Is there a way to make the v20 5G compatible?

baldybill

Senior Member
Aug 8, 2010
388
40
48
Thought I read somewhere that the V20 won't be exactly compatible with 5G, but will get a slight speed boost when in 5G markets. Thoughts?
 

darkknight200

Senior Member
Mar 10, 2014
359
182
63
Thought I read somewhere that the V20 won't be exactly compatible with 5G, but will get a slight speed boost when in 5G markets. Thoughts?
The only way if you are still using v20 when 5g fully rolls out is when majority of lte users move onto 5g. Thereby freeing up bandwidth space for the now legacy lte for you to use so it will be faster.
 

runningnak3d

Recognized Developer
Nov 10, 2010
2,649
7,180
0
Largo
The only way if you are still using v20 when 5g fully rolls out is when majority of lte users move onto 5g. Thereby freeing up bandwidth space for the now legacy lte for you to use so it will be faster.
Most insightful comment I have read in a while.

That is exactly what happened when they rolled out LTE. I stayed on HSPA+ and got great speeds because everyone else was jumping on the LTE bandwagon.

Once LTE was fully deployed, and you couldn't buy a phone anymore without LTE support, things were much better -- 120mbits average for the area I am in.

Once T-Mobile fully deploys band 71 (600Mhz) with 5g, then I will bite the bullet and buy the least sucky flagship phone that is available and supports it (I think I will have my V20s for many years yet ;) )

-- Brian
 

kaluna00

Senior Member
Mar 24, 2011
594
139
63
Tacoma
Most insightful comment I have read in a while.

That is exactly what happened when they rolled out LTE. I stayed on HSPA+ and got great speeds because everyone else was jumping on the LTE bandwagon.

Once LTE was fully deployed, and you couldn't buy a phone anymore without LTE support, things were much better -- 120mbits average for the area I am in.

Once T-Mobile fully deploys band 71 (600Mhz) with 5g, then I will bite the bullet and buy the least sucky flagship phone that is available and supports it (I think I will have my V20s for many years yet ;) )

-- Brian
I like to hear that! . :) Still Loving my v20 also. Guess I am a little bit old school and like the Legacy device :)
 

KUSOsan

Senior Member
Jul 21, 2013
853
293
0
Once T-Mobile fully deploys band 71 (600Mhz) with 5g, then I will bite the bullet and buy the least sucky flagship phone that is available and supports it (I think I will have my V20s for many years yet ;) )

-- Brian
This is mainly what I'm waiting on for a new phone. My next phone I would definitely want that band to have as future proofing but since I'm in a rather low populated part, I don't think I will be seeing this band on a tower in my area for quite a few years at least.
 

mirrin

Senior Member
Feb 7, 2011
889
151
73
It is not possible as the radio inside the phone would need to be changed. So 5g compatibility is something on the hardware level that needs to be available not something able to be turned on with software.

Unfortunately the v20 seems as if it will be the last phone to have removable battery everyone has since moved to the glass laminate design apple uses.
 

FNetV1

Senior Member
Jun 15, 2015
113
23
0
It is not possible as the radio inside the phone would need to be changed. So 5g compatibility is something on the hardware level that needs to be available not something able to be turned on with software.

Unfortunately the v20 seems as if it will be the last phone to have removable battery everyone has since moved to the glass laminate design apple uses.
I am hoping that when 5G fully rolls out that a manufacturer releases one more smartphone with a removable battery. As long as the specs are ok, and by ok I mean a minimum of 4 GB of RAM and a 4K (or greater) display resolution and of course Micro SD card support then it would be up for my consideration.

I recently purchased a brand new LG V20 H918 (the Unlocked T-Mobile variant) phone. The very first purchase that I did was getting the PowerBear extended battery on Amazon, with the 2 day prime shipping that's what I got much sooner than the actual phone since the phone I also got it brand new but on Ebay since there it was significantly cheaper ($150) compared to any price I was seeing for a new phone for any variant on Amazon, you could only get a "renewed" (another way of Amazon saying "refurbished" I guess) for the same price I got my new phone on Ebay. (I guess the price inflation could be another way of Amazon getting back their 5% cash back they pay their Amazon Chase Visa card holders).

