New Verizon Plan and C Band

[bimmer456]

So it looks like Verizon is going to have more ultra Wideband access later this month. I signed up for one of their new plans after being on a grandfathered unlimited plan since 2009. Pretty good deal with Apple Music and Disney Bundle included for free, and 6 months of discovery plus. Once ultra Wideband on c band is widely available streaming will be in 4k. So only downside is 50 gig limit on hotspot, but it's at ultra Wideband speed. UWB and regular data is unlimited with no throttling. It's cheaper than my old plan too, are any of you switching from grandfathered plan, might be worth it to hop on now before they change their minds and restrict the plan again, assuming anyone who signs up now is grandfathered into unlimited.

[shoei]

Only reason I hopped off my old grandfathered unlimited data plan was for a specific unlimited everything BUSINESS plan. Business doesn't throttle or rather, if they do, the cap is much much further out than just wireless plans. You also get first dibs during network traffic.

They have different tiers as well different price points. Doesn't hurt to take a peek.

[E92inNC]

In a few months I’m switching from T-Mobile to either AT&T or Verizon, leaning towards AT&T because Id prefer HBO Max over what is included at Verizon. A big part of the reason is T-Mobile’s service in outside of the city isn’t good and often no service at all when I go fishing/camping. Would love to get some feedback about users from the other two service providers.

[shoei]

Originally Posted by E92inPHX

In a few months I'm switching from T-Mobile to either AT&T or Verizon, leaning towards AT&T because Id prefer HBO Max over what is included at Verizon. A big part of the reason is T-Mobile's service in outside of the city isn't good and often no service at all when I go fishing/camping. Would love to get some feedback about users from the other two service providers.

Depends where you live and how you commute. Verizon is cdma still and att is gsm.

Personally, I won't be switching away from Verizon. Had plenty of other carriers over the years and through business lines and whatnot. I usually pay a bit more for Verizon but there's usually a pretty good reason for it. I like when I don't have to call for issues. I can't remember the last time I had to call Verizon with an issue.

[bosstones]

Originally Posted by E92inPHX

In a few months I'm switching from T-Mobile to either AT&T or Verizon, leaning towards AT&T because Id prefer HBO Max over what is included at Verizon. A big part of the reason is T-Mobile's service in outside of the city isn't good and often no service at all when I go fishing/camping. Would love to get some feedback about users from the other two service providers.

Not the greatest comparison, but I switched from T-Mo to Verizon back in 2010 due to coverage issues when I travelled to remote areas for work. Since then, I only had issues on 1 trip way back in 2011 where, oddly, Sprint had excellent coverage but Verizon, AT&T, and T-Mo. Service for me has been pretty reliable. I'm still on an unlimited data plan from back then. lol

Edit: in your neck if the woods, I had coverage drops on Mt Lemon but was good out to and on Child's Mountain.

[vreihen16]

Originally Posted by shoei

Depends where you live and how you commute. Verizon is cdma still and att is gsm.

4G LTE made this distinction less critical a decade ago, and the looming sunset of all 3G service in a few weeks here in the USA makes it irrelevant as the old 3G/GSM/CDMA towers will be shut down and those phones will join their analog equivalents as paperweights.

The FAA (airplane regulators) is giving the FCC (radio regulators) and Verizon/AT&T a huge amount of grief with starting up their C-Band 5G service. Both were ready to launch 5G C-Band last fall, but the FAA asked them to delay because some aircraft altimeters use an adjacent frequency and they wanted more time to test for possible interference.
Both carriers subsequently rescheduled their 5G C-Band launch for January 4th, but are now delaying *another* two weeks because the FAA threatened to close some major airports during inclement weather over safety concerns if they powered up the C-Band stuff. With the amount of money that Verizon and AT&T spent in the C-Band frequency auctions, I think that they have been more than accommodating to the FAA. (European authorities have not found any safety problems with the same setups.) Plus, they apparently have the C-Band towers built and ready to be turned on.

