T-mobile home internet - external antennas

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LifesaGlitch0
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T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by LifesaGlitch0 »

Can anyone recommend the best external antenna for the tmobile home internet?
Utilizing the newest provider's router. Probably team it up with an indoor repeater panel antenna or something like that.

I have 2 bars on n71, but would like to see better, maybe 4 bars.

In addition,, is there a 5g booster needed, if so,, which one?

Thank you :)
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by Didneywhorl »

If you're willing to open it up only.

The The Wireless Haven 4x4 MIMO panel antenna is all in one and will work on all the frequencies, even B71. I have tested it.

https://thewirelesshaven.com/shop/antennas/4g-lte ... onnectors/

Then two of these duplex cables: https://thewirelesshaven.com/shop/cables/antenna- ... -straight/

and four of these to hook to the antenna ports in the router: https://thewirelesshaven.com/shop/cables/pigtail- ... ail-cable/
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by Didneywhorl »

4G and 5G use the same frequencies. With exception to mmWave, but the TMHI device isn't mmWave. The only frequency most antennas dont have is for the new rare B46 with uses 5200Mhz. The newer antennas coming out go from 600Mhz to 6000 Mhz, but they are weak antennas on some parts of that range. Its a tough call.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by miah411 »

I bought the AD4M antenna and was wondering how you connect the cables? I have the pigtails all connected, but am wondering if there is an ideal way to connect the cables? there are 4 pigtails, and four cables off of the antenna. should they be connected to specific ports? I haven't been able to find any information online for connection specifics or wiring diagrams. Anyone have any answers? I have it hooked up with the antenna ports above the gps antenna connected to the right two antenna connectors on the antenna and the other two connected to the left two. should they be in any specific order? Thanks in advance.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by Didneywhorl »

Hey there!


Yes, if you notice on the board when removing the internal pigtails and placing the new ones, there is two groupings. One pair on one side of the purple GPS antenna connector and another pair on the other side of it.

I believe you should connect the primary and secondary pairings on the AD4M antenna to each of those pairings on the modem.

You can see a diagram of the primary and secondary pairings of the ad4m antenna on its listing page under the tab - "4x4 MIMO Connections"

Which pair to which pair doesn't really seem to matter. As they are the same frequencies on the antenna itself. Just do not mix between them.

https://thewirelesshaven.com/shop/antennas/4g-lte ... onnectors/
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by Dr-BroadBand »

T-Mobile 5G Home Internet Add External Antenna

See https://youtu.be/eiO-xqFbVho
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

Check out my post in this sub-forum. I've been using TV whitespace yagi's that are 480-698
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by mtl26637 »

I agree with cagordon1985. I also have the 4x4 MIMO panel you referenced. Even though it does cover almost every sub 6ghz frequency, it doesn't seem to give as much gain as might be needed in the n71 lower frequency. Depending on the distance to the tower and interference you might be good with the 1 panel. If you find that speeds are not adequate, I think the way to go is to look at antennas available for the tv whitespace area and give it a try.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

I probably will test this soon also;

https://www.antelantenna.com/product/ata-ya570hv-9/

The below is what i am currently using, with the top antenna positioned normal vertical polarity, arrow pointing up, the bottom antenna 4.5' below with the polarity arrow pointing at 9 O'clock horizontal. I am using 50' runs of LMR400, the antennas are about 55'. Router is in the attic... The LMR400 isn't going to work for a perma install, going to have to throw everything in a ip67 with poe. It'll be nice gaining back 4-6dB anyways.

https://www.antelantenna.com/product/ata-ya470-10/
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

Maximum theoretical speed for N71 with 20x20MHz, 2x2 MIMO, and 256QAM is 226.85Mbps.

This a fairly average test for me.

Cherry picked
11644502054.png
As I posted
11658371220.png
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

Also be aware, 4x4 mimo is not currently possible on n71 with available modems.

I may be wrong about SIM8200, though I think 2x2 is controlled at the tower anyways.

The Snapdragon x55 definitley has whitepapers stating such.

I suspect after I factor in b2 and b71 CA testing (only b2, b71, n71 look to be available on my two towers to the north), I will find SA n71 is the best route. At this point with current limitations, we only need 2 antennas.

It would be cool to find out B2+B71+n71 or B2+n71 can aggregate without issue. Our b2 and b71 are 10mhz, that would be an additional max theoretical 97.9Mbps ↓ & 37.5Mbps ↑ for each, assuming 256QAM and 2x2 mimo on the additonal pins.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by mtl26637 »

cagordon1985 wrote: Wed Jun 30, 2021 12:43 pm Maximum theoretical speed for N71 with 20x20MHz, 2x2 MIMO, and 256QAM is 226.85Mbps.
I assume that theoretical is for single n71 SA connection? With the normal ENDC mode you have to aggregate it all together and include your speeds from your main 4G band along with any spatial streams and extra 4G aggregated connections. I assume your speed tests were of your aggregated connection and not locked down to just the 5G n71 band no? That pushes the theoretical maximum of a speed test way above. At the tower I average 300-500mbps or so.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

That is just SA n71 2x2mimo 256qam. In the test above.

Yes b2+b71+n71 NSA/ca would be nearly 430mbps down alone. Assuming 2x2 mimo. 10mhz b2 and b71.

If you add in 4x4 mimo for b2 and 20mhz width. Nearly 1gbps. Fussy math.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

By August I'll have some updates for 4x4 testing. NSA. CA.

Also ip67/Poe setup versus 50' lmr400 runs.

I'll make sure to swing back by.

Waiting in China 😭

Then a massive ebay sell off. Of my extra stuff.

I do plan on adding in a setup for AT&T as a backup, those towers form a perfect 6 mile minimum distance box grid around me. It seems to have more potential over Verizon standalone b13 or us cellular standalone b12. (Those towers are two miles away but 75/25 is the max. Visible is cheap though)

Also need to see how bad two T-Mobile setups interfere with each other. 60+l-90ft apart. I suspect some fall off. Though if each connection can maintain about 80%.. totally worth for $100/month
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by gscheb »

Hello all,
Anyone working primarily on B71 and N71 won't lose as much signal strength with wire runs. Lower frequencies don't loose as much. Can verify this on the data loss calculator.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

Does look like only 1.5-1.9db lost in the 600-700 range over 50' lmr400

3-4dB lost in the 1800-2000 range.

2' lmr400 pigtail. Negligible.

I'm pursuit of Insanity though. I'll lower hopefully a dB and have much easier to finish cable run.

