Video, Gambling, and 5G in Devon
According to current Devon Council roadmaps, there are no plans to make use of 5G within the county in 2020. Despite this being a newly popular and very forward-thinking technology, there is a range of reasons as to why this lapse exists not just in Devon, but in many other counties over the UK.
Using the popular examples of video streaming and gambling, we want to look at the positives and negatives of this technology, to illustrate what it can do, and where possible misconceptions lie.
Gambling, Gaming, Bandwidth and Latency
4G phone connections, as are currently popular all over Devon, are almost always enough to allow most forms of gaming to operate smoothly and without issue. This is because some of the most popular forms of mobile gaming, such as online casino games, are not massively demanding in their bandwidth and latency requirements.
For those unfamiliar with the terms, bandwidth refers to the quantity of data which can pass through an internet connection at any one time. Latency, another component of this, refers to the time it takes a piece of data to perform a round trip. Even the most bandwidth- and latency-dependent casino games, such as the poker, roulette, and baccarat tables at https://casino.paddypower.com/p/live-casino, have no issue with current 4G connections. This is owed to 4G's general speed and the programming systems as put in place by online casinos.
The limits of 4G, however, won’t cover newer game streaming services such as Microsoft’s Project xCloud. This is because game streaming has enormously higher requirements for bandwidth and latency, making this form of on-the-go gaming impossible on public systems not running on 5G infrastructure.
Video and Music Streaming
The other common example which most people will turn to is that of traditional media entertainment. Just as with the gambling and gaming examples, your reliance on 4G or 5G will depend on your use case. In terms of music-streaming, bandwidth requirements are low enough that this should never be an issue on 4G connections. The same cannot be said for video connections.
In most instances, video streaming works perfectly fine over 4G connections. A lot of this is owed to the smaller screens which mobiles have, which make them a poor fit for ultra-HD video. Going forward, this might become a greater issue. Folding phones and casting to larger screens could well create a greater need for 5G connections, as the bandwidth required for this form of streaming exceeds 4G capabilities, as explained at https://www.techradar.com/nz/news/
Why the Delay?
There are several reasons as to why 5G is yet to find a home within Devon. The first and foremost is that, looking at the above examples, it is so far unnecessary. Most gamers like games like online casino experiences, which don’t have high requirements. Most video streamers do so with quality settings which also do not require 5G connections.
This means that the actual act of installing 5G towers, which is expensive and time-consuming, is far from being highly demanded. There have also been pseudo-scientific allegations pushed by those claiming electrosensitivity and apparent risk, though as https://www.skeptic.com/reading_room/ details, such concerns are not based in scientific reality.
Whatever the reason for slow adoption, the end result is the same. 5G doesn't appear to be coming to Devon, at least not on any appreciable scale, any time soon. As the current advantages and rates of 5G-capable devices are so limited, however, this is not something many of us will need to worry about for a few years yet.
