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Roll up for El Reg's 3G/4G MONOPOLY DATA PUB CRAWL

Part one: Measuring how many bars you get in London

It's not just voice – we're looking at 3G and 4G too

For packet data testing, we need to get much more scientific than just running a couple of tests and showing the best speed. We ran a number of download tests and showed the harmonic mean of all download task throughputs. Only successfully terminated tasks are included in the harmonic mean task throughput calculation.

It is calculated by taking the sum of all application-level data transferred (kilobits) divided by the sum of ALL task durations (seconds). For both upload and download, the data transfer task was fetching or sending a 4MB file from or to the GWS server. The maximum time allowed for task completion was two minutes.

Most of the testing was done on foot with a little bit of drive-round testing using the Citroen C-zero electric car that we had on test at the time.

The secret weapon in testing

The equipment we used came from the Rohde and Schwarz company SwissQual, using the aforementioned QualiPoc Freerider II backpacks. Each pack – we had two – contains six Samsung Galaxy S4s which had been rooted to run custom software. This gave us full access to Layer 3 radio information. Getting the details such as network-level messaging and reasons why something has failed is essential to get an accurate look at the network's performance. This gives us greater insight into the reasoning behind each failure, as well as assurance that it was the network that caused the failures and not the device itself.

The Freerider weighs about 6kg, which includes an extended battery. A separate Android tablet controls the six phones through Bluetooth. Time synchronisation is controlled by the Android tablet and ensures reliability on all KPI calculations, so that networks can be accurately compared as like-for-like.

The system gives full logging and decoding of multiple protocol layers, 3GPP, Layer 3 and TCP/IP, with text decoding of Layer 3 and TCP/IP packets. The data collection is performed on the Samsung Galaxy S4s and then uploaded in scheduled bursts, during downtime, to the GWS servers in Virginia. There it hits the post-processing platform which provides a huge variety of post-processing options.

For The Register's MONOPOLY CRAWL test, the post-processing took the best part of eight weeks, with GWS carefully analysing the data and testing its validity by both looking at raw engineering data and applying statistical confidence models to the information.

Monopoly testing

I'll have an Ericsson RBS 6120 on Mayfair

This is vastly superior to testing methods that crowd-source the data or which use unmodified customer phones as there is little control or validity of the data. With access to the full radio data you can spot an anomaly and disregard it.

The 2014 MONOPOLY CRAWL test is far more comprehensive than the one What Mobile did in 1994.

We’ll be announcing winners for each of the Monopoly colour groups for voice calls on 22 August and for data transmission in the new look Weekend edition Register on 23 August, when we’ll announce the overall winners.

Checking london streets

The Register's upcoming interactive map. Keep an eye out for the full map in our Weekend edition

On 29 August, we’ll be holding a live chat with Dr Paul Carter, the boss of GWS, to explain the decisions that were made in testing and to look at some of the interesting lessons learned, such as when mobile networks have better upload than download capabilities and who is sacrificing 3G to promote 4G.

Then, and only then, will my friend Richard know which mobile phone network he should be on. It has only taken six months for me to answer him. Maybe it’s time for another pint? Keep an eye out for the next instalment.

You can email questions ahead of the session to livechatquestions@theregister.co.uk or log on next Friday (29 August) to post them live. ®

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