Any plans a 5G enabled phone?

[Johnny Hazcker 1]

I am curious, as 5G approaches global release, are there any roadmaps for an updated phone? 

[VaZso 1,998]

2 minutes ago, Johnny Hazcker said:

I am curious, as 5G approaches global release, are there any roadmaps for an updated phone? 

It is too early to ask this, but if a successor will come up later, they may have to also experience with 5G. 🙂

[david 929]

1 hour ago, Johnny Hazcker said:

I am curious, as 5G approaches global release, are there any roadmaps for an updated phone? 

I'm not sure if you are asking about a new phone or a change to the Pro1.  It would require a whole new chipset.  At a minimum, it would require a 765 chipset in the 7xx line or an 855 in the 8xx line, assuming off-the-shelf chips from Qualcomm.

For those who don't care about 5G, it isn't just a matter of true 5G connections.  The 4G connections will often be faster too, as long as the vendors have taken advantage of the added 4G capabilities of the 5G modems.

It will also mean the possibility of more 4G bands being supported.

[D1ggs 141]

Looking forward to the F(x)Tec Pro 5G

[CornholioGSM 338]

...question is why is needed 5G? i mean that it is maybe only good for phone when you use phone as hotspot...but for internet inside phone is it not needed because speed is enough.

[silversolver 849]

Personally I care nothing for 5G. I see absolutely no reason why we need to have 5 bazillion gigabits per nanosecond streaming OTA. 3G is plenty for me, and 4G is far overkill. In what use case scenario is 25mbps per device not enough? It's like processor power......we reached the limits of what is useful to most people a long time ago.

[CornholioGSM 338]

...and now in when streaming videos starts on HEVC codec - less data more quality.

i must say that 3g/h is enough for me too...but only problem is with coverage in my country...and now is better coverage for LTE than for 3G.

So now is for me better LTE...not for speed but for coverage of usable data connection 🙂

Edited January 19, 2020 by CornholioGSM

[david 929]

1 hour ago, CornholioGSM said:

...and now in when streaming videos starts on HEVC codec - less data more quality.

i must say that 3g/h is enough for me too...but only problem is with coverage in my country...and now is better coverage for LTE than for 3G.

So now is for me better LTE...not for speed but for coverage of usable data connection 🙂

Yes, that is certainly part of the benefit of newer protocols over older.  They will cannibalize the older frequencies to make room for the newer, so you'll need the newer to get the same coverage you had with the older.

If we are talking strictly bandwidth of 5G, here are some of the benefits:

• Fixed wireless broadband.  This is not related to having it on our phones, but rather having the network in place so that wireless routers can be used to provide internet service to homes and businesses.  But, similarly, a phone can serve as a wifi hotspot, as well, as you mentioned earlier.
• Higher bandwidth means higher capacity.  By that, I mean they can support more devices over the same, limited frequencies.  Not only are the 5G protocols more efficient, but the higher total bandwidth capacity means more devices can share the same infrastructure.  So, for example, whereas you might not need 1 Gbps on your phone, because you can stream your HD Netflix just fine over 5 Mbps, 1 Gbps allows your phone to buffer the next chunk of data it needs quickly and then get out of the way so that other devices can get their chunks of data.
• Newer use cases that require higher bandwidth, such as:
  • Holographic video calls
  • Virtual Reality
  • IoT devices (not related to phones)
  • Autonomous vehicles (not related to phones)
    • On this note, it is an interesting problem.  On the one hand, more smarts can be held in the cloud and the cars can communicate over a high speed connection to send sensor data and the cloud can help them make decisions.  They can use the high speed connections to communicate with other vehicles and other sensors that will be built into the infrastructure.  On the other hand, if they got down this path, it makes the digital divide between urban and rural areas that much greater.  They can use localized mesh networks and special frequencies to reduce this issue a bit, but it will be interesting to see what happens.

5G also provides lower latency for:

• Autonomous vehicles (not related to phones)
  • Not only do they need to transfer a lot of data, they need low latency to make decisions quickly
• Drones - Same situation as autonomous vehicles (not related to phones)
• New types of apps that will be able to take advantage of greater processing power in the cloud (than what we have in the phones) and getting the mobile apps the results faster.  Games would be one category of apps that could take advantage of this.

NOTE:  There are some challenges when it comes to latency.  To get the ultra low latency, you need to use the ultra high frequencies.  The higher the frequency, the lower the latency, but the lower the coverage (distance).  Lower frequencies will travel further, but the latency will go up.

5G, in some cases, may provide better coverage:

• T-mobile, in the USA, has the 600 MHz frequencies.  That reaches farther than the higher frequencies.  They'll also do LTE over this, but over time, I wouldn't be surprised if they crowd out LTE in favor of 5G on the lower frequencies like this.  There is nothing inherent in 5G that requires 600 MHz, but using the most efficient protocols is always a good thing, especially if they are using it for fixed wireless broadband services.

5G can, in theory, reduce battery consumption:

• This will get better in time.  Early chips may not be as efficient as later chips.
• Screens take far more power, but if you get what you need faster, *maybe* you'll have your screen on less than if you had to wait longer.

Edited January 19, 2020 by david

[FlyingAntero 871]

I wouldn't be worried about missing 5G yet. 5G became available to Finland last year but there are couple issues with it:

1. Coverage is very limited (small dots inside few city centre in big cities)

2. Data plans for 5G are expensive (unlimited 50€/month (5G) vs 20€/month (4G))

3. Most of the 5G phones are using chipsets where the 5G modem is not integrated to it so the battery consumption is high (about +20-30% compared to 4G)

4. Currently 5G is used only for download, not for upload.

At least in Finland, operators have said that it still takes 5 years that 5G will be mature and widly available. So if Pro2 come out some day I hope that it is 5G phone but for Pro1 I am not really missing 5G at all. It is just too early for that.

Edited January 19, 2020 by FlyingAntero

[silversolver 849]

@david 5G is (mostly) not related to phones. Got it! I suspected this all along. Now if only everyone else would get the hint. ;)

[david 929]

43 minutes ago, silversolver said:

@david 5G is (mostly) not related to phones. Got it! I suspected this all along. Now if only everyone else would get the hint. 😉

Yeah, there are a lot of those reasons that aren't phone related.  But without the phone services paying for that infrastructure, those other things would take longer to pay for it.  We're subsidizing some of that through our phone bills (which is a whole other emotional topic! LOL).

[oliviersenn6 47]

On 1/19/2020 at 2:40 AM, CornholioGSM said:

...question is why is needed 5G? i mean that it is maybe only good for phone when you use phone as hotspot...but for internet inside phone is it not needed because speed is enough.

the discussion was the same when 4G rolled around. more speed would be great, especially considering the ever-increasing data speeds needed for video specifically.
personally i don't think rushing to get on 5G as a consumer makes a lot of sense right now considering the fiddling required to make milimiter wave working correctly and the current poor coverage, but in a few years it'll make more sense.

so basically the same as when 4G came out.