EM7411 & ME826GO-U on Verizon? Replacing MoFi SIM7

[Actinidia_arguta]

Hey guys and gals,

A couple of weeks ago I decided to try a LTE home internet setup in order to ditch ViaSat (I live out in the boonies). I found a Verizon reseller who seemed fairly legit, and ordered a MoFi 4500 SIM7. I found a window to perch the MoFi where I can get 20+mbps @ 4am, and 6 mbps during the evening rush. I was getting ~1 mbps with ViaSat in the evening, so needless to say, I'm thrilled. I'm having problems with the MoFi though, and I haven't heard anything back from customer support, so I'm thinking of building my own router/modem and sourcing everything from thewirelesshaven.com

I was looking at the modems in stock and the new EM7411 caught my eye due to the expansive band support and 2x carrier aggregation. It's a bit pricey, but band support is important to me in case I need to use an ATT or T-mobile reseller in the future. I plan to use my AmpliFi router for home WiFi, so I figured a simple ME826GO-U would be a good basic router to house the modem. I understand I'll need an m.2 to mini PCI-E adapter, but none of the m.2 routers are in stock. Is this modem/router combo likely to work out-of-the-box with my plan if a MoFi 4500 SIM7 worked without any hassle or settings changes? Is there any reason to go with the NEXQ6GO-U instead? Is there anything I should be aware of before ordering?

Thanks for the help and guidance!

[Adm1jtg]

Hey guys and gals,

A couple of weeks ago I decided to try a LTE home internet setup in order to ditch ViaSat (I live out in the boonies). I found a Verizon reseller who seemed fairly legit, and ordered a MoFi 4500 SIM7. I found a window to perch the MoFi where I can get 20+mbps @ 4am, and 6 mbps during the evening rush. I was getting ~1 mbps with ViaSat in the evening, so needless to say, I'm thrilled. I'm having problems with the MoFi though, and I haven't heard anything back from customer support, so I'm thinking of building my own router/modem and sourcing everything from thewirelesshaven.com

I was looking at the modems in stock and the new EM7411 caught my eye due to the expansive band support and 2x carrier aggregation. It's a bit pricey, but band support is important to me in case I need to use an ATT or T-mobile reseller in the future. I plan to use my AmpliFi router for home WiFi, so I figured a simple ME826GO-U would be a good basic router to house the modem. I understand I'll need an m.2 to mini PCI-E adapter, but none of the m.2 routers are in stock. Is this modem/router combo likely to work out-of-the-box with my plan if a MoFi 4500 SIM7 worked without any hassle or settings changes? Is there any reason to go with the NEXQ6GO-U instead? Is there anything I should be aware of before ordering?

Thanks for the help and guidance!

I would look at the ep06 modern. I am also on Verizon and it covers all the bands. I believe it also covers all the att bands as well. The only thing it lacks is band 71. It's also pcie so no adaptors or different pigtails needed.

As far as the box/router itself they're seen to be 2 schools of thought.

The first is all the lte routers have subpar wifi so just get an 826 and use your own router for wifi via ethernet.

The other school of thought is the one I follow and that's the wifi is not stellar but for me good enough, in which case you look for something like a wg3526. It has both 2.4 and 5 ghz and gigabit ethernet ports. The wg1326 also works well but you can't hook external antennas to it without filing additional holes in the casing.

As far as availability I just went through this in August. They're just isn't much readily available. I actually ordered my wg3526 direct from zte in China.

One last footnote... The 826 models only have 10/100 ethernet so if you use a separate wifi router with the 826 that will be a possible limiting factor.

[Actinidia_arguta]

I would look at the ep06 modern. I am also on Verizon and it covers all the bands. I believe it also covers all the att bands as well. The only thing it lacks is band 71. It's also pcie so no adaptors or different pigtails needed.

So, the EP06-A was actually the first modem to catch my attention. Out of all the modems I've looked at, it was definitely the best bang for the buck. Great band coverage and carrier aggregation, for just $100, what's not to like? A couple things made me a bit hesitant though. One, this seems to be a mostly Sierra Wireless forum and there seems to be a lot more support and documentation for Sierra Wireless than Quectel in general on the web. WiFix doesn't have GUI support for band locking and some other features that I like on my MoFi, so it looks like I'll need to get familiar with AT commands. Which is fine, as I've quite enjoyed geeking out over this whole DIY 4G/LTE thing. But I figured I would get more help on this forum if I ran into problems with a Sierra module.

I also saw a few recent posts about people on Verizon with an EP06-A suddenly not being able to connect, and speculation that Verizon might be "cracking down" on people using that model to connect to their network. I have no idea how much credibility to lend the assertion, but it did have me worried. This is also why I want to source from The Wireless Haven. These guys seem pretty respectable, and I'm not as worried about getting something with a blacklisted IMEI.

