Re: 4G on the fringe...Antennas and connections
azbruski
Newbie

Here is the link for the panel antenna I use.  It comes with a 20' extension cable.

 

http://3gstore.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=443_138_466&products_id=2784

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Re: 4G on the fringe.....antennas and connections
spkay31
Enthusiast - Level 3

Thanks to everyone who has contributed to this great thread. I am in the process of setting up a 4G connection at my home and just reading all this information and having some contacts is a relief.

I live in central Massachusetts but believe it or not there are a few towns like mine, where I don't have access to cable, DSL (too far from CO), fiber, and my only option for reasonable latency internet is a municipal wireless system that is pretty slow and unreliable. 3G was not so hot until the last 18 mos but now I am on the edge of full 4G based on the Verizon maps (right near full 4G coverage, just in 4G extended).  So I decided to try a UML290 with an antenna.

So far only 3G with the modem, but wardriving it around I found a tower about 3 miles from my home where I got a whopping 35Mbps down/7.2Mbps up during a couple of tests.  So I decided to go for broke and ordered a Wilson electronics bundle with a 15dBm YAGI antenna, 4G LTE Booster amplifier, and in home Panel Antenna (4G up/down to phones/modems in house).  I am still waiting for the order to arrive but will post again once I have some testing done and some results to share.

I'm also disappointed that Verizon doesn't recognize underserved rural areas with a discounted rate on a higher monthly capped plan as well. I don't mind $80/mo but think the 10GB cap (plus $10/GB overage) is gouging for people with no other internet options. I will offset this by using my unlimited plan on two phones (grandfathered) to allow me to live within the 10GB modem cap but I'd rather just have Verizon recognize communities and areas that are using this as a sole source for internet connectivity and allow some price/data considerations for such areas.

I'll post more information on my complete rig if others are interested, so far I'm at about $350 for all the gear and I expect to get a very solid  10-15Mpbs down/ 3-5Mbps up with this antenna and amplifier once it is aligned, tuned and tweaked.

Re: 4G on the fringe.....antennas and connections
spkay31
Enthusiast - Level 3

Followup to my last post with the gear I purchased for this system (using SolidSignal dot com )


Wilson Electronics 971116 N Male Crimp for RG58U Cable (971116)       $4.95       4       $19.80

Wilson Electronics 4G Signal Booster Repeater LTE 700 with Yagi Antenna Kit (801865-BUNDLE1) $299.99 1  $299.99

  -  includes 801865 amplifier, 301135 Inside Paneal Ant, 301111 Outside YAGI Ant

Wilson Electronics 951125 20 Foot White RG58 Low Loss Foam Coax Cable (951125)    $20.95  1    $20.95

Wilson Electronics 951110 2 Foot Extension Cable RG58 Low Loss Foam Coax (951110)   $10.95  1   $10.95

Wilson Electronics 359921 External Antenna Adapter Cable for Pantech UML290  LG Merlin Samsung Audiovox Models (359921)   $10.95   1    $10.95

I also purchased a 15' LMR240 cable 2X N-type Male connectors for 19.95 on eBay for connecting the YAGI antenna to the 4G LTE amplifier, since this cable is a very low loss cable ideal for antenna to signal amp connections.

The Wilson 4G bundle price is really good for all three components and should yield the best possible results when properly aligned to target 4G tower location. If all of this works well and I get some good test data I'll post another update and share my knowledge gained installing and setting up the system.

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Re: 4G on the fringe.....antennas and connections
dmc271
Enthusiast - Level 3

Thanks for sharing.  Very interested in hearing about your results.

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Re: 4G on the fringe.....antennas and connections
spkay31
Enthusiast - Level 3

So I got my 4G LTE gear in this week and cables came in Friday so this weekend was initial setup and test. I have a colonial and the nearest corner to the towers I've tested for 4G is the east side of the house. I reluctantly mounted the YAGI ~ 2.5 ft below a large TV antenna (yes it's less than optimal) but I ran into some setup issues and want to at least give it a try and that was the best location for quick installation.

I aimed at a tower right around 4 miles away and just used estimated positioning based on a few landmarks (actually hard to see a lot through the woods and over a hill. But I was confident I was withing +/- 5 degrees, unfortunately I can't see a light or identifying feature on the tower itself. I hooked up the external antenna and after soldering my N connectors on a 35' RG58 cable, I hooked up the internal antenna to the inside panel antenna.

I applied power to the amplifier (in the attic) and saw a blinking green light and was hoping for the best. When I went down and got my laptop I didn't see any 4G connection in Vz Access Mngr so I walked upstairs with it and viola!  4G LTE connection available. I connected and as soon as I went to run a speed test the connection went back to 3G - sh*t. So I ran upstairs and saw the amplifier now had a solid RED light on so I knew the connection has dropped for some reason. After reading about the amplifier setup I saw one problem was the internal antenna was too close to the outside antenna so I quickly moved it as far away as possible. Next trip to the laptop was a little better but the signal still dropped out to 3G after a minute or so. I read some more on the amplifier setup and realized my gain settings may be too high resulting in feedback so I dropped down the downlink about 5bB (from 70 to 65) and dropped the uplink gain (internal antenna amplification) down around 10-12 dB to around 58dB. 