The neighborhood around my employer has *extremely* swamped 4G/LTE service, to the point of not even being able to download an email message most times of the day. Verizon was apparently testing their 5G C-Band on one local tower back in November, and it was glorious for the few minutes that it was enabled. Keeping my fingers crossed that they will be throwing the 5G switch here and everywhere else on or around January 18th.....

[dreamingat30fps]

Back when we were traveling in the RV we had like 3 different carriers. I had T-Mobile with an old unlimited plan that had unlimited hotspot, I had an unlimited Verizon hotspot which was useless 80% of the time as they would throttle it to hell even though it was unlimited and my gf had sprint which ended up having coverage in some crazy areas where the other 2 didn’t.

Anyways since we stopped traveling we both switched to Visible. Unlimited plan, unlimited hotspot capped at 5/Mbps for $25/mo can’t beat that. Great signal at home in FL and NC. Fast enough for what I do on my phone. Claims to be 5G but I doubt it. Regardless I don’t know why people want such high speeds on their phone. Most I do on my phone is text, call, email and briefly browse sites. None of those are data hogs.

[Fly320s]

Originally Posted by vreihen16

4G LTE made this distinction less critical a decade ago, and the looming sunset of all 3G service in a few weeks here in the USA makes it irrelevant as the old 3G/GSM/CDMA towers will be shut down and those phones will join their analog equivalents as paperweights.

The FAA (airplane regulators) is giving the FCC (radio regulators) and Verizon/AT&T a huge amount of grief with starting up their C-Band 5G service. Both were ready to launch 5G C-Band last fall, but the FAA asked them to delay because some aircraft altimeters use an adjacent frequency and they wanted more time to test for possible interference.
Both carriers subsequently rescheduled their 5G C-Band launch for January 4th, but are now delaying *another* two weeks because the FAA threatened to close some major airports during inclement weather over safety concerns if they powered up the C-Band stuff. With the amount of money that Verizon and AT&T spent in the C-Band frequency auctions, I think that they have been more than accommodating to the FAA. (European authorities have not found any safety problems with the same setups.) Plus, they apparently have the C-Band towers built and ready to be turned on.

The neighborhood around my employer has *extremely* swamped 4G/LTE service, to the point of not even being able to download an email message most times of the day. Verizon was apparently testing their 5G C-Band on one local tower back in November, and it was glorious for the few minutes that it was enabled. Keeping my fingers crossed that they will be throwing the 5G switch here and everywhere else on or around January 18th.....

Airline pilot here. We've been briefed on the 5G interference and as I understand it, the FCC approved the cell phone companies to use those frequencies before the FAA/airlines were able to offer their opinion.

No matter what the truth is, the FCC and FAA have had plenty of time to resolve the issue.

[E92inNC]

Originally Posted by dreamingat30fps

Back when we were traveling in the RV we had like 3 different carriers. I had T-Mobile with an old unlimited plan that had unlimited hotspot, I had an unlimited Verizon hotspot which was useless 80% of the time as they would throttle it to hell even though it was unlimited and my gf had sprint which ended up having coverage in some crazy areas where the other 2 didn’t.

Anyways since we stopped traveling we both switched to Visible. Unlimited plan, unlimited hotspot capped at 5/Mbps for $25/mo can’t beat that. Great signal at home in FL and NC. Fast enough for what I do on my phone. Claims to be 5G but I doubt it. Regardless I don’t know why people want such high speeds on their phone. Most I do on my phone is text, call, email and briefly browse sites. None of those are data hogs.

I’m gonna have to look into them then as I as have the same uses for my phone as you and am moving to NC in a few months. How’s the signal when you’re not in the cities over there? My main concern is being able to get a signal in case anything happens on my trips.

[bimmer456]

Originally Posted by E92inPHX

In a few months I'm switching from T-Mobile to either AT&T or Verizon, leaning towards AT&T because Id prefer HBO Max over what is included at Verizon. A big part of the reason is T-Mobile's service in outside of the city isn't good and often no service at all when I go fishing/camping. Would love to get some feedback about users from the other two service providers.

