Cat6 LGH LTE Super bad performance

hgb · Wed Feb 05, 2020 12:26 pm

I think im done trying Mikrotik LTE devices, their performance are worse than you could imagine, with samsung s8 im getting around 60mbps with 4G+ here, and as much as I tried with the LGH CAT 6, The download speed never exeeded 18mbps, this is with aggregation connecting twice at 20mhz and 15 mhz to the cellular tower .

Indoor devices and LTE modems would give way better performance if put in the right place .

Anyone else has the same bad performance ?

SiB · Wed Feb 05, 2020 12:38 pm

First you have LHGR with R11e-LTE6 who have 30° signal focus. Remember that you have got limit at 100MbEthernet port.
I go with my sxtr and lhgr to 600m from bts and do testing with the best signal on few bts's and receive ~95/35-45Mbps as stable speed.

At SXTR I have and test the new beta firmware and this show me that new release candidate v22 give you a boost of speed in aggregation.
One @20Mbps band with good signal can reach more then limitation of FastEthernet port then maybe you should check the speed per every band, check near bts with perfect signal scenario your the best transfers and from that check what is wrong.

hgb · Wed Feb 05, 2020 10:20 pm

Ok First off thank you for your input, and let me explain more about the issue :

The site actually has 3 Mikrotik LTE devices: LHGR Cat6 , SXT Cat 6 Version, and the older SXT LTE device, the Older SXT LTE has been installed a year or more ago, and we have been trying to install the 2 extra new devices Cat6 since yesterday as we "proposed" an upgrade to our customer network for this site and multiple extra sites .. The frustration slap on the face came hard to me when I found out my phone (inside the building) gives triple the speed of the LHGR cat6 and the SXT cat 6 (Mikrotik uploads are higher reaches 40mbps but the download stuck at 17mbps max in both devices) .. then the biggest disappointment came when I mounted the SXT Cat6 exactly beneath the older SXT LTE, and I did speed test with both ... The Older SXT LTE gave around 39mbps Download , the Cat6 SXT gave only 17mbps (with link aggregation and only 10mbps without), I tried right and left nothing changes notice the same aiming is counted for both devices.

I have upgraded to the latest ROS stable version (6.46.2), and went for the beta (6.47.19) on the LHGR, nothing changed, I tried to change the MTU and such still nothing changed ... (the OLD SXT LTE was on version 6.40 something)

There is something wrong im doing idk where, I am mounting the devices on a roof of a building with 3 floors not on the ground .

Anything else suspicious ?

JardinEspanol · Thu Feb 06, 2020 1:59 am

Are your older and newer devices connecting to same tower, cells, bands, etc?

SiB · Thu Feb 06, 2020 2:16 am

hgb

Anything else suspicious ?

Of course.
First, you should know what Band's are used before because LHGR and SXTR have got difference in Gain per Band.

ApplicationFrameHost_DYaBuvhRyj.png

This B8 = 900Mhz have better signal by back site, not front of devices and in France with 700Mhz is the same.

Other case is you can place the same way device but they can connect to other band(s) and have other speed-s. Check speedtest per every band !.
I always recommend to do in every band record of Band/CellID/eNB/avg. speedtest from few tests/rsrp and sinr. This records per bands give you information.
If on all bands the eNB is differ then you know that connection is done with differ TOWER even that lghr is a sector 30° antenna.

I can agree and say sure - Cat.6 not add speed with 2CA but I know that is fixed in next firmware version (other long history) who have now a Release Candidate. I do CellLock on Band3 as primary-band to have his biggest speed and ca-band is automatical added and give me stability but without celllock the slow band with better signal is winning automatical process selection and at finish I have slow speed - this was at lte6 with firmware v20.

You can reach the same speed what old sxt lte 3-7 or sxtr+r11e-lte on new devices like lhgr and sxtr with modem r11e-lte6.

awesomefishguy · Wed Feb 19, 2020 12:32 am

I am also facing issues with SXT R - Installed a UK 3 SIM - Speed Test 2 to 4mbps

on my mobile we get nearly full bars and with a speed test we get 30 to 60 mbps

I have upgraded all firmware.

