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The important part to understand is that mmWave is really short range and is blocked by walls, windows, and sheets of paper. Phones with it may need to have "wi

The important part to understand is that mmWave is really short range and is blocked by walls, windows, and sheets of paper. Phones with it may need to have "windows" to let the signal make it through the phone case to the antenna. So it basically works outdoors in very busy cities where it's worth it to put an antenna every few hundred feet: Most Americans will never actually benefit from it. It won't work in their houses or anywhere not very dense urban. Some Verizon stores actually put a mmWave antenna physically inside the showroom so you can see the performance... but it won't work when you step out the door.

cogman10 6y ago
Yup. mmWave will make a big difference for the likes of stadiums and theaters. Places with huge crowds. A feature of the high frequency is it doesn't travel far which limits cross talk and allows you to pack in more antennas to serve more people. How often Telecoms will want to deploy it is a different matter. My guess is you'll see it go up most often in places where companies want to optimize customer experiences. Likely as a partnership with the various telcos. For example, I could see the likes of Disney deploying it across disneyworld and disneyland.
- ufmace 6y ago
  It's an interesting application, but with Covid-19, it may be a while before places with huge crowds are happening again.
  - cogman10 6y ago
    Oh, totally. It's VERY apparent that 5g was developed for a pre-covid world :D
    - tinus_hn 6y ago
      Corona is not going to hamstring the world forever, that’s just some authoritarian fantasy.
      - ufmace 6y ago
        I won't be forever certainly. But it's entirely possible that large-scale gatherings like that will be discouraged for at least the timeframe of the next generation of phones, i.e. 1-2 years.
        tinus_hn 6y ago
        Look at the areas where the epidemic is considered controlled. The first thing they do to show it is organize large scale gatherings, like China with large dance festivals and New Zealand with sports events.
- ocdtrekkie 6y ago
  I guess... but like, that's what Wi-Fi AX is supposed to cater to. Apart from voice traffic, which isn't extreme, it's hard to imagine why cellular (which is carrier-specific) would be preferred over Wi-Fi deployment. If the cell towers are in the facility, they need to provide the fiber backhaul either way.
  - reaperducer 6y ago
    Doesn't 5G have the ability to be carrier agnostic, so that multiple carriers can be on the same antennae? Or am I sniffing glue again?
    - cogman10 6y ago
      Nope, carriers buy broadcasting bands. Phones are designed to be able to take in and process the various frequencies that all the carriers use. Whenever there is a bandwidth auction, you'll have the potential of your phones not having access to your new network's bands. How we've been handling this is that new purchases often go to newer tech. However, there has been some cannibalism of really old bands (For example, taking a 2g band and turning it into a 5g band). That happens per carrier.
      - Dylan16807 6y ago
        3G is already in the process of being shut down. Which makes it a little annoying how long they kept making phones that had 4G support but still depended on 3G for calls. Still, it seems like we're on track to get those bands reclaimed at a significantly better pace than 2G.
  - cogman10 6y ago
    The major difference is that for wifi, you need to setup your connection to whatever wifi network is provided. With your cell data service, that happens automatically for you. You don't need to go in and explicitly join some guest network and sign their ToS. Maybe if there was some "cell->wifi" standard that could happen, but I'm somewhat doubtful about the benefits there. You'd also have to be super careful, for the same reason you wouldn't really want to join a random open network.
onlyrealcuzzo 6y ago
So it basically only works if you're sitting or walking outside? I'm assuming it wouldn't work if you're in a car/bus (unless maybe a convertible/tour bus?)
- reportingsjr 6y ago
  I imagine it would work just the same as wifi on buses currently. There will be a mmWave access point inside the bus which will use something else (maybe a cell backhaul?) for it's connection. As someone mentioned in another comment, the best use case for mmWave is places with very high density such as concerts, sports stadiums, etc where current cell networks and wifi seriously struggle. You don't have channel congestion if the waves can't make it through the walls in the venue.
reaperducer 6y ago
My guess is that it will be good for high-density outdoor environments like stadia. Hopefully some other useful applications will present themselves. Cruise ships, maybe? Airport terminals?
- maest 6y ago
  Took me a second, but the arent meant "stadia" as in the plural of "stadium", not google's gaming service.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

