It's going to be a long and confusing topic, so please bear with me. 700 MHz is actually a generic name for 4 different bands, which today are used for LTE by North American operators:
B12, B13, B17, B29
Most LTE in Canada is FDD (Frequency Division Duplex), which means one frequency is used for downlink (tower to phone), and another frequency is used for uplink (phone to tower). This prevents data collision if there's simultaneous DL and UL data being transmitted.
For FDD LTE channels, a PAIR of frequencies are allocated, one for DL and one for UL. So when the spectrum was auctioned, it was mostly done so in pairs. Another type of LTE channel is TDD (Time Division Duplex), where a single (unpaired) frequency is used, but DL and UL take place at different times.
There is also a special case of FDD where the spectrum is UNPAIRED, so it is used for DL only.
Let's look at the band plan below from Industry Canada (IC):
Blocks A, B, C, D, E, C1, C2 were auctioned. Ignore B14, as it is for public safety, and ignore the second (orange) "D" block under B14 as well.
The biggest confusion is with the overlapping part of B12 and B17. If an operator buys the license for block B or C, that frequency is in the overlapping part of B12 and B17. The operator can deploy it as either B12 or B17 (or both if they use a special feature called MFBI). But block A is only in B12, not in B17, so it must always be deployed as B12.
You might be wondering why B17 even exists. There's some politics with AT&T in the US, and they were trying to get phone manufacturers to build custom phones for them that only support B17, so the phones wouldn't work on competitor spectrum (B12 - A block). At first they succeeded, but evetually they were made to reconsider. So now we are left with a bit of a mess until all phones eventually support B12. Then we can get rid of B17 entirely.
To recap:
- Block A is 6+6 MHz of B12.
- Block B or C is 6+6 MHz of B12 or B17 (operator's choice to deploy it as they wish).
- Block C1 or C2 is 5+5 MHz of B13.
- Block D or E is 6 MHz of B29 spectrum. Note that B29 (D and E blocks) is unpaired, which means it's only used for Carrier Aggregation (CA) for downlink as a Secondary Component Carrier (SCC). A non-CA phone can never use B29, and a CA phone cannot use B29 as a Primary Component Carrier (PCC), since there is no uplink capability.
Results of the auction are here:
Let's look at Toronto (Southern Ontario) as an example. Rogers owns 12+12 MHz of A and B blocks. They have two options:
- Deploy a single 10 MHz channel for B12 (A + B blocks combined)
- Deploy 2 separate 5 MHz channels, one for B12 (A block), and one for B17 (B block). They can also use MFBI to simultaneously allow B block to be broadcast as B17 and B12. This is how they have deployed it.
Phones can connect to Rogers B block as B12 or B17, though the frequency and capacity are shared. If Rogers B block on B17 cell is congested, a user connecting to the same B block on B12 cell would still suffer from congestion. They would need to move over to A block on B12 or another cell entirely to get better performance.
Bell owns 6+6 MHz of C block. They have deployed it as a single 5 MHz B17 channel with B12 MFBI. They also share this with Telus, so both Bell and Telus see B17 and B12.
Telus owns 5+5 MHz of C2 block. They do not own the RAN in Toronto, so they need to ask Bell to deploy this block for them. Bell needs IC's permission before they do so. If you look at the license info, IC has approved subordinate license for Bell:
Bell subordinate license for Telus C2 in Southern Ontario
* If the above link doesn't work, try the following:
- License category = Mobile Broadband Service
- Area Code (Tier) = 2-008
- Area Name = Southern Ontario
- Choose Telus license 010283515-001 from the search results
Telus C2 license in Southern Ontario
This allows Bell to deploy C2 block in Toronto. Bell has deployed it as a single 5 MHz B13 channel and shared it with Telus.
Bell also owns 12 MHz of D+E blocks. They have deployed this as a single 10 MHz B29 channel for CA. They also share this with Telus.
Rogers ($3.3B) definitely spent way more than Bell ($0.5) and Telus ($1.1) combined.
http://www.ic.gc.ca/eic/site/smt-gst.nsf/eng/sf11086.html
I'm not sure if it was worth it for Rogers. In the future, when all phones support B12, they can deploy as a single 10 MHz B12 channel, so maybe that was their approach.
I'm not aware of any tax breaks, do you have any info on that to share?
There seems to be a probleme with the chineese phones as they don't work on certains Telus frequencies (or very much phones outside north america)
I took some answers from our great Oracles that might help you out, hoping they pop in and give you more info
.
Short Answer : "Public Mobile supports LTE on the 700 MHz band but not everywhere. So, LTE will be more variable for you."
By @Luddite
A bit longer Answer: " you will get some LTE coverage with that phone. The primary band is band 4, used throughout the country (wherever LTE coverage is available), and that's the band you really want to look for if you desire LTE speed. The other bands are used to augment coverage, and only in use in some areas (though I've never seen listing of where what bands are deployed)."
By @srlawren
Here is a link of the source if you want to read more
Bands arent really by big expertise so I will stop here)