Also I have a edgerouter 6p as my core. So that is semi driving me. It should be able to power/load balance 3 setups.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by mtl26637 »

gscheb wrote: Wed Jun 30, 2021 4:30 pm Hello all,
Anyone working primarily on B71 and N71 won't lose as much signal strength with wire runs. Lower frequencies don't loose as much. Can verify this on the data loss calculator.
Maybe not lose as much in 'db' but def. lose '$' from the pocket, lol.
cagordon1985 wrote: Wed Jun 30, 2021 4:02 pm Also need to see how bad two T-Mobile setups interfere with each other. 60+l-90ft apart. I suspect some fall off. Though if each connection can maintain about 80%.. totally worth for $100/month
With minimal separation I don't think you will see much if any noticeable drop. Have as many as 6 cheap LTE setups here as experiment and don't see anything out of the normal as far as conflicts. Not all same provider but all very close frequencies coming from same tower.

On another note, you mention att/t-mob/us cellular/etc. Might check into "US Mobile", i've tested many of the different providers and couldn't be happier with them in comparison esp. with pricing. You have a choice of Tmo or vzw when activating sim and as cheap as $25/line unlimited. They also use main providers apn's so traffic is 'routed' same as the legit subs vs. through mvno path past tower (at least from what I can tell).
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

I did try US Mobile for T-Mobile and was rather quickly throttled to 1mbps.

I haven't tried them for Verizon. I do notice visible for Verizon has some added latency going through their mvno VPN. I currently have a few $25 party plans through visible. Maybe US mobile isn't as laggy.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

Also had very good luck with att and TMobile prepaid sims. Both I've downloaded upto 2tb in a month from. No gripes or throttle. But nearly $60/mo

Trash can sim is nice because no throttle anywhere. And only $50/mo flat of you call in. They don't care where you live. Just find an address in service. Use actual location for shipping. It's a Philippines located call center I think.

I've noticed some issues with T-Mobiles ipv6 though. Sometimes it needs a vpn to make certain services work. Such as Xbox live or PSN. Maybe I have a double Nat or borked upnp on my end...
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by Didneywhorl »

cagordon1985 wrote: Wed Jun 30, 2021 8:13 pm I did try US Mobile for T-Mobile and was rather quickly throttled to 1mbps.

I haven't tried them for Verizon. I do notice visible for Verizon has some added latency going through their mvno VPN. I currently have a few $25 party plans through visible. Maybe US mobile isn't as laggy.
Did you adjust the TTL values for IPV4 and IPV6? Both services (Tmo/Verizon) currently use TTL value to track hotspot data.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

I did for Visible (Verizon), US Mobile (T-Mobile), T-Mobile Prepaid, AT&T Prepaid (Not sure if they care or not), and my FirstNet sim from work.

TTL 64/65 or straight 65 splits.

US Mobile was the only provider to hard lock me to 1 Mbps, however it clearly states that for the GSM service on their site after 10GB of usage or 20GB, I can't remember now. Thought not saying I didn't do something wrong and give up too easy, I was testing quite a few different providers at the time.

FirstNet sim will roam on U.S. Cellular also, however It has speed issues to different locations, connecting to a VPN seemed to clear that up, TTL 65 also mattered. (This was only roaming on US Cellular, it is great on ATT/FirstNet B14, though ATT prepaid sim also will freely use B14 unless first responders take priority). Need to loop back on this one.

Trashcan sim is kind of free reign without much worry, though you will need a VPN such as wireguard to use all services with a moderate/strict NAT. Without a VPN connected, for myself anyways, any NAT/UPNP type services suffer or fail to work. Though it is kinda sweet seeing fast.com report 180mbps without firewall mods or vpn on. This will be activate for a while, too much value locking all the media players / web browsing / downloading to it, leaving the DSL modems open for gaming type services.

Also food for thought using T-Mobile or AT&T prepaid brand sims, they are good for 3 years from the date of purchase, both of them had a activate by date on the back. So those are handy to have around a few incase you were to get shutdown, if I recall just basic mailing information was required. No verification information. They also connect to the 5g networks at full speed, in my area anyways, the four states, Kansas, Oklahoma, Missouri and Arkansas. (also have three extra US mobile sims laying around, 1 gsm, and two verizon/cdma. Not sure why they sent so many). Throttled to streaming and gaming services without VPN.

Anything I've used is throttled to Netflix or Amazon Prime, and video gaming services, outside of my Google FI sim (after 24gb of data its worthless, but cheap as hell to keep 3 phones on, uses T-Mobile and US Cellular) and my T-mobile trashcan sim.

I have not tested actual T-Mobile, AT&T, Verizon or U.S. Cellular postpaid sims.

I have read great things about U.S. cellular and Verizon postpaid unlimited phone sims. However you are looking at nearly $85/mo for either of those I suspect. Though B5, B12, and B13 have some serious coverage distance for ultra rural folks. I know using the data from B12 on US Cell, I can get upwards of 15 miles from the tower and still have a data connection that runs satelite image gps and streams whatever music I have going, though I never see those towers get over 75mbps/25mbps. Also B5 and B12 never CA for me from US cell. Verizon only has B13 in range.

I have a friend who uses three different AT&T postpaid. (He keeps a phone, hotspot and one reserved for modem, they are not grandfathered in). At bedtime all the sims go into modems. He downloads multiple TB per line, every month syncing media libraries over syncthing, He has been using those since probably 2018.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by Didneywhorl »

Are you staying away from imei mods, or do some of those service require it to work with your modems?
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by mtl26637 »

Currently I have 1 ATT prepaid, 2 ATT postpaid, 1 vzw prepaid, and 3 US mobile prepaid. All unlimited and was in the process of letting the ATT pospaid and vzw expire and switching to US mobile. I just checked and i'm only at like 10GB on the US mobile accounts so I guess I need to get some testing done before I make the switch to see if I get throttled. This is the first I've read about being throttled on US Mobile, that will suck!
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by Didneywhorl »

I have seen a few people on our facebook group that refute that and say they have been using as much as they want without getting shut down, on US Mobiles Verizon plan. I've also heard the opposite on reddit, so its hard to say. Good thing is its prepaid and no risk of credit damage from closed and collected accounts.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

Update.. added in a Parabolic Grid again. On outside pins.

So now 2 x whitespace yagi. 1x mimo parablic grid 1700-2700mhz horn.
Screenshot_20210701-183001_Speedtest.jpg
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

Antenna view

Image
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

This also cleared up NAT/uPnP issues / connection problems to gaming services and the work VPN.

