Almost 50% of U.S. Consumers Don't Think They Need 4G LTE According to Survey

[tjk629]

SWEET! More LTE for me then!

Till the iPhone 5 comes out with LTE, and that 50% moves over.

 

[PereDroid]

No bashing here, Lloyd. I totally agree.
Need? No. I mean how much faster do you need that web page to load?
10 seconds is too damn long? Really? Come on. Have we become that spoiled? (yes)
I have a 3G Dinc2... I feel no need to run out and get a 4g phone. When my contract is up I will probably hold on to my phone gor a bit longer (since I have unlimited). Then to keep that I may just buy a used phone to keep my unlimited.
Do I feel like I'm missing out? Not even a tiny bit. As I said... I am not that impatient. It's not like it is the difference between 56K and broadband for most things (like streaming or webpages). Straming works great on my 3G. I need 4 for that? Um... no.
When it's time for me to upgrade, having the latest Google OS is more important to me then whether it is on 4 or 3.

Yes, as someone said, 3,000 may be a small samply but I would guess it is pretty accurate. I am an IT Manager. Everyone comes to me for advice on everything electronic. Never once has anyone asked me "should I get a 4g phone?"
People just want a phone that works. A phone that's fun. A 4g phone isn't more "fun" and doesn't "just work" any better. Only geeks... and not all of us at that... care about 4G....

 

[lloydstrans]

We are a society of number worshippers, that shiny new pickup that has 400hp looks a lot better than the one that only has 250hp. The Madison Ave. people know it, a little progress at a slow rate is more profitable than major progress at a fast pace.

 

[PereDroid]

Disagree there Lloyd.

We don't care about numbers. We care about shiny things. and material things.

Take 2 Mercedes. One with 250HP and one with 400HP.

Put alloys and hubcaps on the faster one.
Put chromies on the slower one. Give the slower one body colored sidemolding. A ground effects kit. Painted body color side mirrors. A sleek roof rack.
Give thew faster one none of that. Bet you most folks would pick the slower one.

They both GO when you step on the pedal... but the slow one is much prettier.

I tried this experiment once (I am also a gear head). I asked everyone in my office "How much HP does your car have?"
Not ONE person out of 40 could answer that.

 

[armeddroid]

Car enthusiasts care about numbers.
HP- numbers
Skid pad rating - numbers
Gear ratio - numbers
0-60
0-100
Etc.

If you are a true gearhead, slapping on spoilers, ground effect kits and shiny things into your car make you into a ricer.

No function.
Only cosmetic = RICE

I don't think cars are a good comparison in this subject.

 

[lloydstrans]

Cars are always a bad analogy but we can relate to.
Yes the prettier car would sell first, like for like the more powerful one would sell first, regardless of the price of gas.
Better analogy, I have a qualcom killer wireless card 450mbs, can I use it? No. Not until Kansas City area gets their giga Wi-Fi system up and running and I move there. We love numbers, I myself included. Faster is good even if we can't reap the speed.

 

[PereDroid]

Totally fits. We are talking about average consumers NOT enthusiasts.
I don't mean ricer kits, either. Factory accessories.

 

[SteveIrv]

I'm getting close to my end of contract/replace phone with a new one time and I've wondered what good 4G will do me over 3G??

I use my phones to make phone calls and to txt. I use the hell out of it on the data side too, but seems like it's nearly always when I've got wifi available. I seldom use "data" on my phones when I'm not hooked to wifi somewhere.

I've heard that sometimes 4G can be faster than wifi (depending on who's wifi I'm hooked to), if that was the case and I used 4G instead of wifi the only effect would be that I'd be hitting my data cap in a BIG hurry, and then I'd just drop back to wifi anyway (or pay huge overage fees).

So....what will 4G do for me???