I got fed up with the issues on the THREE network, which i thought it was 3 anyway. So i changed to Vodafone UK

Mikrotik - 20mbps
Mobile - 100mbps

pin-status: ok
registration-status: registered
functionality: full
manufacturer: "MikroTik"
model: "R11e-LTE6"
revision: R11e-LTE6_V020
current-operator: 3 UK
lac: 6168
current-cellid: 1646598
enb-id: 6432
sector-id: 6
phy-cellid: 388
access-technology: Evolved 3G (LTE)
session-uptime: 4h3m46s
imei: 0000000000000
imsi: 00000000000
uicc: 000000000
subscriber-number: "My Number","+4499999999",145
primary-band: B20@5Mhz earfcn: 6175 phy-cellid: 388
rssi: -52dBm
rsrp: -81dBm
rsrq: -13.5dB
sinr: 7dB
cqi: 10
ri: 2

I'm finding the signal very erratic also. the unit is looking straight at the mast. NO trees or buildings. Around 3 miles away. Current speed test 3.2mbps!

There appears to be NO CA Band.

Please help!

SiB · Wed Feb 19, 2020 1:51 am

Please help!

I can try but you region haven't a good information on coverage of fast lte.. when I check at CellMapper.net who can be not updated... .
Thanks that you share that INFO details - they can give me point of checking.
.

So i changed to Vodafone UK
current-operator: 3 UK

This give info that you have still 3 UK in MikroTik
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CellMapper is a site with location of BTS/eNB and what Sector Antenna are installed with what Band and BandWidth ... at your ISP 3 UK I see only that one in your region. More info or more LTE Tower have got EE and winner is Vodafone UK but I haven't idea what you have in real world.
You should do a cell-monitor and thy it in differ world site's to determine your area.
See the signal of your current CellID:
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primary-band: B20@5Mhz earfcn: 6175 phy-cellid: 388

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This B20 is one of slowest (compare to B3 > B1 > B7 who are THREE KING's of LTE in EMEA and R11e-LTE6 only do 2CA: B3+B7 between them).
At http://anisimoff.org/eng/lte_throughput_calculator.html is this info about max your speed when you are near to BTS...:
.

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And you have got your:

rsrp: -81dBm
rsrq: -13.5dB
sinr: 7dB
cqi: 10

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Who are not the best and not the worst... but your cell are connecting with only @5Mhz and not @20Mhz :( and without additional ca-band.

When I try search other ISP and other BTS then I see all with B20@5Mhz or B20@10Mhz :(... and one exception with Vodafone:

FINAL:

Mikrotik - 20mbps
Mobile - 100mbps

This means you should install Mobile APP who give information whith one BTS you are connected, on what Band and BandWidth etc.. because I haven't that information online and CellMapper is not proper as you can see via my limitation.

Android: Network Cell Info Lite > Data tab.
At MikroTik you can do a Cell-Monitor to scan what your MikroTik see in air. Remember to not set CellLock and specific band because your RB see only this band or cell.
Do:

# Disable CellLock - AutoSellect Cell
interface lte at-chat lte1 input="AT*Cell=0"
# Select 3g and LTE
interface lte set lte1 network-mode=3g,lte
# Select All Band-s means no one specific to enable
interface lte set lte1 !band
# SCAN YOUR AIR and search good band! Slow to Speed are: B8/B20/B3/B1/B7. SXTR is 60° and LHGR is 30° and move device and scan again until you do 360°.
interface lte cell-monitor lte1

Now you see your ISP only. Not work in roaming because show still your original BTS only.
Check every new EARFCN in https://www.cellmapper.net/arfcn to find a Band and possibility BandWidth of this band.
Slow to Fast EARFCN are in range:

B20: 6150->6449
B3: 1200->1949
B1: 0->599
B7: 2750->3449

My example: I have only two Band possibility in every BTS in Poland and those are:

I hope I give you some idea and new information.
Good Luck

uldise · Wed Feb 19, 2020 2:41 pm

and you can always install Cellmapper app on your Android phone to see your all LTE info - not only connected BS but all others too.

SiB · Wed Feb 19, 2020 4:29 pm

uldise

and you can always install Cellmapper app on your Android phone to see your all LTE info - not only connected BS but all others too.

Yes, but he not have one good feature, MAPS

0xuCNfytH6.png

awesomefishguy · Fri Feb 28, 2020 8:34 pm

Thank you for the feedback.

