So, I have a WISP that is mostly ok, but it has a tendency to crap out at the wrong time. With that said, I'd like to have backup options during weather / tower outages from that service. Am I understanding correctly in that I can just purchase a hotspot from OTR, and then switch on OTR for a month if a problem comes up? Would it be as easy as activating the service and connecting the hotspot to my current router or would I have to make some changes to my router at each switchover?

I'm guessing this is maybe not a viable option. Are there routers that allow for a primary connection and secondary/backup connection without any reconfiguring to the router settings?

tfunk02 said:

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Just FYI, I'm still having to chat with OTR every month to turn back on my internet. After each billing cycle it shuts down until I tell them and then unplug my router for a reboot. Pretty frustrating when you aren't at home to unplug it, and you want to see your cameras. I thought this would go away when they started doing auto-renew.

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So you wait until the day it renews and you have no service to renew? Or do you call a day in advance to make sure it will already be activated the next day when you wake up? Since you have to talk to an actual person to activate it, it's a little annoying if I will have to do that. The biggest issue will be not having my security cameras work, especially if it resets when I am out of town over a weekend. I don't remember, do they have support on the weekends, or just during the week?

I always do it through their online chat on their website. I don't call.
I never remember until I get a notice that my cameras are offline and I remember it's about that time.
I'll have to chat with them to see if there's anyway to make it better. It's annoying now that I'm working from an office.

How long are you normally without internet? If it's only a day or two at a time, I'm not sure it would be worth it. You'd have to pay the $60 up front to get it setup and test it to make sure it works. Then, if you don't continually maintain your service, you are charged $80 the first month you are reconnected (they're basically charging a $20 reconnect fee). And you can't automatically activate on your own, you have to chat or call in for the activation. I don't remember if they have the support on the weekends or not if that's when it happens to go down.

As far as ease of setup, basically you just switch the cable into the WAN port on your router from the WISP connection to the modem with the OTR sim. At least it was that simple for me when testing. The worst part was having to go to the attic to switch it.

You can literally call or chat the morning or goes down, and they have you back up and running within a few minutes. Only time it would be an issue is when support is closed.

You don't have to pay the reconnect fee as long as you don't let your subscription lapse.

I've never had to chat with them. I just pay the renewal. Service has never been interrupted.

Good to know. I might still test it out and see if I have better luck than the WISP.

Any thoughts on why my upload speeds would have slowed dramatically? When I first signed up, I was getting 15-20 up, but pretty much always above 10. Lately I have been only getting around 6-7 up and tonight was between 2.5-3. My download is still around 30-35 if I'm directly beneath the router, so not much different than when I first started. These are all on my phone.

It's not a big deal since I am not normally uploading stuff, but I'd like to be faster for the times I actually need it to be.

I'm not really sure. I'd power cycle everything to make sure it's not on my end. Maybe the tower is overloaded or under performing.

Hello!

Thanks for all the information in this thread! Super helpful.

Question - I'm unsure of the coverage at my house, so I'm considering getting a more universal refurbed Cradlepoint CBA850LPE and try SIMs from both OTR (AT&T) and Verizon for their unlimited/uncapped plans. I know OTR offers the Netgear Nighthawk, but I don't think that works on the Verizon network.

Can you confirm that this solution will work? Looking to replace my DSL connection at home.

Thanks for the help!

kave said:

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Hello!

Thanks for all the information in this thread! Super helpful.

Question - I'm unsure of the coverage at my house, so I'm considering getting a more universal refurbed Cradlepoint CBA850LPE and try SIMs from both OTR (AT&T) and Verizon for their unlimited/uncapped plans. I know OTR offers the Netgear Nighthawk, but I don't think that works on the Verizon network.

Can you confirm that this solution will work? Looking to replace my DSL connection at home.

Thanks for the help!

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The Nighthawk from OTR is locked to AT&T so you will need to get a Cradlepoint to try multiple services.

****Verizon is not offering their prepaid unlimited plan after today. It retires tomorrow. If you get it today then you can be locked into it, but if you don't you will have to find a Verizon vendor similar to OTR to get unlimited. The problem with that is that they are all around $150/month and up. So, if you want Verizon, you need to get the sim and plan today.

https://www.rvmobileinternet.com/verizon-prepaid-65-month-unlimited-jetpack-data-plan-pudp-retiring-soon/

Alright, I think I am going to give this a shot. I've finally had it with my WISP and am willing to try something else for my primary. I am zero'ed in on the Cradlepoint product linked earlier & purchasing service through OTR. If I am understanding correctly, this will put me on an AT&T tower, yes? My regular phone service on my S8 (AT&T) works well in my house, is this a decent indicator of what I can expect or should I run other tests before ordering hardware?

