2G, 3G still is in phone.

[Piotr Bujakowski]

Hi.

Why that old not used 2G and 3G is still in phone?

Thanks for answers.

[zetabeta]

Hi.

Why that old not used 2G and 3G is still in phone?

Thanks for answers.

i think question is poorly worded, you probably mean "why technical gsm/2g and umts/3g capability is in pinephone and pp pro even many networks has shutdown those networks?".

pinephone and pro uses eg25-g modem chip, which has gsm, umts and lte functionality. and lte in eg25-g support volte as well. eg25-g is intended for iot devices more than ordinary phones. but in other hand, many iot devices rely on lte and nr5g networks. software can disable those features, but capability is still there.

hint: use lte only or 4g only. some cases you have to use at commands.

[Kevin Kofler]

Also, there are countries which still have working 2G and/or 3G networks, which may have better geographic coverage than 4G  (LTE).

In Austria, Magenta (T-Mobile) has shut down 3G (UMTS) on their network, but 2G (GSM) is still supported as a fallback for legacy phones not supporting 4G and for coverage. The other 2 physical network providers still support both 2G and 3G.

[zetabeta]

hint: use lte only or 4g only. some cases you have to use at commands.

for at commands. if gui is not available.

Code:

# shows a mode.
AT+QCFG=“nwscanmode”

# sets a mode.
AT+QCFG=“nwscanmode”[,<scanmode>]

<scanmode> Number format, network search mode
0 AUTO
1 GSM only
2 WCDMA only
3 LTE only

[Kevin Kofler]

Just don't be surprised if you get worse network coverage in remote areas then. Forcing 4G/LTE only makes sense if your country has completely turned off both 2G and 3G networks (and even then, only as long as you are in your country, do not forget to turn 2G/3G back on for roaming abroad).