Future of C-band Radio Content Distribution

[lost_mesa]

In New Mexico there are plenty of areas away from major roads that have zero cell phone coverage because of the mountains. Our previous home had a weak 4G signal from a Verizon tower 15 miles away. Zero signal from any other provider.

 

[EarDemon]

5G usage of the C-band spectrum is just lame as f**k. There are far more worthless spectrum bands they could have taken away to give to cellular companies than the secret cool band where all the live events got backhauled that only a few technologically inclined individuals were 'in the know' about. Now we lose a fun secret hobby for the elite and get 'skibidi toilet' Internet idiocracy in return.

I'm still learning and open to new ideas and ways of thinking. What spectrum block do you think would be better suited for sub 6 5G in lieu of c-band?

DoD was limited to only 40 MHz nationwide from what I understand. And DoD can be aggregated with c-band to provide even more capacity. I know 4.9 is also out there, not sure what it's status was during the c-band auction, but the government awarded that to AT&T for FirstNet. So forgetting about 3.45 and 4.9 for a minute, what spectrum block(s) would be more ideal and why?

No, a bunch of worthless normies on AT&T or Verizon uploading dogshit quality stupid aspect ratio 9:16 videos of them doing dumb sh*t out in public to a Chinese psychological warfare platform will never be as cool as getting all the professionally produced live events you could dream of backhauled in Blu-ray or better quality for free via satellite.

It's more than that. 5G based connections for home, business and for back up are a thing. I personally do not believe that a FWA connection is a suitable replacement for a high quality cable or fiber connection, but many people do. I host my own VPN and need a real public IP address, so I can't use T-Mobile Home Internet, even if they had coverage where I live. I know about a dozen people that have switched from Spectrum Internet to Verizon 5G Home Internet and are happy to be saving money. Without c-band, this would not be possible. C-band is giving people who never had good quality internet before something that can use, and that is a good thing.

I'm involved in a project that has been put on hold for budget reasons that involves vehicle cameras that are connected to a CradelPoint 5G router with dual WAN failover supporting two cellular connections. T-Mobile reception is very poor, AT&T is LTE only and now with c-band from Verizon reaching out campus, we will be able to make this work with Verizon being WWAN 1 and AT&T being WWAN 2.

Verizon's n77 is the only mid band 5G that is present in my facility, and it is making a huge difference already.

Cellular internet is not just used for phones you know. Whenever I'm not at home and have a laptop with me, I connect to my mobile hotspot on my phones, choosing the provider with the best signal at the time. I could be at a hotel, using my hotspot, connected to my VPN, uploading the photos I took to my NAS back at home.

I've received zero benefit from this. I have the best wireless provider -- T-Mobile -- which doesn't use the C-band spectrum, and their 5G service works great for me. And at home I have AT&T Fiber, symmetrical 2.5 Gbps. So taking away my ability to get all sorts of cool feeds from around the world just so normiecattle who use inferior mobile providers (AT&T or Verizon) can keep their eyeballs glued to big tech social media psyop platforms at all times at faster speeds when they're grazing in public is an utterly useless prospect to me.

You received zero benefit from this because the T-Mobile acquired 2.5 from Sprint (as well as 1.9) and had no real need for c-band. 2.5 GHz n41 is doing all of the heavy lifting. Had the Sprint buyout never happened or was denied by government regulatory agencies, T-Mobile would have been chomping at the bit for c-band. They did participate in the auction and got a very, very small portion of the c-band licenses, so there will be some T-Mobile customers that will be benefiting. US Cellular also participated in the auction and got licenses. I'm not sure if T-Mobile conceded them as part of the buyout or not, but if they didn't T-Mobile customers in the upper mid-west will be benefiting as well.

What you are benefiting from is the demise of OTA analog TV. All of the 600 MHz that was once used for analog TV is the backbone for T-Mobile's LTE and NR networks. A lot of people were upset about analog OTA TV going away. But here you are benefiting from that. You are upset about the slow demise of c-band satellite, but a lot of people are benefiting from that. How is that any different?

I've had T-Mobile since 2018, AT&T (FirstNet account) for exactly a year, and a Verizon work issued phone since 2022, and now a Verizon personal account as of last month. While location dependent, in a lot of testing and comparison between the three, there is no doubt T-Mobile is generally the fastest, usually by large margins, but Verizon and AT&T generally have better coverage especially in rural areas, although T-Mobile has improved a lot. T-Mobile is my primary provider, but they are not the end all, be all. AT&T appears to be best positioned for the future. Between the 600 MHz and DoD they bought from Dish, the ripping and replacing of all of the Nokia gear to convert to Ericsson, 4.9 GHz and ASTS they may have the network to beat. Time will tell.

T-Mobile offers a Starlink connectivity option if you have the extremely unusual use case of wanting cellular connecivity 100% of the time while driving around in the most isolated deserts in North America. I have never had connectivity issues with TMO while driving around the Midwest.

AT&T will be using AST Satellite, which should provide a superior user experience versus T-Mobile/Starlink. I signed up for the T-Satellite beta and never got it to work. The whole thing seemed extremely hokey, half-baked and rushed to the market. The AT&T solution seems to be more well thought out.

https://about.att.com/blogs/2025/att-satellite-successes.html

 

[primestar31]

Tsk Tsk... according to some, you'll just be "normiecattle who use inferior mobile providers (AT&T or Verizon)" because, dontcha know, T-Mobile is the BEST in the MIDWEST!!

Identifying Cellular Equipment [RabbitEars Knowledge Base]

www.rabbitears.info

That tower above is completely constructed and ready to go, but not active as of yet. It's definitely Verizon. I tried posting some pics I took of the tower, but for some reason, this forum turns them ALL sideways! Nothing fixes it in this case. I tried turning them every way, and no matter what, they all post sideways...

 

[comfortably_numb]

Identifying Cellular Equipment [RabbitEars Knowledge Base]

www.rabbitears.info

That tower above is completely constructed and ready to go, but not active as of yet. It's definitely Verizon. I tried posting some pics I took of the tower, but for some reason, this forum turns them ALL sideways! Nothing fixes it in this case. I tried turning them every way, and no matter what, they all post sideways...

View attachment 188077View attachment 188078

Enter your address here and it should pull up more information about the tower:

AntennaSearch - Search for Cell Towers & Antennas

Search for the locations of cell towers and antennas to determine cell reception.

www.antennasearch.com

 

[primestar31]

Enter your address here and it should pull up more information about the tower:

AntennaSearch - Search for Cell Towers & Antennas

Search for the locations of cell towers and antennas to determine cell reception.

www.antennasearch.com

I already have the info, but it's not very useful. Here's the link:

AntennaSearch - Search for Cell Towers & Antennas

Search for the locations of cell towers and antennas to determine cell reception.

www.antennasearch.com

It looks like it's just been sitting there completely built for months. IF it's true they are simply waiting on fiber install, they certainly aren't in any hurry.