I assume the b2 network as the primary is causing this.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

They're not pointed perfect but.. I need a break.. Too much ladder and wrenches this past month. Haha
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by mtl26637 »

Was this the setup at like 7 miles and using the RM500Q-AE?
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

WG1608 and RM502Q-AE or the Trashcan. They both perform the same with this antenna array on the proper lb and mb ports- mapped it today. 6.33 miles actually. -127ft of elevation. The antennas are mounted 50-55'

The benefit I see of using the WG1608 over the Trashcan. Port forwarding does work in NSA mode and the Trashcan currently lacks advanced firewall. NAT or routing.

The RM500Q-AE. 502Q-AE. Or SIM8200EA-M2 should all work for this. Not sure about the 510 or 505 yet. Also have noticed a Sierra 5g modem out.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

Having an issue with my feeder horn. One side is 12dB lower... The two yagis and one side of the parabolic are reading 89-91dB... the other side of parabolic is reading 103dB... Better pointing and a replacement feeder horn will yield 20mbps extra guessing...

Going to setup two of these T-Mobiles and a ATT in the coming month. The ATT will use two of the grids for b2 / b4 / b66. I do have b14 that works great also saw b29. However I think two grids pointed at the b2+b4+b66 tower will surpass the b14 tower. Just because CA differences I've observed with different antennas. Also I think 4x4.mimo is only going to work on b2/b4/b66... B14 I'm fairly sure only uses 2x2. more testing to do...
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

Didneywhorl wrote: Thu Jul 01, 2021 10:59 am I have seen a few people on our facebook group that refute that and say they have been using as much as they want without getting shut down, on US Mobiles Verizon plan. I've also heard the opposite on reddit, so its hard to say. Good thing is its prepaid and no risk of credit damage from closed and collected accounts.
I had issues with US Mobile - TMobile. After 20-40gb. It locked to 1mbps. I have not tried USMobile Verizon yet. I am intrigued. The Visible Verizon has some serious added latency going through their mvno VPN. (120-140ms for me) I hope that US-Mobile Verizon is closer to actual Verizon latency I've observed (around 35-40ms)
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by gscheb »

cagordon1985 wrote: Thu Jul 01, 2021 8:19 pm Having an issue with my feeder horn. One side is 12dB lower... The two yagis and one side of the parabolic are reading 89-91dB... the other side of parabolic is reading 103dB...
Hello,
How is the feeder horn
orientation Polarization vectors pointing? Where is the vertical arrow pointing? From your picture if it is pointed vertical that could cause different gains possibly. Since the horizontal vector would get more reflection than the vertical. In the past have pointed that vector at 45 degrees to get equal reflection. Vertical arrow pointed to one of the corners instead.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

gscheb wrote: Thu Jul 01, 2021 10:52 pm Hello,
How is the feeder horn
orientation Polarization vectors pointing? Where is the vertical arrow pointing? From your picture if it is pointed vertical that could cause different gains possibly. Since the horizontal vector would get more reflection than the vertical. In the past have pointed that vector at 45 degrees to get equal reflection. Vertical arrow pointed to one of the corners instead.
Thanks for the pointer. Will give this a try.

What is your opinion on the TV whitespace antenna orientation? Think 45 degree offset mimo is worth trying? Versus the current upside down T formation?
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by Didneywhorl »

Typically angled at 45 haa been prominent. Your trying to match the polarization of the tower, and I think X pol is the most common. + Pol will work of coarse, but again X seems most common.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

Didneywhorl wrote: Fri Jul 02, 2021 8:36 am Typically angled at 45 haa been prominent. Your trying to match the polarization of the tower, and I think X pol is the most common. + Pol will work of coarse, but again X seems most common.
Good info. More ladders and wrenching.

I need to perfect this setup though. As I suspect my neighbors will be very interested. We are extremely rural..most neighbors are a mile or two away. All we have available is $200 - 24/2 vdsl outside of Ceullar or Satellite.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by Didneywhorl »

Doing the work of Gods my fren.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by gscheb »

cagordon1985 wrote: Fri Jul 02, 2021 12:19 am Thanks for the pointer. Will give this a try.

What is your opinion on the TV whitespace antenna orientation? Think 45 degree offset mimo is worth trying? Versus the current upside down T formation?
Honestly don't have experience with the white space antennas.

Was wondering what antennas are. Connected to what? Like white space antenna going to L1 or L2 and etc and vise versa.
I have my high gain / high frequency parabolic going to L3/L4. Seen to do the best for me.

Which sure you seen here.
https://wirelessjoint.com/viewtopic.php?f=24&t=2736#p18848

To be honest your signal and speeds are better than mine.
I am completely satisfied with download speed. Just want more upload for working from home.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

I need to take the router apart to confirm, I suspect it is L2 and L3 for low band, and L1 and L4 for middle band, in my setup, maybe I have something crossed as I know this contradicts a few folks as of now.

I will confirm my pin configuration once my waterproof enclosure shows up.

On the WG1608 I tinkered with Hardware and Software NAT offloading settings today, I need to loop back on my notes, but this has caused a very stable 250mbps down / 75mbps up. Before I would steadily climb to 230-240 max by the end of the speed test. Same for a upload of 50-60 mbps.

Now the speed test are ramping up to 255-260mbps in just a few to 5 seconds, then slowly backing off to 248-252 by the end of nearly every test to a few specific sites.

I still do not fully understand the settings or specifics of why this has caused the connection performance to change.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by gscheb »

So are you moving the T-Mobile home ISP sim card to other devices?
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by Didneywhorl »

gscheb wrote: Fri Jul 02, 2021 11:08 pm So are you moving the T-Mobile home ISP sim card to other devices?
It can be done, and is being done. Just have to move the imei with it.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

Going to give four of these a try. 600-6500mhz single input output feed horn. (this was super hard to find, direct from supplier)
test.jpg
Also going to give two of these a test. 700-4000mhz, 2xmimo feed horn.
test2.jpg
I will keep everyone posted on the results.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

Been a busy month, still running the T-Mobile 5g gateway sim in a WG1608 with a quectel RM502Q-AE. Two TVWS 11dB yagi, One 2x MIMO 1710-2700 parabolic grid with feed horn. 4x 50' LMR400 runs.

Also a Visible sim in a GL.Inet X750, all I have for verizon is b13, so thats about as good as it gets on any hardware. $25 best deal on earth...

It has been ultra stable (the t-mobile), also found a neat little program called ngrok for assisting with bypassing cgnat.

