Forget the fracas between fibre-to-the node (FTTN), fibre-to-the-premises (FTTP) and fibre-to-the-home (FTTH). While the politicians stress out, I’ve found an internet configuration that’s far more relaxing. It’s “wireless to the pool” (WTTP), and I’m soaking it up now courtesy of Netgear’s Nighthawk M1 modem router running on Telstra’s Gigabit network.
I do get strange looks luxuriating on a banana lounge taking in streamed, wireless 4K ultra high resolution movies poolside on a laptop. But I grin and bear it in the name of technology research.
With theoretical speeds of up to 1 Gigabit per second, Telstra’s Gigabit LTE network offers 10 times the maximum download throughput of a high-end, 100 Megabits per second NBN fibre connection and, in theory, 150 Mbps uploads. Telstra says you can connect up to 20 WiFi-enabled devices plus one Ethernet device at the same time.
In reality, you get nothing like those speeds for several reasons. Other wireless signals, distance, location, atmospheric conditions and the volume of traffic on the network all affect speed. In January, Telstra cited download actual speeds of 5-300 Mbps in tests in Brisbane and Melbourne. Further, this network currently targets a 1km radius from the centre of Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne, with Adelaide and Perth to come online.
In tests I conducted in Sydney, the speed results were varied. At Sydney’s Hyde Park in the CBD, I achieved 61.09 Mbps download and 21.29 Mbps upload. At Circular Quay the speeds were 36.4/23.13 Mbps download/upload.
At home at Erskineville, about 3km from the centre, I had better-than-expected results: 64.78/39.55 Mbps download/upload. This outshone my regular home speeds of 23.71/25.00 on a 100 Mbps fibre plan. At The Australian offices in Surry Hills, on the edge of the CBD, I achieved my best download speed: 209.57 Mbps, but poorest upload speed, just 11.01 Mbps.
Next day, the speed at home shot up to 108.11/44.95 Mbps, at 6.30am on a Saturday when well-adjusted people are still asleep.
Having half-decent upload speeds means there is potential for you to create a new-age Outside Broadcast Van, streaming even 4K video from the street live to an online audience. I say half-decent because even on a Gigabit network, upload speeds are typically only in the 20-40 Mbps range.
Not many platforms support 2K/4K live streaming yet, but YouTube does. I used a laptop with an attached Logitech Brio 4K webcam. Free encoding software Open Broadcaster Software (OBS) sent the 4K-quality video to YouTube at about 13 Mbps. YouTube cites 13-30 Mbps for its preferred bitrates. I had to work hard to get totally smooth motion, and find settings in OBS to eliminate a camera/sound sync issue. I found streaming 4K video was easily workable with the bitrate set low to c 8 Mbps.
Streaming 4K video also opens the possibility of streaming 360-degree video with similar bandwidth. Telstra’s Gigabit LTE network is an evolution of the 450 Mbps 4GX Cat 9 network it rolled out in 2015. I got almost 200 Mbps in the street with that network. It combined the throughput of its 1800 MHz and 2600 MHz networks with the high-quality 700 MHz spectrum obtained when analog TV spectrum was sold.
Telstra now has added LTE Advanced features such as 4×4 MIMO (multiple-input and multiple-output), three carrier aggregation, and 256 QAM (quadrature amplitude modulation). These names sound like technical gobbledygook, but in essence the features combine to squeeze more data over a bigger data highway.
The M1 uses Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X16 LTE chip set, which also supports four carrier aggregation to achieve Gigabit speeds.
Netgear’s Nighthawk M1 has a USB Type-A, USB Type-C and Ethernet ports. The USB Type-C port is used both for charging the M1 and for a wired internet connection to a computer. You can use the regular USB port to add a USB drive but it needs to be formatted as FAT 16 or FAT 32. You can plug in a cable to the USB port and recharge a smartphone. There’s TS9 for adding an antenna and a slot inside the device for a microSD card.
To eliminate using a wireless connection, I linked the M1 to a Windows Surface laptop with the supplied USB-C to USB-A cable. I could surf websites, but it caused some currently running apps to freeze.
The M1 will set you back $360 outright or you can buy it as part of a data plan. Costs are $24 per month (1 GB plan), $45 (10 GB) and $70 (20 GB).
There is the issue of increased cellular usage. I chewed through 4.5 GB of data in less than a day testing connection speeds and trialling 4K live streaming. It’s so easy to become worried about churning through data quickly. I therefore agree with those who say it’s time the telcos in Australia offered affordable unlimited cellular data plans.
Netgear’s Nighthawk M1 modem router coupled with Telstra Gigabit LTE delivers the freedom to set up a large number of connections anywhere within the enabled network, enjoy 4K video streaming including Netflix, 360 degree media and high resolution live broadcasting. You can experience some of the benefits of fast cellular data connections as we transition to 5G around 2020.
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