I changed this site to Vodafone and service is much better.

However, I have another site that during the day we get 60 to 70 mbps on three, but during the evening it appears to drop the larger frequency and CA.

Any advice? Vodafone only gives around 10mbps here...

uldise · Sat Feb 29, 2020 1:53 pm

Any advice? Vodafone only gives around 10mbps here...

Again, avoid using B20 and 5Mhz bandwith..

SiB · Sun Mar 01, 2020 4:02 am

Thank you for the feedback.

I can write but you not write back what with the scanning, you run the "cell-monitor" ?

I changed this site to Vodafone and service is much better.

Sorry. I am technician. You write marketing. Better means results of what band/bandwitdh/sinr/cqi and speedtest - those are parameters better then "much better".

However, I have another site that during the day we get 60 to 70 mbps on three, but during the evening it appears to drop the larger frequency and CA.

Better answer will be. At BandX in ISP_X I receive good speed. When I use other BTS and BandX then ... .
When I have details then I can write feedback.
For now I think you should note the details in day and night and compare them to know what is change. Maybe this is only BTS and his FUP/FAP policy or you change Band and bts during day.

Any advice? Vodafone only gives around 10mbps here...

Of course. I monitor this forum by keyword "SiB" "lte" to give advice when I have possibility to.

Record parameters form INFO command.
Remember that B8/20 are always slow and when you have @5Mhz is slow too.
Fast is when you use B3 or better B1 or better and winner B7 ++ all those B3/1/7 should work with @20Mhz width ++ the CA works with B3+B7 or B3/1/7+B8/20.

Read about CellLock. I have situation that my B3 is fast but B8 is slow.
Automatically I receive B8+B3 and in result I always have slow primary B8 :(
I do a CellLock to B3 to setup it as primary band and have fast speed. Additional the B8 as assigned as second leg who improve stability.
That way CellLock fix my situation but I do research and many test, cell-monitor etc. even I go with lte modem and check what my around me bts give me a speedtest.net/run at every single Band - that way I know what/who/witch BTS give fast B3 24/7 and witch one have terrible FUP/FAP policy and in day give 1/3 and at night 20/6.

Previous post I write long to give you as much hint to you. I hope you can use it proper way.

Gigair · Sat Mar 07, 2020 4:29 am

I am also facing issues with SXT R - Installed a UK 3 SIM - Speed Test 2 to 4mbps

on my mobile we get nearly full bars and with a speed test we get 30 to 60 mbps

I have upgraded all firmware.

I got fed up with the issues on the THREE network, which i thought it was 3 anyway. So i changed to Vodafone UK

Mikrotik - 20mbps
Mobile - 100mbps

pin-status: ok
registration-status: registered
functionality: full
manufacturer: "MikroTik"
model: "R11e-LTE6"
revision: R11e-LTE6_V020
current-operator: 3 UK
lac: 6168
current-cellid: 1646598
enb-id: 6432
sector-id: 6
phy-cellid: 388
access-technology: Evolved 3G (LTE)
session-uptime: 4h3m46s
imei: 0000000000000
imsi: 00000000000
uicc: 000000000
subscriber-number: "My Number","+4499999999",145
primary-band: B20@5Mhz earfcn: 6175 phy-cellid: 388
rssi: -52dBm
rsrp: -81dBm
rsrq: -13.5dB
sinr: 7dB
cqi: 10
ri: 2

I'm finding the signal very erratic also. the unit is looking straight at the mast. NO trees or buildings. Around 3 miles away. Current speed test 3.2mbps!

There appears to be NO CA Band.

Please help!

Man I thought I was the only one. I am having all of the same problem. ALL OF THE SAME.

1- Erratic signal. From full strength to 1 bar.... It's all over the place and I am barely over a mile away.

2- No matter what SIM I use NOR what carrier, it will not do anything other than "Evolved 3G" even though putting the SIM into a phone results in 4G LTE right away.

All but 2 bands are not supported. So I KNOW it should at least be connecting to those bands at 4g LTE. I have yet to find anybody with an answer. How did you solve the issue?

SiB · Sun Mar 08, 2020 9:14 pm

Gigair

1- Erratic signal. From full strength to 1 bar.... It's all over the place and I am barely over a mile away.

