Mobile Citizen / Calyx Internet Service Change 5G Upgrade Required

[Blurb]

Build...
Goldenorb x86 running on an hp tower.
Adaptor type: USB and sim card combo to Sierra Wireless Incorporated EM7455 modem.
Em7455 flashed to generic firmware, now probably quite old firmware as it was a Daniel dude who made a bootable linux distro to help fix weird sierra wireless cards after I posted what I'd suffered through to get mine into generic mode.
APN: r.ispsn
SIM: Taken from the junky Sprint modem 4 years ago an put into my build...
Modem locked to band 26 via modem ATA commands, as I am so remote that was the only band that'd work for me no matter how good my antennas were.

The Question....

So I got the following email from my mobile citizen distributor and I'm hoping that all it'll mean is a sim card swap from the new 5g device they're sending me and a new APN. But I don't really know so I' m asking....


Dear Blurb,

Our internet service will soon be upgrading to 5G and your hotspot device will no longer be supported. If you choose to continue internet service an upgrade will be required. With an upgrade, you will receive a new 5G hotspot free of charge. This offer expires on 28 March.

To upgrade to 5G service and claim your free hotspot follow these steps:

Go to the Special 5G Replacement Hotspot Bundle, add it to your shopping cart (Limit 1), and proceed to checkout,
Login to your existing account and update your shipping and billing information,

If you do not wish to continue internet service, no action is needed.

Thank You.


1) Do I need a new sierra wireless 5g capable modem?
2) Does anyone know what the new APN is going to be, as Tmobile bought Sprint and now they're finally getting around to monkeying up all the bands and such.
3) Am I so far behind the times that there's a readme somewhere to catch me up so I can so much as post an intelligent question?

Regards
Blurb

[gscheb]

Hello think this is a relatable post viewtopic.php?t=3448

[Blurb]

Hmm not getting anywhere with the help of gscheb's suggested post....

In the goldenorb --> modem --> network menu the status forever says connecting but it never does, and debug information never shows that it even tries to, despite the new little T-mobile Franklin modem connecting with full bars. Also, in goldernorb --> modem --> menu the SIM IMSI and ICCID data populate, but the phone number never does, even though it did so automatically with the old Sprint SIM.

Anyway since my bands were locked to Sprint on my goldenorb rig anyway, and I wanted to be sure ipv6 was disabled per the suggested post I went to
modem --> miscellaneous and threw the following AT commands:

ati --> Hello modem, tell me about yourself. So the sierra wireless modem game me it's revision imei.

at!entercnd="A710" --> put me in command mode on the sierra wireless modem..

at+cgdcont=1,"IP","fast.t-mobile.com" --> Set the new APN same as what the new Franklin modem uses. Also set in goldenorb's connection profile.

at!band=00 --> Use all LTE bands, I'll ask, or figure out, the new mask for T-mobiles band 2 and 5 later... Don't think my card can do band 71...

at!custom="IPV6ENABLE",0 --> turn off all IPV6 at the modem itself. Also set in goldernorb web gui per suggested thread.

at!reset --> Cement the new settings in the modem and restart it.

reboot goldenorb

no luck, booooo.

I have my new T-Mobile Sims phone number, so I guess I manually enter it into goldenorb along with a made up SIM name and see if that gets me anywhere.

Nope that didn't work, golden orb cleared the phone number and such I manually put into it. Dooom!

[radec]

@blurb

I have been using the T-Mobile sim no problem. So there is hope!

The phone number doesn't populate anymore for me either.

I have been using b2b.t-mobile.com, fast.t-mobile.com worked for me but seemed to be throttled after a few weeks.

[Didneywhorl]

Most modems I've used on old Sprint plans that are now T-mobile, lately, including the Calyx SIMs, needed the modem imei to match the hotspot the SIM came in. (SierraKeygen bkerler might be a good think to lookup)

You can also give a go at calling Tmobiles BUSINESS support line and tell them your device was destroyed and you need to swap to a new device. Once they ask, Give them the phone number of the SIM and the correct imei of the new device.

