BT Wholehome Discs with 4G

[ChrisHeathcote]

I was wondering if anyone is able to help. Where we live is limited to 2/3 mb/s due to not having either fibre or virgin, this means that our only hope for 21st century internet speeds is 4G, however our house has a couple of WiFi black spots. I have fixed these with BT Wholehome WiFi discs (connected to normal broadband) but does anyone know if the discs can be used with a 4G router? I have tried with the HUAWEI AI Cube from Three but this doesn’t work.

Thanks in advance for any advice

 

[Furtim]

I don't see why it wouldn't. We're in the same situation, I have BT Broadband and 5 disks (bought separately though, not part of their latest router). In my setup, one disk is the master and this needs an ethernet connection from the router - it might be than on the latest BT HUB, the hub itself is the master, and all the disks are 'slaves' though.

I'm looking at the Vodafone Cube for the same reasons but have not pulled the trigger yet. £50 per month for unlimited 4G data doesn't seem that bad if the speeds are reasonable.

 

[ChrisHeathcote]

I’ve got the AI Cube from Three which I get unlimited data for £25, however it won’t connect to the discs as the wan port only works with an incoming internet feed not the other way. I seem to get between 15-30mbs from it.

 

[ChrisHeathcote]

OK, so an update for anyone that may be interested. Mainly because I struggled to find anything on the internet so this might help others.

In the end I bought a Netgear LB2120 from Amazon for about £125, put in my SIM card and it fired up straight away. Plugged in my discs and all was good. The unit itself is showing 3 bars, however I think I might get an external antenna to see if that boosts thing any. I have run a number of speed tests throughout the day and I am 25-30mbps down and around 8mbps up.

Anyway why did I make my choices. After researching many differing modem routers ranging from £50 up to £300, I found that many didn't say that they could be used as a bridge into another router, however the Netgear does have a bridge mode. However now it is connected I haven't found that I needed to change the setting, it worked straight out of the box, so any other router would possibly have worked as long it had LAN ports (not just WAN like the AI Cube). My main criteria was that it needed to have a download speed of at least 150mbps although, given that I only currently get about 40mbps tops, this is probably overkill. As to dual band wi-fi, I decided that this wasn't necessary as it connected to the discs via ethernet and my wifi devices are connected to the discs which are dual band.

So in summary I now have a connection with around 30mbps down (enough for streaming UHD/4K) with a solid wifi signal in all areas of my house. All for £25 per month. Happy days, now just to test the reliability over the coming days.

(@Furtim thought I'd tag you as you mentioned that you were contemplating a similar set-up)

 

[Furtim]

OK, so an update for anyone that may be interested. Mainly because I struggled to find anything on the internet so this might help others.

In the end I bought a Netgear LB2120 from Amazon for about £125, put in my SIM card and it fired up straight away. Plugged in my discs and all was good. The unit itself is showing 3 bars, however I think I might get an external antenna to see if that boosts thing any. I have run a number of speed tests throughout the day and I am 25-30mbps down and around 8mbps up.

Anyway why did I make my choices. After researching many differing modem routers ranging from £50 up to £300, I found that many didn't say that they could be used as a bridge into another router, however the Netgear does have a bridge mode. However now it is connected I haven't found that I needed to change the setting, it worked straight out of the box, so any other router would possibly have worked as long it had LAN ports (not just WAN like the AI Cube). My main criteria was that it needed to have a download speed of at least 150mbps although, given that I only currently get about 40mbps tops, this is probably overkill. As to dual band wi-fi, I decided that this wasn't necessary as it connected to the discs via ethernet and my wifi devices are connected to the discs which are dual band.

So in summary I now have a connection with around 30mbps down (enough for streaming UHD/4K) with a solid wifi signal in all areas of my house. All for £25 per month. Happy days, now just to test the reliability over the coming days.

(@Furtim thought I'd tag you as you mentioned that you were contemplating a similar set-up)

Thanks. Given me a lot of food for thought today!

 

[ChrisHeathcote]

External aerial just ordered, arriving tomorrow. I’ll update once I’ve tested everything out

 

[Furtim]

@ChrisHeathcote Thanks for bringing 'Three' to my attention! £24/month (I only went for the month to month commitment for the moment), and 35-40Mbps down and 25-30Mbps up, which is where I was really looking for the improvement over my 3-4Mbps up on my fixed line. It makes using cloud as a backup realistic as it's around 15 times faster to upload *and* if I keep this 4G broadband 'just for me', it doesn't mess with the kids gaming on the main line.

I went with the Huawei B525 4G router which is certainly overkill for the moment, and the Chinese government probably get a free copy of all my epic pictures too! Looking forward to your feedback on the external antenna as this has the capability to add one (the three 'cube' does not, so I went SIM only and bought router from Amazon).

