Three UK - 4G Home Broadband - any users here?

[blueg33]

page3 said:

blueg33 said:

IanA2 said:

Which Huawei router, some are better than others.

B535-232

I use a B535-232 and have found it to be excellent.

I don't however use it for routing or wifi, which could be your problem if you do.

I use it for both......

[Murph7355]

blueg33 said:

I have a Three Huawei 4g router I am finding that download speeds vary wildly from <1mbps to 30mbps. Obviously this makes streaming tv and teams calls flakey and annoying.

is there a good way to sort this. Building is listed so I don't really want to install external antenna's with all of the planning consents that go with it. The router is located on the first floor.

Help would be appreciated

Per previous posts...

- try moving the router to different parts of the house : to check whether there are better signal areas in your house (don't assume higher up is necessarily better)
- try connecting directly to it via a LAN cable for a bit : to check if it's actually wifi performance causing you the issues

from there

- try a different provider to see if their coverage is better. IME EE are way better in terms of performance than 3. But that is very likely to vary depending on location. Assuming your router isn't locked to 3, you can get cheap one month sims to test this. When switching sims, retry different spots in the house for coverage
- try a different router. The Huawei B818 is pretty much the "go to" choice on here at the moment

[beko1987]

I did a change!

My contract ended last month, and tbh I was just going to let it run, but new devices are expensive to buy outright...

However, the current device 3 give out is the B535, which is a cat7 rather than cat4, so I hope to see an increase in numbers just from that. A poster further up gave it a good recommendation too (and it'll have a cat5 plugged into it with the wifi off and DHCP server elsewhere on my PiHole with a seperate wireless access point so in theory being rubbish at networking is not a concern)

The better thing is when I called I got told I was a loyal customer (after 2 years, pah!) but she knocked the monthly cost frpm £22.91 to £18 and chucked in a nest mini (woo another one...)

The B535 has 2 SMA ports vs the 311's 1 as well which makes external antenna's easier to find too.

TLDR: Upgraded, paying less and in theory a better device. If it turns out to be rubbish I can keep the current B311 and just save a fiver a month.

[Yabu]

3 24gb pre loaded data sims are on offer at just under £32 for Amazon prime day

[OnaRoll]

blueg33 said:

I have a Three Huawei 4g router I am finding that download speeds vary wildly from <1mbps to 30mbps. Obviously this makes streaming tv and teams calls flakey and annoying.

is there a good way to sort this. Building is listed so I don't really want to install external antenna's with all of the planning consents that go with it. The router is located on the first floor.

Help would be appreciated

Have you tried just setting the router out on a window ledge. Window open and seeing what the signal is like?

If I do that speeds increase dramatically, however I shall be moving my router to another location and I shall put an antenna in though there are antennas that will suction onto the window on the outside and the cables are so thin you can close most windows.

You can also get flat patch leads that allow the window to close.

[beko1987]

TD:DR - The B535 is way better than the B311!

It came at 8.30 which was nice, so after taking the children to school I did the sim swap, thinking it would take a while as the paperwork said... 45 seconds later the internet died... ah!

With a 10am teams call deadline approaching I sat the new 535 on the windowsill, chucked a lan cable to my work laptop and got through the day with 4/5mb speed. Noticed it a bit too, had a whole day of calls and with nothing else connected bar one laptop it got a bit crunchy. but did the job.

After work I went into the loft and swapped them round, then came back downstairs and set it up and plumbed my pihole DNS settings in. This killed the speed stone dead to 1/2mb until I realised I needed to use the WAN/LAN port, where full service was resumed!

What I was most interested in was the difference between the cat3 B311 and cat7 B535. I'd get 17/20mb tops with the old one, however now...


With it sat exactly like this, no more no less, I get



Instant 10mb extra, for £4 less a month, that'll do! TV loads youtube snappier, 4k videos take less to buffer etc, it's lovely! I'm trying to supress the thoughts of "I wonder how nuts a B818 LTE Cat12 would be" for later in the year now, it could be more, alot more. Could also be sod all extra and £200 gone, I'll have a think later in the year.

Also three are giving google nest products away with new orders, which my upgrade was eligible for. I'm sure sharon from bangalore said it was a nest mini which I thought was cool, can stereo pair it with my current one etc but nope, inside the plastic bag (which smashed the crap out of the router box) was a full fat nest audio, which is alot nicer than the nest mini (I use it as a bluetooth speaker for my PC because I don't have anything else and it's leaps ahead of the nest mini. The kids want the mini in their room so who knows what inane rubbish they'll make it say!

Because I'm a massive saddo the B311 will be returned to it's mint original box and kept as a spare for a while just in case/kept forever as I'll forget I have it

[trowelhead]

I'm currently using an EE unlimited 4G plan with Netgear Nighthawk M1 router - it's awesome.

