Help me understand what LTE is

[lucidstate]

I got into an argument about LTE with my roommate yesterday. He says that verizon's 4G network (the one that the gnex and other recent phones run on) is not LTE. He says it's not even 4G, verizon just calls it 4G and LTE. What is what?

 

[x026092]

VZW's 4G is LTE. Go to their website & check the internet... a quick google should give you the answers you need.

 

[Yeahha]

Your roommate may be right. the current versions of LTE that are in use do not qualify for the ITU's standards for 4G service. LTE Advanced will. In reality compared to current 3G networks the LTE that Verizon uses is considered 4G from the average consumer prospective.

 

[tbzj7]

Shoot, long as it continues to be fast, reliable and ever growing who cares what's technically LTE and what's not, if your roommate wants to bag on somebody, at&t is your target, advertising their 3g + network as 4g and whatnot... What a joke ha

 

[x026092]

Yes, I agree , after a little research I found out LTE is not true 4G yet. LTE advance will be and it will be rolled out next year... BTW, 100Mb is way better than what 3G is offereing and when LTE advance rolls out at 1Gb, I hope our phones can take advantage of it.

 

[andr01d]

well....... whatever Verizon 4G LTE is.... it's faster than my Comcast/Xfinity home internet service :\

 

[andr01d]

Just saw this...
What is LTE? | ExtremeTech
(7 pages)
Oh wow... like a major dissertation .... can't read if in a hurry.

 

[kyler13]

Actually, didn't they tweak the definition so carriers like at&t and T-Mobile could call their hspa+ networks 4g? I couldn't care less what anyone says. Just because they can channel bond hspa+ to 84mbps doesn't mean it's 4g. First gen LTE covers most of the 4g requirements that get overlooked because people think max theoretical throughput is the only thing that matters.

Someone had an article from early 2011 on 21 mbps HSPA+ that showed that they were able to achieve ~15mbps speeds when in close range of a tower and stationary, but at further reaches of the cell and on the move, it was a more real world 2-3mbps. As a matter of fact, HSPA+ speeds have been shown to decrease almost exponentially with distance from the tower. LTE was developed to address these kinds of issues. Your data rates aren't highly dependent on proximity and motion. I tested this back in the summer, running speed tests cruising the interstate at 75mph and was able to achieve downloads in the 20-30mbps range.