Verizon has always had the best reception and they give you Disney plus and Hulu as well as Apple Music and arcade. The top plan has no throttling except for hot spot theirs a cap

[bimmer456]

Originally Posted by shoei

Only reason I hopped off my old grandfathered unlimited data plan was for a specific unlimited everything BUSINESS plan. Business doesn't throttle or rather, if they do, the cap is much much further out than just wireless plans. You also get first dibs during network traffic.

They have different tiers as well different price points. Doesn't hurt to take a peek.

There's no throttling on the top Verizon plan besides hot spot. And not counting Netflix which you can opt to get 720p for free. Over hotspot it's not throttled because that has a cap.

[bimmer456]

Originally Posted by dreamingat30fps

Back when we were traveling in the RV we had like 3 different carriers. I had T-Mobile with an old unlimited plan that had unlimited hotspot, I had an unlimited Verizon hotspot which was useless 80% of the time as they would throttle it to hell even though it was unlimited and my gf had sprint which ended up having coverage in some crazy areas where the other 2 didn't.

Anyways since we stopped traveling we both switched to Visible. Unlimited plan, unlimited hotspot capped at 5/Mbps for $25/mo can't beat that. Great signal at home in FL and NC. Fast enough for what I do on my phone. Claims to be 5G but I doubt it. Regardless I don't know why people want such high speeds on their phone. Most I do on my phone is text, call, email and briefly browse sites. None of those are data hogs.

I had unlimited Verizon hot spot no throttling or downgrade of video. 5G is only about as fast as LTE unless you're near a uwb antenna. But c band will expand network coverage.

[shoei]

Originally Posted by vreihen16

4G LTE made this distinction less critical a decade ago, and the looming sunset of all 3G service in a few weeks here in the USA makes it irrelevant as the old 3G/GSM/CDMA towers will be shut down and those phones will join their analog equivalents as paperweights.

The FAA (airplane regulators) is giving the FCC (radio regulators) and Verizon/AT&T a huge amount of grief with starting up their C-Band 5G service. Both were ready to launch 5G C-Band last fall, but the FAA asked them to delay because some aircraft altimeters use an adjacent frequency and they wanted more time to test for possible interference.
Both carriers subsequently rescheduled their 5G C-Band launch for January 4th, but are now delaying *another* two weeks because the FAA threatened to close some major airports during inclement weather over safety concerns if they powered up the C-Band stuff. With the amount of money that Verizon and AT&T spent in the C-Band frequency auctions, I think that they have been more than accommodating to the FAA. (European authorities have not found any safety problems with the same setups.) Plus, they apparently have the C-Band towers built and ready to be turned on.

The neighborhood around my employer has *extremely* swamped 4G/LTE service, to the point of not even being able to download an email message most times of the day. Verizon was apparently testing their 5G C-Band on one local tower back in November, and it was glorious for the few minutes that it was enabled. Keeping my fingers crossed that they will be throwing the 5G switch here and everywhere else on or around January 18th.....

That's all super informative, thank you.

So 5G doesn't have penetrating issues into say the subways and underground or buildings? When I'm in Chicago, I see "5G-uc" on my phone and even streaming is insane. I'm lucky to see LTE with 3 bars when I'm in Los Angeles though, lol

[shoei]

Originally Posted by bimmer456

There's no throttling on the top Verizon plan besides hot spot. And not counting Netflix which you can opt to get 720p for free. Over hotspot it's not throttled because that has a cap.

There is absolutely throttling on all Verizon plans.

Business plans are where it's less likely because the data limit usage is substantially higher that they will allow you to go before throttling.

[vreihen16]

Originally Posted by shoei

So 5G doesn't have penetrating issues into say the subways and underground or buildings?