You should enable script's to monitor the change of eNB/CellID etc. in time to discover what change that your signal is change rapid.
I assume that the change of Band happend and differ band's have differ signal level and of course speed as result.
I have similar situation using r11e-LTE6 with only 2 band accessible and one is slow with good signal and second fast with low signal and the modem itself one time prefer a and sometimes prefer opposite one. All this in 4G-LTE Cat.6 who give us 2xBand connection.
The primary-band only show signals on LED's.
I fix this by 2 ways:

select only band who give me speed with low signal - that way I use modem as Cat.4 device only with one active band
use Cell-Lock to specific Band/CellID to force exact Band as primary-band and that way my preffered band is used and signals at LED give me the always the same results. Of course the second ca-band is used automatically. In my situation device can stuck in offline and I use own checking and fixing script.

Please check and use this script to monitor of change the LTE parameters: viewtopic.php?f=7&t=153622&hilit=watchdog#p768105

2- No matter what SIM I use NOR what carrier, it will not do anything other than "Evolved 3G" even though putting the SIM into a phone results in 4G LTE right away.
All but 2 bands are not supported. So I KNOW it should at least be connecting to those bands at 4g LTE. I have yet to find anybody with an answer. How did you solve the issue?

What issue?
Evolved 3G (LTE) or Evolved 3G (LTE CA2) = Next Generation of 3G = Newer then 3G = 4G = LTE
I not understand the question.

floaty · Tue Mar 10, 2020 11:51 pm

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Again, avoid using B20 and 5Mhz bandwith.

...
how ? ... and why ?
.

This B20 is one of slowest (compare to B3 > B1 > B7 who are THREE KING's of LTE in EMEA and R11e-LTE6 only do 2CA: B3+B7 between them).

...
where got that wisdom from ??
.
Just tested new delivered RBLtAP-2HnD&R11e-LTE6 ... and so far I'm seeing similiar performance as with my huawei-pad.
No reason to get lost in frenetic jubilation, but since my old teltonika maxed-out at 5 MBit/s download speed ... I'm o.k. so far.
Guess I have to repeat tests later at night, when the horny folks chilled down and traffic is low.

But again ... whats wrong with B20 ?
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pad:
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pad-perf.png

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router:
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lte6-router-perf.png

floaty · Wed Mar 11, 2020 12:09 am

...
guess it's not that simple ?!
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... maybe country-specific delicacies ?!
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skip-b20.PNG

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b20-disable.PNG

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floaty · Wed Mar 11, 2020 12:47 am

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would be interesting ( ... for me)
which (and where) is the highest speed ever scored to a cellular network with the latest mt-hardware (R11e-LTE6)
...
gentlemen ... start your engines !

floaty · Wed Mar 11, 2020 1:02 am

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!!! B O O Y A C A S H A !!!
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in front of the peloton:
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!!! FF ... FF ... FF ... F L O A T Y !!!
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in_front.PNG

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https://www.speedtest.net/
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pop.PNG

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hw-cfg.PNG

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cfg-stat.PNG

SiB · Wed Mar 11, 2020 2:03 am

floaty

!!! B O O Y A C A S H A !!!

Please read this one post: viewtopic.php?f=13&t=158498
With CellLock at this B1 as primary-band you reach better speed.
Read part about cell-monitor feature!.

Of course proper documentation what you should read first is here: https://wiki.mikrotik.com/wiki/Manual:I ... _Cell_lock

vortex · Wed Mar 11, 2020 2:14 am

LTE is just slow here with all providers. It has nothing to do with the equipment or issues.

3G is simply unusable.

I noticed big slowdowns today on several sites (wired). I assumed it was all the people at home.

mkx · Wed Mar 11, 2020 4:32 pm

.
Again, avoid using B20 and 5Mhz bandwith.
...
how ? ... and why ?
.

This B20 is one of slowest (compare to B3 > B1 > B7 who are THREE KING's of LTE in EMEA and R11e-LTE6 only do 2CA: B3+B7 between them).
...
where got that wisdom from ??
.

It's really not that simple.

