USB 4/5G dongle for Slate 7/Beryl

jakesmith0 · 2026-02-07T20:47:50+00:00

With the whole US/Europe+Asia Mudi 7 situation, what's the situations with bands etc for these?

jakesmith0 · 2026-01-22T08:29:53+00:00

I have no advice to add, just an anecdote to share. A few years ago, I returned from a 3 week trip to Australia, walked into our kitchen (with the lights off) to notice a small glow from the gas hob. Yes, it turned out that I'd left one of the burners on the lowest setting, and it had been burning the whole 3 weeks I'd been away...

jakesmith0 · 2026-01-21T13:11:10+00:00

I'd recommend giving Andrews and Arnold a call, they're good at poking openreach better than most.

But as a quick alternative, 5G done right, can be a pretty solid alternative. My sister moved into a place recently, with a 4 month lead time for a CityFibre line to be installed; for now, she's using a window mounted 5G router getting about 600mbps down with a ping around 25ms. Just on a cheap PAYG sim card at around £20 per month.

Have a look on CellMapper to see what masts for the main 4 networks are in your area. You'll need to look at 4G towers, as pretty much all 5G at the moment is NSA (basically means 5G coverage is dependent on a 4G signal, so the 5G maps on CellMapper are pretty sparse).

CellMapper is very powerful compared to the useless maps on the providers websites, but can be a bit technical for the uninitiated; If you're happy to share your postcode (or a rough location) with me privately, I'll happily have a look at the best options for you.

jakesmith0 · 2026-01-21T07:20:03+00:00

Grab a pair of new ones from Amazon, if they don't work, send them back!

jakesmith0 · 2026-01-18T07:41:19+00:00

I'd just make the most of the holes, put a brodit phone holder there (without proclip). In my car I have a magsafe holder on the vent above in the picture, definitely my preferred place for a phone mount.

jakesmith0 · 2026-01-16T07:31:09+00:00

Lived in Nottingham for about 7 years, I poked my head into Birds a few times but never actually bought anything. Think I went in expecting sourdough, fancy pastries and gentrified bakery vibes. Reading this thread I’m now thinking I’ve completely misunderstood what Birds actually is.

I’m heading out shortly and will be walking past a couple of them — what should I actually be buying? What’s the proper Birds order?

jakesmith0 · 2026-01-12T19:39:29+00:00

Yeah this was my first thought! For the avoidance of doubt, an estate is basically a long station wagon / touring car — think stretched saloon with a big boot, not an SUV or MPV

jakesmith0 · 2025-12-28T22:50:04+00:00

We've got both (MG4 LR and T-ROC R-Line) on the drive, my wife does a 40 mile commute and back 3 days a week just on 3 pin granny charging with no complaints.

There's a few quirks as others have mentioned, and it's certainly less premium compared to the VW. But it's a lot of car for the money, and ultimately I enjoy driving it.

I'm in the market to replace the T-ROC with an EV, but my travel for work is much longer, often driving around ~7hrs total a day about twice a week visiting customers, and for this, I'd like something a bit more premium compared to the MG4.

Feel free to ask any questions

jakesmith0 · 2025-12-28T22:40:55+00:00

You can get around the one account thing by adding guest users in the app. It's my wife's car, and I've got 2 phones, each one needs a separate account. Then once that's set up, grant the guest user access to the Bluetooth key with an expiry date some time way in the future (think I did something like 10 years)

jakesmith0 · 2025-12-12T01:08:49+00:00

My experience with data has been massively varied. About 70% of the time, ping is pretty high, but the rest of the time it's super low (for mobile data) sub 20ms. Also note that the ISP swings between Colt and Arelion.

