General Chat

Same on my landline which is probably 'Talk Talk'.

As far as I know, and is not my department, calls under an hour are free on my landline, BT.

My landline at 12 per minute daytime is virgin media, but l think BT is similar, so the 3p per min on the pay as you go is a lot cheaper for me, especially if lm stuck in a 'queue' when trying to get through to my GP for instance. Every penny helps!

I often forget I have free calls on my mobile so it’s better to use that during the day rather than the landline
Both are virgin media anyway

Sharron, if you have to make any daytime calls, might be worth checking if your mobile is cheaper than your landline. I only have a basic PAYG mobile phone, but it is 3p a minute, whereas my landline is 12p a minute during the day. Landline is free evenings and weekends.

I think I made it clear that I only wanted to make a voice call annually in a year of heavy use anyway so I think I might be vindicated for ever and a day at least.

Thanks for that Rollo. I'm getting left behind as I have an old 3G PAYG which I aught to change soon as it is about 10 years old! I just wish there was more straightforward information available. It seems that updates of all kinds assume you have and understand the previous version, when in fact it is the version before that that you have and mostly understand.

I think we're safe, Sharron - all we can do on ours is phone or text. :-D

....although you may not be able to play 'snake' in the future....

don't panic as I said you have two or three years for the "features" and it will make voice calls for ever and a day.
https://tinyurl.com/yyu85u2t

so is my wifes' nokia 3220 going in the bin soon?

I was lucky as well Joylouise, I was given my IPhone which is 4G by my daughter who wished to drag me kicking and screaming into the 21st century.

I don't use it now but I still have a Nokia on the shelf and also a small Samsung, which was just a phone I just used it for texts as with my hearing problem I have problems hearing people on the phone. I like it because it was small and fitted nicely into handbags etc.

Of course, if it is not readily available information, you could state anything and nobody would could check on it's authenticity. As if.

"Things have developed so that almost no one understands science and technology. We might get away with it for a while but sooner or later this combustible mixture of ignorance and power is going to blow up in our faces."

Carl Sagan

Did you make it up then?

Telecomnms is what I do for a living of sorts.
Very little of what you need to know can be Googled.

He would not have been able to look it up on Google then, he would have had to resort to the Arthur Mees like the rest of us.

I knew you'd come up with the goods, Rollo. I wish you'd been around when I had homework to do ... but you probably weren't even born then, or you may have been just a young sprog. :-D

Can't say I understand much of that but I only want to talk on my phone about once every year or so.

(what might have been called 1G, analog cellphones, has been switched off )
2G - second generation
3G - third generation
4G - fourth generation
5G - fifth generation

Current generation is 5G - which will overtake 4G by 2011. 4G and earlier phones cannot be upgraded to 5G.

Fewer than 10% of users are still on 3G. The service providers dislike 3G because it needs a lot of bandwidth compared to 4G/5G and is unprofitable. However 3G, which uses lower radio frequencies, is the best bet for rural areas as the distance between masts is fairly generous. 4G and especially 5G use much higher frequencies so such things as video on the go become possible. Along with that 5G requires a totally different mast strategy with "intelligent" access points fairly close together. If the row with Huwei is not resolved then UK/EU rollout of 5G will be delayed for a year and cost more.

Those who have 3G phones will find that they will still work for voice telephony (2G) but nothing else. It will not be possible to make new activations with 3G phones including used phones, bin ends etc. with most providers ceasing service by 2022 if not before. Sooner if 5G/Huwei is sorted out.

The end of 3G will also see the end of "burner phones" which often star in TV police dramas. Evading detection and identification with 5G is a very challenging thing to do. No SIM.

HF (high frequency) digital radio telephony is a great technology for communications in areas of high density population i.e. cities and especially Asian cities such as Tokyo, Seoul, Hong Kong, NYC, central London. It is the pits for rural areas though some ISPs, notably Virgin, are looking at various solutions. As ever who pays?

5G is far, far more than just an improvement on using WhatsApp. It will be embedded in all sorts of devices which are part of everyday life. Some will like it others will hate it nobody will be able to evade or ignore it.

Don't forget that the venerable BT phone system will be switched off by 2025 and replaced with a virtual network running over the internet. This has already happened in Australia.

Waste yer money, Sharron, you can't take it with you. :-0

5G(eneration) on the way so I'm just going to wait for the next cast-off. :-D