Next on my list of things to do, is still convert this setup to a coaxless, waterproof enclosure, also when I do that, I am going to reposition my feed horn as it is pointed verticle, and reposition my TVWS antennas as X-POL, will post those results hopefully in the next few weeks.

I am also going to deploy 2 x 1710-2700 grids for AT&T/FirstNet. CA using B2, B14, B66 (B4 and B29 are also avaialble though I never see them CA) on a EM160R-GL was hitting 150mbps or so. With a limited setup in 2x MIMO. 4x MIMO and better antenna mounting will greatly help this connection. I know the above antennas are not great for B14, however the signal is so strong it comes in fine through the feedhorns. Though also the above mentioned feed horns may be game changers.

I also need to start exploring / testing AT&T 5G. I have noticed n5 is about 9 miles away and faintly recieving on my yagi's. It is 850mhz it looks, I expect that to show up on the towers that are only 4-6 miles away soon. First I will test the above mentioned horns and cross my fingers. I doubt I have those in my possesion before mid September. The joys of being tight. :D
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by mtl26637 »

Did you hit the lottery, LOL? I will be interested in all of your testing. I'm still working on my RM500Q-AE setup, no matter what I have tried (and that is ALOT) I can't seem to get anything above 100mbps. Have 3 new antennas to try on Monday so fingers crossed. Exploration at the tower shows I'm literally setting perfectly between 2 of the 120 degree sectors, which is what I think is my ultimate issue on speeds. Also my specific Tmob tower is also vzw and att so dealing with noise factor too. Of course the vzw and att sectors are pointing right at me. Found out with my nanoVNA the vzw band 66 (2150mhz) sets right next to my tmob band 66(2140mhz) so I believe it is overpowering my primary band tmob signal.

First round of 5G trials was of AT&T prepaid sim. My results were less than 4G speeds at several different locations. End result in my area was nothing more than a 5G label replacing the LTE symbol on phone so it will be interesting to see how you do with their 5G service in your area. I thought about reactivating my att 5G to do some more investigating now that I have much more equipment for testing than I did prior.

I assume you have no vzw 5G in your area either? I have no idea why vzw doesn't have or use a sub 6ghz 5G signal, they seem to be missing out on a lot of customers in my opinion. I would think they are going to eventually have to come up with something or get left behind. I just don't see the higher mm frequencies being any type of solution for most rural areas and especially for anyone looking for rural connections like us folks here visiting this site.

Keep us posted! I'll be very interested in all of your results..
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by gscheb »

cagordon1985 wrote: Thu Jul 01, 2021 6:32 pm
Speed test T-Mobile Results.PNG
Hello,
Could you please share you Cell Tower Connection Stats you have that are pulling in these speeds?
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

Here it is, running about 225 down / 55 up right now.

Yagi antennas still not xpol. Horn arrow still pointing straight north. Being lazy :D

P.S. I am surrounded by fiber providers. It seems like every cooperative jumped on some sort of grant / loan program. So not sure if my towers just have a better backbone than others testing. Literally every town around here with a population above 100 has fiber.

I will also say while testing this, if someone said do something this way, I done it the opposite also, I'm a fairly ocd person. The downside of that, is sometimes you trick yourself into thinking you're right.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

mtl26637 wrote: Sun Jul 25, 2021 1:13 pm Did you hit the lottery, LOL? I will be interested in all of your testing. I'm still working on my RM500Q-AE setup, no matter what I have tried (and that is ALOT) I can't seem to get anything above 100mbps. Have 3 new antennas to try on Monday so fingers crossed. Exploration at the tower shows I'm literally setting perfectly between 2 of the 120 degree sectors, which is what I think is my ultimate issue on speeds. Also my specific Tmob tower is also vzw and att so dealing with noise factor too. Of course the vzw and att sectors are pointing right at me. Found out with my nanoVNA the vzw band 66 (2150mhz) sets right next to my tmob band 66(2140mhz) so I believe it is overpowering my primary band tmob signal.

First round of 5G trials was of AT&T prepaid sim. My results were less than 4G speeds at several different locations. End result in my area was nothing more than a 5G label replacing the LTE symbol on phone so it will be interesting to see how you do with their 5G service in your area. I thought about reactivating my att 5G to do some more investigating now that I have much more equipment for testing than I did prior.

I assume you have no vzw 5G in your area either? I have no idea why vzw doesn't have or use a sub 6ghz 5G signal, they seem to be missing out on a lot of customers in my opinion. I would think they are going to eventually have to come up with something or get left behind. I just don't see the higher mm frequencies being any type of solution for most rural areas and especially for anyone looking for rural connections like us folks here visiting this site.

Keep us posted! I'll be very interested in all of your results..
So far only seeing T-Mobile n71 and AT&T n5, Haven't got n5 to connect, just seeing NR band on modem, assume its n5 out here in BFE.

Other two providers are USCellular and Verizon, US Cell is using 5 and 12, Verizon only has 13.

AT&T is using 2, 4, 14, 29, 66 that I've saw for LTE. Maybe n5 5g northeast of me about 9 miles.

T-Mobile have saw 2, 71 for LTE and n71 for 5g.

For a very remote area, like when people say they are remote. Add 10 miles of dirt road to whatever they said haha.

I'm lucky on towers I think, USCell and Verizon are 2.7 miles away in LOS. No LOS for AT&T towers average 7-10 miles, T-Mobile is 6.7 miles.

I would say reactivate and test every 3 months at least. I'm starting to notice different looking tower heads popping up everywhere. Also T-Mobile and Verizon are going to be forcing AT&T and USCellulars hands to deploy low and mid band solutions.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

Also the decent results for T-Mobile have been on a RM502Q-AE

AT&T best results have been with EM160R-GL.

I will get to test a RM500Q-AE this week in a WG3526-P, without the 50' coax runs. Been waiting forever for CATV enclosures, cable glands and other stuff from China. (I hope the WG3526 MPCIE doesn't cause a bottleneck over the WG1608 M.2. I haven't found a definitive answer but the WG3526 MCPIE should be good for 480mbps at least)

I'll test the yagi's in x and + POL, 1700-2700/3800 mimo feedhorns, 700-4000 mimo feedhorns and the 600-6000mhz feedhorns (in + and x pol, going to be annoying mounting 4 of those...)

Something else that is perplexing me, I think I can get more speed on AT&T with marine omni's, just because I am located directly inbetween 6 different towers 6-10 miles out. Going to go broke playing with internet, fine way to go.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

I raise cattle out here and haven't planned on moving. Going on 25 years out here, since I was 12. So finding this gold mine of radio waves has been a ton of fun. (hybrid system analyst by night, do a little devops, little normal ops, ton of automation)

I honestly can't believe I've been so complacent and getting in the game this late. I spent many a hour bonding 56k connections back in the day before DSL showed up out here.

