SpaceX Competitor Lynk Testing 5G Cellphone Service From Space (space.com) 49
Lynk, a competitor to the much larger SpaceX, plans to offer an experimental 5G cellular base station aboard a mission in December, working alongside an undisclosed cellular partner. Space.com reports: The experimental payload will launch on Lynk's second commercial satellite, company officials said. "This test will demonstrate the ability to send a 5G signal from space to standard mobile devices on Earth," Lynk officials wrote in late September. The test is a shot across the bow to SpaceX, which has already signed a deal with T-Mobile for cellular service but, unlike Lynk, does not yet have Federal Communications Commission (FCC) approval. Lynk received the prized FCC thumbs-up just a few weeks ago.
Lynk and SpaceX are jostling for market access to people living in rural areas who lack access to standard internet service. Lynk already tested a satellite-to-phone service link last year, according to Via Satellite, and is ramping up service fast in a bid to keep ahead of the competition. "We are actively testing satellite-direct-to-phone-services in 12 countries on five continents," Dan Dooley, chief commercial officer of Lynk, said in the same company statement. The company's patent allows the orbiting cell tower to link up with standard 5G devices in 55 countries, Lynk says.
Lynk and SpaceX are jostling for market access to people living in rural areas who lack access to standard internet service. Lynk already tested a satellite-to-phone service link last year, according to Via Satellite, and is ramping up service fast in a bid to keep ahead of the competition. "We are actively testing satellite-direct-to-phone-services in 12 countries on five continents," Dan Dooley, chief commercial officer of Lynk, said in the same company statement. The company's patent allows the orbiting cell tower to link up with standard 5G devices in 55 countries, Lynk says.
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Furthermore, have "5G cell phones" trashed all cellular protocols for voice transmission and moved completely to 5G IP transmissions for voice e.g. using voice over IP?
I am seriously asking because I never looked into it. If not, I am not sure what the title means exactly and how 5G is going to help transmit voice over satellite.
So again, seriously asking, are cell phone moving to VOIP for voice transmissions or at least some kind of hybrid mode? Otherwise, 5G Internet connectivity has nothing specific to d
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OK, going to bed now, it's time! I must have confused 5GHz and 5G, LOL. A quick search seems to reveal that 5G is a protocol where you would need a SIM card and where Internet IP packets would be wrapped into the lower level 5G protocol.
Please feel free to enlighten me if I am wrong but I *think* I got it...
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A quick search seems to reveal that 5G is a protocol where you would need a SIM card
Oh. My. God. Welcome back from your coma. Seriously 520 articles on Slashdot since 2016, about 1/3rd of which have 5G in the damn headline. Like Oh Em Gee.
Re: anit-life green cult (Score:1)
It's VOIP. Many operators do a fallback to old generation when a call is made, if they don't support VOIP. Thus you no longer have 5G during the call.
I'm guessing these sattelites would be 5G only. But even so, they could just restrict this to VOIP and not allow any other traffic. So for the end user, all they can do is make a phone call.
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All mobile phone traffic is packetized, has been for forever.
Previously (2G/3G/4G) there were voice packets, SMS packets, and data packets with IP addresses.
Now they have tweaked the layering so they are all data IP packets, those packets contain voice, SMS and data.
There are some changes on the provider/tower side, different routing etc.
There is no impact to the user, the phone attaches the required packetization and the provider handles them, whatever G is used.
While it is Voice data over IP which technic
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https://www.androidauthority.c... [androidauthority.com]
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Bad news for the anti-5G nutjobs (Score:4, Funny)
You can't take this cell phone tower down with your axes and hacksaws. Mind control is here to stay.
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Oh, right, because it was the towers not the radio waves.... That makes sense.
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This is your brain.
This is your brain next to a handheld transmitter that's powerful enough to transmit to space.
How is that meant to work (Score:2)
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What? 5G is just the protocol types, the frequencies it works in varies.
T-Mobile in the US has 5G Band n71 which works in the old Over-The-Air TV frequencies of 600MHz, and they bid for that one on the exact premise the signal travels further.
Other frequencies have other characteristics of course but...
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The antenna that can beam form 600MHz to spots not covered by terrestrial 5G, from a satellite in orbit, and receive the return signal from the phone, is going to be pretty impressive.
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There are different frequency bands that can be used for 5G, low, medium and high. A single low band (~600MHz) cell can cover hundreds of square miles. But not with very high data rates. Mostly meant for rural areas and IoT applications. Maybe that can reach space (I'm not sure if it can get through the ionosphere).
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But then again Starlink's hardware on the side of the user does use a phased array antenna to work both as a receiver and emitter.
So maybe if you're willing to carry a large antenna around that has a large enough gain...
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5G has a very short range
5G does not define range. It defines a protocol and air interface, both of which have a longer range than 4G (slightly). You are confusing 5G (the technology) with the frequency band which *may* be assigned to it. 5G in the common sub 6GHz bands have longer range than 4G. 5G in the k-band (which you are referring to) are short range and not at all what is being discussed here.
Re: How is that meant to work (Score:1)
NR has the frequency range of all previous standards. It's a common mistake to think 5G is Gigahertz. It adapts to the circumstances.
5G architect here. If anyone have questions.
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I actually do have a little question. One of the main selling points of 5G is the increased subscriber numbers per cell. I'm curious what the limitation in 4G was in this case. I have my suspicions that it was something to do with the way the air-interface divides up resources, but then why are there different subscriber number limitations for femtocells, microcells, etc defined for 5G? Basically, what defines the current limitation for subscribers?
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Re: How is that meant to work (Score:1)
Yes
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Exactly, I was wondering about this.
I recall the demo with a glass door - close door, no signal and open door, get signal.
Can the signal even get thru tree branches if you are standing below a tree?
Or is this glorified 4G, being called 5G ?
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FCC [fcc.gov]: search results [fcc.gov] include "Technical Narrative" and "Sched S Tech Report".
USPTO [uspto.gov]: search "Lynk Global" or patent "10523313 B2", "Method And Apparatus For Handling Communications Between Spacecraft Operating In An Orbital Environment And Terrestrial Telecommunications Devices That Use Terrestrial Base Station Communications".
There are similar documents for AST&Space's SpaceMobile system.
More data from satellites? Really? (Score:2)
In the same decade that China is developing ever more powerful anti satellite killers the west seems hell bent on relying ever more on this 1960s technology.
Other than for services that just can't be done any other way - eg data for weather forecasting - the era of the satellite will be coming to a close one way or another despite what musk et al think because china and russia will eventually make sure of that. And no, I'm not suggesting more cable links since russia demonstrated they're vulnerable too, but
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From space to Earth isn't the problem (Score:4, Insightful)
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Old fashioned satellite internet used to use an aDSL or even POTS connection for an uplink. In this case with 5G downlink satellites it could be used whatever the closest cellphone tower offers, transmit it to a base station which then sends it as a powerful enough signal to the satellite network. This of course will mean that the uplink is likel
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Latency could potentially be an issue for gaming, but transfer rates usually do not need to be high in the upload, unless perhaps some peer to peer networking is used where the upload doesn't only need to go to a single server which then distributes it to other c
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5G is a joke (Score:2)
I work in the industry. True 5G is millimeter-wave transmission and is very short range. It would take a decade to actually deploy. What these "telecoms" are claiming to be 5G is simply multi-plexed 4G. Don't buy the hype.