4 ms·

Ehhh, my opinion is that 5G is bullshit for consumer internet. Actual 4G (as opposed to whatever your carrier has in your area) is supposed to be capable of up

Ehhh, my opinion is that 5G is bullshit for consumer internet. Actual 4G (as opposed to whatever your carrier has in your area) is supposed to be capable of up to gigabit speeds, but that's obviously not happening many places, if anywhere due to a variety reasons. However, even so, 4G with good implementation and penetration would be fast enough to stream or download anything reasonable on mobile devices for quite a few years yet. 5G, however, is not bullshit for IoT. If you've ever tried to build an IoT device that uses 4G, you know it generally sucks. 5G will, if they actually build to the flashy spec, fix a lot of issues around latency, cost, and power to send/receive "thing" data.

tanilama 7y ago
> but that's obviously not happening many places Is it happening in ANY places at all? As the carriers add more and more users to their 4G network, and they are not in place to raise the price for their plans, the 4G is just getting worse and worse.
sonnyblarney 7y ago
"5G, however, is not bullshit for IoT" I humbly disagree because IoT itself is BS. We've been talking about it for a decade, and I don't have any use for it, nor do most folks. The ideas are nice, but practicalities are not there. There's a lack of standards, no consistent 'home hub', not enough use cases for expensive gear, security problems galore. The 'beachhead' for IOT has thus been Google/Alexa, which are really Cloud services and don't integrate very well locally. Theoretically, I can see my fridge telling me what to order, my microwave knowing how long to cook etc. etc. but I'm wary that any of it will come to fruition for a long time. But I'm not that concerned because I don't care. I think IoT needs a 'killer app' that everyone 'needs' which paves the way for everything else. Nobody was building anything for the data networks when BlackBerry came along with an addictive product. It was not until BlackBerry was printing money that Apple and Google took notice and thus justified massive investment in their mobile offers.
- ianai 7y ago
  I agree. I think it may be a dollar value thing. I recently doubled my income and still can’t see the value in expensive Hue bulbs. Their price for wirelessly dial-able colored light far exceeds my willingness to pay and deal with hub generations. I might budge if they were half their cost, or if I doubled my income again. But probably not because of the technicalities. Seriously, what benefits from perfect information? Human stuff...healthcare, weather, investment choices, etc. the information I would like on my “things” are things like when things will fail or what I need to do to keep them. I don’t need nor want a fridge suggesting merchandise for me. The other use is wireless control-that’s also got limited appeal.
  - katbyte 7y ago
    i got hue bulbs (adjustable white) for: - lights turn off at night/when i leave - lights turn on when i get home - i can ask google or siri to turn them on or off as i am doing other thing as for the colour ones? I have on on my deck, its blue. sometimes i change it to another color if i'm asked but otherwise i can't find any use for the color ones.
- im3w1l 7y ago
  Where I see IoT going is the same place as apps already have. Sending off random telemetry data. You may or may not want a fridge that tells you what to order. But advertisers want a fridge that spies on you so they can tell you what to order. Or the power company wants you to have a fridge that uses power when they tell it to. What is coming is "You Are The Product, Act 2". ps. If you upset the fridge company they will terminate your account and your fridge will fail-open-and-warm.
  - ericd 7y ago