Basic fact is that cell max throughput is proportional to the cell frequency bandwidth. In Europe it usually like this:

B20 / 800MHz: 10MHz bandwidth (new LTE band, 30MHz total divided among 3 operators) = 100Mbps cell throughput
B8 / 900MHz: 5MHz bandwidth (traditional GSM band, some operators using it for 3G/UMTS) = 50Mbps
B3 / 1800MHz: 20MHz bandwidth (traditionally low used GSM, many operators started off with broadband LTE on this band) = 200Mbps
B1 / 2100MHz: 10MHz bandwidth (traditional UMTS band, some operators re-used part of spectrum for LTE while still offering UMTS, can as well be only 5MHz) = 100Mbps
B7 / 2600MHz: 20MHz+ ... the first new high-capacity band for LTE. Many operators have more than 20MHz spectrum ... as max cell bandwidth is 20MHz as per standard, using more than 20MHz means intra-band CA (B7+B7). = 200Mbps+

Then it comes to the number of users sharing cell throughout. Cell range is inversely proportional to the frequency, meaning B20 cell covers around 5-6 times larger area than B7 cell. If users are spread evenly, this means 5-6 times more users sharing same 100Mbps of a B20 cell than users sharing a 200Mbps+ B7+B7 cell. Making it obvious why B20 cell might seem to be some 10-times slower than B7 cell.

Things are not this simple though: if cell signal strength is low (RSRP below -105dBm or something) then throughput drops and it's still better to stick to lower-frequency cell, keeping in mind that uplink suffers because of air path-loss even more due to lower Tx power ... CA with high-frequency cell might still work nicely though (due to higher Tx power by cell tower). Using narrow-bandwidth cell in low-signal case is benefitial as well (low Tx power gets spread over narrower frequency bandwidth, making RF higher amplitude and better SINR).

And then to peculiralities: I've heard that A1 Austria is the only "in class" who actually has 20MHz in B20, making their B20 cells untypically fast (200Mbps cell throughput).

vortex · Wed Mar 11, 2020 8:55 pm

DE-CIX hit 9.1 Tbps yesterday.

As suspected.

floaty · Thu Mar 12, 2020 12:11 am

.
Guess there is enough processing power in such an LTE-pop to force me to whatever channel / config they want, if I do not fit into the "for-the-greater-good-QoS-shaping-policy".
And most of the time I'm not in the mood to wardrive the best spot for a high-perf LTE-link around.
Good Old G. generally and Berlin in particular may not be the best spot to try such stunts.
Thing I'm interested in, is what would be the max.bandwidth possible, in LTE-shangri-la ?

mkx · Thu Mar 12, 2020 11:40 am

Guess there is enough processing power in such an LTE-pop to force me to whatever channel / config they want, if I do not fit into the "for-the-greater-good-QoS-shaping-policy".

Generally eNodeB has plenty processing power to handle a few hundred connected users per LTE cell. To do it intelligently, it needs some feedback from users' terminals - terminals do some measurements as instructed to give eNodeB feedback on quality of carriers. Unfortunately some terminals are brain-dead enough that the measurement feedback is not valid making eNodeB take wrong decissions. Unfortunately some users think of their LTE knowledge too high by forcing some things or other (most notably forcing terminal to particular PCI - cell whereas there might exist more optimum cell in the same frequency band) causing radio conditions worse for themselves and other adjacent users.

The maximum bandwidth possible in LTE? Most of devices support 10Mbps/MHz of bandwidth, which assumes MIMO 2x2 and use of 256QAM modulation. Support of higher MIMO order is limited to a few device types and higher frequency bands and TDD in particular (e.g. bands 40-43). Then it comes to amount of available frequency bandwidth (e.g. 3CC CA with total bandwidth of 60MHz yields around 600Mbps cell throughput: possible example would be B3+B7+B7. OTOH in some extremely god-forsaken places it could be only 5MHz giving 50Mbps throughput in ideal radio conditions ... which might still be improvement over UMTS/3G with its maximum 21Mbps using same 5MHz spectrum in B8 or B1).
The biggest impact on achievable throughput at user's equipment has RF attenuation (LoS distance between eNodeB and terminal, any obstacles inside Fresnel zones) ... if RSRP drops below around -70dBm, max throughput is not possible any more. If RSRP drops below -100dBm, only around 10% of max throughput is still achievable ... slightly depends on eNodeB Tx power (some MNOs tend to set it high which helps with DL slightly but hurts UL). This is where use of quality directional antenae helps (mind that even though some antennae have nice directional diagrams, their gain is suboptimal for some frequency bands).
Also big impact comes due to multiple users sharing resources of single eNodeB. It's not as simple as this (but not much more complicated either): users share air-time. The higher number of users, the lower air time and thus lower throughput each gets.
MU-MIMO helps here (effectively multiplies available air-time), but requires support from terminals ... and is, again, limited to higher frequency bands due to need for larger antenna arrays at the eNodeB (antenna array dimension is directly proportional to the wavelength or inversely proportional to frequency).

