Cannot get a secondary signal

ka79535 wrote:

I have had home internet through T-mobile for a little over 3 weeks and I cannot get a secondary signal. I have tried changing the gateway location and tried using an external antenna. The t-mobile map shows my area as covered by 5g extended. No such luck. 

The signal I am getting is pretty weak. All T-mobile can tell me is they are constantly upgrading towers in order to provide the best customer experience…..

How far are you from the tower and if you know where your tower is, are there a lot of hills or forests in the way between you and the tower? If you have a distance over 7 miles and/or obstructions, that could account for they weak signal and not picking up the Secondary, which means you aren't getting 5G. You probably know this already since you seem to have a good handle on the meaning of the data, but I'm just stating it for people who may be just starting out.

There is one more possibility and if I were in your place I would try it only if I had good sight-lines to the tower and were less than 7 miles away from the tower. That is you may have gotten a defective gateway. You can call them and just say you've tried everything, really want it to work, and just ask them if you can swap it out.

Another possibility is the 5G equipment at your tower is down, and once it is up, you'll get the Secondary signal. If that were the case, it is unfortunate the service department can't give you a specific answer on that for your tower.

I just watched a video of a guy who had been on the old 4G white modem for a year and switched to the 5G gray can and was disappointed he got only 10 to 20 in speed on the gray can. But after a short time, the can got stuck in re-boot mode, kept rebooting itself over and over and wouldn't work at all. So they let him exchange it for a refurbished can and bingo, speeds around 80+ and he is very happy.

So that is the last-ditch effort people who really want Tmobile to work for them will try, who don't have a good service provider alternative to fall back on. Unfortunately, most people who try swapping out their gateway find that isn't their problem.

I read some of your previous posts and saw you mentioned getting 16/1 speeds on Frontier, your former provider.The policies of these companies vary. Some might even charge you for a re-connection fee. But many will give a price break if you are coming back to them, at least for one year. They want to get their old customers back. It is a big loss for them.Then in a year you can try again with Tmobile and see if they've improved.

When Tmobile gives you that stock line about "constantly improving," in general, that is true. I've read a lot of the speed progress from beginning of the 5G rollout just less than a year ago and speeds are getting better. But you don't want to be stuck for months waiting.