5G uses several frequency bands. The super-high frequency "ultra-wideband" ones used in urban areas have problems penetrating a paper bag, which is why they use densely-spaced microcells sometimes as close as every light pole. As ultra-wideband use increases, I'm sure that the carriers will add UWB microcells and DAS (distributed antenna systems) into subways, buildings, etc. We installed our own DAS on the ground floors of a few buildings where I work, because there is zero outside signal from any carrier in those underground areas.

The new C-Band allocations have never been used for phones/data, but are expected to perform between the current phone bands and the ultra-wideband frequencies in terms of penetration. If you have ever checked the penetrating ability of 2.4 GHz versus 5 GHz wifi signals, the 2.4 GHz punches through walls better but has less usable bandwidth because the frequency allocation is smaller. C-Band's frequencies fall between those two, and actually closer to 2.4 GHz.

With the sunset of 3G/GSM/CDMA service scheduled for less than a month from now, I would like to think that those older bands and tower infrastructure will be re-purposed into a lower-speed 5G tier when penetration is needed (at the expense of speed). This assumes that the carriers didn't have to surrender their old bands as part of the C-Band auctions. I personally never looked at the auction terms.

Not too long ago, Verizon was supposedly handcuffed by a term in one of their auction band wins that prevented them from charging 3G customers extra for using the 4G/LTE service on that band (or something like that). Those of us with grandfathered 3G contracts got truly unlimited 4G/LTE data for $29.99/month...with no throttling allowed.....

[dreamingat30fps]

Originally Posted by E92inPHX

I’m gonna have to look into them then as I as have the same uses for my phone as you and am moving to NC in a few months. How’s the signal when you’re not in the cities over there? My main concern is being able to get a signal in case anything happens on my trips.

Haven’t been anywhere too crazy. They are owned by Verizon I believe and use the Verizon network so wherever you get Verizon you should get Visible. We do have a big tower I can literally see from our house in NC so that helps. Only one plan and it’s $45/mo. But they have some deal that you can have people join your group or something, without sharing billing info or anything, you can get it down to $25/mo with a few people. So of course there are giant groups with thousands of people you can just use their code and join and get the $25 basically right off the bat.

Originally Posted by bimmer456

I had unlimited Verizon hot spot no throttling or downgrade of video. 5G is only about as fast as LTE unless you're near a uwb antenna. But c band will expand network coverage.

Dunno, mine was a post paid plan. They killed it shortly after I signed up for it, but I was grandfathered. It was lowest priority. Would work fine where there are a lot of towers, but anywhere with less towers or a lot of congestion forget about it. I used my T-Mobile phone hotspot probably 75% of the time when we traveled. I’m sure the higher end plans don’t throttle like that one did.

[bimmer456]

Originally Posted by shoei

There is absolutely throttling on all Verizon plans.

Business plans are where it's less likely because the data limit usage is substantially higher that they will allow you to go before throttling.

the highest tier plan has no throttling as seen here.

[shoei]

Originally Posted by bimmer456

the highest tier plan has no throttling as seen here.

.

[upstatedoc]

I switched to spectrum mobile and blah blah blah

[bimmer456]

Originally Posted by shoei

.

Must be for the lower tier plan back when it was 22gb. It's now at least 50 gb and unlimited on the top plan. Didn't see anything like that in the 5G get more plan.

[dreamingat30fps]

Most carriers do not throttle on phone data. However they pretty much all throttle hotspot data at some point. There are whole websites dedicated to finding unlimited hotspot data for people who live on the road or on boats etc. I don't recall any recent plans with "real" unlimited hotspot data. There are grey market vendors that will basically rent you hotspots that use old grandfathered true unlimited plans.

[bimmer456]

Originally Posted by dreamingat30fps

Most carriers do not throttle on phone data. However they pretty much all throttle hotspot data at some point. There are whole websites dedicated to finding unlimited hotspot data for people who live on the road or on boats etc. I don't recall any recent plans with "real" unlimited hotspot data. There are grey market vendors that will basically rent you hotspots that use old grandfathered true unlimited plans.

Yeah hotspot throttled after 50 gb