I'm actually probably cancelling 8 pairs of copper and 4 vdsl connections this week, that have been costing me $440/mo. Was using l2p vpn to bond those. In its prime I was able to hit about 80 down 5 up.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

Here is AT&T stats right now using 1 x 1700-2700 feed and 2 x wilson yagi.

They are about 15' on a temp setup.

The kicker is they are pointed at a B2 and B66 tower about 7 miles away, However a B14 and B66 tower is literally inline behind them 10 miles and serves as the primary on 14 for the wilsons on pin 1 and 4. and pin 2 and 3 are on the 1700-2700 feed. Both are x pol. 50' RG58.

My grand finale may be deploying two t-mobile, two AT&T, a US cell and verizon then leasing a 2gbps VPS and layer 2 bonding them just for shits and giggles.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by gscheb »

Hello, if band 14 wasn't your primary band would be even better more than likely. If you are just trying to get better and better.
Double check and make sure that the parabolic antenna is going to the main antenna port on the modem.
Me anything over hundred is great for LTE download speeds.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by mtl26637 »

cagordon1985 wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 1:56 am Also the decent results for T-Mobile have been on a RM502Q-AE

AT&T best results have been with EM160R-GL.

I will get to test a RM500Q-AE this week in a WG3526-P, without the 50' coax runs. Been waiting forever for CATV enclosures, cable glands and other stuff from China. (I hope the WG3526 MPCIE doesn't cause a bottleneck over the WG1608 M.2. I haven't found a definitive answer but the WG3526 MCPIE should be good for 480mbps at least)

I'll test the yagi's in x and + POL, 1700-2700/3800 mimo feedhorns, 700-4000 mimo feedhorns and the 600-6000mhz feedhorns (in + and x pol, going to be annoying mounting 4 of those...)

Something else that is perplexing me, I think I can get more speed on AT&T with marine omni's, just because I am located directly inbetween 6 different towers 6-10 miles out. Going to go broke playing with internet, fine way to go.
Testing with the RM500Q-AE for the Tmob 5G stuff here. I FINALLY got things working well enough I think I can move on to next project. I'm currently testing with 2 of the TVWS yagi's you had previously mentioned and also 2 additional 12dbi 698-2700 yagi's that are very similar to the 2 TVWS antennas. The 2 TVWS yagis are Xpol and picking up 5G n71. The 2 LTE yagis are +pol (due to original mounting) and are picking up my 4G anchor b66. I do not have b2 available but do have access to b12, however, at 700mhz the RM500Q-AE won't latch on to this band since the 2 lower band antenna ports are already latched on to n71. I was using the m.2-usb3 adapter from The Wireless Haven along with the rpi4 running rooter. All I can say is FK the rpi4! I have no idea why but this was my problem the entire time it seems. Even though it 'should' be more than capable, as soon as I swapped out to my wrt32x running rooter/GO my speeds increased to what is expected. At the moment I'm aggregating 4 sims. Check out my peak speeds on the attached OMR snippet I ran this morning. wan1=att prepaid tablet / wan2=US Mobile-vzw / wan3=simplemobile-tmob / wan4=att postpaid tablet. The Tmob 5G is wan3. You gotta love the upload on that one. I can tell that its the first of the month as my speeds are most definitely NOT being throttled. I think this is the best speeds i've seen on every one of them in the past couple years for some reason.

Ultimately for anyone doing a 5G build and after all of my testing i'd have to say be careful with the hardware you choose to push your modem. Spent countless hours troubleshooting but never thought to swap out the pi4 since there isn't many other options with gigabit speeds and usb3 that fit in an external box.

Oh ya, btw, I don't think the omni for your ATT setup would work that well. As far as I know 4G will only aggregate from a single tower at a time at this point so it might be better to do some testing on each tower and pick the fastest and point some directionals at it.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

gscheb wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 6:48 am Hello, if band 14 wasn't your primary band would be even better more than likely. If you are just trying to get better and better.
Double check and make sure that the parabolic antenna is going to the main antenna port on the modem.
Me anything over hundred is great for LTE download speeds.
So far in testing if B2 primary, I have about half the upload of the 700mhz B14 and about 30MBPS less download. However! there was a spike using B2 as primary of 175mbps, so I would say what you are saying holds water, I need to test different antenna setups, The 2 wilsons over another parabolic, or those 700-4000 feed horns is holding me back I'd think.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

mtl26637 wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 10:10 am Testing with the RM500Q-AE for the Tmob 5G stuff here. I FINALLY got things working well enough I think I can move on to next project. I'm currently testing with 2 of the TVWS yagi's you had previously mentioned and also 2 additional 12dbi 698-2700 yagi's that are very similar to the 2 TVWS antennas. The 2 TVWS yagis are Xpol and picking up 5G n71. The 2 LTE yagis are +pol (due to original mounting) and are picking up my 4G anchor b66. I do not have b2 available but do have access to b12, however, at 700mhz the RM500Q-AE won't latch on to this band since the 2 lower band antenna ports are already latched on to n71. I was using the m.2-usb3 adapter from The Wireless Haven along with the rpi4 running rooter. All I can say is FK the rpi4! I have no idea why but this was my problem the entire time it seems. Even though it 'should' be more than capable, as soon as I swapped out to my wrt32x running rooter/GO my speeds increased to what is expected. At the moment I'm aggregating 4 sims. Check out my peak speeds on the attached OMR snippet I ran this morning. wan1=att prepaid tablet / wan2=US Mobile-vzw / wan3=simplemobile-tmob / wan4=att postpaid tablet. The Tmob 5G is wan3. You gotta love the upload on that one. I can tell that its the first of the month as my speeds are most definitely NOT being throttled. I think this is the best speeds i've seen on every one of them in the past couple years for some reason.

Ultimately for anyone doing a 5G build and after all of my testing i'd have to say be careful with the hardware you choose to push your modem. Spent countless hours troubleshooting but never thought to swap out the pi4 since there isn't many other options with gigabit speeds and usb3 that fit in an external box.

Oh ya, btw, I don't think the omni for your ATT setup would work that well. As far as I know 4G will only aggregate from a single tower at a time at this point so it might be better to do some testing on each tower and pick the fastest and point some directionals at it.
NICE! So I will say I have spent about $2800 testing LOL. I can't take someone's word fully. A problem of mine for sure.