floaty · Fri Mar 13, 2020 4:17 am

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It's not as simple as this (but not much more complicated either): users share air-time. The higher number of users, the lower air time and thus lower throughput each gets.

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guess this is a verry sensefull statement !
cause good old air is a very democratic medium - shared by all of us.
you wanna see exeptional LTE-performance ... go for a spot where many people are expected, at a time nobody's there.
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a couple of colleagues tried to bring WiFi-perfomance to a storehouse of a beverage-distributor ... after they failed multiple times epically, they asked for advice:
I said: 'The power of water is so tremendous, not the strongest men can hold it back !'
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floaty · Fri Mar 13, 2020 4:48 am

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and the main problem ... results are totally erratic ... in the middle of the effin night, no lights on in the hood !!
... same config I've used before ... performance is unexplainable like "my ass"
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... who has the guts to explain such B-sheet to a paying customer ?
... are they scrubbing the antennas ? ... is this kinda power-saving mode ? ... or is there a new porn-serial everyone is torrenting in the moment ?
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man ! ... better polish your wires ... all this shared-over-the-air-thing is a lot of maybe ...
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fck.PNG

mkx · Fri Mar 13, 2020 8:55 am

One phenomenon we observed in our MNO (LTE accounted for majority of traffic, 3G contributed some): the peak hour for data usage by users lasted between roughly 8PM and 3AM. It really died off only at 4AM and started to pick up again at 6AM. Then it was more or less constant during business hours to ease only slightly before evening rush hour again.
My explanation: just before going to bed at 1AM everybody added a few torrents to download and it takes an hour or three to finish the download.

And that was network-wide, some eNodeBs showed very different usage patterns.

And yes, some network equipment vendors implemented power-saving features... which include switching off cells operating on higher frequency bands which reduces capacity but doesn't affect coverage. And it does take minutes (rather than miliseconds) for system to enable disabled cell again (because it monitors average load on related cells and averaging, well, takes time).

floaty · Fri Mar 13, 2020 11:08 pm

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22:05 (todays watermark ... guess they'r all out there hunting the last shit-paperroll avail in the stetl ?!
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13mar2020.PNG

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floaty · Fri Mar 13, 2020 11:14 pm

just realized ... broke ma own record ... and still leader of the pack !
H O O K A Y I P P Y J A Y H E Y !!

floaty · Fri Mar 13, 2020 11:54 pm

.
just found the solution:
https://mikrotik.com/product/intercell_10_b38_b39
: )
power up your own cell ... out in the middle ... no interference and with your own iperf-server !!
That stops all the yodeling and tells you whats behind that door !!
Maybe that beast is excatly intended for that purpose ... gives back healthy sleep at night to you ... you never have to worry again "is my access-router really capable ?!"
3500 bucks for the peace of mind ! ... why not ! ... think !
The corona-tion-thing gets your little booty next month ... you can't take your money with you ... now or never !
: )

floaty · Sat Mar 14, 2020 3:58 am

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some toilet-paperroll-hunters returned to aerie ? ... or power-saving mode ... keeping the shores of kreuzberg-mountain green ?
we know only a little !
plz remember ... floaty is YOUR performance leader in tha moment (actual results in post above) ...
... so far ... good night and good luck !
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13mar2020_later.PNG

