Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

My contract with Virgin broadmand is nearly up and I'm thinking of using a router with a SIM slot instead. Has anyone had any experience with this instead of regular broadband? There seem to be some good SIM only deals with 'good' speeds and unlimited data at the moment, but could I use this to say, stream 4K Netflix? Sorry if this is the wrong place to ask...

Thanks chooks.

Re: Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

:wavey:

I used a 4G setup for a couple of years. It can work well but it’s a minefield. Lots of things to get right, beginning with finding the service provider with the best local signal, whether or not they’re the cheapest. I have seen an entire rural community 4G broadband trial fail spectacularly because they got this most basic requirement wrong at the outset.

So don’t start by looking at deals, start by thoroughly researching your local signal environment. You’re going to be placing a modem/router wherever the best 4G signal is in your house, and if you’re stuck with universally meh service from all providers you’re going to be adding an external antenna whose flylead must not be more than 5 metres long.

If you’re up for it I can probably answer most of your questions but I’m off out just now - happy to post more later if you want.

Re: Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

Thanks Chris, yeah, some advice would be greatly appreciated. I'm currently looking at some router reviews and also coverage quality for various networks. I'll no doubt have some questions for you!

Re: Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

No worries … have a look at cellmapper.net (desktop browser is best) and ask if you need help with it. It’s a tad fiddly but has tons of information on your local cell coverage.

Re: Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

+1 to all Chris has said.

I’ve set up a 4G connection for a family member during lockdown since they had no broadband at all and a caravan set up for another family member. It’s possible that you might have to use the modem/router to override the automatic signal search as well, as it might latch into a stronger signal from a slower mast. Some allow you to lock to specific masts or bands.

I’m considering moving to 5G from Three when my Virgin deal is up I’ve got a mi-fi that gets me 200-500 meg I assume based on congestion.

Also happy to assist.

Re: Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

I tried that site, and got this ;

Re: Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

If you click okay the site should still work. Assuming you are also blocking your location it starts off at a point in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean so you need to zoom out to find some land then can zoom back in to wherever you need.

The menu at the side will let you filter by network/band.

Re: Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

More and more common these days.

The free version of the site is more than adequate for selecting and setting up a provider and equipment for 4G home internet and the adverts on the site are hardly offensive.

---------- Post added at 18:33 ---------- Previous post was at 18:14 ----------

We installed 4G internet at church earlier this year. I asked the installer to research 5G modems but they’re still a lot more expensive than 4G ones, there’s a lot less choice, and to be honest they’re not always quicker. Most cell towers in most urban locations will allow channel bonding, as long as the modem supports it. A single 4G channel maxes out at 150Mbps down, 50Mbps up. We are normally able to get 2 channels off our local mast so on a good day we can get close to 300/100. The only way 4G really falls down compared to 5G is capacity. If you’re in an area where a lot of people are using the same tower then the available speed will drop considerably. Our previous house was a tourist hotspot; we got it during lockdown and it was brilliant, but when everything opened up again, come the summer holidays our speeds would really suffer.

At church we tend to see 60-70 down, 30 up during the week, but we only really hammer it on Sundays when we live-stream the church service and town is quiet then, so it zips along and we provide 1080HD at ultra-low latency.

Re: Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

I was wondering if someone could step by step walk me through how I can check whether 4G is going to be better than wired broadband for our new home? We're being quoted extortionate prices for an average of 10mbps with only BT or Shell as the available providers. I got a Three home broadband kit for our last place that is 2 minutes down the road as they said they didn't offer it at our new address. My plan is to test it out to see if we can get useable speeds - however I'm getting really variable speeds, from 23mbps download at best to 1 at worst, leaving the router in exactly the same spot! Apart from streaming services, mainly on one TV, we don't do anything else that requires huge speed.

Re: Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

The only way to know for sure is to use it.

A website like cellmapper.net can tell you where all the local cell masts are which will give you an idea what sort of signal strength to expect. That information should inform your decision about which network to go with and where to place the modem/router for best signal reception.

However, with 4G a major determining factor is how many users are on the same cell as you at the same time. A single 4G channel is capable of 150mbps download and 50mbps upload but you will only see that speed with a very good signal and not many other people also using the cell at the same time.

