Slow 4G connection only, but only sometimes -- SOLVED

iTinkeralot wrote:

I tend to agree the download speed of one device or another could have no bearing on the matter. The radios and antenna configurations could be very different the same as drivers etc… but as a reference point for trouble shooting having multiple devices did help here. The reporting by the software and/or the LED panel on top of the Nokia router are not very impressive. The signal strength indicator is just a quick reference so sure it is probably not sufficient. It does take effort and attention to optimize the placement of the router. I would speculate that the current location of the router in the middle of the house may have something to do with the signal bounce off surfaces in the house. It does seem crazy wrong that having it in the window with direct line of sight to the tower would not provide a better reception. It is easy to overlook screens that are not nylon or in one odd case here I discovered my wife and daughter were pulling down the "metal" blind inside the glass door which totally shielded the router. They did it to themselves but did not think about the aluminum blind between the glass when using it to darken the room. 

Today things are not as good in that spot down 30-70 varies.

When I test in windows I remove the metal screen.

None of this makes sense and sure I get the phone and can are diff but so odd that my phone gets 10 times the download speed in the same spot. Further the day I got this can I set it on my desk, it was hot from being in the UPS truck. I turned it on and was getting 300 down, I put in in the window that is direct line of sight of the tower and was getting 500+ no problem. I said this is great I left it, to bad I did not check the bands that day. Overnight it got updated to the latest FW and then I was getting 1-9 down. Noting I do brings back anything over 100 down. But my phone can easy get 300-500 in many spots around my home. But the best I can do with the can is 100 and that seems rare now. I think if I could get 50 it would be enough to dump cable. But what baffles me the can was getting 500+ and now it just cannot no matter where I put it. Note I don't think it is related to the new FW if it was other would be having the same issue I would think.

More testing with long extension cord today.

Found another spot that today is working ok 100 down that’s all I need if it says that way.

For sure tuning the can makes a big diff so you do have to test, rotate, test, rotate…

Nothing about this device makes any sense really but in the end all I care is can it supply me with what I need for internet.

Also been doing some reading and at one point I had 500+ down so that means I had to have an N41 signal right? But looking at all the cell maps there is only 1 tower in my area registered with N41 and really it's to far I think 5 miles. So now I wonder how did I get that speed with no towers in the area that would support it? I wonder it TM is upgrading the closer towers and was testing when I caught that speed?

I get b66/n41 currently which is normally guaranteed to be better than the old 10 Mbps max per phone line I got with DSL for the last decade. Speeds have been fairly inconsistent although normally (but not always!) better than 10 Mbps. I get 3 bars with b66 and 2 with n41.

I have seen over 200 Mbps but also disconnects from time to time. Usually it's over 100 Mbps which is still great for me. I've had it for 3 days now.

I like using https://fast.com/ for a quick Netflix specific test and http://www.dslreports.com/speedtest to keep track. That’s ‘http’ and not ‘https’ since the secure connection doesn’t always work with the test for some reason.

Hey timsw, et. al.,

(I you want to skip my intro - go down to “=====”)

I’ll join the club of reporting here.

First, I have been programming since 1968 - my have things changed.

Also, I am a ham radio guy - “extra class” (3 rd level license).

I also have a brother who was 30 years a Verizon network guy last number of years in VOIP.

I thought I knew something - until I met this device ...

I have lived in a house in a reception "hole" for ever.  Things good up the street in one direction, good down the street in another direction - just not at my house.

I got t-mobile in 1998 (actually it one of the companies it acquired later).

I have lived with having to go outside or to the top of my 3 story house to make a call.

Finally I got a t-mobile "cell spot" which was a total savior. I good finally be in any place in the house and it worked.

But my internet has always been  AT&T - dialup, then DSL, then U-Verse. ALWAYS lousy - but my only other choice was more expensive and super unreliable Comcast.

So the best I ever had was UVerse 10M down and 1.2M up. Yeah - and for $60 / mo.

So I jumped all over this deal.

It is definitely a keeper because at worst I am doing 6 times better than UVerse and $10 cheaper a month.

=====================

BUT - TO MY EXPERIENCE WITH 5G21-12W-A.

Top floor - windows N/S/E

Mid floor - windows N/S

basement - window S

Now line of sight to nothing - hill N/S/E.  West house 20 ft away, trees, etc.