This is in a 3 floor house with no extensions or anything, just the box in the middle floor

Was planning to use it as a stopgap but it's been that good, perfect reliability - runs streaming on 2 TVs plus home office

I've even gamed online using it and it's good enough

I'm considering cancelling the broadband that is due to be installed (not fiber) and just have this for now...

Before i got this i was using my 3 sim tethered to my phone but that was pretty crap.

I'm getting 150-300mb download speed, 20 upload - feels better/more reliable than an expensive virgin fiber did at my last house...

We can't currently get fiber here - and i was quoted speeds max of 60mb i think from a normal BB line so seems pointless for the expense?

Edited by trowelhead on Thursday 24th June 19:21

[Shnozz]

Jumping on this thread but completing on a new place where there is an abundance of fibre providers but also have had Three offer 4G internet for £26 a month.

Its a city centre pad.

I am a technophobe and know very little about these things but is there any case for taking this deal over a fibre connection?

[beko1987]

Crikey I'd be over the moon with 150mb down! I'd not look back after cancelling everything bar the EE contract! (I binned off my sky ADSL many years ago and have WFH'd pretty hard with the 4g, and run my youtube channel perfectly fine, 3/4gb videos take not too long to upload if you set it off and go do something else for 30/40 minutes!

That's part of the appeal to me, mine is limited to 30mb due to my location, but if I moved I could (theoretically) plop it down and have another massive speed increase!

[beko1987]

The sky has brightened up a tad and wow!

[techguyone]

Seeing b818 for £135 on ali Express (dunno if that's a different local one or unlocked though)

I can see 5G once the towers are everywhere, being like the equivalent of cable broadband for the guys in rural areas, those poor fkers suffering 2/3 Mbit currently.

Edited by techguyone on Thursday 24th June 20:13

[trowelhead]

Shnozz said:

Jumping on this thread but completing on a new place where there is an abundance of fibre providers but also have had Three offer 4G internet for £26 a month.

Its a city centre pad.

I am a technophobe and know very little about these things but is there any case for taking this deal over a fibre connection?

Don't you live across 2 countries? Might be nice to just have one internet contract you can take with you if the speeds at both locations are good.

Before i took a contract, i bought a mobile/4G router and tested the speeds/connection for 3 and EE with a PAYG sim and small top up - EE was significantly better for me so went with a full deal with them (£37 a month i think, unlimited)... 3 was perfectly fine but EE was/is insanely fast here for some reason. City centre location i'm sure 3 will be decent

I know nothing about it either, certainly did not think it would be a legit solution to power an entire house and online business comfortably. Happy accident though! I would imagine alot of the reliability / stability is getting a good router as when i tether my phone it's rubbish and constantly times out

Edited by trowelhead on Friday 25th June 07:32

[trowelhead]

beko1987 said:

Crikey I'd be over the moon with 150mb down! I'd not look back after cancelling everything bar the EE contract! (I binned off my sky ADSL many years ago and have WFH'd pretty hard with the 4g, and run my youtube channel perfectly fine, 3/4gb videos take not too long to upload if you set it off and go do something else for 30/40 minutes!

That's part of the appeal to me, mine is limited to 30mb due to my location, but if I moved I could (theoretically) plop it down and have another massive speed increase!

Just emailed the guy who was set to install the broadband and cancelled it - this is where my router blows up and EE cap my data to 1GB a month

[page3]

trowelhead said:

I'm currently using an EE unlimited 4G plan with Netgear Nighthawk M1 router - it's awesome.

This is in a 3 floor house with no extensions or anything, just the box in the middle floor

Was planning to use it as a stopgap but it's been that good, perfect reliability - runs streaming on 2 TVs plus home office

I've even gamed online using it and it's good enough

I'm considering cancelling the broadband that is due to be installed (not fiber) and just have this for now...

Before i got this i was using my 3 sim tethered to my phone but that was pretty crap.

I'm getting 150-300mb download speed, 20 upload - feels better/more reliable than an expensive virgin fiber did at my last house...

We can't currently get fiber here - and i was quoted speeds max of 60mb i think from a normal BB line so seems pointless for the expense?

Edited by trowelhead on Thursday 24th June 19:21

I'm currently using EE 4G as my main and only broadband provider. No FTTP here and HTTC has been severely degraded for over a year now - diagnosed (eventually) to faulty cable going up telegraph pole. OpenReach have still not seen fit to fix it after 12 months, so doubt they ever will now I'm not a customer.

Just beware though - EE do not offer any unlimited plans. Personal is 'fair-usaged' to 600Gb/month and business to 1Tb. This might sound a lot, but for a household it really isn't. We had AppleTV stuck on it's screensaver without realising for 4 days - at a rate of something like 50Gb/day just for the pretty image!

[beko1987]

I'm sat here now thinking I don't need the small network switch in the loft now... Was only up there because I needed 2 LAN ports, and I've got 4 now on the 535...

My Pi-Hole is my DHCP server, would I loose speed to my unraid by using the 535 as a network switch instead of the old but faithful gigabit netgear currently suspended by it's cables? Or just leave it as it is and have the 535 just inject internet into my network?

