5G in Malaysia: Much ado about... not very much yet

Detail from a map of 5G coverage in this part of the world, from nperf.com. The purple patches indicate 5G coverage – as you can see, Malaysia’s coverage looks a little light…. That single dot represents a solitary 5G live trial by one Internet provider.

4K TVs went on sale in Malaysia in 2012 at the eye-watering price of US$20,000 (RM83,600 at today’s rates). I didn’t buy a set until 2019, and even at the special discounted price of RM2,499 I still thought twice before buying it.

You see, the first question that ran through my mind was, “What would I do with it?” At the time, terrestrial digital TV was still more concept than actuality – Astro’s announcement about 4K content only came out later in the year so the only place to find 4K content was Netflix. You couldn’t even watch football in 4K.