    I sometimes wonder if it’s time to make a company that makes high quality dumb devices and hammers on competitors in marketing, calling out their specific privacy abuses, and the long term potential implications. Really play up the 1984 angle, private conversations being subpoenaed from Amazon, that sort of thing. Or a smart appliance company that works with local hardware and keeps all data on premises.
klingonopera 7y ago
If you've ever tried to build an IoT device that uses 4G, you know it generally sucks. Haven't yet, but may soon in near future. Care to elaborate in a sentence?
- mdorazio 7y ago
  I'll try. 2G/edge was a solid platform due to low modem cost and cheap data available on multiple carriers, but the spec is mostly phased out at this point. 3G and 4G modems have both been expensive in hardware cost, expensive in bandwidth cost, and massive power hogs if your device needs to run on batteries. It usually ends up being a better bet to try to get LoRa or XBee working for device-to-device (despite their limitations) and having only a single "expensive" box for cellular internet connection, but this gets tricky if you need communications across fairly large geographies (ex. distributed outdoor sensors).
  - klingonopera 7y ago
    Thanks for the info! Yes, I would've always used a "hub" to connect devices to the outside world, it's the sensible thing to do. I checked out the availability of hardware on eBay Germany, and it seems GSM/GPRS modules start at €3.00, averaging at about €12.00, whereas 4G modules start at €30.00, and average around €70.00, that's quite a hike! I'm guessing the Arduino MKR NB 1500 is something like a "reference device", and runs for ~€66.00 before tax on their own website. It has the uBlox SARA-R410M 02B chip on it. A cheaper alternative seems to be the SIM7600CE and its variants, selling from Chinese traders around €30.00 to €70.00. Does anyone have any experience with any of the chips I mentioned?
kalleboo 7y ago
> Actual 4G (as opposed to whatever your carrier has in your area) is supposed to be capable of up to gigabit speeds Isn't what's being sold as 5G now just finally fulfilling the promises that were made for 4G? So we'll have to wait for them to sell 6G to get what is being promised for 5G.
- cududa 7y ago
  Pretty much. However some folks in more rural areas were only on a fancier 3G, being told it was 4G, and now ATT telling them they’re on 5Ge.
- pavs 7y ago
  2 more things" - in what ungodly scenario would a consumer need 1gbps speed on their desktop, let alone on their phone. I consider myself a power internet user (I own an ISP), and even I can't think of many scenarios where I would need more than 50 Mbps of internet speed for a sustained period of time. - On mobile devices, higher speed will almost surely result in higher power usage. When consumers are asking for longer battery life on their phone - does 5g theoretical speed really gives that, much advantage over a 4g phone? I can't think of any situation where it does. In conclusion, 5g advantage is nothing more than to stimulate tech industry component sells to consumers and business, ie, 5g modems, phones, antennas, license fees for goverments, exporting tech stack to other countries. All these scenarios adds up to a huge financial market. The first country/company to be in this market will benefit from it. Thats whats its all about. I am not worried about snooping - the telcos and ISPs are already inside government's pocket for decades now under eecutive order (I am not only talking about USA here).
  - HeadsUpHigh 7y ago
    >- in what ungodly scenario would a consumer need 1gbps speed on their desktop, let alone on their phone. I consider myself a power internet user (I own an ISP), and even I can't think of many scenarios where I would need more than 50 Mbps of internet speed for a sustained period of time. On demand streaming of game worlds would be a possible application imo. So instead of downloading the entire game you don't install the world locally but download it as you need it. This could give access to terabyte-sized worlds if done properly. Honestly these would be new markets rather than existing ones.

