Using Cell Service for Home Internet

D

Deleted member 10829

Guest
Part of the stimulus package last year included getting high speed internet in rural areas, it may be slow in coming. Here's where I should say "Or, the money went to a donor whose company is now on the verge of bankruptcy and he's walking away with millions", but I don't want to get too political or I won't stop!
 

handiman

Member
John -
Is a high speed wireless link between your neighbor that has Charter service a possibility? If so, make a deal with them ...
 

polarisrider1

New member
I can't even imagine what 12 megs would be like! The sad part is Charter service is at my neighbors about 800 feet away, but not going any further. I even offered to pay the expense of bringing it here and they said no. To tell you the honest truth, living in the sticks like I do, you have to make some sacrifices and I have just been very happy that I can even get broadband through the satellite. It's not that bad when you think back to what dial up and the first DSL was like. However, I am always looking for ways to improve my internet service, since all of my business is done over it.

Again, I appreciate all the help everyone has given. I am excited to test out the MyFii next week.

-John
I hope it is a true 12 megs they promised me. If you go 2 miles north or south of me High speed isn't even available. And we have about a 602,000 people in the county I am in. Were is Al Gore when we need him???? lol. AT&T Switching station is 1 block from my house, so I lucked out.

John, can you run a wire threw the trees from the neighbors house. Home Depot has huge spools of the stuff. Back in the day that is how I got Cable TV, lol
 
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Stack

New member
AT&T 3g service is not too bad, 4-6 MBPS in chicago, definitly better than Verizon's 3g speeds. I have verizons LTE 4G and I have been happy. Now my wife travels all the time with her tethered blackberry on Verizon 3g and has no problems and is happy with the speeds.

Stack
 

farmermark

New member
John,

I switched from satellite to cellcom's broadband integrated Wi-Fi router. http://www.cellcom.com/device.html?id=93&categoryid=7

I usually have download speeds around .50mbps and uploads of around .35mbps. A little faster than the satellite, but where I noticed the difference was in the latency. Much faster than satellite. 5 gigs of service for 39.95 a month.

On another note on my smartphone I cannot access your site. Anybody else have this problem? It loads most of it and then locks up.

Farmermark
 

Northstar

Member
I have the AT&T MiFi 2372 but I only see around 60k-70k down when I am at the cabin, but that is only an EDGE connection and signal strength -90db, ideally you would want to be in the -50db to -65db. In the city with decent signal strength and 3G/HSDPA I see speeds in the 6mbps range.

If I were trying to run a business on a the cellular network I might consider something more durable then the MiFi, my experience is that it will have a tendency to just shut down or lose connection when not being used. Which may be a bad think if you wake up to start your day expecting that your overnight data has been downloaded. Also it does not have the option for an external antenna if needed to better your signal strength, many of the USB and PCMCIA cards have an option to add an antenna. The other thing to consider is it is strictly wireless for connections so you would have to add wireless cards to any desktops. It also generates a lot of heat for a little piece of plastic. At the end of the day it is designed to be a portable device not a real hardened network device. Before I pulled the trigger I would probably look at something like the Netgear MBNR3000 in conjunction with a USB Data Card, this would give you WiFi at home for laptops but also has Ethernet ports for other equipment. And if you hit the road you just have to pull the USB device for your travels.

But like Farmermark mentioned you may notice more network latency which I see about twice my DSL, but then you might also be seeing that with a satellite link.
 

Admin

Administrator
Staff member
Thanks Northstar.

I am pretty sure, but not positive, that they guy that is going to let me demo the system said the service we now have is the 3G/HSDPA. I remember him telling me it was better than 3G, but not quite 4G and then gave some letters like HSDPA after that.

I appreciate you giving me all of the other details. I will certainly look into the Netgear device as well, as I would like to keep my existing ethernet setup and not have to go wireless on all machines.

The latency issue is huge with satellite (as expected). I ftp a lot of things during the day and it is so slow due to the latency.

I guess the demo will probably say it all!

Thanks!