I like where your results are heading. Those TVWS Yagi's are limited in the spectrum but nail n71 so far. I can't wait to test the 600-6000mhz horns.

Omni's may be a bad idea... As far as single tower CA, my AT&T testing is confusing. I think I know where the B4/66, B14 - B2,4/66 - B2/B29, and B2,4/66 towers are. I am thinking when hitting 175-200mbps in rare cases, I may be pulling 3 different towers. 2 almost definitely.

OR! I am pulling everything off the back of the grid and yagis.

OR! I do not realize where another B14 tower head has been deployed.

On the hardware front, I am hoping a WG3526-P, RBM11G (lacks wifi option?) or RBM33G, and an RM500Q-AE is the speed/cost combo (Would like to test a SIM8200 or Sierra 9190...). However, I am still curious what the M-PCIE ports max bandwidth is, I've read anywhere from 300-480mbps. The alternative is using a WG1608 board and a 48v 60w injector to 12v 5a PoE splitter (Though the WG1608's wifi is sketchy as hell, maybe I'm missing a fix, the WG3526-P wifi 55' in the air with 12" fiberglass antennas goes far and rarely restarts). Or obviously I suppose I could use any nice router board, a POE splitter and a usb3.0 to m.2... Hindsight...

Also worried about heat dissipation, it stays hot here in the summer +90F in direct sun is almost a given for a few months minimum.

Going to pick up some mentioned 40x40mm sinks by Didney. Also maybe a IP67 fan or something to vent the cases. I am using a WiFIX antenna case (without the glue on antennas, MHF4 to N bulkheads) also a few Chinese cast 210x130x80mm CATV box (again MHF4 to N bulkheads) I have 3ft LMR400 pigtails to patch them to the antennas, however, some of the shielded RG like included with the antennas or LMR240 ultra flex would be much easier to work with. I do not like the amount of stress the LMR400 3ft pigtails are causing...

If I get everything stable and in a fairly easy to finish and tidy looking package. Going to have some happy neighbors and maybe a happy pay for all this testing. :lol:
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

mtl26637 wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 10:10 am Testing with the RM500Q-AE for the Tmob 5G stuff here. I FINALLY got things working well enough I think I can move on to next project. I'm currently testing with 2 of the TVWS yagi's you had previously mentioned and also 2 additional 12dbi 698-2700 yagi's that are very similar to the 2 TVWS antennas. The 2 TVWS yagis are Xpol and picking up 5G n71. The 2 LTE yagis are +pol (due to original mounting) and are picking up my 4G anchor b66. I do not have b2 available but do have access to b12, however, at 700mhz the RM500Q-AE won't latch on to this band since the 2 lower band antenna ports are already latched on to n71. I was using the m.2-usb3 adapter from The Wireless Haven along with the rpi4 running rooter. All I can say is FK the rpi4! I have no idea why but this was my problem the entire time it seems. Even though it 'should' be more than capable, as soon as I swapped out to my wrt32x running rooter/GO my speeds increased to what is expected. At the moment I'm aggregating 4 sims. Check out my peak speeds on the attached OMR snippet I ran this morning. wan1=att prepaid tablet / wan2=US Mobile-vzw / wan3=simplemobile-tmob / wan4=att postpaid tablet. The Tmob 5G is wan3. You gotta love the upload on that one. I can tell that its the first of the month as my speeds are most definitely NOT being throttled. I think this is the best speeds i've seen on every one of them in the past couple years for some reason.

Ultimately for anyone doing a 5G build and after all of my testing i'd have to say be careful with the hardware you choose to push your modem. Spent countless hours troubleshooting but never thought to swap out the pi4 since there isn't many other options with gigabit speeds and usb3 that fit in an external box.

Oh ya, btw, I don't think the omni for your ATT setup would work that well. As far as I know 4G will only aggregate from a single tower at a time at this point so it might be better to do some testing on each tower and pick the fastest and point some directionals at it.
I also need to pick your brain about OpenMPTCProuter. Your screenshots got me jelly. :oops: :o
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

After a bit more reading the wg3526 mpcie is 480mbps or 2.5gbps. leaning towards 480mbps because USB 2.0 is the modem bus no?
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by mtl26637 »

cagordon1985 wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 4:19 pm NICE! So I will say I have spent about $2800 testing LOL. I can't take someone's word fully. A problem of mine for sure.
I feel your pain. Wrap everything up from the past couple years and I'm probably around 3-5k I'd guess.
I like where your results are heading. Those TVWS Yagi's are limited in the spectrum but nail n71 so far. I can't wait to test the 600-6000mhz horns.
Yes, they are limited to the low bands but this was exactly what I needed for n71. Just so happens I'm setting directly at the point of the 120 degree sector antennas at the tower for Tmob. The same tower has vzw and the 120 degree sectors are perfectly aligned and facing towards me. Both Tmob and vzw have b66 beaming from this same tower. Tmob=2140 and Vzw=2150. It is amazing at the difference in signal strength when comparing those 2 signals on my SDR. I needed everything I could get from those lower band yagis since I didn't want to mess with an amp.
[/quote]
As far as single tower CA, my AT&T testing is confusing. I think I know where the B4/66, B14 - B2,4/66 - B2/B29, and B2,4/66 towers are. I am thinking when hitting 175-200mbps in rare cases, I may be pulling 3 different towers. 2 almost definitely.
OR! I am pulling everything off the back of the grid and yagis.
OR! I do not realize where another B14 tower head has been deployed.
I too thought that 4G was capable of aggregating bands from different towers and it actually is 'capable', however, I'm pretty sure this is not implemented. I almost certain that your connection including your PCC and all of the SCC carriers was to a single tower. Unless you are really close to the towers you want I would probably avoid the omni.
On the hardware front, I am hoping a WG3526-P, RBM11G (lacks wifi option?) or RBM33G, and an RM500Q-AE is the speed/cost combo (Would like to test a SIM8200 or Sierra 9190...). However, I am still curious what the M-PCIE ports max bandwidth is, I've read anywhere from 300-480mbps. The alternative is using a WG1608 board and a 48v 60w injector to 12v 5a PoE splitter (Though the WG1608's wifi is sketchy as hell, maybe I'm missing a fix, the WG3526-P wifi 55' in the air with 12" fiberglass antennas goes far and rarely restarts). Or obviously I suppose I could use any nice router board, a POE splitter and a usb3.0 to m.2... Hindsight...
I had a couple of the RBM33G boards until recently I accidentally send 12v up into the USB ports with my mess of 'legacy' POE wires. I really liked those boards but be aware that the mpcie/m.2 ports are only usb2. If you want usb3 you will have to use its usb port for your modem. They are also 'legacy' POE so not sure if you can run just 1 gigabit lan POE cable. I do like the fact that they take a wide range of input (12-24v or something close). I'm not familiar with the other boards mentioned. As far as wifi goes, I wasn't too concerned with the wifi capability since these boards were going in an external box outside 50' up.
Also worried about heat dissipation, it stays hot here in the summer +90F in direct sun is almost a given for a few months minimum.