If your speeds are highly variable then there are a couple of potential factors at play. First, weak signal. If they refused to offer you service at your new address it is because their coverage model is telling them not to. That’s not to say you won’t be able to make it work, but it is marginal enough to be susceptible to interference. Second, if the speed drops at a particular time of day, then you’re suffering from movement of Three subscribers into or out of your area. If you’re close to a town centre or industrial estate where people work you will see a dip during the working day. If you’re near a popular night spot it will be constrained in the evening. I used to use mine in a remote rural location with lots of campsites and caravan parks so it would drop to a crawl every evening for 8 weeks in the summer.

If you’re determined to stick with 4G the first thing I’d say is ditch Three. If even they don’t want to provide your service there’s no merit in sticking with them. Try out a couple of PAYG SIMs from different networks, based on what you discover at cellmapper.net. The golden rule with 4G internet is you go with the network with best coverage, not the cheapest deal.

And on that final point, *do not* ever sign up to a data SIM contract with any supplier. They will always charge you more for a data-only contract than you can get with a phone contract that has data included. Get a SIM-only phone contract and put the SIM in a 4G router. You are legally allowed to do this due to a market/competition court ruling from several years ago. The mobile service providers would prefer you not to do it but they can’t stop you.

Re: Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

It might also be worth checking (assuming the router allows) what mast(s) it is connecting to. If you are in variable signal it might be switching between slower masts with better signal, and faster masts with lower signal strength. Depending on what frequencies these operate on it could grind to a halt.

If it's always the same masts despite the speed variation then as Chris says it's more likely to be congestion.

It might be worth trying out some of the SIMs from the virtual operators. Lebara use Vodafone, and currently are offering an unlimited data SIM for £9.99 a month for 3 months (no minimum contract). Lyca Mobile use EE, and are doing the same for £8.99 for 3 months (500GB fair use policy, and again no minimum term).

Both would offer ample data for speed testing at various times of the day and night.

Re: Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

I know my post won't help but if I was moving to a new location the first thing I would check is how good or bad internet connectivity is, and if it was next to useless I would avoid if possible.

Re: Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

Unfortunately the move is due to work, so not able to decide where.

This is all really useful information. Thank you all! We are in quite an urban area, and not too far from the station. I'll have a look at the patterns.

Does that mean I could potentially use my current phone SIM in the router to test it on Vodafone?

Re: Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

Any SIM you have, and speeds you experience on a phone (assuming it’s not on 5G) you could reasonably expect from a 4G router. If you have friends or family members on other networks as a sniff test you could see what they get - it’s not necessarily definitive for a number of reasons but it gives a sense of who has infrastructure in the area.

Re: Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

Yes, *but* there are a couple of caveats.

1. If you have an iPhone there’s a risk that Apple’s servers will deregister your SIM if you use it in a non-Apple device. This will lock you out of iMessage and Find My for a time; while it should correct itself fairly quickly I have heard of people needing help from Apple to restore it.

2. If the SIM bay in your router is not the same size as the one in your phone you will need an adapter - either to put it in the larger SIM bay in your router, or if your router requires the smallest size and you have to push out the plastic surround you would then need an adapter to get it back into your phone.

Neither of these is a deal breaker, but just be aware you can cause yourself complications.

Before you take any physical actions in the real world, use cellmapper.net to establish which, in theory, is the network with the strongest, most local coverage.

Re: Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

I feel like I've learnt more from this thread than I have in a week of researching by myself. Thank you so much!

Re: Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

Regarding cellmapper, what am I looking for to see which providers might have the best coverage? Is it just the areas covered by the cells?

For example, it looks like our property falls under the cells of 2 different Three towers but none of the other providers on the map.

Re: Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

Are you selecting 3 UK as a provider? If so, you need to change that to Vodafone, EE and O2 to see what those operators have in your area. Under network pick “4G LTE”.

At this point it’s probably worth knowing what providers are the closest masts in your area and what bands they are using.

You could also try putting the router next to a window in the direction of the masts you do know about with Three.