And then there is band 71. I want to leave the T-mobile option open, as these bandwidth resellers are all a bit sketchy, some more than others. Because of the chance that I might get cut off at some random point, I want to make sure I'm not limited if I have to go searching for another plan. I live in a heavily forested rural area, so if I do have to switch to a T-mo based provider in the future, I'll have access to that sweet sweet tree-penetrating 600mhz signal.

The first is all the lte routers have subpar wifi so just get an 826 and use your own router for wifi via ethernet.

I already have an AmpliFi Mesh that I'm using so I figured I would just keep using that for my Wifi needs.

One last footnote... The 826 models only have 10/100 ethernet so if you use a separate wifi router with the 826 that will be a possible limiting factor.

I hadn't even considered that, but I would be so so thrilled if 100 mbps ethernet was my limiting factor I just figured I would go with the 826 as it's a tried and true option that will be easy to get some help with down the road if I need it.

Also, for the antenna I was thinking about the ProxiCast polarized MIMO panel. I would go with the The Wireless Haven 15 dbi MIMO panel, but alas, they're out of stock.

Thanks for taking the time to respond and help me think things out. Please let me know if any of my logic is flawed. This is a great community, and I've learned so much from the countless hours I've spent pouring through posts on this forum.

[Adm1jtg]

You do bring up some good points many of which I had considered myself. I had also started with a mofi, a mofi sim4 as I knew right off I wanted to mess with carrier aggregation even though mofi support tried to convince me it really wasnt useful as most of their customers bandlocked to a single band. i had the mofi less then 30 days as their support was subpar and their equipment overpriced. I quickly realized I could make my own that would be better and cheaper.

So what setup did I end up with. As I suggested to you I got the EP06-A. It is literally like combining the modem from the sim7 and the sim4 and getting all the benefits of both. Aka band 66 suport AND 2x carrier aggregation. As you pointed out it does NOT suport band 71. For me this was a non issue as my ONLY choices are att or verizon. There is absolutely no coverage for miles with tmobile/sprint. That said the newest Sierra would help you futureproof, kind of, but,
1) your paying a lot more for a band you may never use. Personally I would buy the EP06-A and if i later found I needed band 71 just replace the modem with one that supports it. Band 71 is new so the modems that support it are expensive, I would expect that to change as more of the modems that support band 71 hit the market

The other problem to consider with band 71 is that most antennas dont support band 71. They start at 700 and go up or in the case of some of the higher end mimo anetnnas start at 1700. Thus even if you futureproofed with the modem unless you change all your choices for antennas as well you woudnt be able to utilize band 71 anyway.

Lastly your cant really talk about futureproofing without talking about 5g. None of these solutions would help with 5g

Your concerns about quectel vs Sierra. As far as support and finding commands and all I really havent had an issue at all. The EP06 and its lesser version the EC25 (which btw is what you have in your sim7) are very well supported. There is a spreadsheet for bandlocking commands on this forum as well. Just be sure you get the one for quectel as there is one for sierra as well and they are not the same.

As far as the compatability with verizon, yes I am VERY aware of the issues but they have nothing to do with the modem. In my case its about the dhcp from verizon not renewing properly. For others its about not whitelisting the IMEI and verizon doesnt like having devives on their network that isnt whitelisted. BTW I have saeen all sorts of issues like this with ATT as well its just part of the game we play and again these are pretty hardware agnostic.

One last comment should you decide you want to "refresh" you IMEI its is tremendously easier to do on a quectel then a Sierra

[Actinidia_arguta]

Thanks for the detailed response. You raise some VERY good points.

The other problem to consider with band 71 is that most antennas dont support band 71. They start at 700 and go up or in the case of some of the higher end mimo anetnnas start at 1700. Thus even if you futureproofed with the modem unless you change all your choices for antennas as well you woudnt be able to utilize band 71 anyway.

I haven't even considered antenna support for band 71. That definitely makes me reconsider the importance of modem support for it. Fortunately, I have Verizon, AT&T, T-mo, and Sprint towers all in the same direction, where 2 US highways intersect. Verizon defintely has the best coverage though, and I have 3 of their towers 6-7 miles away, within a 60 degree cone. So I'll forget about band 71 for now, and hope it doesn't become relevant.

Your concerns about quectel vs Sierra. As far as support and finding commands and all I really havent had an issue at all. The EP06 and its lesser version the EC25 (which btw is what you have in your sim7) are very well supported. There is a spreadsheet for bandlocking commands on this forum as well. Just be sure you get the one for quectel as there is one for sierra as well and they are not the same.

