topic Re: A week without service, followed by very poor 5G coverage in Mobile Network discussions

A week without service, followed by very poor 5G coverage

Profile closed — Mon, 11 Mar 2024 07:30:02 GMT

Hello,

Over the past week, I have been without any kind of service from EE while under contract on two devices. I then found out from a family member that there were engineers out to the cell tower near me. It is around 460 m / 1,500 ft away from my house, according to Google Maps. I checked the coverage checker, and sure enough there was maintenance in my area.

It would appear that we were getting 5G around where I live. The 4G LTE I've had as a customer since 2018 has been excellent, with full signal strength at all times across the four devices I've had from you over the years. Maybe the odd fluctuation, but generally unnoticeable.

However, following the completion of the maintenance, I have been facing extremely poor 5G signal reception, with only a single bar showing on my phone. Now I'm aware that higher frequencies don't travel as far, etc. (I enjoy physics), but this coverage is so slow that I can't even load up the EE app anymore. I am forced to use Wi-Fi. 4G signal strength and speeds have also been affected to the same degree.

I upgraded from Vodafone because their coverage in my area for anything beyond 2G was abysmal. In fact, it seems EE has somewhat of a stranglehold on the people living in my area as every other carrier is terrible on 4G speeds.

Now it seems EE has joined them with the atrocious 5G coverage I have, not to mention the week without service and no apparent bill reduction to compensate.

What can be done about all of this?

Re: A week without service, followed by very poor 5G coverage

Chris_B — Mon, 11 Mar 2024 07:58:26 GMT

@Profile closed if it was me I’ll switch off 5G for now on your device and just use 4G. It’s what I did when 5G first became available to me as it wasn’t great at all. It’s only in the last few months I’ve used 5G.

Re: A week without service, followed by very poor 5G coverage

Profile closed — Mon, 11 Mar 2024 08:04:55 GMT

Hi @Chris_B,

Unfortunately, it seems 4G coverage is equally poor ever since the maintenance. I'm not noticing a difference between them honestly.

Re: A week without service, followed by very poor 5G coverage

Chris_B — Mon, 11 Mar 2024 08:08:07 GMT

@Profile closed Give it time then, once a mast has had any maintenance on it it can take awhile before it’s full up to full strength output. Don’t forget everyone else is also trying to connect to that mast in that area and this puts a strain on it until it’s up to full output power.

Re: A week without service, followed by very poor 5G coverage

bristolian — Mon, 11 Mar 2024 08:27:40 GMT

@Profile closed wrote:

I have been facing extremely poor 5G signal reception, with only a single bar showing on my phone. Now I'm aware that higher frequencies don't travel as far, etc. (I enjoy physics), but this coverage is so slow that I can't even load up the EE app anymore.

What 4G & 5G carriers are showing as available? And is it only the EE app affected, or are other internet-based functions similar?

@Chris_B wrote:

@Profile closed Give it time then, once a mast has had any maintenance on it it can take awhile before it’s full up to full strength output.

A site is either on-air radiating or it's not.

There can sometimes be a period of stability where particular performance config may be tweaked, but this wouldn't affect the raw ability to receive coverage. This can also be equally true of any live site just as much as one that's recently had hardware changes made.

Re: A week without service, followed by very poor 5G coverage

Profile closed — Mon, 11 Mar 2024 08:29:53 GMT

Hi @bristolian,

O2, Three and Vodafone show up, as well as a mysterious entry called 23432.

It has affected all internet-based functions, not just the EE app.

Re: A week without service, followed by very poor 5G coverage

bristolian — Mon, 11 Mar 2024 08:40:52 GMT

234-32 is the additional MNC for the separate ESN-core.

Re: A week without service, followed by very poor 5G coverage

Profile closed — Mon, 11 Mar 2024 11:03:05 GMT

@bristolian; I understand.

I will wait for a response from a member of the support team.

Re: A week without service, followed by very poor 5G coverage

bristolian — Mon, 11 Mar 2024 11:19:42 GMT

Comments on the reasons for speed diffentials would need details of the EARFCNs observed.

A list of networks available is different to a list of carriers.

Are you using Apple or Android?

Re: A week without service, followed by very poor 5G coverage

Profile closed — Mon, 11 Mar 2024 12:37:27 GMT

@bristolian I am using Android.

Re: A week without service, followed by very poor 5G coverage

Profile closed — Wed, 13 Mar 2024 11:41:58 GMT

Hello?

Re: A week without service, followed by very poor 5G coverage

bristolian — Wed, 13 Mar 2024 13:39:11 GMT

Android phones are much better than Apple in allowing third party apps, access to the radio stack info. Thus with understanding of the data, you can monitor "pre" & "post" radio config and the resulting performance.

Many "why is data slow" or "why has my signal changed" queries can be answered with this methodology. At a high-level, 5G is currently deployed in "NSA" mode which effectively makes it an additional capacity layer beyond the 4G base.