cogman10 6y ago

Yup. mmWave will make a big difference for the likes of stadiums and theaters. Places with huge crowds. A feature of the high frequency is it doesn't travel far which limits cross talk and allows you to pack in more antennas to serve more people. How often Telecoms will want to deploy it is a different matter. My guess is you'll see it go up most often in places where companies want to optimize customer experiences. Likely as a partnership with the various telcos. For example, I could see the likes of Disney deploying it across disneyworld and disneyland.

ufmace 6y ago
It's an interesting application, but with Covid-19, it may be a while before places with huge crowds are happening again.
- cogman10 6y ago
  Oh, totally. It's VERY apparent that 5g was developed for a pre-covid world :D
  - tinus_hn 6y ago
    Corona is not going to hamstring the world forever, that’s just some authoritarian fantasy.
    - ufmace 6y ago
      I won't be forever certainly. But it's entirely possible that large-scale gatherings like that will be discouraged for at least the timeframe of the next generation of phones, i.e. 1-2 years.
      - tinus_hn 6y ago
        Look at the areas where the epidemic is considered controlled. The first thing they do to show it is organize large scale gatherings, like China with large dance festivals and New Zealand with sports events.
ocdtrekkie 6y ago
I guess... but like, that's what Wi-Fi AX is supposed to cater to. Apart from voice traffic, which isn't extreme, it's hard to imagine why cellular (which is carrier-specific) would be preferred over Wi-Fi deployment. If the cell towers are in the facility, they need to provide the fiber backhaul either way.
- reaperducer 6y ago
  Doesn't 5G have the ability to be carrier agnostic, so that multiple carriers can be on the same antennae? Or am I sniffing glue again?
  - cogman10 6y ago
    Nope, carriers buy broadcasting bands. Phones are designed to be able to take in and process the various frequencies that all the carriers use. Whenever there is a bandwidth auction, you'll have the potential of your phones not having access to your new network's bands. How we've been handling this is that new purchases often go to newer tech. However, there has been some cannibalism of really old bands (For example, taking a 2g band and turning it into a 5g band). That happens per carrier.
    - Dylan16807 6y ago
      3G is already in the process of being shut down. Which makes it a little annoying how long they kept making phones that had 4G support but still depended on 3G for calls. Still, it seems like we're on track to get those bands reclaimed at a significantly better pace than 2G.
- cogman10 6y ago
  The major difference is that for wifi, you need to setup your connection to whatever wifi network is provided. With your cell data service, that happens automatically for you. You don't need to go in and explicitly join some guest network and sign their ToS. Maybe if there was some "cell->wifi" standard that could happen, but I'm somewhat doubtful about the benefits there. You'd also have to be super careful, for the same reason you wouldn't really want to join a random open network.

onlyrealcuzzo 6y ago

So it basically only works if you're sitting or walking outside? I'm assuming it wouldn't work if you're in a car/bus (unless maybe a convertible/tour bus?)

reportingsjr 6y ago
I imagine it would work just the same as wifi on buses currently. There will be a mmWave access point inside the bus which will use something else (maybe a cell backhaul?) for it's connection. As someone mentioned in another comment, the best use case for mmWave is places with very high density such as concerts, sports stadiums, etc where current cell networks and wifi seriously struggle. You don't have channel congestion if the waves can't make it through the walls in the venue.

reaperducer 6y ago

My guess is that it will be good for high-density outdoor environments like stadia. Hopefully some other useful applications will present themselves. Cruise ships, maybe? Airport terminals?

maest 6y ago
Took me a second, but the arent meant "stadia" as in the plural of "stadium", not google's gaming service.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]