Yes, it's through AT&T and yes the data rates will be comparable.

Sweet. I'll give it a go. This week, Rise Broadband has been buzzing at about 1 - 3 mbps down from the hours of about 6pm - 11pm. I'm done.

CJS4715 said:

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Sweet. I'll give it a go. This week, Rise Broadband has been buzzing at about 1 - 3 mbps down from the hours of about 6pm - 11pm. I'm done.

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Any updates?

I ended up getting some 15db gain directional panels on my roof, and Snook must have gotten a nice upgrade to their towers. I've seen up to 119 Mbps and I'm averaging 80 Mbps today when it used to be 40's. Looks like the SINR has gotten a lot better too. I was lucky to get 5db SINR, and now I'm bouncing from 10 to 17.

https://ltefix.com/shop/antennas/4g-lte-antennas/directional-panel/700-2700mhz-15dbi-4g-lte-directional-antenna/

CJS4715 said:

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Alright, I think I am going to give this a shot. I've finally had it with my WISP and am willing to try something else for my primary. I am zero'ed in on the Cradlepoint product linked earlier & purchasing service through OTR. If I am understanding correctly, this will put me on an AT&T tower, yes? My regular phone service on my S8 (AT&T) works well in my house, is this a decent indicator of what I can expect or should I run other tests before ordering hardware?

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Have you done an actual speed test on the data through your phone? That should give you an idea of the minimum you can expect through OTR.

My SIM card is arriving today. I'll report back tonight.

On my phone, my download average seems to be about 12 - 15 mbps; it spikes at 30+ depending on the time of day.

Initial test isn't yielding great results. Getting anywhere from 4 - 8 mbps download on OTR using Cradlepoint. My phone is pulling 20 - 25 mbps at the same point.

CJS4715 said:

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Initial test isn't yielding great results. Getting anywhere from 4 - 8 mbps download on OTR using Cradlepoint. My phone is pulling 20 - 25 mbps at the same point.

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Most likely the same issue with all of the other recent signups that only had 3G service initially. I would call tomorrow and see if they can tell you that's the issue.

Update on my service. My autopay went through without a hitch last month. Don't check my speeds all that often, but it is consistently fast enough for my needs and comparable to when I started. My biggest complaint is that every 3-4 weeks I have to restart my modem and/or router because my speeds and jitter become terrible. But once I do that, speeds return to normal.

I had the annual meeting for my electric co-op last week and they are planning to try and run fiber for their customers along their electric lines. It's just in the planning stage and they're hoping to get grants, so it'll probably be another 3-4 years at least, but hopefully I will have a stable solution or internet. The reasons I would not consider my current setup stable is I don't know if AT&T would ever force a change to OTR's terms and reduce speeds, data limits or both. Any of those would likely then cause a price increase as well.

It's not totally unlikely that by the time they run fiber you'll have access to low latency satellite internet. The latency of the proposed satellite internet is actually longer for localized traffic (comparable to LTE), but shorter over greater distances.

Depends on SpaceX's launch schedule, but their service will probably be localized to the United States by next year if everything goes well. If it goes really well then later this year, but I don't buy that.

CJS4715 said:

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Initial test isn't yielding great results. Getting anywhere from 4 - 8 mbps download on OTR using Cradlepoint. My phone is pulling 20 - 25 mbps at the same point.

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Does the modem say that you're getting 4G LTE or HSPA+. The first time it happened to my parents they sent a second SIM, the second time the rep was able to fix the problem through their customer service chat in 5 minutes.

For those with pretty stable connections already that are looking for a little bit more...

https://ltehacks.com/viewtopic.php?f=24&t=251

This is the thread that got me to order the 15dbi gain panels. I really didn't expect them to do as well as they have so far. I'm finally thinking about dropping satellite TV and getting a streaming service.

Thanks for the link tfunk. Testing all the different spots in my house led me to put my modem in an area that gets hot. If I leave it on for extended periods of time, my speeds are significantly reduced. I wanted to move the modem/router to a central location in the house to keep it cool, so I followed your recommendation on the antenna. I am hoping to get a boost in speed (avg around 30ish) and keep the devices cooler.