That got me in business and now my 4G LTE access is showing 2 bars and speed tests are giving me the following:

http://www.speedtest.net/result/1739047557.png

The setup of the antenna was a challenge simply because I need to get up on the roof but overall not too difficult for someone with some engineering and mechanical ability. I'm hoping over the next few weeks to be able to get tweaked and get in the 10-12down / 4-5up range but I'll need to get back on the roof and get the diagnostic mode going for Vz Access Manager.

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Re: 4G on the fringe.....antennas and connections
MCAPPLE
Enthusiast - Level 2

Wish you would come fix me up! I want 4g!!

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Re: 4G on the fringe.....antennas and connections
dmc271
Enthusiast - Level 3

Thanks for reporting on your results, and congrats on getting connected!

You might try locking your modem into LTE-only mode using VZAM. This should allow it to attempt a 4G connection with a lower signal strength. After locking the modem into LTE-only mode, are you able to connect without the amp, and if so, would you mind reporting back with the speeds? (Also, I wonder if 35' of RG58 is causing substantial signal loss?)

Thanks again for following-up. I'm eyeing the same setup to improve the connection on my Thunderbolt. (I also have a UML290 with the 301135 antenna alone that really helps.)

Cheers,

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Re: 4G on the fringe.....antennas and connections
dmc271
Enthusiast - Level 3

Also, I noticed that you have an external adapter cable for the UML290. Have you tried plugging the outside antenna directly into the UML290 (with no amp of course)? I'm curious about the speeds because the UML290 is supposed to support MIMO, and with an external antenna plugged in, there has been speculation that the UML290 can use the external antenna + its existing internal antenna as a MIMO setup.

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Re: 4G on the fringe.....antennas and connections
spkay31
Enthusiast - Level 3

Thanks for the tips dmc!

Yes dmc271, I did buy the antenna adapter and male N connector to FME female jumper to go from the antenna to the antenna adapter cable. But since I was setting up the antenna inside (on a Mic stand 😉  and trying to get the 4G signal with no amp I guess I just didn't have a strong enough signal to connect 4G. This was a kind of a bummer since my plan was to find the strongest 4G signal (if any) that way and then mount the YAGI outside and connect the amp and internal antenna to connect the entire house.

Last night was the first night of usage and I ran a couple of tests that got me 10.5Mbps down / 2.1up which is very good based on the current anemic municipal ISP speeds.  I imagine I will improve on that over the coming week and hopefully also improve on the consistency (a couple of drops back to 3G over a few hours). Once my son is back on his feet (down with Mononucleosis ;-(   )  I'll be able to adjust the antenna and have a test tech in the house to monitor the amplifier and run connectivity and speed/bandwidth tests while I'm on the roof.

And MCAPPLE, do you have 4G in the vicinity around your house? If so this equipment will provide a few miles of extended range and improved reliability. It does require some legwork and elbow grease on your part though. In my case I was just tired of waiting forever for web pages to load and updates, etc. to download.  Now that I have 4G throughout the house I am really looking forward to upgrading both android phones to 4G when I'm eligible for upgrade in April. That will also allow me to live with the 10Gb cap more easily since the phones are both older on the unlimited plan, so I'll use them for any netflix or high capacity traffic and use the modem for day to day internet activity which shouldn't burn more than 10G a month.

Re: 4G on the fringe.....antennas and connections
spkay31
Enthusiast - Level 3

I finally got back on the roof to finish installing and aligning the YAGI antenna properly. I added a couple of chain-link fence poles to get the antenna up about 5 ft above the TV antenna (about 9 ft above roof peak). At the same time I swapped out the existing 15' LMR240 cable with a 25' LMR400 cable since I needed more height and figured the lower loss would more than make up for the additional 10' of cable run. I did get a slightly better connection but found the big boost came when I swapped out the 25' RG58 cable to the indoor panel antenna with the LMR240 I took from the outside antenna. Wow, now I am getting an average RSSI (4G LTE) -59dBm and LTE SINR 10dB. Huge improvement from before, and now with the antenna up another 10' higher I can crank the gains all the way up on the 801865 w/ no feedback problems.

So I am much happier with the performance now, I am getting speedtest results now typically of 55ms ping, 12mpb/s down, 5mbp/s up. The connection is very solid now and doesn't disconnect from 4G (set to force 4G LTE only mode).

Now I am trying to figure out how to configure it as a primary connection on my new Cradlepoint MBR1200, but so far I have connected but have lots of issues to fix with the modem configuration and eliminating disconnects from LTE when using it in the MBR1200.