Going to pick up some mentioned 40x40mm sinks by Didney. Also maybe a IP67 fan or something to vent the cases. I am using a WiFIX antenna case (without the glue on antennas, MHF4 to N bulkheads) also a few Chinese cast 210x130x80mm CATV box (again MHF4 to N bulkheads) I have 3ft LMR400 pigtails to patch them to the antennas, however, some of the shielded RG like included with the antennas or LMR240 ultra flex would be much easier to work with. I do not like the amount of stress the LMR400 3ft pigtails are causing...
It gets in the 90's here too but I've ignored heat for now until I got things working properly. I have added heatsinks to all of the modems though and so far I don't think I've seen issues due to heat 'yet'.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by mtl26637 »

cagordon1985 wrote: Mon Aug 02, 2021 4:24 pm I also need to pick your brain about OpenMPTCProuter. Your screenshots got me jelly. :oops: :o
OMR works great when you want to combine these LTE connections. It's only weakness is you have to bypass OMR for a select few sites such as netflix/prime since your external IP is typically blocked due to being from big server. I'd not skimp on hardware either, I started with pi4 then the wrt32x and now a protectli box. I had many issues with the first 2 setups in comparison to the protectli setup.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

Holy fast shipping from China. All the horns and grids came in today and I happen to be on vacation until the 8th!

They actually sent two extra grids. Not sure if on purpose or an accident.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

mtl26637 wrote: Tue Aug 03, 2021 10:10 am OMR works great when you want to combine these LTE connections. It's only weakness is you have to bypass OMR for a select few sites such as netflix/prime since your external IP is typically blocked due to being from big server. I'd not skimp on hardware either, I started with pi4 then the wrt32x and now a protectli box. I had many issues with the first 2 setups in comparison to the protectli setup.
Are you using OMR on the PI4? I have one I'm willing to test but it would need about 700mbps throughput capability. Or should I just breakdown and get a wrt32x for the OMR primary?
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

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cagordon1985 wrote: Thu Aug 05, 2021 6:40 pm Are you using OMR on the PI4? I have one I'm willing to test but it would need about 700mbps throughput capability. Or should I just breakdown and get a wrt32x for the OMR primary?
Neither :(. I used the pi4 for about 6-9 months and had various issues with speed/throughput. Could never get over ~200mbps. Finally upgraded to the wrt32x and used it for a few months. It fixed my speed problems and would see something like 300-400 or so but was still having random situations with pushing additional speed and bypass and things so I finally upgraded to an x86-64 build and it has been pretty much rock solid for a couple months now. You might start with the pi4 just to familiarize yourself with OMR's features but end the end I would say if you are looking to push 'top' speeds with an OMR setup I'd skip straight to something like a Qotom or Protectli mini pc. I'm using the Protectli Vault 4 and I love it.

Also, update on the above. I think those 'peak' speeds in the pic above are misleading. After further research I'm still not seeing the download speeds I should with my Tmob 5G setup. It may have hit that peak at some point but an average download speed test and I'm still seeing under 100mbps. Guess I'm gonna have to contact Quectel afterall, sigh.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by mtl26637 »

In reference to my speed issues with my Tmob/RM500Q-AE setup, I'm trying to get a better idea of speed vs. signal numbers such as what levels of RSRP/RSRQ/SINR are needed for speeds say over 100mbps? As of now I'm using 2 of the TVWS yagi's and 2 additional LTE yagi's that are for the mid bands. My signals are the best I've been able to obtain but still no love with top speeds. Below is an estimation of where my signals are as of now. I would think that at this level of signal I should be seeing the additional MIMO/CA/QAM gains (if available). Does anyone know or have an idea of what signal strengths it takes to tell the modem to go ahead and add in the above additional gains? I feel like I'm not getting the extra MIMO/256QAM benefits but can't prove it. I do know my only bands are b66/n71.

4G:
BAND: 66 (10MHZ)
RSRP: -87
RSRQ: -11
RSSI: -59
SINR: 6
CSI: 15

5G:
BAND: n71 (10MHZ)
RSRP: -78
SINR: 7
RSRQ: -12

AT+QRSRP
+QRSRP: -77,-83,-44,-44,NR5G

AT+QCAINFO
OK

Anything stand out on the above signal levels? Setup is up on the tower but I swear when I took this setup for a car ride to the tower it connected at the expected 200-300mbps that it is supposed to. I has been awhile since I did that however.
Dr-BroadBand
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by Dr-BroadBand »

n71 is 600MHz signal. And your pipe only 10MHz wide you are doing very well to get 100MBs speed!!

See link

https://www.pcmag.com/news/t-mobile-5g- ... -work-well
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by mtl26637 »

My bad. Looking again at the numbers "3" would indicate a bandwidth of 20Mhz in 'ENDC' mode and not 10mhz like it indicates with 'LTE' stats using the "servingcell" AT command. At a minimum I'm connected with 10Mhz on band 66 and 20Mhz on band n71. From what I can tell 100mbps with those 2 bands aggregated would be pretty slow and on the lower end of total capacity. Almost as if I'm not getting any MIMO or QAM benefits. Maybe my signal quality is still too low but I don't know further specifics on what signal levels are required to get the extra benefits.

It seems like at some point in the past few months I did run across some information that indicated what signal levels were required to 'enable' the extra benefits but I can't seem to find it now. I think it may have been somewhere buried in the E-UTRA/LTE 3GPP documentation but I can't find it now.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by Dr-BroadBand »

I always tell users when they question they’re single/speed is to drive to the tower and test.

It takes all the mystery out of antennas and cabling out of the equation.

Get a baseline then move back to your home test every mile. Take good notes.

Log signal strength, Single quality, Signal to noise, and speed.

Note Speed can vary due to many things, also eats a lot of precious data.

Better to look at Signal.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by mtl26637 »

Agreed and a trip to the tower confirmed that I do have access to the extra speeds, however, you got me on the notes. I should've taken much better notes at the time as all I have as of now is the fact that I did get better speeds. I might have to climb the home tower and unhook everything and go on a joy ride to the tower again and do some more testing. Did I mention I hate heights, LOL. Not gonna be fun unhooking everything again 40'+ up in the air.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by Dr-BroadBand »

😂

The Wright brothers were just two Bicycle mechanics that got an airplane in the air because they took good notes and did a lot experiments.

