I'm new, looking for help in choosing antenna and 4G modem/router
Posted: Fri May 22, 2020 3:19 pm
Hi,
I'm new to this whole topic, so sorry I have a lot of questions.. I'm in a rural area in Spain, and have good signal from a single tower from Movistar, and want to buy a modem/router/antenna set up that will give me the most reliability and speed.
From reading wikipedia (https://wirelessjoint.com/posting.php?mode=post&f=24), I figured that Movistar has b3, b7, b20. From field test in an iPhone 11 and 8, it seems it's using b20 as primary carrier with 5Mhz (I think) bw, and doing CA with b3 (20Mhz). iPhone 11 has 4x4 MIMO. This all seems consistent with max speed I observe and what https://www.cellmapper.net/4G-speed predicts.
That wiki page says that 20Mhz CA corresponds to Cat 4, and 40Mhz CA corresponds to Cat 6.. So I suppose the tower has only support for Cat6. I'm not sure if that makes sense. Apparently 4x4 MIMO is only compatible with Cat 6 and above? And 4x4 of iphone 11 defo has a noticable difference. One question I have is would 8x8 MIMO result in higher speeds in my situation?
I think an antenna may help me, but I want advice there too. There are two reasons it could help I think: one the higher SNIR could allow the device to use 256QAM (33% speed boost), the other is that it could maybe use the B7 band and do 3-carrier CA, if the B7 band is actually there, but getting attenuated because of its high frequency..
The other thing is that the internet speed seems to fluctuate a lot. Sometimes, it seems to go down (completely or to very slow speed) for a few seconds or minutes. I have no idea why. Maybe an antenna and/or better general setup would make it more stable/reliable? Atm I'm using the iPhone 8 as hotspot.
Am I right in thee abov two points, and would an antenna be therefore worth it?
Given the above, I think I definitely want at least a 4x4 MIMO modem/router (e.g. https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B073VBYFL5), but maybe 8x8. However, all 4x4 MIMO modem I find only two SAM/TS-9 connections. Does this mean that if using the external antenas, the modem could only operate in 2x2 MIMO? I have seen some 4x4 MIMO antennas, but they have 4 SMA connectors, so I assumed I needed a modem with 4 connections, but I can't find any!
Am I correct in my thinking? In anyway, what modem/router/antennas would you guys recommend given all the above that could give the highest speed and reliability? Also taking into account I don't have infinite budget. I'm thinking of <= 300 dollars/euros; would only go above if really worth it.
I am also thinking maybe getting two routers and antenna systems, each with a different SIM card. I think if I separate them enough, it could give approximately twice the effective speed (if I combined the connections somehow) ?
Many thanks for any help ^^
I'm new to this whole topic, so sorry I have a lot of questions.. I'm in a rural area in Spain, and have good signal from a single tower from Movistar, and want to buy a modem/router/antenna set up that will give me the most reliability and speed.
From reading wikipedia (https://wirelessjoint.com/posting.php?mode=post&f=24), I figured that Movistar has b3, b7, b20. From field test in an iPhone 11 and 8, it seems it's using b20 as primary carrier with 5Mhz (I think) bw, and doing CA with b3 (20Mhz). iPhone 11 has 4x4 MIMO. This all seems consistent with max speed I observe and what https://www.cellmapper.net/4G-speed predicts.
That wiki page says that 20Mhz CA corresponds to Cat 4, and 40Mhz CA corresponds to Cat 6.. So I suppose the tower has only support for Cat6. I'm not sure if that makes sense. Apparently 4x4 MIMO is only compatible with Cat 6 and above? And 4x4 of iphone 11 defo has a noticable difference. One question I have is would 8x8 MIMO result in higher speeds in my situation?
I think an antenna may help me, but I want advice there too. There are two reasons it could help I think: one the higher SNIR could allow the device to use 256QAM (33% speed boost), the other is that it could maybe use the B7 band and do 3-carrier CA, if the B7 band is actually there, but getting attenuated because of its high frequency..
The other thing is that the internet speed seems to fluctuate a lot. Sometimes, it seems to go down (completely or to very slow speed) for a few seconds or minutes. I have no idea why. Maybe an antenna and/or better general setup would make it more stable/reliable? Atm I'm using the iPhone 8 as hotspot.
Am I right in thee abov two points, and would an antenna be therefore worth it?
Given the above, I think I definitely want at least a 4x4 MIMO modem/router (e.g. https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B073VBYFL5), but maybe 8x8. However, all 4x4 MIMO modem I find only two SAM/TS-9 connections. Does this mean that if using the external antenas, the modem could only operate in 2x2 MIMO? I have seen some 4x4 MIMO antennas, but they have 4 SMA connectors, so I assumed I needed a modem with 4 connections, but I can't find any!
Am I correct in my thinking? In anyway, what modem/router/antennas would you guys recommend given all the above that could give the highest speed and reliability? Also taking into account I don't have infinite budget. I'm thinking of <= 300 dollars/euros; would only go above if really worth it.
I am also thinking maybe getting two routers and antenna systems, each with a different SIM card. I think if I separate them enough, it could give approximately twice the effective speed (if I combined the connections somehow) ?
Many thanks for any help ^^