No need to tell them anything else. Don't answer questions that aren't asked.

Tmobile has gone heavily to IPV6, but the IP only should work. I think you're just getting a block based on device identity. Sprint always did this. I think it's still going on in the transfer over to Tmo.

Also, assuming you are using the EM7455's "GENERIC" firmware, yes?

Side note for most people reading: I HAVE seen some modems not need this, but stating that by anyone isn't helpful to the OP.

[islander261]

I am dreading the arrival of a new T-mobile SIM card from Calyx. My present setup using the Sprint/Calyx SIM card has worked flawlessly up and down the West coast and across the Northern tier states. I only put the SIM card in the Calyx provided device (Linkzone2) for about 10 min. when I first got it under the closest tower. I am running a MC7411 in an old WE 826 T. The modem is band locked to T-Mobile bands only (2,4,12,66,71, what our local tower has). It never did work well with any of the usual Sprint bands enabled, constant attempts to connect to marginal signals. I get IPV4 and IPV6 addresses in most locations with more than enough speed for our use. We use it at home channel bonded (OpenMPTCProuter on a Rpi 4) to our Starlink for great VOIP and video conferencing. Streaming was a big problem until I installed the latest snapshot release now all is good. I have studied all the B. Kerler stuff and practiced doing the magic to a MC7455 we have as practice for when the T-Mobile SIM arrives.confrencing

[FreeRangeRedneck]

Old SIM / 7565 quit working today. Couldn't get old SIM to work in 7565 or 7455.
Was showing typical band and signal levels, but no data for users.
Is "IMS Reg state: No Srv" bad?

Using new SIM / Frank now at painfully slow speeds.

[radec]

I've had zero issues with the new t-mobile SIMs in four custom devices (not all mine, I help out neighbors). They are all using quectel modems.

I put the new sim in the hotspot that was sent with the sim and let it activate, then with then with the quectel modems I matched device identities, set APN and made sure modem was in 4G only (none of them are 5G). That was it.

I don't know if all those steps are 100% necessary, it's just what seemed to work for me.

[FreeRangeRedneck]

FW and ID in 7455 have been updated. APN updated. Back online with new SIM on B2. GSTATUS looks good on B41, but no data. Tried some different APNs.

[Didneywhorl]

Router firmware is the latest? The SIMs are on IPV6 only and only the latest router firmware seems to handle it.

[melaniedyoung]

I think you need to enable IPv6

at!custom="IPV6ENABLE",1

[Jaybuds]

I am also haviing the same problem, Calyx cut off my old Sprint sim so I called Tmobile and they said these "new" sims from Calyx are sprint numbers on Tmobile cards. The lady explained that the IMEI to connect to TMobile towers requires matching IMEI from the device the sim was shipped with. So I looked into the python program and I got it running but I cant enter commands into it to get the proper keygen for the MC7455. Anybody have luck "repairing" the IMEI for the 7455?

[islander261]

The instructions for repairing a MC7455 can be found on this site using the tools created by B.Kerler on his EDL git page. I had to place my MC7455 in a USB sled that was connected to my PC to make it work. It would not work for me with the modem in the router. This probably easier if you are using a Linux PC. Still waiting for the new dreaded T-mobile SIM card.

[radec]

The instructions for repairing a MC7455 can be found on this site using the tools created by B.Kerler on his EDL git page. I had to place my MC7455 in a USB sled that was connected to my PC to make it work. It would not work for me with the modem in the router. This probably easier if you are using a Linux PC. Still waiting for the new dreaded T-mobile SIM card.

I wouldn't worry about the t-mobile sim card. I got it a month or more ago, I saw a slight improvement in speed and that was about it. I think that was mostly tower related though. I've helped several local friends switch to the T-mobile sim card and none of them have had any issues either.

[Blurb]

Thanks all,

I deliberately attempted to abandon this thread once I knew what was involved with IMEI repair. But well, it looks like it grew anyway.

@radec: Yes Quectel Modems are dead simple, indeed atrociously easy, to make "repairs on the IMEI with." So much so, that I was considering buying one of those and selling the em7455.

