Virgin Media’s Smart Pavement keeps you connected on the go. Photo: Virgin
You’ll never be without an Internet connection in U.K. towns and cities in the future, thanks to Wi-Fi-emitting sidewalks.
Chesham in Buckinghamshire has become the first town to deliver Wi-Fi at speeds of up to 166 Mbps, seven times the average broadband speed in the U.K., through “Smart Pavements” courtesy of broadband provider Virgin Media.
Think Google’s 1Gbps fiber speeds are impressive? Think again. BT and Alcatel-Lucent have teamed up to achieve lightning-fast speeds of 1.4 terabits per second in the U.K. — that’s over 10,000 faster than the current fastest consumer broadband available in Britain, and it will let you download 44 full-length HD movies in a single second.
What’s more, it was achieved using existing fiber broadband cables.
EE, currently the United Kingdom’s only 4G LTE provider, has just announced that it will double its 4G speeds in 12 cities starting tomorrow, July 4. The carrier says that the average connection will increase to between 12 Mbps and 30 Mbps, which is twice the average speed of home broadband in the U.K.
EE has also announced new “pay-for-speed” plans that will allow customers to pay higher fees for faster connections from September.
Having just come back from a weekend wedding in Austin, Texas, I can speak well of it. It is a city where every liquid is beer, every food is meat, and every dog is good.
It is also a city of, as near as I can tell, universally terrible mobile broadband coverage, especially under Verizon. But who needs LTE when you’ve got sickly overpowered broadband?
Good news, Austin. Google is bringing Google Fiber to Austin!
Google has applied for a license to build a wireless network over its headquarters in Mountain View, California. The company submitted an application to the Federal Communication Commission last week requesting permission for an “experimental radio service” that would cover a two-mile radius around its building.
Some analysts believe the move could be the start of numerous dense and “superfast” Google wireless networks in other locations.
