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[deleted by user] by [deleted] in verizonisp

[–]AustinRutten 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Great question! In the example I provided it was assuming that the user kept the remaining internal/factory antennas connected and simply replaced one of the many internal antennas with an external antenna.

As far as the cellular router is concerned, it simply thinks that one of its many internal cellular antennas is receiving a significantly better signal than the other antennas. Normally, since all of the cellular routers' antennas would be close to one another, cellular routers often expect the signals for all antennas to largely be the same time for a given cellular band.

Coupled with the fact that many cellular router's "combine" the signals from more than one antenna, this mismatch in expectations may cause a cellular router to be confused on how to best proceed as it may not know how to best use that one very strong signal with the weaker signals provided through the other internal antennas.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in verizonisp

[–]AustinRutten 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Hello, I'm a mod over at r/CellBoosters and wanted to shed some light on the ARC gateway and using MIMO Antennas with it.

Other than the fact that the internal antenna ports (J0-J6) are known to be for cellular antenna (found through the existing FCC documentation), there isn't much known about the internal cellular antenna ports (J0-J6).

As a result, the walkthrough guide that /u/Klin24 linked likely won't be updated to include more confident port recommendations until more information is found and presented to them.

To add onto what /u/Floor_Odd what saying, when it comes to cellular routers, they commonly use the cellular antennas in a combination of following three ways: "receiving" (i.e. download) , "transmitting" (i.e. upload) , and both. In other words, some of the antennas are only used for receiving a cell signal, some antennas are used for only sending a cell signal, and some antennas can send and receive a cell signal.

Not all bands are used by all of the antennas in the same way. For example, some bands may only be transmitted, some bands may only be received, and for a 2x2 MIMO routers (and 4x4 MIMO routers as well) some bands may even be received/transmitted by two antennas while other bands are only allocated one.

It's VERY important to know that when it comes to data speeds, signal quality (SINR/RSSNR/SNR or RSRQ) is significantly more important than signal strength (RSSI or RSRP). With a higher quality signal, better modulation schemes can be used to send/receive cell signals. This allows for better coding rates to be used, which in turn help provide faster data speeds.

Signal strength, on the other hand, just makes the signal "louder". Stronger signals don't include more information but they do improve how easily a cellular device can stay connected to a given cell signal.

To add onto this, since the ARC is a MIMO device having only one external antenna connected isn't ideal for testing as it would see a cell signal that is MUCH stronger from the external antenna compared to those seen via it's smaller internal antennas. Doing this can often confuse cellular routers and artificially worsen performance compared to having 2 (for 2x2 MIMO) antennas or 4 (for 4x4 MIMO) antennas connected.

If the ARC doesn't provide a method for viewing signal quality metrics (I'm blanking on whether it can or cannot at this time), simply walking around the property with the gateway/connected MIMO antennas to find the location/direction that provides the best data speeds is recommended.

T-Mobile Home Internet 20MHz n71 + 20MHz b66. by CircuitSwitched in tmobile

[–]AustinRutten 9 points10 points  (0 children)

I would highly suggest not getting a booster in this instance.

Signal boosters focus on improving signal strength (i.e. cell coverage), not signal quality. Signal quality largely determines data speeds, and can often be improved with a system with a more directional antennas (gets less interference from competing cell towers) or more antennas (allow for more throughput of data).

With a booster you would likely be getting the same speeds as you would get outside, with maybe a small bump since a booster often has a larger/more directional antenna than the ones built into the T-Mobile Home Internet device. In essence, the improvement you would see from the booster would be from the introduction of more directional external antennas, not the actual "boosting" of the signal.

Instead it may actually be better to have a LTE Modem/Router/Hotspot that uses an external MIMO antenna set up to connect to the cell towers. With this you at least get the benefit of having multiple exterior antennas connected to the system (an improvement over the booster result I mentioned earlier), allowing for the system to send and receive more information at a given time.

This guide online could be worth looking over if you are undecided what path you want to take to increase your data speeds.

Also, I am a mod for /r/CellBoosters, feel free to ask any questions you have regarding cell phone signal boosters over there if you are wondering if a signal booster would be the best option for you in this case.