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FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler has a plan to free up spectrum for 5G wireless service.
The Federal Communications Commission next month will vote on a proposal to help identify and free up wireless spectrum at very high frequencies that could be used to power fifth-generation, or 5G, cellular networks. The agency will do as it did with the development of 4G LTE and stay out of the way of industry innovators as they define and develop 5G technology, FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler said in announcing the proposal Monday.
"Turning innovators loose is far preferable to expecting committees and regulators to define the future," he said. "Instead, we will make ample spectrum available and then rely on a private sector-led process for producing technical standards best suited for those frequencies and use cases."
[...] 5G speeds could be 10 to 100 times higher than those of today's 4G networks. Even though standards for 5G have yet to be developed, the technology is expected to enable everything from self-driving cars to remote surgeries done via robots to school field trips through the human body made possible by virtual reality gear.
The hype around 5G has been building over the past year, with wireless operators like AT&T and Verizon already demonstrating the technology and promising a limited service roll out as soon as this year.
The FCC's proposal to free up additional spectrum is the first step in a long process to make sure wireless operators get the airwaves they need to make these services a reality. The chairman's promise to take a hands-off approach in developing policy is a welcome signal to wireless operators that the government won't be a roadblock.
[...] Very high frequency spectrum known as millimeter waves are key to the development of 5G because these frequencies can carry large amounts of data and transfer signals with low latency -- that is, with minimal delay. But there are technical challenges in using this spectrum. Signals transmitted over very high frequencies can only travel short distances and have difficulty penetrating obstacles, which makes designing such networks tricky.
Some of the spectrum that could be used for 5G is currently used for satellite communications and for navigation services like GPS. As part of this proposal, the FCC will work with satellite providers to ensure the spectrum can be shared with wireless broadband companies that want to use it to build terrestrial 5G networks.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Wednesday June 22 2016, @01:27PM
No, see, it's all about the bit rate - double the bit rate, and the first bit takes half as long to transmit! I mean at 1Mbit/s you're talking 1000ns per bit of lag! Of course at 1Gbit/s you're only talking 1ns...
If I had to guess, the real issue (assuming it's not just the usual marketing BS) would be network architecture - assuming its packet oriented with error detection/correction your device effectively doesn't actually receive that first bit until the last bit has been received and verified. And if it has TCP-style repeat requests for irrecoverably corrupted packets that introduces additional unpredictable round trip delays.
Of course none of that has much to do with transmission frequency, but with 4G pretty much "locked in" now, a new low-architecture would pretty much require a new spectrum to operate in to avoid interference with the existing deployed infrastructure