Re: Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

Yes I've gone through each provider on cellmapper. They all have towers nearby but the cells on the map don't fall over us, except for Three. Looking at these towers, I think our router is in the best window already for Three.

Re: Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

Smarty on Three has unlimited for £16 a month for a year

Re: Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

Might be worth checking that against the O2, Vodafone and EE coverage checkers to see if they claim to offer 4G indoor coverage at your postcode.

Re: Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

If Three really is the best local network, there are things you can do to improve reception. You can add an external antenna to your router if it supports one (is there a pair of small copper terminals on the back?). This can make a dramatic difference to your speeds if you buy the right antenna and place it carefully.

Before that however, if you can. I’d try your voda SIM in it just to see what happens. And after that you should spend a couple of days doing regular speed tests to see if your speed is constrained by time of day due to local congestion. This will help give you a baseline of performance to improve against.

Re: Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

I've been looking into this and the equipment selection was quite key for me, 5G is massively overpriced and realistically 4G can deliver the speeds at a fraction of the cost. I already have a pfsense setup at home so I bought a second hand Microtik dish off a mate and used it as failover when I was having lots of VM issues, mounted inside but could go outside it works more than good enough for me.

I already had an EE sim, O2 was poor so bought a Smarty unlimted sim for peanuts and have been using that.

Equipment and operator and even the building can make the difference, someone at work bought a 5G Zyxel thing which was used as a modem with an O2 sim in, mast less than 100m away in a pre fab building, luckily if we got 80mb, yet outside got far more. Been running that temporarly for 6 weeks only issue we had with 40 users on was the upload was so poor the network was shocking and dropped the VPN (double NAT probably didn't help in some instances).

For Joe Public at home its more than enough if you have the right provider, I did look at Pepwave routers which are not cheap but you can put miltiple sims in, often used in vehicles for travelling but have other features, in my setup at home I use VM and a SIM.

I will be doing some more testing on this in a few weeks as I am just about to redeploy the 5G at work to another site whilist the main connection is been installed then it will be back for site failures so will have time to play and tweak a bit more.

Have a look at YouTube on those who live in campers and their setups, some even use Peplink with SIM's in, connect to site WiFi through the router when on sites and some even add Starlink into the equation.

Re: Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

4G speeds are definitely more than adequate especially if your modem can bond multiple channels. In theory my Huawei can achieve better than gigabit downloads. However, the real constraint with 4G isn’t speed, its capacity. For starters the service provider gets to decide whether each cell will permit channel bonding; most in urban areas do but by no means all. Then you will find in busy areas speed will drop at certain times of day. 4G can become totally unusable when the local cell is exceptionally busy, even if you can get 150/50 off it at midnight on a Tuesday.

Various things could be impacting your speeds from that cell even though you can see it. There could be cables in the walls causing interference or as its a prefab there could be a lot of metal in the frame creating a faraday cage effect. It’s also possible that the cell is highly directional, intended for fill-in service to a specific blackspot, and you’re on the fringe of the area it’s aimed at. An external aerial makes all the difference in marginal situations.

Re: Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

And my 4G speeds at home are a super fast 2.22Mbps Down and 0.44Mbps Up.

Re: Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

Are you talking about your phone or a 4G modem?

Re: Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

Phone, is there a difference in signal strength?

Re: Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

Quite markedly, yes. A modem even on just its own internal aerial will get better reception than a phone and if you put an external antenna on it it can be much, much quicker.

The maximum speed of a single 4G data channel is 150mbps download, 50mbps upload. 2.2 down, 0.4 up really isn’t very quick at all.

Re: Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

I considered this before I went into care as it was the cheapest option (before I clarified that the care home had WiFi).

I don't know if any of the others had this clause, but it did say that it must not be used in place of a fixed broadband connection and that action would be taken if this was found to be the case.

Re: Using a SIM instead of standard broadband
 

It’s illegal for them to stipulate that. EU net neutrality laws which have been retained in UK law state that mobile providers are not allowed to tell you what you can and cannot put your SIM in once you have it. You can take out a phone contract and legally put it in a 4G modem. If Smarty does take ‘action’ then you have a valid compliant to put to Ofcom.