tanilama 7y ago

> but that's obviously not happening many places Is it happening in ANY places at all? As the carriers add more and more users to their 4G network, and they are not in place to raise the price for their plans, the 4G is just getting worse and worse.

sonnyblarney 7y ago

"5G, however, is not bullshit for IoT" I humbly disagree because IoT itself is BS. We've been talking about it for a decade, and I don't have any use for it, nor do most folks. The ideas are nice, but practicalities are not there. There's a lack of standards, no consistent 'home hub', not enough use cases for expensive gear, security problems galore. The 'beachhead' for IOT has thus been Google/Alexa, which are really Cloud services and don't integrate very well locally. Theoretically, I can see my fridge telling me what to order, my microwave knowing how long to cook etc. etc. but I'm wary that any of it will come to fruition for a long time. But I'm not that concerned because I don't care. I think IoT needs a 'killer app' that everyone 'needs' which paves the way for everything else. Nobody was building anything for the data networks when BlackBerry came along with an addictive product. It was not until BlackBerry was printing money that Apple and Google took notice and thus justified massive investment in their mobile offers.

ianai 7y ago
I agree. I think it may be a dollar value thing. I recently doubled my income and still can’t see the value in expensive Hue bulbs. Their price for wirelessly dial-able colored light far exceeds my willingness to pay and deal with hub generations. I might budge if they were half their cost, or if I doubled my income again. But probably not because of the technicalities. Seriously, what benefits from perfect information? Human stuff...healthcare, weather, investment choices, etc. the information I would like on my “things” are things like when things will fail or what I need to do to keep them. I don’t need nor want a fridge suggesting merchandise for me. The other use is wireless control-that’s also got limited appeal.
- katbyte 7y ago
  i got hue bulbs (adjustable white) for: - lights turn off at night/when i leave - lights turn on when i get home - i can ask google or siri to turn them on or off as i am doing other thing as for the colour ones? I have on on my deck, its blue. sometimes i change it to another color if i'm asked but otherwise i can't find any use for the color ones.
im3w1l 7y ago
Where I see IoT going is the same place as apps already have. Sending off random telemetry data. You may or may not want a fridge that tells you what to order. But advertisers want a fridge that spies on you so they can tell you what to order. Or the power company wants you to have a fridge that uses power when they tell it to. What is coming is "You Are The Product, Act 2". ps. If you upset the fridge company they will terminate your account and your fridge will fail-open-and-warm.
- ericd 7y ago
  I sometimes wonder if it’s time to make a company that makes high quality dumb devices and hammers on competitors in marketing, calling out their specific privacy abuses, and the long term potential implications. Really play up the 1984 angle, private conversations being subpoenaed from Amazon, that sort of thing. Or a smart appliance company that works with local hardware and keeps all data on premises.

klingonopera 7y ago

If you've ever tried to build an IoT device that uses 4G, you know it generally sucks. Haven't yet, but may soon in near future. Care to elaborate in a sentence?

mdorazio 7y ago
I'll try. 2G/edge was a solid platform due to low modem cost and cheap data available on multiple carriers, but the spec is mostly phased out at this point. 3G and 4G modems have both been expensive in hardware cost, expensive in bandwidth cost, and massive power hogs if your device needs to run on batteries. It usually ends up being a better bet to try to get LoRa or XBee working for device-to-device (despite their limitations) and having only a single "expensive" box for cellular internet connection, but this gets tricky if you need communications across fairly large geographies (ex. distributed outdoor sensors).
- klingonopera 7y ago
  Thanks for the info! Yes, I would've always used a "hub" to connect devices to the outside world, it's the sensible thing to do. I checked out the availability of hardware on eBay Germany, and it seems GSM/GPRS modules start at €3.00, averaging at about €12.00, whereas 4G modules start at €30.00, and average around €70.00, that's quite a hike! I'm guessing the Arduino MKR NB 1500 is something like a "reference device", and runs for ~€66.00 before tax on their own website. It has the uBlox SARA-R410M 02B chip on it. A cheaper alternative seems to be the SIM7600CE and its variants, selling from Chinese traders around €30.00 to €70.00. Does anyone have any experience with any of the chips I mentioned?

kalleboo 7y ago

> Actual 4G (as opposed to whatever your carrier has in your area) is supposed to be capable of up to gigabit speeds Isn't what's being sold as 5G now just finally fulfilling the promises that were made for 4G? So we'll have to wait for them to sell 6G to get what is being promised for 5G.

cududa 7y ago
Pretty much. However some folks in more rural areas were only on a fancier 3G, being told it was 4G, and now ATT telling them they’re on 5Ge.
pavs 7y ago
2 more things" - in what ungodly scenario would a consumer need 1gbps speed on their desktop, let alone on their phone. I consider myself a power internet user (I own an ISP), and even I can't think of many scenarios where I would need more than 50 Mbps of internet speed for a sustained period of time. - On mobile devices, higher speed will almost surely result in higher power usage. When consumers are asking for longer battery life on their phone - does 5g theoretical speed really gives that, much advantage over a 4g phone? I can't think of any situation where it does. In conclusion, 5g advantage is nothing more than to stimulate tech industry component sells to consumers and business, ie, 5g modems, phones, antennas, license fees for goverments, exporting tech stack to other countries. All these scenarios adds up to a huge financial market. The first country/company to be in this market will benefit from it. Thats whats its all about. I am not worried about snooping - the telcos and ISPs are already inside government's pocket for decades now under eecutive order (I am not only talking about USA here).
- HeadsUpHigh 7y ago
  >- in what ungodly scenario would a consumer need 1gbps speed on their desktop, let alone on their phone. I consider myself a power internet user (I own an ISP), and even I can't think of many scenarios where I would need more than 50 Mbps of internet speed for a sustained period of time. On demand streaming of game worlds would be a possible application imo. So instead of downloading the entire game you don't install the world locally but download it as you need it. This could give access to terabyte-sized worlds if done properly. Honestly these would be new markets rather than existing ones.