I did find a copy of the EP06 AT command PDF, when searching for EC25 AT commands several days ago. I figured the basic commands were likely to be the same. Unfortunately my MoFi won't let me use the WebShell and SSH via PuTTY keeps timing out on me before I'm able to do anything. I'm 99% sure my MoFi has a hardware error though, due to error messages I see in the WebUI.

As far as the compatability with verizon, yes I am VERY aware of the issues but they have nothing to do with the modem. In my case its about the dhcp from verizon not renewing properly. For others its about not whitelisting the IMEI and verizon doesnt like having devives on their network that isnt whitelisted. BTW I have saeen all sorts of issues like this with ATT as well its just part of the game we play and again these are pretty hardware agnostic.

Okay, you have convinced me not to fear the Quectel modems. Now I'm also considering the EM12, as it's still $5 less than the EM7411, and very feature rich. No band 71 support, but as you have established, I really shouldn't be concerned about that.

Do you know if The Wireless Haven takes steps to whitelist their modem IMEIs, or how that works?

One last comment should you decide you want to "refresh" you IMEI its is tremendously easier to do on a quectel then a Sierra

I really hope it doesn't come to that, but good point. Thanks again for all the info. Looks like I'm back on the Quectel train, probably an EP06, but the EM12 is tempting.

[Adm1jtg]

[quote=Actinidia_arguta post_id=13114 time=1602455881 user_id=3763]

I did find a copy of the EP06 AT command PDF, when searching for EC25 AT commands several days ago. I figured the basic commands were likely to be the same. Unfortunately my MoFi won't let me use the WebShell and SSH via PuTTY keeps timing out on me before I'm able to do anything. I'm 99% sure my MoFi has a hardware error though, due to error messages I see in the WebUI.

Worst case you could scrap the mofi and re-use the modem inside of it. Just put it into a cheap 826 enclosure. If your using a sim4 it has a Sierra 7455 which is a good modem. Only thing it lacks is band 66 support. If your running a sim7 that has a quectel ec25 which has band 66 support but no carroer aggregation support.

Okay, you have convinced me not to fear the Quectel modems. Now I'm also considering the EM12, as it's still $5 less than the EM7411, and very feature rich. No band 71 support, but as you have established, I really shouldn't be concerned about that.

This is also a great choice but with a few small caveats:
You would need to buy an m2 adaptor as almost all routers except the very newest use the older pcie form factor.
You would need to buy different pigtails (m2 connectors to sma) as opposed to the normal pcie connectors to sma
m2 connectors are tiny in comparison to the pcie connectors and my old eyes would have a lot of trouble connecting them up

Do you know if The Wireless Haven takes steps to whitelist their modem IMEIs, or how that works?
Depends on the plan you have. Usually if you just call into verizon and give them the imei to add to your acount thats all thats needed for the whitelist, however, I have read many reports that it will recognize the device at that point as a hotspot and use only hotspot data. This is fine if you have an unlimited hotspot plan but I currently know of no plans that dont throttle hotspot data after some data point.

Some have been able to use the ttl trick and some have said it didnt work at all. Thus why I mentioned "refreshing" the imei. If you refresh to a valid verizon phone imei, one thats not in use and listed on your account, verizon should see it as the device you got the imei from.

a few more thoughts:
I cannot give you the command to "refresh" your imei as i dont think its allowed on here
TECHNICALLY it could be considered illegal to modify/refresh your imei on any device

If you just dont wanna mess with all the above you could always try visible $40 a month on verizon network, treated like an mnvo (meaning lesser priority then true verizon) but very usable and they dont seem to be implementing the 5mbs cap on tethered data as of right now.

[Actinidia_arguta]

Ok, so I got itchy fingers and pulled the trigger. Figured if I got the order in tonight it might ship tomorrow.

- Quectel EM12-G
- WiFix WE826GO-U
- The Wireless Haven USB3.0 to NGFF M.2 Key B Adapter Enclosure
- x2 MHF4 Female to SMA Female 5in Pigtails
- Proxicast 7-10dBi MIMO panel (from Amazon)
- x2 6ft LMR-400 N Male to SMA Male Cable (from USA Coax/MPD Digital)

I decided on the USB adapter enclosure over the mPCI-E to m.2 adapter so that I can flash the modem firmware myself if needed/wanted. Since I was able to skip the 2.5A power supply too, it was about the same price. I have a 5.3V/2A wall wart and cable from an old Galaxy S4 that I'm going to use as supplemental power. I imagine that should be more than enough on top of the .5A from the router over the USB cable.

LMR-400 is probably overkill on such a short run, but I was messing around with an attenuation calculator and it looks like you can lose a full decibel at 2150mhz over 6ft with a LMR-200, and even more with RG-58/U. I get my best speeds on band 66, so I figured that was a good reference point. ProxiCast antenna will sit in a window for now. I want to mount an external antenna down the road, but I want to put a lot of thought into that first.

