Introduction of 5G Technology
5G is the latest generation of mobile networks. And it is a huge step up from what is available to us today. The jump from 3G to 4G networks was massive, but the jump from 4G to 5G is many times greater, so much that it is difficult to comprehend. 5G is a totally new kind of network designed to connect virtually everything and everyone, from smart devices, vehicles, and industrial machinery. 4G and 5G will coexist until the 5G expands significantly across the globe. But it is intended to stand alone, providing an amazing and massive speed of interconnectivity.
Latency is the time it takes for devices to respond to each other on any wireless network. The 3G networks had a latency of about 100 milliseconds, and 4G of around 30 milliseconds, but the 5G are predicted as low as 1 millisecond.
This is almost instant communication which is opening a new world of possibilities for anything establishing a connection. It benefits the internet experience. The projection of all the world technologies will depend heavily on the success of 5G, such as Augmented reality or Automated driving.
Each wireless network new generation grants quicker speed and an increased functionality to our smartphones. The very first cell phone to let us text for the first time was 2G, then 3G brought us online and 4G finally gave us the speeds that most of us enjoy today. But now as more users connect online to 4G networks from new smartphone or automated devices the network has just about to reach its limit of what it is capable to do now when users wish to stream or surf even more channels than ever before, these are coming in the way of streaming videos and video calls or zoom conferences.
Now, we have arrived at the beginning of 5G for many countries. The next generation of Wireless, 5G will manage to operate a thousand times more transit than today’s networks, and it is going tol be at least 10 times faster than the current 4G. You can sinmply imagine the improvement on streamming a video or downloading large files in less than second. 5G is setting the basis for autonomous driving, augmented reality, the internet of things, and other advances in tech communications we don´t even imagine yet.
Let´s see what exactly forms a 5G Network and what technologies have allowed us to get there. Experts point that 5G is actually because there have been developed five new technologies emerging as the basis of 5G. These are small cells, millimeter waves, massive MiMo (multiple in, multiple out), beamforming, and full-duplex transmitting techs.
Let us review each of these in detail:
The millimeter waves is the first technology
Smartphones, Wifi and other electrical devices use certain frequencies on the spectrum of the radio frequencies, these are the ones typically below 6 gigahertz, unluckily these frequencies have started to get too crowded. Mobile carriers are able to squeeze only so many data bits of the same frequency spectrum of the radio, and since more devices are starting to appear online, we start to have more traffic accidents and slower services. The solution is to make accessible some new radio frequencies. The researchers are experimenting on broadcasting on the shorter ones. The sub 6 GHz frequencies are even smaller and much better than the 4G LTE band frequencies already being used. The locator base is now those which fall between 30 and 300.
5G operates in 3 different spectrum bands, between 600 Megahertz and 86 Gigahertz, these are:
Low band network (the most commonly used by carriers for 4G LTE) offers the widest coverage and best wall penetration, but it doesn’t offer any great change as for speed improvement, just about a 20% improvement on speed topping at 120 megabits per second.
– High band spectrum, which has the highest performance for 5G. This goes to 10 megabits per second and has almost no latency. But its penetration is very poor. So the antennas have to be very close by
– Finally, there is a Mid band spectrum, which provides faster speed and less latency than the low band but they don’t compete with High band power.
5G speed is up to x 100 times the capacity of 4G. The fastest section spectrums have never been used before for mobile devices for everyone, but there is a catch, millimeter waves can travel building walls or physical obstacles and have the tendency to be absorbed by plants and also by rain, therefore it is difficult for them to get around. This problem will be a technology new challenge for the new small cell Networks installed all over, this brings us to the next technology change.
More Networks of Small Cells:
The number of small high cellular towers must be increased. The towers are called stations or substations. Today’s 4G wireless networks are large high-powered cell towers that send their signals on long distances. But beware, higher frequency millimeter waves have a harder time traveling through obstacles. This means if you move behind one, you can’t use your signal. Whereas 5G small cell towers work to solve that problem using hundreds of less-power small base stations, these smaller stations in the electricals. These 5G antennas are much smaller containing many more repetitors per antenna, each as small as the size of a pizza box, and they must be physically installed in smaller cell antennas, or on top of buildings, or light posts. Installing all of these will take still some time all across the globe. Remember we’re going to need to transmit signals on smaller distances. This would be especially useful for when you’re behind obstacles, smart mobile to automatically switch to the new faces, allowing better ratings for device connectivity to keep this connection. This brings us to the 3rd new change to achieve this new network technology.
MiMo:
Next up, technology number three, is MiMo, which stands for multiple input multiple outputs. Today we have about a dozen stations per antenna that resend all cellular traffic but with the new 5G antennas the number of stations will increase the capacity of today’s networks, by a factor of twenty, of course, these are massive, and there are concerns of a climate issuing deriving some of the installation own complications nowadays. Carrier antennas send broadcasted data signals in all directions at once and the sum of all these signals can cause serious interference which brings us to technology number four beamforming.
Beamforming:
It is like a traffic signal system for cellular waves. Instead of broadcasting in every unique direction, this allows a base antenna station to emit a focus group of data streamed to a specific location or user to prevent interference. And it’s way more efficient. That means stations can process more outgoing and incoming info streams at once. This is how it functions: imagine you are in the center of many buildings and you are trying to connect and stream or to call, your signal is ricocheted off the other surrounding structures and crisscrossed along with the other signals from users cross over in a massive amount of all directions. In use, signal processing algorithms decide exactly where the best transmission route is through the air to the each destination, and sometimes these will even have to bounce several stations in diverse directions bouncing from other objects or other building to refrain from signal interfering. Resulting in a coherent data signal stream directed to one destination. This brings us to the fifth technology.
Full Duplex technology:
Allowing 5G networks to communicate taking turns. Take for example when you have used a radio like a Walkie-Talkie, both ends cannot speak and send their voice message at the same time. Well, today´s Cellular base stations have that same old problem. The current antenna is only able to do one job at a time. It can transmit or receive. This principle is called reciprocity. In previous networks, data could only travel one direction, either backward or forward on the same frequency. To understand this, think of a train track loaded with data, this frequency is traveling on it, but when there is another train on the same track coming in the opposite direction, these interfere with each other. But now this has been solved by super quick transistors which take turns, so all the trains on different tracks can bypass one another. Things will be a lot more efficient with the new technology targeting to solve the reciprocity principle.
On the concerns and environmental concerns, scientific evidence has proven that high-speed frequencies are not radioactive. These signals are way under the frequencies that produce harmful radiation to humans. So, The only real downside seems to be the battery drainage of current devices like smartphones. Which will surely be solved on the next generation of smartphones.
The communication tech giants are still working out how to face muscle networks In fact, all the five key technologies are still being set all over the main countries as work in progress. It will likely be in function over the next few years. Allowing all sorts of new technological advances based on the ultra-high-speed of the new data connectivity of 5G Networks. The momentum is now as the restrictions of the 2020 pandemic are lifting, and 5G continues to be installed from certain areas of large cities, for example, it just started in about 100 cities of the United States. into the rest of the cities of the world, hence changing the connective world as we nowadays know it.