It's a dark cloudy day here, my 39mb best is currently 23...

[beko1987]

trowelhead said:

Just emailed the guy who was set to install the broadband and cancelled it - this is where my router blows up and EE cap my data to 1GB a month

I can fling you my spare B311 if needed!

I think half the battle is a decent network in general, as per my post above I try and maintain a hands-off approach to the huawei routers, and have them doing as little as possible! The only downtime I've ever had is where it does the annoying thing of falling off the 4g completely and not switching over, needing a quick trip to 192.168.8.1 somewhere to flick over. My ebay jumble of cheap and used networking kit has held up well, partly down to my low needs, if I used the wifi much more the access point would do with an upgrade.

Also means I can have the router as high as I can. It could go another inch before hitting the roof. Have always throught of an external antenna, even more so now I have a device with 2 ports. Could easily mount one to the wall in a good line of sight with a small screw or suction cup to the bedroom window, then feed the cable through a soffit vent that sits bang in the middle then fish it up and plug it in. Every time I look it's a sodding minefield though, poynting something keeps coming up

[trowelhead]

page3 said:

trowelhead said:

I'm currently using an EE unlimited 4G plan with Netgear Nighthawk M1 router - it's awesome.

This is in a 3 floor house with no extensions or anything, just the box in the middle floor

Was planning to use it as a stopgap but it's been that good, perfect reliability - runs streaming on 2 TVs plus home office

I've even gamed online using it and it's good enough

I'm considering cancelling the broadband that is due to be installed (not fiber) and just have this for now...

Before i got this i was using my 3 sim tethered to my phone but that was pretty crap.

I'm getting 150-300mb download speed, 20 upload - feels better/more reliable than an expensive virgin fiber did at my last house...

We can't currently get fiber here - and i was quoted speeds max of 60mb i think from a normal BB line so seems pointless for the expense?

Edited by trowelhead on Thursday 24th June 19:21

I'm currently using EE 4G as my main and only broadband provider. No FTTP here and HTTC has been severely degraded for over a year now - diagnosed (eventually) to faulty cable going up telegraph pole. OpenReach have still not seen fit to fix it after 12 months, so doubt they ever will now I'm not a customer.

Just beware though - EE do not offer any unlimited plans. Personal is 'fair-usaged' to 600Gb/month and business to 1Tb. This might sound a lot, but for a household it really isn't. We had AppleTV stuck on it's screensaver without realising for 4 days - at a rate of something like 50Gb/day just for the pretty image!

Thanks, have you ever crossed that and had issues?

I just checked my router and i've used 340GB in half a month so i must be hovering around that limit... Don't seem to have had any problems at all (yet touchwood) though...

I had no idea that apple TV picture used internet haha i used to leave that on all the time!

[Zoon]

page3 said:

I'm currently using EE 4G as my main and only broadband provider. No FTTP here and HTTC has been severely degraded for over a year now - diagnosed (eventually) to faulty cable going up telegraph pole. OpenReach have still not seen fit to fix it after 12 months, so doubt they ever will now I'm not a customer.

Just beware though - EE do not offer any unlimited plans. Personal is 'fair-usaged' to 600Gb/month and business to 1Tb. This might sound a lot, but for a household it really isn't. We had AppleTV stuck on it's screensaver without realising for 4 days - at a rate of something like 50Gb/day just for the pretty image!

I didn't realise it streamed the screensavers. I thought it downloaded them and updated them once in a while.

[trowelhead]

beko1987 said:

I can fling you my spare B311 if needed!

I think half the battle is a decent network in general, as per my post above I try and maintain a hands-off approach to the huawei routers, and have them doing as little as possible! The only downtime I've ever had is where it does the annoying thing of falling off the 4g completely and not switching over, needing a quick trip to 192.168.8.1 somewhere to flick over. My ebay jumble of cheap and used networking kit has held up well, partly down to my low needs, if I used the wifi much more the access point would do with an upgrade.

Also means I can have the router as high as I can. It could go another inch before hitting the roof. Have always throught of an external antenna, even more so now I have a device with 2 ports. Could easily mount one to the wall in a good line of sight with a small screw or suction cup to the bedroom window, then feed the cable through a soffit vent that sits bang in the middle then fish it up and plug it in. Every time I look it's a sodding minefield though, poynting something keeps coming up

Appreciated, so far so good all seems to be well!

Is it best practice to have the router as high as possible? I haven't tried that....

[beko1987]

trowelhead said:

Appreciated, so far so good all seems to be well!

Is it best practice to have the router as high as possible? I haven't tried that....

No, if you have excellent coverage you could stick it under the stairs. I get fairly rubbish coverage in my house (EE says I don't have any atm on my phone until. I step out the door) but sticking it in the loft gets good signals. If you know where your local mast is you can gravitate to that side and try the positions.