SiB · Sat Mar 14, 2020 6:20 pm

If you have a remote MikroTik with better internet speed then you can use a scheduler to do a periodic speedtest and report it into logs.
I use it to see change per hour via any day.
HowTo: viewtopic.php?f=9&t=156579#p777760
results like:

floaty · Fri Mar 20, 2020 1:10 am

.
This is a nice thing ... but I have to admit my company plan is not an unlimited one, so while I normally in "the zone" every month, I want avoid any BW-kinkyness.
But the test-router is intended as custumers mgmt-backup-line ( F L A T R A T E !) ... then I'm definitly able to flood some statistics

ninja365 · Fri Mar 20, 2020 10:46 pm

So to wade in my 6 eggs worth (very english expression).
I have been deploying SXT LTE and only a few LHG LTE units to customers and have seen huge variations between the 2 devices side by side connecting to the same network provider. Only in very rural locations and then mounted high up does the LHG unit achieve better results than an SXT LTE unit. I mainly connect the units to either EE or 3 and before the CAT6 modem and CA arrived was setting the frequency to band 3 for both providers and found the speeds to be okay. Now with CA here, i configure these on providers to band 3 + 20 but am not seeing too much of an increase.

A recent installation at a farm which is only 1.6km (1 Mile) from the EE mast saw the LHG unit struggle to achieve more than 5Mbps down with 2Mbps with it mounted high up (12 mts). When i replaced the device with a SXT LTE the speed increased massively to between 35 - 40 Mbps down and 15 - 20 Mbps up. This does defy logic as i would have guessed that the LHG unit had a more powerful antenna so should have had a better connection but was actually slower. All my installations are configured to point directly to the mast and this is sometimes helped by using the OpenSignal Mobile App which shows the tower information and the direction of the connection. Whilst this works 75% of the time, always experiment with the antenna alignment as this week i installed both a SXT and LHG unit at the same site location and the Opensignal APP on my phone pointed to a mast due East which gave me 30 - 40Mbps but i actually ended going North East to another mast that locked in at 60 - 70Mpbs.

My limited experience (i've only installed maybe 30 SXT/LHG units) has taught me to test the location on Band 3 first, then on Band 20 and finally the 2 bands together. The best results have all been using Band 3.

To answer hgb, i haven't found a 4G Router with an external high gain antenna attached that can get anywhere near the Mikrotik equipment in terms of stability and speed. My frustrations with the equipment is my lack of knowledge and the problems i have trying to run the devices using POE + WAN from port 5 on the hAP Routers. I have tried a wAP LTE unit and was very dissapointed with the performance of the connection, unless you are on top of the mast it has a very limited range so probably good for urban but bad for country side. I even modified it to use a Poynting Omni-directional antenna which was just as bad (i had much better results with the same antenna and an old Huawei 4G router).

mschuckmann · Sun Jun 07, 2020 3:57 am

I sent the report below to Microtik support just last night:

I have a RBLHGR&R11e-LTE6 that I am using with AT&T.
I also have a R11e-LTE-US miniPCI-e card.

With the R11e-LTE6 card installed in the RBLHGR I am getting data rates of around 3-5Mb down and 13Mb up.
With the R11e-LTE-US card installed in the RBLHGR of around 13-15 Mb down and 13Mb up.
With both cards the connection parameters appear to be the same, i.e. the same cell tower, sector, band (band 2), and similar signal strength numbers.
I have tried setting a band lock on the R11e-LTE6 to make sure CA isn't causing a problem but it has no effect (although I don't think I've ever CA get activated).

Today I did a bunch more testing in various locations and the only place the R11e-LTE6 card even matched the R11e-LTE-US card was in an urban location less than 1 mile from a tower.

I'm pretty new to Mikrotik routers and modems so there could be something I'm missing here but it really doesn't not make sense to me that the CAT4 modem would out perform the CAT6 modem by such a wide margin with all other parameters being equal.

floaty · Fri Jun 12, 2020 1:22 am

unless this isn't a hardware-related issue ... I see the same odds here on the other side of the pond.
.
[R11e-LTE-US 13-15 Mb] ??
.
This is (my oppinion !) a very sorry performance for the capabilities the standard should be able to serve.
so.. (for me very) obviously the providers classify the hardware ... you can easily read the identifiers, so sub-providers-hardware is 'degraded'.
.
Maybe if I were a power-greedy, stock-exchange-driven tech-fuck-up ? ... I would do the same.
.
example ?
served:
https://keivan.io/the-day-appget-died/
.

