Mobile Broadband Dongle Antennas
in [UK Mobile]
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From: HarpingOn on 30 Jun 2010 07:48 Anyone use one? The reviews on mobilefun are completley polarised. I'm looking at this for a home broadband installation where ADSL is a not-quick option, and had in mind the high gain directional antenna from that site, initialy for an E220, but I'm open to other suggestions. <http://www.mobilefun.co.uk/cat/Mobile-Broadband.htm> I sometimes get HSDPA with the e220 and sometimes WCDMA from O2. Voda only have 2G service for me, 3 is very marginal for any connection. Orange is hopeless. O2 looks like the best bet but I'd like the connection to stablalise on HSDPA if I can. I've seen speed checkers report my O2 mobile broadband speed as 2MBps which I think is quite good. Better than my <1Mbps ADSL anyway. I'm with SKY ADSL so I'd drop that down to the free or very-low-cost option to run long downloads on, and use the mobile BB for teh snappy web browsing. I didn't know if this belonged in uk.t.mobile or uk.t.broadband. Hope it's okay in here! Thanks
From: Theo Markettos on 30 Jun 2010 08:51 HarpingOn <HarpingOn(a)127.0.0.1> wrote: > Anyone use one? The reviews on mobilefun are completley polarised. I'm > looking at this for a home broadband installation where ADSL is a > not-quick option, and had in mind the high gain directional antenna from > that site, initialy for an E220, but I'm open to other suggestions. FWIW I tried a 'wok-tenna' (actually a 'sieve-tenna'): http://www.usbwifi.orconhosting.net.nz/ with an MF627 on Three and didn't see much difference in signal strength. I wasn't able to adjust it very accurately though, and I don't know the lag on the dongle's signal strength meter (AT+CSQ? I think I used, to get the raw stats). I didn't cut a hole in the sieve, just held the dongle in the middle of it. The same sieve does a good job in reflecting wifi transmission in the same location, which puzzles me given the small difference in frequencies. Though the wifi wasn't intended to be a focused beam, just a reflector to stop half the signal power going out the window. The sieve was a small kitchen sieve from Wilkinson for about GBP1.20, IIRC. Might be worth a try anyway, just in case you get some results. Theo
From: Martin Nicholas on 1 Jul 2010 03:29 I use an outdoor omni-directional antenna on my narrowboat roof. Reception is excellent. I'd plump for an omni every time as you then always have a complete choice of base stations. I'd have an external one on the roof as reception won't be disrupted by passing cars/animals/people etc.
From: tony sayer on 1 Jul 2010 04:17 In article <ItXWn.565943$gF5.511201(a)en-nntp-01.am2.easynews.com>, Martin Nicholas <reply-2010(a)mgn.org.uk> scribeth thus >I use an outdoor omni-directional antenna on my narrowboat roof. Reception >is excellent. > >I'd plump for an omni every time as you then always have a complete choice >of base stations. > >I'd have an external one on the roof as reception won't be disrupted by >passing cars/animals/people etc. As long as you either use a very low loss downlead feeder or else whatever gains you make on the aerial are lost in the feeder.. or put the whole thing outside suitably weather proofed and then use a USB cable to carry the signals with.. -- Tony Sayer
From: White Spirit on 1 Jul 2010 12:00
On 30/06/2010 12:48, HarpingOn wrote: > Anyone use one? The reviews on mobilefun are completley polarised. I'm > looking at this for a home broadband installation where ADSL is a > not-quick option, and had in mind the high gain directional antenna from > that site, initialy for an E220, but I'm open to other suggestions. > <http://www.mobilefun.co.uk/cat/Mobile-Broadband.htm> > I sometimes get HSDPA with the e220 and sometimes WCDMA from O2. Voda > only have 2G service for me, 3 is very marginal for any connection. > Orange is hopeless. O2 looks like the best bet but I'd like the > connection to stablalise on HSDPA if I can. I've seen speed checkers > report my O2 mobile broadband speed as 2MBps which I think is quite > good. Better than my <1Mbps ADSL anyway. I'm with SKY ADSL so I'd drop > that down to the free or very-low-cost option to run long downloads on, > and use the mobile BB for teh snappy web browsing. > I didn't know if this belonged in uk.t.mobile or uk.t.broadband. Hope > it's okay in here! It's not just the provider who matters but also the quality of the dongle. I happen to have one with Vodafone (the Huawei K3250) and find that it is unfortunately limited by the power of the antenna, which is less powerful than any mobile telephone I have used. In good signal areas I get very good download speeds but in an area with a weak mobile 'phone signal the device is often useless. Not recommended for rural areas... The good thing is that it works perfectly with Linux :) |