 

[ChrisHeathcote]

@ChrisHeathcote Thanks for bringing 'Three' to my attention! £24/month (I only went for the month to month commitment for the moment), and 35-40Mbps down and 25-30Mbps up, which is where I was really looking for the improvement over my 3-4Mbps up on my fixed line. It makes using cloud as a backup realistic as it's around 15 times faster to upload *and* if I keep this 4G broadband 'just for me', it doesn't mess with the kids gaming on the main line.

I went with the Huawei B525 4G router which is certainly overkill for the moment, and the Chinese government probably get a free copy of all my epic pictures too! Looking forward to your feedback on the external antenna as this has the capability to add one (the three 'cube' does not, so I went SIM only and bought router from Amazon).

Your welcome, I’ve got the aerial up now and just trying it in different locations to test for the best signal strength. I will certainly update as I find out more (probably after the weekend)

Good call on the router. With hindsight, if I was to go again, I would go sim only and get a separate router, however at the time we,d just moved house with no internet and the lure of built in Alexa appealed. Again it would have been good to know that although it does have a built in speaker it cannot be grouped with other Echo devices for multi room playback. Originally I was looking at the b525 although I read so many differing reports about it being able to switch it to bridge mode, I was put off as I needed to connect to my WiFi discs to get a signal in all rooms

 

[Furtim]

Your welcome, I’ve got the aerial up now and just trying it in different locations to test for the best signal strength. I will certainly update as I find out more (probably after the weekend)

Good call on the router. With hindsight, if I was to go again, I would go sim only and get a separate router, however at the time we,d just moved house with no internet and the lure of built in Alexa appealed. Again it would have been good to know that although it does have a built in speaker it cannot be grouped with other Edho devices for multi room playback. Originally I was looking at the b525 although I read so many differing reports about it being able to switch it to bridge mode, I was put off as I needed to connect to my WiFi discs to get a signal in all rooms

Just this moment given up with it and arranged an return so you may have dodged a bullet! Connected and worked out of the box but randomly would stop connecting to the internet for downloads only, uploads would carry on as normal. Power cycle needed to get it working again.

After hours trying to figure out why and 10 plus ‘dropouts’ I’ve sent the router back :-(

Might try the TP link next!

 

[ChrisHeathcote]

Just this moment given up with it and arranged an return so you may have dodged a bullet! Connected and worked out of the box but randomly would stop connecting to the internet for downloads only, uploads would carry on as normal. Power cycle needed to get it working again.

After hours trying to figure out why and 10 plus ‘dropouts’ I’ve sent the router back :-(

Might try the TP link next!

If your going to be connecting to the BT Wholehome discs, I can recommend the NetgearLB2120. As you will be using the WiFi from the discs , you don’t need the 4g device to have dual band or anything special

 

[ChrisHeathcote]

OK so as promised, an update on how things have been working so far. I will also include links to the products used.

As previously mentioned I decided to purchase the Netgear LB2120 (Link). This was mainly due to it having the ability to switch to "bridge", how much of this was needed I don't know as it worked straight out of the box, without changing any settings. Showing 3 bars with the occasional flutter to 4. Connecting to the discs was simple and I was able to get circa 30mbps however this was now across the entire house. Knowing that this was now functioning and had the ability to attach an external aerial I decided to see how things improved. The items I ordered were: Poynting Aerial (Link) and, as this has SMA connections, I ordered the SMA-TS9 adaptors (Link). However due to the poor quality of the connectors, they kept falling out of the back of the modem. I therefore ordered a different type of adaptor (Link). These arrived bright and early yesterday. Within half an hour the aerial was connected and in place. The Netgear now shows a solid 4 bars, but equally important I was now receiving around 50-60 mbps. Running speed tests today I am getting in excess of 60 mbps consistently, topping out at one point at 80 mbps.

These are all based on the download speed, upload has remained fairly stable at around 15 mbps



@Furtim

 

[Furtim]

OK so as promised, an update on how things have been working so far. I will also include links to the products used.

As previously mentioned I decided to purchase the Netgear LB2120 (Link). This was mainly due to it having the ability to switch to "bridge", how much of this was needed I don't know as it worked straight out of the box, without changing any settings. Showing 3 bars with the occasional flutter to 4. Connecting to the discs was simple and I was able to get circa 30mbps however this was now across the entire house. Knowing that this was now functioning and had the ability to attach an external aerial I decided to see how things improved. The items I ordered were: Poynting Aerial (Link) and, as this has SMA connections, I ordered the SMA-TS9 adaptors (Link). However due to the poor quality of the connectors, they kept falling out of the back of the modem. I therefore ordered a different type of adaptor (Link). These arrived bright and early yesterday. Within half an hour the aerial was connected and in place. The Netgear now shows a solid 4 bars, but equally important I was now receiving around 50-60 mbps. Running speed tests today I am getting in excess of 60 mbps consistently, topping out at one point at 80 mbps.