TimGuyUK · Tue Sep 07, 2021 3:19 pm

Ill chip in my experiance. I have two RBLtAP-2HnD here in the UK. Using both O2 and Vodafone sims. One is currenty in London and one out in the country side.

The 4 tests we have seen are as follows:
Iphone test 50-60Mbps+, In london sometimes 90Mbps
Huawei e3272 dongle 50-60 Mbps
RBLtAP-2HnD 10Mbps or worst
Huawei e3272 dongle IN RBLtAP-2HnD USB Port 50-60Mbps

There is defo something wrong with this LTE modem in this unit. I have two, two different locations. Also the Iphone is the best, the Huawei in a laptop second, Huawri in MK third and the MK with inbuilt LTE last, and proper last at that.

If its a regional thing thats fine, stop selling it in those countrys. There must be a solution.I have a site where ethernet broadband is still a montha way because of delays, I should be able to offering them 50Mbps 4G and I cant.

Tim

Tim

SiB · Tue Sep 07, 2021 3:38 pm

Probably R11e-LTE is not connecting to that Band what other devices and thats why you have that situation. USB Doungle have good speed, this measn it's not a antenna problem.

TimGuyUK · Wed Sep 08, 2021 10:16 am

Probably R11e-LTE is not connecting to that Band what other devices and thats why you have that situation. USB Doungle have good speed, this measn it's not a antenna problem.

Looks like band 20 is the only one I can use with the R11e-LTE, I cant unfortunately tell what band the dongle is running on, the 3372(might have previous stated wrong model) is cat 4 same as the R11e-LTE

Ive upgraded the firmware on the R11e-LTE and also set the suggested tether setting in case it was that. No difference, Dongle thrashes the MK hands down.

Tim

chrisshan94 · Sat Dec 04, 2021 12:11 am

Hi Guys,

So I've started to deploy LHG LTE6, LHG cat4 and tried the SXTLTE6. I can definitely say the LTE6 hardware is just a lot more money for no reason. *the cat4 does exactly the same job and provides the same speed*

In my install process, I now just use the LTE6 on a tester rig to cell-monitor the available cells and then program them in (cell-locking) to the best cell that had the best speed. I use maps to find the tower directions in an attempt to be more efficient and reduce the install time. However, after over 10 now installed, I effortlessly get far greater speeds on my Samsung S21 Ultra than the modem in any of the above-named devices. I too would love to know if it's just a setting or tweak that is needed to unlock the rest of these speeds that are clearly available.

Why is the speed available for consumer handheld devices but not on HIGH GAIN DIRECTIONAL purpose-built antennas is beyond me.

Also, a side note, some customers complain that there could be a 1-hour gap of downtime on random days and times and I'm wondering if anyone has a self-heal script to offer up that when internet isn't available it performs a reboot or something similar and then my startup scripts for cell lock will run. At the moment I believe it only attempts to self-heal after 60minutes.

TimGuyUK · Fri Dec 10, 2021 12:45 pm

Hi Guys,

So I've started to deploy LHG LTE6, LHG cat4 and tried the SXTLTE6. I can definitely say the LTE6 hardware is just a lot more money for no reason. *the cat4 does exactly the same job and provides the same speed*

Not much comfort for you but at the advice of a UK supplier we started using a wAP ac LTE6 which got me to 40-50Mb but no more, better than the original RBLtAP-2HnD which was 15-20 Tops.

Cheers

Tim

chrisshan94 · Sat Dec 11, 2021 10:12 pm

Maybe its something to do with the LHG not supporting MIMO? does it support MIMO? Is LHG the best solution to LTE deployment?

Currently both 4G LTE and 5G support MIMO in the downlink and most cellular operations are deploying 2×2, 4×4 or 6×6 MIMO solutions which means multiple antennas are used for transmitting at the base station (4G or 5G Towers) and multiple antennas are used to receive at the mobile device (4G or 5G Routers). This means to maximise your 4G LTE or 5G router throughput you must use multiple antennas. In a 2×2 MIMO scenario for example, if you hook up only one external antenna even with the best RF conditions you will be limiting yourself to roughly half the downlink speed. This means it is extremely important to use multiple external antennas to maximise performance with 4G LTE and 5G.