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Home internet / WiFi hotspots - 4G Community
- Thread starter Spiderman11
- Start date
Maybe I shouldn't have read the instructions, LOL! I'll play it safe and get the timer.......just in case. I love the service.
I'm truly disappointed it won't work at my house for this purpose. I get .46 up and .90 download speeds. Not much different than AT&T DSL. I'm going to have to go back to Comcast (AAAAUUUUGUUUUGGUUHUUHUUHUGGGHUUUUGGGGGHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!), Chucklenut forgive me.
I'm truly disappointed it won't work at my house for this purpose. I get .46 up and .90 download speeds. Not much different than AT&T DSL. I'm going to have to go back to Comcast (AAAAUUUUGUUUUGGUUHUUHUUHUGGGHUUUUGGGGGHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!), Chucklenut forgive me.
Thanks for the info on charging, etc.
I plan to take the plunge. But, the Sprint Data coverage seem about 1/2 mile outside of my home, with tree in the way- no structures. It may not matter, since those maps are estimates.
I plan to take the plunge. But, the Sprint Data coverage seem about 1/2 mile outside of my home, with tree in the way- no structures. It may not matter, since those maps are estimates.
My neighborhood showed "dark yellow" but when I hooked it up to test here? .41mbps up and .88 down. 
I am assuming you did a survey of your house to find a potential "sweet spot". I had to do a speed test all over my house at every window to find an acceptable location. What worked best for me was to find the direction of my nearest Sprint tower and locate my hotspot there. The hotspot has an internal antenna and I pointed it towards the tower. For me this was the end of my hotspot where the on/off switch is. It worked best laying flat. I know this sounds kind of wonky, but every little improvement you make can be cumulative. Proper placement made several MBS difference. It took me a few days of experimentation to run this down. I then purchased the Weboost unit and it virtually doubled my best MBS.
Just what worked for me. It may or may not help your situation.
Just what worked for me. It may or may not help your situation.
Test every window. Best signal will be on the window sill. Signal strength fluctuates between 20% and 40%, with an occasional 10%. I have a signal booster on order, hoping to stabilize it. The screen shot below was taken just now, with less people using their cellphones and stronger signal.
I have 12 to 24 mb down normally. Just finished connecting my hot spot via USB cable to the router. Turned off WiFi on the hot spot and now I do not have limitations as to the number of devices I have connected to the internet, have hardwire for PC, VOIP phone, Blue ray. Life is great!
Have solid WiFi coverage inside, this weekend I will pipe it to the barns and outside.
I have 12 to 24 mb down normally. Just finished connecting my hot spot via USB cable to the router. Turned off WiFi on the hot spot and now I do not have limitations as to the number of devices I have connected to the internet, have hardwire for PC, VOIP phone, Blue ray. Life is great!
Have solid WiFi coverage inside, this weekend I will pipe it to the barns and outside.
Yep. I need to connect almost 2 dozen of devices to the WiFi, plus 3 or 4 Ethernet devices. Hot spot has a limitation of 9 WiFi connection. Hot spot is physically incapable of a strong WiFi signal. It was not designed to be used in one spot and cover the whole house.
I also send video and audio data from one device to another in the house, and no hotspot is robust enough to handle that kind of constant network traffic.
To connect the hotspot to the home network you need a router that can use a hotspot as an Internet Gateway. Not every router with an USB port can do it. On most of them USB ports are ONLY for printer or file sharing. Trust me, I tried. You would need to hack the router and load DD-WRT on it. Not worth it.
I bought Asus RT-AC56R
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00LR4OF5Y/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
Stick to Asus routers, they have the most flexible and capable interface.
USB 2.0 port on RT-AC56R is capable of accepting input from a 3G/4G hotspot. USB port will also charge the router. Yes, it might decrease the battery life, but batteries are cheap, relatively speaking, so I leave mine plugged in . It has to be.
During the set up go to "Manual" option and pick the router yourself. "Automatic" set-up loads basic command set, and supports Dial-up speeds to the router.
I have 4GCommunity ZTE MFS-975S (the deluxe model). It was not on the list, BUT ZTE MF 636 was (list has 3G/4G USB sticks only). MF 636 seems to share the instruction set with MFS975S and my hot spot is running 100% strength now. Pic above was taken after Hot spot and router were set up.
Rest of the router set up is basic and straight forward. Pick encryption (I recommend AES), copy password and encryption mode between the 2.4 and 5Ghz channels (your dual band devices will pick the strongest one automatically). I did the WiFi sweep and picked the free channel and put my router on it manually. Neighbors can dance around me
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Disable the WiFi (both 5GHz and 2.4Ghz) on the hotspot. It will interfere with your router, plus you should have only one DHCP server on your network, and Router should be it.
From the router I will have one Ethernet cable going to my desktop, another to an un-managed 8 port switch and feeding the main smart TV (to keep the Wi-fi traffic down, plus the WiFi card on the TV has been wonky lately), ObiTalk VOIP box and home phone, Bluray player, and Ethernet over the electric grid WiFi signal extender, to put signal on the opposite side of the house (my house is not huge, but long) and in the back yard.
Asus router is powerful enough that 99% of people will not need a WiFi range extender. It covers much, much better than AT&T U-Verse Modem/router I had before. Even the 5Ghz signal punches to the master bedroom on the opposite side of the house. ATT 2.4 GHz router barely reached there, that's why I had bought the range extender in the first place. Now I am using it just because I have it.
I bought Asus RT-AC56R
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00LR4OF5Y/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
Stick to Asus routers, they have the most flexible and capable interface.
USB 2.0 port on RT-AC56R is capable of accepting input from a 3G/4G hotspot. USB port will also charge the router. Yes, it might decrease the battery life, but batteries are cheap, relatively speaking, so I leave mine plugged in . It has to be.
During the set up go to "Manual" option and pick the router yourself. "Automatic" set-up loads basic command set, and supports Dial-up speeds to the router.
I have 4GCommunity ZTE MFS-975S (the deluxe model). It was not on the list, BUT ZTE MF 636 was (list has 3G/4G USB sticks only). MF 636 seems to share the instruction set with MFS975S and my hot spot is running 100% strength now. Pic above was taken after Hot spot and router were set up.
Rest of the router set up is basic and straight forward. Pick encryption (I recommend AES), copy password and encryption mode between the 2.4 and 5Ghz channels (your dual band devices will pick the strongest one automatically). I did the WiFi sweep and picked the free channel and put my router on it manually. Neighbors can dance around me
.Disable the WiFi (both 5GHz and 2.4Ghz) on the hotspot. It will interfere with your router, plus you should have only one DHCP server on your network, and Router should be it.
From the router I will have one Ethernet cable going to my desktop, another to an un-managed 8 port switch and feeding the main smart TV (to keep the Wi-fi traffic down, plus the WiFi card on the TV has been wonky lately), ObiTalk VOIP box and home phone, Bluray player, and Ethernet over the electric grid WiFi signal extender, to put signal on the opposite side of the house (my house is not huge, but long) and in the back yard.
Asus router is powerful enough that 99% of people will not need a WiFi range extender. It covers much, much better than AT&T U-Verse Modem/router I had before. Even the 5Ghz signal punches to the master bedroom on the opposite side of the house. ATT 2.4 GHz router barely reached there, that's why I had bought the range extender in the first place. Now I am using it just because I have it.