These are all based on the download speed, upload has remained fairly stable at around 15 mbps



@Furtim

Thanks Chris, very useful information. I'm back to using my iPhone as a temporary measure - still quicker than my wired broadband ( the iPhone is giving 30-40Mbps down and 25Mbps up on BT mobile which is 200Gb for £20, so not unlimited, but it's the data plan I have anyway which eclipses my BT 'Superfast' Broadband) as I could not get the Unlimited 3 SIM to stay connected - it may not have been the router could be a local problem.

What's key for me is Mobile 4G broadband is certainly viable, indeed preferable to the fixed lines - unfortunately there are no plans to install fibre to the premises where we live.

 

[ChrisHeathcote]

Thanks Chris, very useful information. I'm back to using my iPhone as a temporary measure - still quicker than my wired broadband ( the iPhone is giving 30-40Mbps down and 25Mbps up on BT mobile which is 200Gb for £20, so not unlimited, but it's the data plan I have anyway which eclipses my BT 'Superfast' Broadband) as I could not get the Unlimited 3 SIM to stay connected - it may not have been the router could be a local problem.

What's key for me is Mobile 4G broadband is certainly viable, indeed preferable to the fixed lines - unfortunately there are no plans to install fibre to the premises where we live.

We may get FTTC before xmas but, with what I'm getting at the moment, I can't see any reason to change

 

[Furtim]

We may get FTTC before xmas but, with what I'm getting at the moment, I can't see any reason to change

We were one of the first to get FTTC in our area (10+ years ago), and it was great with around 25Mbps down and 5Mbps up, but since then, there's been no improvement, if anything, it gets slower as more people had broadband installed etc.

We're a fairly 'internet' intensive house - Now the kids are older, there are 5 adults in the house, all heavy internet users - the kids in particular think nothing of streaming youtube for music which watching another movie and gaming etc.

Looking at the router logs, the last 13 days stats (since last 'reboot') have been fairly typical:

Connection time:
13 Days, 2 Hours 46 Mins 1 Secs

Data usage:
85 GB Uploaded / 491 GB Downloaded

We can't get a second line as apparently there is no spare copper at the cabinet, so options are limited. Hence the interest!
The only fly in the ointment on 4G might be the ping time - the kids are into online gaming, so need a relatively short ping (we get around 9ms typically on the fixed line).

 

[ChrisHeathcote]

We were one of the first to get FTTC in our area (10+ years ago), and it was great with around 25Mbps down and 5Mbps up, but since then, there's been no improvement, if anything, it gets slower as more people had broadband installed etc.

We're a fairly 'internet' intensive house - Now the kids are older, there are 5 adults in the house, all heavy internet users - the kids in particular think nothing of streaming youtube for music which watching another movie and gaming etc.

Looking at the router logs, the last 13 days stats (since last 'reboot') have been fairly typical:



We can't get a second line as apparently there is no spare copper at the cabinet, so options are limited. Hence the interest!
The only fly in the ointment on 4G might be the ping time - the kids are into online gaming, so need a relatively short ping (we get around 9ms typically on the fixed line).

Our use is mainly streaming and quote often TVs are streaming different things via Netflix/amazon and Sky Q. Mostly streamed in either 4K or HD, so ping speed isn’t overly essential, having checked mine they are typically around 40-60ms

 

[JonathanRyan]

OK so as promised, an update on how things have been working so far. I will also include links to the products used.

As previously mentioned I decided to purchase the Netgear LB2120 (Link). This was mainly due to it having the ability to switch to "bridge", how much of this was needed I don't know as it worked straight out of the box, without changing any settings. Showing 3 bars with the occasional flutter to 4. Connecting to the discs was simple and I was able to get circa 30mbps however this was now across the entire house. Knowing that this was now functioning and had the ability to attach an external aerial I decided to see how things improved. The items I ordered were: Poynting Aerial (Link) and, as this has SMA connections, I ordered the SMA-TS9 adaptors (Link). However due to the poor quality of the connectors, they kept falling out of the back of the modem. I therefore ordered a different type of adaptor (Link). These arrived bright and early yesterday. Within half an hour the aerial was connected and in place. The Netgear now shows a solid 4 bars, but equally important I was now receiving around 50-60 mbps. Running speed tests today I am getting in excess of 60 mbps consistently, topping out at one point at 80 mbps.

These are all based on the download speed, upload has remained fairly stable at around 15 mbps



@Furtim

Thanks for all the updates.

Just to be clear - are you using the 3 SIM in a Netgear modem and getting (much) faster internet than using the 3 sim in 3's modem?

I have the AI Cube and it's fine. But faster would be better

 

[ChrisHeathcote]

Thanks for all the updates.

Just to be clear - are you using the 3 SIM in a Netgear modem and getting (much) faster internet than using the 3 sim in 3's modem?

I have the AI Cube and it's fine. But faster would be better

Yes you are correct although in fairness to the Cube, the biggest difference has been made by the external aerial. I have just run the speed test and got 56mbps. Before I was probably averaging around 20-25mbps.