5G requires a lot of towers/repeaters/etc. since the signal doesn’t transmit far. Part of physics, higher frequencies carry more data but the range and tolerance to obstacles is low. Low frequencies (such as the ultra low ones seen in old movies on subs) can travel far distances but the data rate is very low.
It appears a lot (most?) of 5G traffic is actually being carried by 4G networks.
So I clicked the link and watched the icon spin for two minutes, gave up, tried again, spun another two minutes before giving up. Apparently you need fast internet to see of you can get fast internet.
Or maybe a bit more patience? Try clicking, get something to eat, and come back later. You’ll either have your answer, or you’ll have an error message.
Or email your location to someone you trust and have them do it for you. I would do it for you, but since you don’t know me I would understand if you weren’t comfortable doing it.
It is very possible you don’t have any nearby towers. That’s the price of living in the boonies. I would love the boonies, but lack of services (like internet) like you describe would drive me nuts. Plus, as we get older, we need to think about access to good medical care. We can’t be an hour or more by road from a hospital. Hopefully we’ll never need them again, but the past two years we have both been in the hospital TWICE (each), so we can’t make that assumption.
I would love the boonies, but lack of services (like internet) like you describe would drive me nuts.
That’s one of the parameters I used when I was looking for my current home - How far into the countryside can I get and still have high-speed internet (DSL doesn’t count)
It is very possible you don’t have any nearby towers. That’s the price of living in the boonies. - 1pg
Of course i would prefer fast, but slow internet is a price I am more than willing to enjoy the peace and tranquility of living out in the boonies. The nearest cell tower is a Verizon tower
about three miles as the crow flies, and heavily wooded the whole way. I had to buy a signal amplifier with a Yagi that I have aimed right at the tower to get any service at all.
Of course i would prefer fast, but slow internet is a price I am more than willing to enjoy the peace and tranquility of living out in the boonies.
I ordered and finally received a Starlink satellite receiver. Best of both worlds…I live in the boonies and have 100+ mbps speeds. $500 for the receiver and $99/month service.
I ordered and finally received a Starlink satellite receiver. Best of both worlds…I live in the boonies and have 100+ mbps speeds. $500 for the receiver and $99/month service.
Tim
I had heard about that while back and never pursued it. How do you handle your voice communications. Can you use WiFi calling through Starlink?
Being in the boonies also means there is no wired phone service, so I must depend on Verizon for cell phone as my only source for voice. If I had fast enough internet, my idea would be to use Wifi as a way to make my phone service more reliable too.
I have a land line. It had truly dismal DSL (2.7 mbps on a good day), which I have now cancelled.
I’ve had the Starlink up and running for about two months now. The speed is more than adequate to serve wifi calling. Although I have a decent cell signal here, so I just use the cell phone in cell mode.
Tim
I’d cancel the land line, but my wife won’t let it go. It’s her security blanket.
I’d cancel the land line, but my wife won’t let it go. It’s her security blanket.
Have you thought about porting your landline over to google voice? It’s a FREE VOIP service that you can port your landline number to. That way, DW still has the “landline” number. but you can cut the cord with Verizon.
We cut the cord about 7 years ago and haven’t looked back. Hope that helps.
'38Packard
Have you thought about porting your landline over to google voice?
Good idea. I did that at the office, and when the kids get cell phones, we’ll do it at home too. My wife likes the fact that a land line will still ring even if the power goes out. We have a plug-in Princess phone just for that reason. I’ll donate it to a museum some day. The only people who will miss it are the telemarketers…
My wife likes the fact that a land line will still ring even if the power goes out.
I’m not making or receiving all that many phone calls these days on the home phone or the cell phone.
We probably overpay for what our usage is, but it doesn’t affect our standard of living, so we don’t sweat it.
We have VOIP (Vonage) mainly because my wife thinks the quality is better than a cell phone for talking with her mom, which she does probably 4 or 5 days a week. We have a UPS to provide power to the router, Vonage base unit and a wireless phone base unit/charger. So, as long as we have internet service and as long as the UPS lasts, we can use the phone and the internet/web through battery-powered devices, which provides us redundancy beyond our cell service.
I dodged that bullet with one of these that ALL of our networking gear is attached to.
In reading the specs, it doesn’t appear that it would last all that long (a few hours, maybe?). If the power stayed out for a couple days, would this be that useful?
In reading the specs, it doesn’t appear that it would last all that long (a few hours, maybe?). If the power stayed out for a couple days, would this be that useful?
I have a similar model. If I lose power, I also lose internet because it appears that my ISP’s local distribution center is powered by the same grid section. So I use mine primarily to allow my to finish/save any work and conduct a controlled shutdown. The unit also provides protection against power voltage spikes & dips (brownouts)
I’d cancel the land line, but my wife won’t let it go.
The landline is likely to be VOIP, unbeknownst to you. If it is truly a landline, it is most probably the same wires that would be used to carry DSL.
When we changed from landline phone & DishNetwork to Uverse, AT&T didn’t even run new wires, they just sent a tech out to install the Uverse modem.
We recently dropped ATT phone and went VOIP with a paid provider (voip.ms). ATT Uverse phone was VOIP anyway, so nothing much changed. Except our monthly phone bill went from $45 to $3.
If it is truly a landline, it is most probably the same wires that would be used to carry DSL.
Yes, the very same wires. We are located too far from the nearest boosting station to get faster DSL. I’ve talked to the service tech who comes out periodically to repair the wires which get torn up once or twice a winter by the plow truck. CenturyLink refuses to move or bury the service lines, apparently preferring to send out a tech regularly to splice them back together. Sigh.
I have thought about getting a Powerwall to power a couple of essential circuits in the house in the event of power failures, but they are so infrequent, and generally only a few minutes to a few hours, that it seems like overkill. Our primary heat is a propane stove, as is the kitchen stove, so we won’t freeze or starve to death.
There have been a lot of 5G “towers” installed in my neighborhood recently. You might not even notice them. They tend to be short pole antennas on top of regular telephone/electric utility poles. They are spaced less than 0.25 miles apart and are not very noticeable unless you know what to look for. I only realized they were going up when a new pole appeared on one street where the telephone/electric lines were in a different position.
5G sounded revolutionary, but in real-world use, results are mixed—especially outside dense urban zones. I’ve seen more impact when it’s paired with optimized routing and data tools. For example, using Phonexa to analyze mobile user behavior revealed latency spikes tied to tower congestion, not raw speed. So yeah, 5G is powerful—but it’s only part of the story.
Most of us do not download stuff using Cell Towers. That is where 5G is an improvement over earlier stuff. Lots of people hear “Faster & Better” from our home internet people and don’t notice any change because they have a WiFi system whose age is a dozen or more years old.
Do you know what part of your system is bandwidth limiting?