PM, David <dlochrin at key.net.au> wrote:

> The article states: "The real range of mmWave appears to be about about a
> third of a mile.  4G?  It ranges from three to 30 miles."
>

mmWave is what is used for some satellite communication.  They are
generally more than about a third of a mile.

There are certainly challenges for mmwave, but it's just one of the ranges
planned to be used for 5G.

  Scott