Actually alot of the time 4G is congested because there isnt enough bandwidth to support everyone, hence why they want to kill of 3G to allow for more 4G bandwidth. 4G is alot more efficient at spectrum utilization than 3G.

Also, 4G & 3G in general consume about the same amount of power given the signal strength is the same. 4G might save u more power cuz your phone can check for new uodates or notification much faster(provided its not congested), so the radio on ur phone can go back to sleep much faster.

As for the VoLTE, I think that will be the greatest hurdle, Maxis doesnt even have support for VoLTE yet, and many 4G capable phone do not support VoLTE(referring to older or more budget ones).

Likely I think the gov will miss the 2021 target, but i'm interested to see whats the plan going foward.

I really doubt Maxis tower's backbone is less than 50mbps, it depends on the Band frequency of 4G youre connected to. I dont have the numbers for Maxis, but Digi's 4G network runs on 4 different bands. Band 1, 3, 7 & 8. Different Bands have different bandwidth. Digi's Band 3& 7 each is 20Mhz(same for Maxis AFAIK). Band 8 is 5Mhz & Band 3 is 10Mhz. Band 8 being only 5Mhz only has a theoretical max throughput of about 35mbps whereas Band 7 & Band 3 each can do 150Mbps each. Band 1(2100) is actually refarmed from 3G because Digi has 15Mhz chunk for 2100Mhz. So some area 10Mhz is for 4G & 5MHz is for 3G. Same for Band 8 which is 5 for 4G + 5 for 2G.

The reason 2G is know for its coverage is due to the use of 900Mhz(Band8 for 4G). Thats why Digi has made efforts to roll out 4G exclusively with B8 in many rural areas. Band 8 is key for good indoor signal penetration, so killing off 2G would allow for that.

Band 1 would be also be helpful to supplement B3 & B7 if those gets congested. Not only that, your phone can do CA(carrier aggregation) with two of the least congested bands for better through put(eg B3+B7 or B3+B1). These are all not possible on 3G. Since most will be connected to 4G, the spectrum allocated to 3G would be wasted, hence why sometimes 3G can be faster because phones default to 4G.

Phasing out 3G is bound to happen eventually, its just that 2021 is too early still(at least for malaysia) Singapore doesnt even have any real plans of shutting down their 3G that soon either.

Most of the time congestion is due to a lack of spectrum, not due to back-bone, but i'm not in this industry so i know nothing. sifu prosibu please enlighten us

How hard is it to migrate those M2M to 4G? I'd assume it is very tedious and might be impossible for some.

In Malaysia we are already doing that, 2G&4G for 900Mhz & 3G&4G for 2100Mhz.

You got any source on that? i wanna read up on it

I remember back then when 4G was just starting to get rolled out, Digi did a campaign where people can vote for towns to get 4G coverage. The gov should make it something permanent for all telcos, and award telcos that manages to bring 4G to the place first.

Really doubt they will bother to implement this, too much work for barely any gain(esp financially). Most users won’t notice it...

Depending on your phone model you might struggle, but I was using a S8 and was able to force 4G only for almost a year without any issue. Calls routed through VoLTE and didn't have to deal with 3G at all, very reliable.

I'd be suprised if there arent any delay to the shutdown lol

I also received the same SMS from Digi but I can still switch to 3G just fine so…idk

Location : Alor Setar, Kedah

Well… here’s an update