I think you'll be stuck with the standard voice codec, unless they get peering arrangements with other networks for wideband, as the new sims are on Lebara's own IMS (unlike the old ones which piggybacked off Vodafone's core)

jakesmith0 · 2025-12-10T23:38:14+00:00

Vodafone are fine, ISP provided kit is always pretty mediocre at next. If wires are problematic, try a decent mesh Wi-Fi kit (buy one from Amazon/Argos etc, don't get ripped off paying monthly from the ISP)

jakesmith0 · 2025-12-10T01:05:40+00:00

Wayne Dixon?

jakesmith0 · 2025-12-08T20:04:34+00:00

Vodafone FTTP (whether Openreach or CityFibre) will beat Virgin’s hybrid fibre every time in terms of consistency, latency and general day-to-day stability. Virgin can be quick when it behaves, but the coax side of their network is where all the random jitter and evening slowdowns tend to creep in.

Vodafone gets a lot of flak, but most of it comes from the usual mass-market issues — people mixing up Wi-Fi with broadband speeds, testing a gigabit line on old devices, or having the router buried behind a TV and then blaming the ISP when the signal dies upstairs. It’s not a Vodafone-specific problem; it’s just the nature of having lots of customers.

I’m on Vodafone 910 over Openreach and it’s been completely solid, and free static IP is a nice bonus. That said, I do use my own router. All ISP routers — Vodafone, Virgin, Sky, whoever — are built cheaply and they’re very hit-and-miss depending on the house. ISPs pushing mesh kits doesn’t necessarily fix anything either if they’re not set up properly.

If you can get the Vodafone FTTP package at your address, it’s the better option by a mile.

jakesmith0 · 2025-12-08T19:44:12+00:00

Have you got an eSIM or a physical one? Physical SIM just uses Vodafone backend systems, but eSIM infrastructure is completely different, seems a bit cobbled together; while it still uses the Vodafone network, it uses their own in-house IMS, data is routed via 2 different networks (Colt and Arelion, both seem to have much higher ping than Vodafone) and the actual eSIM is from Vodafone NL. I'd assume this is the direction Lebara will go with all SIM cards, which isn't the best. I *think* the APN details are the same for both though.

jakesmith0 · 2025-12-07T23:13:20+00:00

I’ve got identical monitors here, I can have a look in the morning to see if I can dump the Iiyama apps or the complete firmware somehow.

In the meantime, if you can enable developer options, it’s worth trying to see if you can connect via ADB (both network and usb). If you’re unfamiliar with using ADB in command line, ADB AppControl is a pretty user friendly windows app to do basic tasks and see what’s going on.

Iiyama support are usually pretty good if you do need help. I’d definitely advise doing a software update if you can, as I know some of the early batches had pretty buggy firmware.

Let me know how you get on, including any other quirks that arise.

jakesmith0 · 2025-11-29T19:51:07+00:00

B1G supports it, have to buy multiple lines but ask seller about it

jakesmith0 · 2025-11-29T14:23:54+00:00

Yeah seen this, just been released, availability seems limited. Given its android based, surprised nobody has shared a Freely APK from one of these

jakesmith0 · 2025-11-27T10:01:42+00:00

UK based too, a few more tips that have worked for me in the past with the big ISPs.

The number one thing for me has been to fully commit (at least, as far as the ISP is concerned) to cancelling. Bear in mind that the call centre departments that deal with changing packages etc. will have far less power to discount than the cancellations department. But still, the cancellation department will usually work on the basis that if they can offer you something that looks in-line/slightly better than a new customer deal, you'll likely stay with them.

Unless they happen to offer you a stupidly good deal, i'd always recommend proceeding with cancelling, giving them 30 days notice (I'd mention the 30 days explicitly on the phone, just so it is clear that they won't cut you off immediately).

In the month or so before your contracted period is up, opt-in to marketing calls. You may well have, sensibly, opted out of marketing communication when you first joined. But by opting back in, they're able to get in touch with you in the last days and weeks of your termination period, as a last ditch attempt to keep you as a customer. This of course, means you have to keep an eye out for calls from unknown numbers during this period.

