I wanted to find out how fast mobile internet is at Oktoberfest and whether the latest mobile technology, LTE, would provide a speed advantage at the Wiesn.
The idea for the test came to me a few days earlier in the Hofbräu tent, when I tried to send an email containing a roughly 500 kB photo over a 3G connection. Unfortunately, it did not work at all. Instead, after a good hour my battery was almost empty because my iPhone had spent the whole time repeatedly trying to send the email over the air.
The Test Environment
At least the 1800 MHz LTE network supported by the iPhone 5 is available at Munich’s Theresienwiese. Unfortunately, my test setup did not include an iPhone 5. Instead, I used a MacBook Air and a Huawei E398 with an LTE-capable Telekom SIM card enabled for download speeds of up to 42.2 Mbit/s. I carried out the test on 3 October.
LTE Rocks at Oktoberfest Too
I have to admit that the result at Oktoberfest did not really surprise me. What did surprise me was a speed test a little away from the festival grounds, hidden behind thick old walls and using a repeater to improve the signal. But more on that later … First, the data throughput of an LTE connection at Oktoberfest.
3G Is Poor Even on the Supposedly Best Network
But how does a “conventional” 3G connection perform at the same place, at the same time and even on the same network? The answer: REALLY BADLY! At 0.16 Mbit/s download, it is 116 times slower than the LTE network. These figures do not even convey how much longer the speed test took on 3G than on LTE.
LTE Is Not Always the Best Connection
What surprised me, by contrast, was a connection-speed test around five minutes’ walk from Oktoberfest, in my brother’s company premises. The building is old with very thick walls and generally has poor mobile reception, so a repeater has been installed to amplify the radio signals.
Conclusion
Anyone who depends on a high-performance mobile data connection even at major events certainly has an advantage by switching to LTE now – at least until LTE networks become as heavily loaded as today’s 3G networks. However, in terms of data throughput, LTE does not always have to be the better connection.
Finally, here is a link to an article from teltarif.de. It tests the 4G network with an iPhone 5. Teltarif also reports experiences with LTE in connection with repeaters, this time on Deutsche Bahn’s ICE trains.
