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Thread: 4g Signal strength Issue

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    Default 4g Signal strength Issue

    Living in metro Melbourne you would think internet (4G) would be available but alas not always so.
    We are approximately 1.5km as the crow flies from a tower (telstra) yes there is some minor topography
    blocking a full visual.

    On my Netgear modem I cant get any more than 1 to 2 bars of signal strength. and speeds vary.
    No rhyme or reason as in time of day just all over the shop.

    Is there something I can do to enhance my signal strength ? or I am I not understanding something?

    We dont do cabled internet due to frequently travelling.



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    Default

    You may be able to get better signal with outdoor antenna.

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    bongo (19-02-20)

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    Default

    +1 for the outdoor (roof-mounted) antenna.

    Cabled is best, but a passive repeater using the outdoor antenna connected to an antenna indoors often works.

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    bongo (19-02-20)

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    There are a couple of things you can do.
    The simplest is to move the modem to somewhere where there is a better signal and then run wired ethernet in to the area you want.

    External antennas, you can do these two ways. The first is to have a high gain external antenna pointed at the RBS and a small omni inside connected together.
    This is a passive repeater or beam bender. It works but it's not the best option.

    An external antenna plugged directly into your 4G modem is better. Less signal loss, but rather than use a high gain directional antenna, I would recommend that you use an omni antenna. The best signal is not always the strongest or the nearest.

    Better still is if you modem has two antenna ports for full MIMO. (or at least space diversity or MISO). Try and get the two antennas more than 2m apart and at slightly different heights.

    There is also an active repeater system you can buy. There are legal ones which will cost you a pretty penny and then there are the cheap and nasty chinese ones.
    I would normally say avoid the chinese ones, but the price of the legal units just makes the chinese ones viable. If you set them up with the same scenario as the passive repeater making it active. They do cause interference to the mobile networks and yes they can find you, but there are just so many of them out there the telcos resort to just chasing the worst cases. The easiest way to avoid getting caught is turn it off when your not using it. Pretty simple.

    The best antennas for the job. If you can get your hands on an old mobile phone omni antenna, they are the ducks guts. Though they are big. About 3m long.
    Normally they are down tilted by a couple of degrees, so if you can get an old inverted omni.... they work really well for 700-900MHz.

    4G signals for Telstra are 1800, 700, 2600MHz and they will hand off in that order. If you can get a 2600MHz signal, then try and force your modem to use that band as there is often less traffic on it. What isn't too surprising is that some UHF TV antennas work really well for 700MHz 4G. Else the antennas designed for cars work fine.

    The real advantage comes with space diversity antennas, having more than one on your modem.
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    Keith (30-03-20)

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    Default

    Have you tried using a ? It's not really expensive and it helped me with my issue, the signal is decent now.

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