Brick house N, siding S/E/W.

all floors, “about” the same” - but getting 2 of 4 bands - varying from time to time.

pairs are bands are:

b2 / n71

b2 / n41

b12 / b2

b66 / n71

b66 / n41

b12 is seldom seen.  b2/n71 is most common.

ALWAYS 2 bars of Five on the unit.

Just taking B2 ones and looking at

Location      Direction  RSSI   RSRQ   RSRP   SINR

Basement    S              -83      -11         -113     8.2

Ground Flr   S              -76      -11         -107     6.3

Top Flr         S              -73      -12         -105     6.8

NOTE - the SINR 8.2 in the basement - MAKES NO SENSE - especially on same band/tower and facing a thick woods and hill.

But just showing readings from the basement and internet speeds from computer on network plugged into the can’s ethernet port, taken at various times of day over 2 days:

Band          Up       Down

b2 / n71      112      14.6

                    89        7.2

                    177      20.2

                    171      17.8

                    126      18.7

                    174       23.1

                    143       15

                    148       19.6

b2 / n41       166       7.4

                    205.3    6.5

I am assuming difference must be loads on the cell tower(s). 

I get no better speeds - on average - at ANY of the other locations.

And yeah - the UI's are pretty bad.  Lack of settings worse.

The lack of making the 2.4GHz Wifi to anything but 1/6/11 is really bad as I have signals IN THE HOUSE from neighbors nearly as strong as mine, and the best channel is 8 - but cannot use.

So I have external ASUS router - and using wifi from it.

That’s my story …

Steve

Interesting that you see so many different channels. I would guess you are in a higher density population area than where I am. It would probably be beneficial for you to investigate the tower locations about your area. I would recommend going to cellmapper.net and locate the various T-Mobile tower locations around your house. It should help clarify why signal strength is better in one location in the house vs another. Plus if your windows and screens are older make be sure to rule out aluminum screens as an influence on the signal penetration into the home. Given you are a veteran ham radios operator (pretty cool) it would surprise me if you have not considered this already. If you have been through the thread you may have come across the reference I made to waveform.com and their guide for MIMO antennas and the router. https://www.waveform.com/a/b/guides/hotspots

Here the B2 4G LTE band seems the most prevalent and n71 for the 5G NR channel. I have mapped out the tower locations and signals sent out from the 4G and 5G towers here and that has helped me clarify router location in our house. You know how important a good antenna is given your background so looking into the MIMO antennas is a good thing. 

Itinkeralot,

Thanks for the reply.

I am in a NW suberb of Atlanta - outside the I285 perimeter.

I have looked into the MIMO antennas and getting into the box - yeah - as a ham that was irresistible to avoid looking into.

But currently - it seems - I am fine with 50M+ down and 10+ up.  I am not a gamer or streamer - and I have an advanced antenna (necessary) in the attic for TV and MythTV as my VCR - the same box running Xubuntu Linux has been at it for 11 years now … and has only required that I replaced the external video decoder box (because the first one failed).

Never had cable …

I DO appreciate pushing me to cell mapper - had not looked into it yet.

Interesting results:

Nearest 5G tower - 3 miles to West.  I have no west window.

All the 5G towers are basically next to I75.  Which handles a TRMENDOUS amount of traffic - 11+ lanes EACH DIRECTION when it hits I 285.  Ridiculous.

There is a CLUSTER of 3 tower at a park nearby  0.7 miles.

BUT there is a hill between us. A direct line to tower from my upper floor would be about 50 down in the dirt or so …

But sitting at my desk IN THE BASEMENT - no windows - my phone shows a B12 connection to a tower 0.76 miles - to the SW.  This is the only one Ihave been able to identify.

At the basement window I am connected to a B2 but I cannot find it by PCI, or any other number I have found.  Cellmapper wants not accept the 7 digit CellID from OpenSignal - and I cannot seem to make it lock onto the one that the T-Mobile can is seeing.

Unfortunately the CAN only gives PCI, Band, EARFCN.

And try as I might, I have not been able to located that tower on Cellmapper.

Also - it seems that the 3 programs I have to try to find this stuff - all disagree to some extant and worse they use deferent sets of identifiers.

