3G & LTE

[73henny]

Hi. 

Can anyone tell me if the switching off of 3G affects some LTE signals? I realise 4G is available but I'm specifically interested in the LTE signals. They're not true 4G. My car (Audi) uses Vodafone for its car services like live traffic information. It used to show LTE in the area I live but now only shows 2G. 4G is available in our area as my work Vodafone mobile works fine on 4G. So it would appear to me that when Vodafone turned off the 3G signal in our area it took the LTE signal with it. Is this possible?

Thanks.

[Mark]

Hey @73henny Any device not compatible with our 4G voice services will switch to 2G once the 3G network in an area's been shutdown. If your car is using a data service to provide traffic updates to your SatNav, this would normally be done via a 4G data connection (depending on the age of the car) and should be unaffected by the retirement of our 3G services. If you continue to experience issues connecting to our service, please reach out to us via one of our social channels and we'll be more than happy to take a closer look into this for you.

[73henny]

Hi Mark,

My car uses an LTE connection. It has never displayed '4G', only ever 2G, 3g, or LTE. Now that 3G is being shutdown why would the LTE signal disappear if it hadn't been removed at the same time? I don't see why Vodafone would transmit both LTE (which isn't true 4G) and 4G? The online signal checker doesn't show LTE coverage and 4G coverage is fine where I live yet my car only picks up 2G now. My car is working fine as it displayed LTE elsewhere just yesterday. So my question remains, is it possible that when 3G was turned off the LTE signal was also turned off as true 4G was available?

[Mark]

As LTE uses the 4G network, this wouldn't be disconnected with our 3G network. If your car isn't equipped to handle 4G calls, it will transfer to a 2G service for these connections, if it was using a 4G LTE connection for data, this will now use our 4G network for these connections. 
As the connectivity services for your car will be purchased via Audi, I'd advise speaking to them directly regarding any issues with your connection.