Trees vs. distance

[BitBucket]

Howdy, everyone. Short-time listener, first-time caller with a question that's mostly about signal attenuation.

Rural internet on a mountainside. I have two main choices of LTE towers. Both towers are reported to have more than sufficient bandwidth on cellmapper (I need 10-15MBit/s sustained down, 2-5Mbit/sec sustained up, and 300-400G/month.). We get snow, we get rain, we get Canadian geese.

I can try a TMO B71 cell (cellmapper max -58dBm) directly up the mountain & pointed at me through 1/2 mile of tree trunks (trunks closest to me) and then 1/4 mile of treetops/road clearing. No gear on-hand to try this B71 tower just now.

I can hit a VZW B13 cell (cellmapper max -73dBm ) across the valley pointed right at me through 1/4 mile of treetops (treetops closest to me) and 7 miles of valley. My VZW phone made 12Mbit/s down from this tower standing on the property with 2 bars service.

I imagine choice of plan providers and hardware is academic once I figure out which tower I should try. (Obviously I want to be able to lock to particular frequency bands and cell IDs, if I can). My question is should I be trying the TMO B71 tower through 1/2 mile of treetrunks + 1/4mi treetops, or that VZW B13 tower across 7 miles of valley + 1/4mi treetops?

Thanks!

[Didneywhorl]

Howdy, everyone. Short-time listener, first-time caller with a question that's mostly about signal attenuation.

Love it! Welcome to the sickness....forum!

Rural internet on a mountainside. I have two main choices of LTE towers. Both towers are reported to have more than sufficient bandwidth on cellmapper (I need 10-15MBit/s sustained down, 2-5Mbit/sec sustained up, and 300-400G/month.). We get snow, we get rain, we get Canadian geese.

I can try a TMO B71 cell (cellmapper max -58dBm) directly up the mountain & pointed at me through 1/2 mile of tree trunks (trunks closest to me) and then 1/4 mile of treetops/road clearing. No gear on-hand to try this B71 tower just now.

I can hit a VZW B13 cell (cellmapper max -73dBm ) across the valley pointed right at me through 1/4 mile of treetops (treetops closest to me) and 7 miles of valley. My VZW phone made 12Mbit/s down from this tower standing on the property with 2 bars service.

I imagine choice of plan providers and hardware is academic once I figure out which tower I should try. (Obviously I want to be able to lock to particular frequency bands and cell IDs, if I can). My question is should I be trying the TMO B71 tower through 1/2 mile of treetrunks + 1/4mi treetops, or that VZW B13 tower across 7 miles of valley + 1/4mi treetops?

Thanks!

Depends on wanted performance. B71 penetrates well and travels FAR, but is generally lower in speeds. B13 can travel pretty far, 7 miles isn't hard to deal with, but can likely peter out with enough reflection. But B13 might be much faster, BUT it may be more congested. Hard to say for sure.


Best bet...

whynotboth.jpg