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It’s stuck.

Imagine if they put the transmitter right at the base of the antenna. Then you would not need all that coax. You might need impedance matching to make the antenna resonant but that’s all and it could be done continuously.

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the antenna is outside and transmitters use electricity (and sometimes a lot). I've also heard hams opine that coax should be replaced with fiber optic cable, just "put the amp on the antenna" as if amplifier ICs aren't finicky enough we can put them outdoors with constantly changing humidity and pressure...

That's how modern 4G/5G base station equipment works; with the antenna panel and electronics in one unit.

I haven't seen any, yet. All the celltowers around me have the gas-filled heliax running up the tower, one for each panel up top. I know that it exists as i have outdoor 802.11 and LTE panels that only need POE, but compared to the 4g/5g antenna sizes they're miniscule.

Interesting; they are pretty common here, although ofter paired with a passive antenna for 3g/4g, like this: https://mt-tech.fi/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/image.png.webp

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