The so-called geniuses of that time were just jumping off buildings and killing themselves.

We have a saying in our lab, trust no one especially yourself.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by mtl26637 »

Did some digging in the AT commands manual and found some interesting information on "CSI" (Channel Status Information). The modem uses the following signal status indicators that are reported back to the tower to establish the modulation for each TTI (transmission time index - 1ms).
MCS: "Modulation & Coding Scheme"
RI: "Rank Indicator"
CQI: "Channel Quality Indicator"
PMI: "Precoding Matrix Indicator"

From this information and the various related tables you can determine the number of spatial data streams (MIMO) along with QAM details.

The following AT commands can be ran to report the instantaneous values on the RM500Q-AE and some other Quectel modems:
AT+QNWCFG="lte_csi" <<--reports the above values for LTE signal respectively
AT+QNWCFG="nr5g_csi" <<--reports the above values for 5G signal respectively

Following is a typical output of my modem during a download:
+QNWCFG: "lte_csi",4,2,8,1
+QNWCFG: "nr5g_csi",21,0,13,3

Even though on the main status page my overall signal shows in the 90 percent, my LTE signal quality basically still sucks. It even drops further on either if it decides to kick in more "ri" data streams. I would be curious to see the output of these commands from anyone else willing to run them on their RM500Q-AE, especially if you are getting great speeds?
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

I'll be able to dig up more on T-mobile testing next weekend and report it here.

Spent all weekend messing with AT&T.

I did find a combo of a 1710-2700MHZ horn on the outside pins. Then either 2 x yagi 700-2700mhz or a single 700-4000 horn on the inside pins is reaching 220mbps down 25mbps up. This caused a B2 B14 B66 CA to be very stable. For AT&T. Antennas still only about 10-12'. I imagine things will change once I get them 65' + and gain LOS of the tower head.

The T-Mobile setup. I have the antennas on a mast high enough the tower head is in LOS of the antennas. I imagine LOS matters greatly.

A 4-5ft hole with a 4x4'+ base pad. Some square tubing for the breakover base then 12' joints of reducing pipe. 75' is possible and stable without guys. Just make sure you balance it properly. Also it is nice being able to adjust antennas without being a professional climber.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

Edit: had some throughput values flipped.

TLDR: In a nutshell OMR will multi xmit on both sides to achieve stability, this causes tons of overhead in the NIC, and switch that may go unnoticed. Also if you want TCP/UDP seamless, also VPN bonding, expect CPU to usage to follow suit.

Tried the wrt32x, pi4 and a vm on my gaming rig. for OMR.

wrt32x and pi4 on OMR would start bogging down between 175-250mbps.

The VM is able to push towards 400mbps, problem now is my vps only gives about 420-440mbps, so I assume that is all I will hit for now.

Also starting to question my switches as they are first gen gig switches with probably no more than a gig of backplane. Likewise for my network adapter on the gaming PC, only 1000mbps and OMR causes some serious double x-mit/loop back usage. I observed the vm/gaming desktop NIC hitting 100% utilization.

Going to do some more testing, it does look like vray over shadowsocks for the proxy and bbr2 versus cubic for the TCP scheduling is quite a bit more performance. HOWEVER. using vray and bbr2 takes some serious processing power. I observed my i7 10700k hitting 30-35% usage with those enabled versus 5% with shadowsocks and cubic.

I suspect a dedicated NUC or something like the Protectli Vault 4 as mentioned. Then a true like 8GB backplane gig switch may improve my speeds a bit. Also going to need a bigger boat / VPS.

Observing, if dealing with more than 250mbps in throughput. One will need a dedicated x86/amd64 instance with at worst 1GBs network interface dedicated and a switch with at worst 1GBs backplane. Once you start getting over 500mbps throughput from WANs, no doubt you will need a 2.5G-10G card and capable switch. Also looking at vray with bbr2, guessing a decent dual core from the i series or up. Literally saw it using 35% of a i7 10700k that is @ 5.1ghz.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by cagordon1985 »

I need to get back to antenna testing or start a new thread... Promise some results on the 600-6000mhz single horn grids by August 30th hopefully. Work has been beyond crazy.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by doubledown00 »

Didneywhorl wrote: Sat Jul 03, 2021 5:56 pm It can be done, and is being done. Just have to move the imei with it.
I have the T-mobile 5g home internet and hate the gateway, it is an overheating piece of crap. Can you provide some details about how you moved this?
It's necessary to clone the IMEI? That would be unusual with a GSM carrier so does T-mobile do some special locking with these devices?

I saw earlier that you're using the WG1608. Is that with a custom firmware? Given that that is currently $1,200+ are there any other devices you're aware of that would also work?

Thank-you!!
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by Didneywhorl »

The IMEI does have to be the same as the gateway router the SIM came in. that's the only trick really. Otherwise it's a typical cellular router build. Everything this forum is about. :)

You really can use any cellular modem and router that will host the cellular modem, some even just plug into a PC via USB. I prefer a router.

NEXP1GO router with Telit LM960A18 will work. The LM960A18 isnt super easy to change imei but it can be done, and that modem supports T-mobiles B71.

I prefer the full outdoor PoE 4x4 MIMO antenna builds for these. That way you take advantage of the 5G modem it should be an it uses an outdoor directional antenna with no antenna cabling signal loss.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by gscheb »

Agree the T-Mobile gateway is quirky and hard to manage. For example the signal strengths usually don't equal speed. Can't rely on the info it gives you.
With that being said mine doesn't over heat. Keep the outer case off of it, don't use the WiFi function on it and don't have it in a window.
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Re: T-mobile home internet - external antennas

Post by Clong2013 »

Didneywhorl wrote: Sat Feb 13, 2021 4:46 pm If you're willing to open it up only.

The The Wireless Haven 4x4 MIMO panel antenna is all in one and will work on all the frequencies, even B71. I have tested it.

https://thewirelesshaven.com/shop/antennas/4g-lte ... onnectors/

Then two of these duplex cables: https://thewirelesshaven.com/shop/cables/antenna- ... -straight/

and four of these to hook to the antenna ports in the router: https://thewirelesshaven.com/shop/cables/pigtail- ... ail-cable/

Can you update the links of your recommendations. Since the website changed it doesn’t take me to the products when I click your link. Thanks!!
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