“And 5G is way more than junky Hollywood productions.”
The company I work for is heavily involved in building out the infrastructure to support 5G. And while 5G has some very real advantages to it there are also serious downsides, too. 5G has the potential to carry huge amounts of data but the drawback is drastically reduced signal range.
You literally need to put antennas every block and support every single antenna with fiber connections. In urban areas the cost to lay a single FOOT of fiber approaches $3,000. So while 5G will eventually be deployed in densely populated areas it’s not going to be cost feasible to roll it out anywhere but there. There’s simply no ROI. Not yet anyway.
Our Ops guys joke that we are actually a sidewalk and paving contractor that happens to leave fiber optic cable behind when we are done. And they’re right.
L
Many of us here are technology minded, and are aware of “Moore’s Law” which simply stated that the processing power of microchips doubled in strength every single calendar year. That may remain true, but few buyers now require that level of processing power, as the electrical power required to drive the ever increasing speed of the chips, along with the cost of cooling the chips, became exceedingly expensive.
Therefore, decisions were made by both buyers and sellers alike, to start focusing on reduced electrical power and cooling requirements on the majority of computer chips being developed. The technology was ubiquitous and had simply matured to the point where speed was no longer the primary driver.
We’ve probably reached a similar point in cellular technology. Obviously you’re much more informed on that business than I, and 5G is unquestionably the future and being invested in by the big players, but increased speed is hardly a necessity at this point for most users. It will be nice, of course, but not worth the risk of allowing the Chinese to infect our infrastructure at such a low level. We can wait, and should, if needed.