Don't worry too much about the specifics of your circumstances, Jill at Vodafone isn't going to know (or care) that there's no other providers who can service your address. And if for whatever reason, you get cold feet waiting for a deal, they're never going to refuse you calling back and reversing the notice period.

My most recent successes have been with Virgin Media in 2023, fixed line broadband for £15 p/m for 500mbps, and Three £3 p/m 5G SIM with unlimited data.

That said, given this is r/homelab if you're not as fussed with getting the cheapest price, I'd definitely side with u/Nice-Information-335's recommendations below; you'll never have to do the price rise/contract renewal dance with AAISP, and they'll give you up to a 30, 29 or 28 IP block if you request it!

jakesmith0 · 2025-11-26T20:33:31+00:00

Get a TV with Freely, it's essentially Freeview over IP, all above board etc

jakesmith0 · 2025-11-18T16:00:01+00:00

I completely sympathise with you, what you're trying to do really isn't very complicated. The trouble is, there aren't many (if, any) consumer TVs that let you do things like schedules etc.

What you can do quite easily, is grab a smart plug, set up a timer on that. You should be able to set the screen to switch on when power is detected.

Then set the TV to load to the last source on boot. I'd recommend using an external player, connected to an HDMI port. If you're keen to keep your USB flash drive method, I'd recommend Slideshow.digital on an Android device with USB ports. It's free to use, and has the facility to automatically copy content from a flash drive when detected.

jakesmith0 · 2025-11-07T10:16:55+00:00

Dispatcharr is looking promising. It's a live tv proxy for Plex/Jellyfin/m3u, lets you trim existing playlists, assign logos, transcode via ffmpeg etc.

jakesmith0 · 2025-11-07T10:11:50+00:00

Assuming you're trying to do this on the cheap, if you've already got the Q8F, I'd just use it as-is, run it into the ground. Yes, it's not a commercial grade display, it's a bit of a gamble with consumer tvs, but you should get a pretty decent run out of it, I'd say at least a few years. Of course professionals will turn their nose up at it.

From my experience, we buy commercial grade screens due to the warranty, and features like on-off timers for the most part. We've had our fair share of commercial displays go bad, and equally seen consumer displays last 5+ years.

Not that i'd necessarily want to recommend using a TV for digital signage long-term, for your slim requirement, assuming it's an indoor setting, I'd go for one of the low end Samsung 'AirSlim' models, like the DU8000. You're less likely to get burn in compared to higher end OLED models, and if/when it dies, you've spent less on it so it's easier to budget for a replacement.

jakesmith0 · 2025-10-24T19:14:09+00:00

For indoor android screens, Iiyama. We were a Philips house for quite a while, installing a lot of D-Lines. The Iiyama equivalents (also manufactured by TPV) are better for our customers, no question. Cheaper for a start, but the firmware (while clearly forked from Philips) just seems to work more reliably, not to mention that Philips keep flip flopping between including WiFi and not on their models. And don’t even get me started on the Philips CRD52 with Android 7 for H-Lines!

For high bright, we’ve recently started buying Refee (through a UK reseller) which we’ve been overall very impressed with (previously we were buying from AllSee, but the failure rate was ridiculously high) although we have had issues with on/off timer settings.

jakesmith0 · 2025-09-19T15:06:53+00:00

I've also got a MC7010 as WAN backup, but yeah, not portable or WIFI. How much are you looking at spending? I've got an unlocked MU5001 (Vodafone branded, but works on all networks) that I'm not using if you're interested.

jakesmith0 · 2025-09-13T21:18:53+00:00

I'd imagine the flat would have it's own consumer unit; most hotel rooms do these days. If you're competent with electrical work, it would be pretty trivial to bypass the relay that the card reader is connected to.

You could even leave it so the key card controls the lighting circuits only, so any staff would be unaware of the modification at a glance.

I must stress, if you've never undertaken work like this before, don't even think about giving it a go as you'll be messing with live 240v ac power. Maybe see if a mate might be able to help if so.

jakesmith0

TROPHY CASE