@ jaybuds --> https://wirelessjoint.com/viewtopic.php?t=696&start=10
The IMEI repair commands are also documented in the "sierra wireless AT command reference datasheet". Oddly, the IMEI LUHN example given by Billa may have been deliberately flawed, as that IMEI example was only 14 numerals, rather than 15, like all the IMEI's I've ever seen, making the 0 padding a bit confusing. Though it's possible there were/are only 14 numbers in some cases.

Now then, on Sierra wireless cards, in order to make the IMEI repair commands work the card must be put into engineering mode, unlike Quectel. Thus (SierraKeygen bkerler might be a good think to lookup), which Didneywhorl had gotten around to saying in other threads around here and then finally in this one. I suppose he/she did as much because they are awesome, or perhaps had thought I'd given up and needed the help, when in fact I talk too much and was just trying to let the thread die. But since I'm at it now, this was the biggest pain in the tail for me, mostly because I despise github(Micr0sucks), and also because I don't think I really understand the whole thought process behind repositories. On the one hand, you're told that if you download the entire repository then you have all you need to use whatever is in it; which almost always turns out to be a lie, because you're supposed to know enough about the build/runtime environment for said repository that such thing are not a hangup. Well it's always is a hangup though, ya it is. Furthermore, bkerler, God bless em' for the contributions to the craft, decided not to include the needed keygen in his Linux Live OS download, while also seemingly hiding the python script in the repository among other things that I had no interest in. So in the end I altered the squashfs file system of bkerler's downloadable Distro to include the generator, and fortuitously all the python dependencies were already met. Also, bkerler's first Sierrakeygen was written in C++ and was Windows based, though old. And finally I found there was a bug in my version of goldenorb resulting in the commands that I sent to the modem being sent twice. So ya, I had to abandon that, and putty also failed, so I ended up using the screen command, as I lost that terminal program I made years ago and have moved all my computers to Linux. Well, I've probably already said too much about that....

Bands 2,4,25,and 26 all work for me with band 26 and 4 being the best. Unfortunately, despite much closer cell towers, the speeds suck compared to what I had with Sprint and I need a little different antenna's to work better at the higher frequency bands, 2,4, and 25, as Tmobile doesn't seem to like to let my modem stay on on band 26 for long before trying to shift the modem off of it.

@ FreeRangeRedneck I also connect on band 41, but no internet, which I assumed was due to band 41 being 5g only while my modem's only 4g capable. However, I'm still on an old version of goldenorb, and my em7455 firmware is way old. I've just hated to mess with what's working now that it works at all.

And so, that leaves me with what Didneywhorl, melaniedyoung, and Radec have said.
Router firmware is the latest? The SIMs are on IPV6 only and only the latest router firmware seems to handle it, and try the other APN's.

Do you all know if the latest firmware's and ipv6 only fixes band 41? And is DanielWoods script still the way to go for updating modem firmware?

Compliments
Blurb

[Blurb]

@ jaybuds

Just realized I didn't actually answer your question.
The repositories sierrakeygen read me demonstrates the the software's usage.

if you just type in python3 sierrakeygen.py
Then the script itself will tell you what you need to give it.

[FreeRangeRedneck]

--- 3 weeks later ---
After getting some B2 on the new SIM with old router firmware, I went away for a while. A few days ago, I flashed a different router to the latest firmware. (I have two modems and enough hardware for two different systems. So the fam won't go ballistic during my testing / fails ... ) B2 still worked with the new router FW and new modem FW. There are a few weak B2s and one good B2 around so I was resetting until the modem connected to the good B2. Still with IPV6ENABLE on 0 though. I tried B41 a couple of days ago, and B41 works now. Still with IPVi6ENABLE on 0. That's the current setup. A while back 3xCA was working on B41, and then a shorter while back 2xCA was working on B41. But now, no CA. I'm on generic FW. I'm on default omni antennas now, but setting up a 2xMIMO panel. Also prepping 7565 to explore B66. Stay tuned. I haven't had any data with any IPV6 tests.