The V20 replaces my Samsung Galaxy S5 that also had an extended battery (the iPossible battery) and then it dropped onto a hard porcelain floor facing down, and while the screen didn't crack, it started zooming and unzooming erratically at random times and it would only reset back to normal if I power off the screen and turn it back on. Faced with having to purchase a new LCD screen and having to do the repair something that I know how to do since I have done it many times to other users I took the opportunity to search for a newer phone with a removable battery since I didn't have the time to dedicate to perform this repair with my super busy schedule, replacing an LCD screen off any smartphone is a tedious task, I just didn't wanted to bother this time. So after 3 days of hard research I finally discovered that the LG V20 is the latest smartphone to actually support a removable battery and then my next research turned on to determine what variant should I exactly go for: I had many options, I could have gone with Sprint's variant (the LS995) the Verizon's variant (VS995) or the T-Mobile's variant (H918). The Sprint's unlocked variant seemed very promising, being compatible with most networks here in the USA, except that it didn't support one of T-Mobile newer LTE Band 66 but other than that it supported every LTE band the Galaxy S5 supported and I guess it could have been a great compromise giving me the future option to go with Sprint or any of their MVNO's, except that when I checked if that phone was rootable I was dissapointed to hear that if my phone came with a certain firmware version or greater then it was unrootable and there has been more than 1 year without a method being discovered yet, um I need to be able to root, certain producttivity apps that I use depends on rooting, including the use of Titanium backup that allows me to import all of my Google Authenticator keys that aren't backed up in any other ways. Next to my list: the verizon's variant: it was a good choice except it didn't support all of Sprint's LTE bands which would mean a spotty Sprint coverage shall I go with Sprint in the future, and no Band 12 support for T-mobile either, that automatically was a no-go. At the end, I just went with the T-Mobile's unlocked variant and T-Mobile is my actual carrier too. In my area I used to get 25 Mbps speed test on my old Galaxy S5 phone that lacked Band 66 support, on this new phone with B66 support I got 100 Mbps. I got surprised when I saw that speed and I was only able to get that speed after I changed the Access Point Name from the default IPv6 only configuration into IPv4 only, under IPv6 I only got 35 Mbps don't exactly know why IPv4 outperformed IPv6 by a factor greater than 3 but those were my results here in the city of New York.

Overall, I am very happy with this phone. Its a super fast performing phone for a phone that was introduced in 2016 and by the looks of it, this phone can continue being relevant for many years to come.

Once again, I really hope to see another phone with removable battery being introduced somewhere in the future that actually supports 5G.
 
  • Like
Reactions: mrtomaso

mprudic0404

Member
Aug 16, 2016
30
2
18
cleveland ohio
Didn't know if it had the necessary Hardware and might be possible with a new SIM card.
this is a fuzzy answer and not one many would tackle due to the efforts gained. the V20 series can NOT handle the data (think volume) rates of 5G , BUT...
i have no doubts the physical device would work on a 5G network. 5G is a VERY short wave, but the V20 is unique because the antennas are easy access with room to spare. ( top/bottom cases)
so with time , a 30,000.00$ -S2-test set- network analyzer, YES its quite simple. but no matter what is done, the core of the device is only capable of the original design for MAX 4G speeds (100-300megs/sec?) PLUS i cant say how the device would hold up to the MAX rates 100% of the time. would be a cool experiment, but this is far out for a 2016 spec phone. T-mobile network would be the best bet for easy tune, but again, how will hardware handle

i wouldn't know where to start for the software side, but tuning an antenna isn't too bad.
 

ezzony

Senior Member
Jul 4, 2012
497
142
63
Dublin
Speeds are often be more down to what your network provider is capable of giving you rather than your fones capability.

3G working at full speed as advertised can be absolutely fine for streaming video.

4G+ is more than good enough for me, not all the time but most of the time. Don't care less I don't have 5g on my V20, my fave fone ever.