 

[lloydstrans]

The electronics sector of the economy is in a massive slump.
TVs; 720p-1080p, 55-60-72in. 60hz-120hz, 5 years ago people were buying a new TV every year, not no more. Ran out of numbers.
Computers; 433mhz now 4.1 MHz on turbo, 512 meg now 32 gigs of ram, couple hundred gigs of HD space now 3 terabytes. The cloud killed HD requirements. Pretty much run out of numbers. PC sales 20% drop every year.
Phones HOT HOT HOT keep edging up the numbers and we will keep buying them.

 

[TauntingBull]

I'm getting close to my end of contract/replace phone with a new one time and I've wondered what good 4G will do me over 3G??

I use my phones to make phone calls and to txt. I use the hell out of it on the data side too, but seems like it's nearly always when I've got wifi available. I seldom use "data" on my phones when I'm not hooked to wifi somewhere.

I've heard that sometimes 4G can be faster than wifi (depending on who's wifi I'm hooked to), if that was the case and I used 4G instead of wifi the only effect would be that I'd be hitting my data cap in a BIG hurry, and then I'd just drop back to wifi anyway (or pay huge overage fees).

So....what will 4G do for me???

Yeah... for capped users 4g is not all that attractive but for uncapped, it an awesome ride. Especially if one travels alot. I don't have to go asking ppl for wifi passwords if i want to watch 15 mins of HBO while i wait in line for something

 

[SteveIrv]

Yeah... for capped users 4g is not all that attractive but for uncapped, it an awesome ride. Especially if one travels alot. I don't have to go asking ppl for wifi passwords if i want to watch 15 mins of HBO while i wait in line for something

And THAT's the thing.......I'm on an unlimited 3G plan right now.....if I "upgrade" to 4G I lose my unlimited plan and then have to buy data in increments so that I've got a cap.

Looking around, I don't see any carriers out there with unlimited plans any more......part of it is that I don't want to change carriers because although I'm retired I'm still on a govt. contract plan that gives me a 15% discount on service charges and 25% off on hardware.

I'm thinking that as long as my D2G (and my wife's D2G) are working...I'll just hang onto them and the unlimited 3G plan we've got.

 

[bluefire7002]

Once you got 4G LTE, you never go back.... :biggrin:

 

[MissionImprobable]

I have 4g on my nexus with a consistently strong signal however I rarely turn it on as it is a battery hog. I still fail to see the use in it. I can stream pandora, and internet radio without it. I can stream netflix fine without it.
What do people use 4g for otherwise?
THe web isnt very appreciably faster, I assume the bottleneck is more the phone processor than the data connection. Speedtest.net reports I have something like 10mbs download or more which is about the same if not faster than my desktop and yet the web pages definitely don't load as fast as my desktop.
I was also rather shocked and humbled when my friend showed me his iphone 4s proudly showing me it's 4g capability. I laughed and told him that of course the iphone wasnt actually 4g and that apple just put that 4g logo there to make iFan boys feel happier. Well he loaded up speedtest.net and I think he was getting as fast if not almost faster than I was on my nexus with his crappy iphone and it's fake 4g. I had to rather swallow my words and walk away from that one.
So what do people need/use 4g for, bittorrent and tethering exlcuded

A big part of your visible speed on your phone is how both it and the browser render the sites in terms of the gpu and Ram use. It's even the same with computers; running two PCs, one with Vista and one Windows 7, the Windows 7 PC will load noticeably faster given all other specs held level.

well actually it would probably be more like 4g+, its still lte technology, just called lte advanced...and it is actually probably too fast lol
video (dont expect these kinds of speeds when it actually gets here, dont forget they are the only ones on that lte advanced network)
First commercial LTE Advanced demo great success in Sweden, promises up to 1Gbps downloads

article on it (more realistic speed provided here- 10x what you normally get with lte)
LTE Advanced Testing Shows 10x Speed Boost Over Normal LTE - HotHardware

That's just the true standard for 4G. When then original specs for what 4G should be were put out a few years ago it was stated that by definition it would see 1Gbps download speeds.There were lots of techie arguments about VZ and others calling their current offerings 4G.

 

[g_what]

This just shows that most people are ignorant.

 

[lloydstrans]

This just shows that most people are ignorant.

If your going to make a stand make it a hazy one.