-John
 

Paul

Board Admin
John, were I work we have about 100 employees on the mifi's that are used in six of the counties we are in. Service is OK, but changes often based on weather, etc.... Some employees can have it work one week and be in the same place the following week and have it not work. The best speed we have ever received was 2mb down with 3g, upload speeds are normally between 384-512K. Verizon just turned up 4G in one area and our tests show 12mb down, however upload speeds are still poor, still around 512-768K. latency is still an issue with cellular, doubt it is anywhere near as bad at satellite, but it is there. You may want to check to see if they have an unlimited plan for business customers, all of our cards are on an unlimited plan because we are a business customer, they do not advertise it, but I believe you can still get it. Another option you could do as handiman suggested and see if your neighbor would let you setup a connection off of his charter. 800 feet is not far at all and there is good equipment that can go through trees, I can get you some info on the equipment if thats something your interested in.

Paul
 

fusionfool

New member
John,
I have been using Verizon 3G for my home internet for over 2 years now. I use PDA.Net (http://junefabrics.com) for a program to tether the phone to the laptop, or desktop.
We had very limited 3G connection signal, so I searched and called this site for help. http://cellantenna.com. I spoke with a rep and he recommended just the perfect fit repeater. We now get full signal all the time. Before the repeater we had intermittent 1 to 3 bar. They are worth the $400 and easy to set up. My normal download speed is 3.4 mbps using 3G speed test. Upload speed is 0.46 mbps.
Down side of using PDA.NET for tether is I have not found a way to easily network yet. I honestly have not tried to hard to figure it out because the wife could care less about internet. Just the two of us now so network is not a priority.
 
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Admin

Administrator
Staff member
Well, brought home the mobile hotspot (MyFii) a few hours ago and have been playing around. Ran a few speed tests and am averaging around 5-6Mbps download and 1.2-1.7 upload. That is around 5-6 times faster than my satellite for both up and down.

I plan to demo it for the next 2 days to see how stable it is and make sure it can do all that I need it to do, but so far I like what I see. Never knew my website could load so fast! :)

-John
 

scott_b

Member
Great to hear, please keep us updated as this could be a great alternative for many of us with places up there that only need internet access a few days a month.
 

ibendwire

Member
John,

Glad to hear your initial tests are working for you. Keep us updated. I am very interested in these mobile devices as I am thinking of doing something like this for my cabin. My daughter has a lot of her school work from college that has to be done online and this type of setup would work great. Plus it will allow me to access John Dee while at the cabin!
 

danbell78

New member
John - Any more thoughts on this set up now that you have had a few days to work with it? Hopefully it is working out better for you.
 

Admin

Administrator
Staff member
I am in the process of making the switch. I bought the wireless hotspot (MyFii) device on Monday and have been running some computer off of it, while some still use the satellite.

I encountered some issues going from a wired network to the wireless, so am having a computer person come to the house to get the wireless working correctly, but that had nothing to do with the device or the service it provides.

So I guess the bottom line is I did, or am making the switch. The speeds were way faster and it looks like it may even be a bit cheaper than the satellite was.

When you get the device, you also have to sign a 2 year deal in which you pay $50 a month and receive 5 Gigabytes of bandwith a month. After that every extra gig is $10. So I was paying about $80 a month for my satellite, so I can use up to 8 gig and break even.

I would suggest anyone wanting to use this, demo it first. There are a number of factors that will come into play and best you try it out to make sure it will work like you want it to. It works great for me (as long as we get all my computers/printers/other devices talking to each other on the network). Way faster and I may even save a few bucks- as long as I stay off Youtube as much as possible. I have a feeling that in around 2 years, they will have unlimited data plans like for cell phones.

-John
 

srt20

Active member
They USED to all have unlimited plans. Now they are getting rid of them and going with tiered plans like what you got. They werent making enough $$$ with the unlimited. I got lucky and got grandfathered in with unlimited on my aircard and 2 phones. But they are constantly trying to get me to switch. HAHA Im around 10G every month just with my phone. Id be paying more than double with a tiered plan.
 
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