Forum Discussion
Brand new to home Internet and hoping to improve speed
I read a bunch of the horror stories in here, but decided to try T-Mobile's home internet anyhow 'cause I ALSO read some of the "I get 200+ Mb/s and it NEVER drops below 100" topics. I'm in a town o...
If you get the PCI value you can search for it on CellMapper.net and locate the tower that serves that signal out. With a 4G LTE / 5G NR capable phone it should be possible to obtain the cellular metrics for both signals. The bars on the LED screen are rather generic and do not provide enough information. It does not sound like you are receiving a 5G signal with those speeds or it is a very poor signal reception.
You state you are using CellMapper on your phone so are you looking at 4G or 5G signaling or both?
With CellMapper.net in a browser you can provide your area code to get the general location and then display 4G LTE, 5G NR, or both. I find filtering for one or the other helpful. You will see more 4G LTE towers and IF the 5G cell you receive is on the map that really helps but CellMapper is not 100% as it does rely upon users using the Android application and uploading the findings to the server to have the data installed into the database. This does require an account but it does not cost anything to set up. CellMapper seems to be one of the best resources for locating the cells still. Below is a chart that will help you determine more about your cellular signals. Use the T-Mobile home internet mobile application on your phone to see the cellular metrics. Determine if you really are receiving a functional 5G signal.
I can't say they're NOT doing maintenance. But at 7 to after 9 pm on Sunday night?
I got through to T-Mobile and one of the people had me do a couple things I'd already done a bunch of times. Then she told me "they're doing maintenance on a tower in that area". I suspect they're ALWAYS doing maintenance on some tower in that area, but my experience with Visible (Verizon) has left me a bit cynical.
Stopped at the T-Mobile store, where they checked and told me the maintenance was ONLY ON 3G and should have NO effect on 5G. So who's right?
In the end, the ONLY thing T-Mobile came up with was “when the home internet slows down or stops, reboot it”.
Which sounds a LOT like Visible support, only faster ‘cause it’s on the phone instead of “chat”.
The store used a different program to access the home internet box, made some changes and did something with the sim, and confirmed which tower the unit would be using. With that, since I know the tower is to the East, I tried all over the upstairs, including sitting in the farthest East-facing window, so you can look over at the tower about ¼ mile away. No difference no matter where I put it. Gets maybe 30 or Mb/s and that's about it.
Cell phones were consistently 200+ Mb/s this morning. Now they're at about 30 also.
We'll see if things improve. Fortunately, we've got 15 days to take the Home Internet back and we're on day 3.
Sherski311, I feel your pain. I THINK we can stream TV. We were yesterday until there was ZERO bandwidth available about 7 pm. T-Mobile support ASSURED me that was "from the ongoing maintenance".
Speeds here bounce all over the place too, but I’ve got you beat on the low end… We’ve been below ONE Mb/s.
As for my service being "weak". What constitutes weak on the cell phone? Using Network Cell Info Lite on the phone, I have RSRP dBm of -86 - well into the green. RSRQ, dB is -9. RSSNR, db is 15. The map says I'm talking to a tower about a half mile to my south. Speed earlier this morning was over 200 Mb/s. Right now it's 17 Mb/s with a max of about 30.
With the cell phone connected to the home internet, Network Cell Info gives me , on the top gauge display, RSRP dBm of -83 on the "serving Cell", which is "5G(NSA) T-Mobile", -10 RSRQ, dB, RSSNR 15. The bottom display appears to be the Home Internet network and RSRP is -96 to -102, so at the edge of yellow, -20 RSRQ db, and 44 to 52 for ASU. Unfortunately, other than the RSRP dBm, with has red, yellow and green, I don't know if the other numbers are good or bad.
At the moment the Home Internet is sitting IN the window, aimed straight at the tower it's supposedly using. I was told at the T-Mobile store that you actually want the right rear corner pointed at the tower as you're facing the unit (the screen being the front). I've tried it with the front facing the tower and the right rear. Made no difference.
At the moment, performance is mediocre at best, but it's as good as the DSL, which is more expensive, so it's PROBABLY good enough to keep if it doesn't get any worse, or quit completely again. But, at the moment, having had sort-of Verizon when on Visible, T-Mobile is about as good as they were. The only difference I can see so far is you get a person on the phone to tell you why you're getting poor service instead of having to "chat"…
As far as cellmapper, I can't run it on ANY of my Windows browsers. It persists in telling me I've got an ad blocker running no matter what I do. So it's on the cell phone.