For example I have found no one else that uses the eNB ID that cellmapper uses.

So at this point I still have no idea where the b2, b66, n41 and n71 I sometimes hit are.

iTinkeralot was tactful enough  to send me direct message saying I had my up and down columns reversed.

Thanks … wrote it in a hurry and somehow reversed them.

Maybe because I am left handed …

If you have an Apple iPhone put it into "field test mode" and see where it connects. To get into field test mode on the iPhone turn off WIFI on it and then dial/call: *3001#12345#* From field test mode you can find the cell identifier possibly. I am just outside of Tusculum TN so I had a pretty solid idea of the tower the router connects to. Today I ran field test mode on my iPhone 12 and found the cell identifier that the phone radio connects to. I can see on cellmapper.net the cell identifier and confirm that is the tower. The only odd element here was I found the cell identifier and it was tagged as 5G which the phone also reported to being connected with. In cellmapper I found that by selecting the 4G LTE NOT 5G. The information on cellmapper is not updated. I joined the T-Mobile home internet BETA back in January so the fact that the information about that tower is not updated on cellmapper does not surprise me too much. I am highly confident that the tower IS indeed the one the router connects to as it was confirmed with the coordinates via a conversation with a T-Mobile support engineer. If people would just be kind to the support engineers they would find they receive mutual respect. I went out of my way to maintain a level tone and tried to be helpful with them and it got results. It bothers and boggles me that people tend to seem to think putting lots of negative trash on the forums will get positive results. 

New data:

Wife got home with ere Galaxy GS9 and I tested with it - turns out - as you said - cellmapper is out of date which is why I could not find the cell towers the T-Mobile CAN was finding.

They are ALL on the same physical tower - the 0.7 miles away tower through a TON of heavy woods - but then only Line-of-sight (except for woods) cell tower I have anywhere near.

in addition to the 12,66 it says in cellmapper, it has b2, b41 and b71.

So that accounts for every connection the can has made from anywhere in the house. and the PCI’s match and the cellmapper cell identifier when I could get a phone to give it to me.

Again, to describe my situation - imagine a canyon (Atlanta is hilly), and I live 2/3 way up the canyon - and down the canyon is basically straight west.

And I have NO west windows.

So the North and Sorth, west corner windows are the best available and where I get the best signal - EVEN in the basement, (which again, surprises the heck out of me).

so - if I come to a point of needing it - mounting a MIMO on the west side of the house - 3 stories up - should actually give me a SUPER signal … I should probably do that sometime before I can’t climb a 32 ladder anymore ...

as for other matters - not quite technical ...

I agree totally on the "tone", iTineralot - in fact, I have ALWAYS for well more than a decade got prompt and helpful response from t-mobile service.  And I try not to comment on forums (and I don't do social media), unless I have something to "add" to the conversation.  I have not bothered t-mobile this time, since I knew this was basically brand new with them - and the poor service call folks were probably covered up. 

I don’t comment “too” much about the limited S/W -because I am hoping that gets better - and the cell towers get better, etc. 

I don’t have an Apple anything - almost everyone else in my extended family does - and I am so fed up with M$ - that as soon as my current Dell Laptop finally dies (it is only 2.5 years old and the screen is “separating”), I think I will finally get a MacBook.

The problem is ALL the S/W I have built up (and written) over the years for Windoze.

I was just thinking if now have the towers located you might be able to leverage one of the north or south facing windows on the third floor. Assuming there are some. If you decided to use a MIMO external antenna you might find it best to not put it on the west wall. The reasoning is that if the noise from other towers is shielded on the north or south facing window sides of the house then you could still point the antenna west and achieve the end goal without climbing a big dangerous ladder. When I spoke with the waveform engineer he stated it is a good practice to leverage the installation to shield the antenna from unwanted influences. In the long run even using the panel MIMO would be a huge improvement and make it much more satisfying. It is a bit of expense as you also need to get lightning arrestors with the antenna. Waveform will also provide the coax cables with a custom length if your needs were such. For me I would need roughly 50 feet of cable to locate the router more central to meet the service delivery with the WIFI inside the house. If i can take full advantage of the onboard WIFI with the 802.11ax then it is actually cheaper to use the external MIMO antenna than add a mesh WIFI solution to cover the low coverage locations.