4G specific frequency selection

KeithFarvis

When using just 4G, I wish to disable the 4G Advanced/Plus functionality and ideally choose just specific 4G network frequencies. Is there a way to do this in GOS (on Pixel 8 Pro).

de0u

KeithFarvis When using just 4G, I wish to disable the 4G Advanced/Plus functionality and ideally choose just specific 4G network frequencies. Is there a way to do this in GOS (on Pixel 8 Pro).

I believe there is not a way to do this via the standard UI.

There may well be some way to do this, but I suspect it would require at least adb access, and potentially something more invasive.

wizoatk

de0u

"editable_enhanced_4g_lte_bool" looks to be the option to change the UI. I'd guess that this would be a relatively easy, but low priority, enhancement to add to the existing carrier overrides. Straight forward if one builds their own image and/or has access to adb root. I'm not in a part of the world to test.

dawt

wizoatk

"editable_enhanced_4g_lte_bool" looks to be the option to change the UI.

That's for the Enhanced 4G LTE Mode toggle, which enables stuff like VoLTE, not LTE Advanced or LTE+ which is a different thing

wizoatk

dawt

Apologies. Either of the following look more interesting?

enhanced_4g_lte_on_by_default_bool
hide_enhanced_4g_lte_bool

That's the end of the enhanced_4g from the "adb shell cmd phone cc get-value" list that look possible to me. Unless I missed something (quite possible) that's likely the end of the easy stuff to enable/disable and might need more actual code to support.

KeithFarvis

Thanks for this. I am not sure if these options are things which I can change via "adb shell" or if they are enhancements that need to be made by devs.

wizoatk

KeithFarvis
They are carrier config keys. If you've got root (e.g. a user-debug image) adb works for testing. A proper fix for production would require code.

adb root
adb shell cmd phone cc get-value
adb shell cmd phone cc set-value

I just checked and the three keys I've mentioned are the same ones that are twiddled by the is4GPlusEnabled option in Pixel IMS.

KeithFarvis

I should explain why I need this ability to disable 4G+. My body is electrosensitive. It tolerates 3G signalling but the final 3G networks in the UK have now been switched off leaving me with no option except 4G+ and 5G. My body struggles with 4G but really does not tolerate the combined signal use inherent in 4G+. I am also sensitive to WiFi and so have ethernet throughout my house and so cannot use WiFi either on my phone, so my Pixel is now almost unusable for me.

I don't want to root my phone as I want to run banking apps, I would therefore like to request that the required coding be done to allow 4G+ to be disabled in the production code.

dawt

KeithFarvis My body is electrosensitive

I'm probably not going to be able to talk you out of it, but

4G+ technologies like carrier aggregation aren't active unless you're doing something bandwidth intensive. It simply doesn't make sense for your phone to make 3 separate connections, eating up battery when your phone is sitting idle. If you turn off mobile data, or bandwidth use is minimal, there's no meaningful difference between 4G+ and regular 4G.
If you actually want to sabotage the carrier aggregation system, you can probably do something with the cfg.db that others have mentioned: https://discuss.grapheneos.org/d/27610-need-to-allow-change-of-fallback-carrier-id-in-modem-level-5g-override-problem.

de0u

KeithFarvis It is possible to use Pixels with wired Ethernet: https://discuss.grapheneos.org/d/96-usb-c-to-ethernet-adapter-compatibility-list

de0u

dawt 4G+ technologies like carrier aggregation aren't active unless you're doing something bandwidth intensive. It simply doesn't make sense for your phone to make 3 separate connections, eating up battery when your phone is sitting idle.

This is a good point. There is no value to the system to transmit any more power to a given device than is necessary to deliver the amount of downlink data to be sent, and especially there is no value to the device to transmit more power to cell sites than is necessary to deliver the amount of uplink data.

@KeithFarvis Carrier aggregation is available in "4G+", but by no means is it always active. If it were, the battery would quickly be drained.

KeithFarvis

dawt By point:
1) That makes complete sense. Good to know. And low use and making calls is still a problem
2) I can't examine the cfg.db on the standard build using adb as the directory under vendor/ shows as
d????????? ? ? ? ? ? firmware
and even if I could I think I would need to make my own build which is too much of an ongoing overhead for me.

As my sensitivity also seems to depend on frequency (WiFi in the 5GHz range is more disturbing than 2.4GHz) what might be better for me is to be able restrict the frequency bands the phone is using in 4G down to the lower frequencies eg Band 20 (800MHz). Is that something that is do-able?

KeithFarvis

de0u
Thanks for that, yes, I do already do that when I am stationary at home and it is great that that ability is there, so my issue is for when I am out and about, which is majority of the time.