Hopefully I won't have a problem swapping the SIM into the new modem. The reseller claims that any device that normally works with Verizon should work with them, and I didn't have any problems getting the MoFi SIM7/EC25-AF to connect so.... fingers crossed. And if I do, I have found the information to do what you mentioned in case it comes to that. My plan is supposed to be unlimited and unthrottled, though I'm sure it's bottom of the barrel in data priority. I can't get any more than 500 kbps on band 13 with a good signal, but band 66 seems uncongested, so it's all good. I still plan on watching my data usage though, because I'm aware that everyone has some sort of cap these days where they'll just cancel your account for excessive usage.

Thanks again for all of your input and guidance. It really is appreciated.

[Actinidia_arguta]

Everything is set up and has been working well for several days now. It wouldn't connect initially, but switching to MBIM mode, setting TTL to 117, and putting in the APN (vzwinternet) did the trick. I'm getting pretty good throughput too, though it varies quite a bit depending on the time of day. My best speed test was 40mbps at 2am, and my worst was 14mbps at 6:30pm. I generally get 17-22mbps during busy evening hours, and 25-35mbps the rest of the time.

I haven't really seen any carrier aggregation though. The very first time it successfully connected it briefly showed B13+B66 in the WiFix UI, before switching over to B66 only with a full 20mhz bandwidth. I've run AT+QCAINFO repeatedly during large test downloads and it only returns "OK". My tower offers B4, B13 & B66. I get garbage speeds on B13 with this plan, and B4 doesn't aggregate with B66, so the only combo I'm really after is B66+B66. I've tried locking the bands to B66 only, and also leaving the bands unlocked. Either way it stays on B66 with no CA. I know there is nothing you can do to force CA, and that it's all up to the tower, but is there anything worth trying to coax it along? My modem has the current A20 firmware, but I believe A17 is the Verizon certified release, so would flashing that be worth a try? Hopefully the tower isn't just refusing to give up a second slot to a low priority reseller account.

And speaking of flashing firmware, how many times can firmware be reflashed before non-volatile memory damage is a concern?

[R1250GSA]

This has been a good thread, and it includes a happy ending.
Although in the boonies, you are doing well.

I don’t see many details about the signal path or signal strength.
Distance from tower? Line of site or terrain in the way?
How high is the antenna? Is it actually outside?
Although a 2x2 MIMO antenna is convenient, it will not maximize your spatial diversity, and you may want higher gain antennas.
What’s your RSSI SNR RSRQ RSRP?
So you still may have more juice to squeeze out of this setup especially since CA has not appeared.

[Actinidia_arguta]

This has been a good thread, and it includes a happy ending.
Although in the boonies, you are doing well.

Oh, for sure. This has already exceeded my expectations, and if this is where it caps out, I'll still be more than happy. But I'm the type to tinker and optimize, so I figure I'll keep at it and see what more I can get out of my connection.

I don’t see many details about the signal path or signal strength.
Distance from tower? Line of site or terrain in the way?
How high is the antenna? Is it actually outside?

Oh right, the important stuff -

- RSRP: -100 to -102 dBm
- RSRQ: -8 to -10 dB
- RSSI: -70 to -74 dBm
- SNR: 12 to 13

The numbers bounce around a little, as you can see, but the range stays the same day after day. I'm in the southern Virginia piedmont, so the terrain is rolling hills and valleys with heavy tree cover. I'm on a ridge and there are several valleys and peaks between the tower and me. I believe I would have LoS on the tower if not for the trees, but I'm not certain. The tower is 6.5 miles away. There is a stand of mature mixed pine/hardwood trees directly behind my house in that direction. The antenna is currently mounted to a pole, with the pole ratchet strapped to a cat scratcher/tree stand in my living room, facing out the window. The bottom of the antenna measures 7ft from outside ground level. This is, of course, a temporary solution. The house is going through some renovations, and I'll be building an addition soon that will block the current signal path. I was thinking of running a pole or tower from the peak of the new addition. The trees around me are pretty tall, so I'm not sure I would ever be able to clear the tree line, but I figure higher is still better. In the mean time I have an old dish antenna mounting pole 12ft off the ground that could be repurposed. Also, an LPDA mounting pole about 18 to 20ft up that may be able to be repurposed. Once I have a permanent mounting location I will invest in a better antenna, probably a grid parabolic MIMO antenna, or just two single antennas. Though I suppose I could mount a MIMO grid parabolic to the cat scratcher... hmmm.

[R1250GSA]

good, the only other thing to consider is a chain saw.