There is a an old directv antenna on the house in a general area of the tower (according to opensignal app), so I am going to try to mount them on that pole. I am hoping this will allow me to use the same coax cables that run into the house and will make setup a breeze. The house is pre-wired with a bunch of coax runs, but its going to take some time trying to figure what all of them are.

tfunk02 said:

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I ended up getting some 15db gain directional panels on my roof, and Snook must have gotten a nice upgrade to their towers. I've seen up to 119 Mbps and I'm averaging 80 Mbps today when it used to be 40's. Looks like the SINR has gotten a lot better too. I was lucky to get 5db SINR, and now I'm bouncing from 10 to 17.

https://ltefix.com/shop/antennas/4g-lte-antennas/directional-panel/700-2700mhz-15dbi-4g-lte-directional-antenna/

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How far are you from the tower? I think my parents are 2-2.5 miles from the nearest tower in the hill country, but speeds are pretty bad. If the SpaceX service will be legit, that may be the better option to wait for that than spending money on what may be a temporary and mediocre solution with the antennas you got.

Hello, I've been somewhat following this thread and finally purchased service with OTR.
Disclaimers: I used to live in Texas but now live in Oregon and I'm full timing in an RV.

I used the discount code someone posted earlier and it still worked. I waited longer than told by OTR for my package to arrive. I bought the Velocity 2 package, which was the cheapest and this is the outcome:

At first, I had 4G and 3-4 bars out of 6 I think, and I was getting horrible speeds and latency jitter, so I talked to OTR like several people mentioned and told them this, and he did something which slightly improved my service. I was getting about 60-120ms ping, with 120 being the upper jitter and 375KB/s average speeds. I frequently play competitive counter strike, so this is acceptable compared to my current WISP at the RV park, and keep in mind that this is with absolutely no line of sight, with loads of thick trees and a literal mountain in the way of the Velocity 2.
After playing for a couple hours, I do another speed test to be amazed at about 3MB/s max, with 1.8MB/s being the lowest (about 25Mbits max), but I noticed I am getting a single bar but my Velocity is now saying 4G LTE, making me think I switched towers at some point.

This is still day one, I don't know that I will remember to come back to this to post my results later down the line, but I am very happy with this currently, as my latency has stabilized to about 60ms. I will be trying to pinpoint where this LTE tower is, as it is not the one I had originally thought I would be connected to and I will buy some high gain Antennas because this thing has two connections.

I just wanted to say thanks to the people on this forum for all of the information and to give my own information. This is a huge improvement from the RV park internet, which uses a WISP which has INSANE packet loss, and the park itself limits my connection to 3Mbit speeds.

If anyone has any questions, I don't know if I will be alerted by a response to my email, so I will try to remember to check this page every now and then for a response.

It looks like I'm about 5 miles from the tower, but I do have a direct line of sight over the trees.
Other towers are around 2 to 2.5, but this one is giving me the fastest speeds.


TardisRepair, congratulations on joining the club. Terrible gaming on a WISP is one of the things that sent me down this rabbit hole. This NetGear antenna is a great one for being small, cheap, portable, and powerful.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00DN3J03O/ref=cm_sw_r_tw_dp_U_x_opEmDb4RCTXMQ

You need to check the impedance of the cable. The dish will typically be 75 ohm RG6 or RG6 quad shield. Most modems want 50 ohm cable. At cellular frequencies you need good cable, typically a minimum of LMR240 or if possible LMR400. The LMR400 is large and not very flexible but very low loss. You can use LMR400UF which is more flexible but more expensive. The Wilson boosters have moved to 75 ohm to be able to recycle DBS satellite cable like RG6 since its more available and may already be installed in may places.

First I must say, this forum helped me a ton when trying to figure out a solution to a really annoying problem. I had a lease signed for a place, IN THE MIDDLE OF THE CITY, NEXT TO THE BIGGEST APARTMENT COMPLEX IN SAID CITY, and I found out the hard way that I had no ISPs available to me. Unbelievable. I moved 1.5 miles from my old apartment, where I had ATT Fiber, to this.

So after I found this, I went ahead and ordered my OTR service with a cradlepoint. Both of which will be here tomorrow. I'm really excited and hoping everything goes like I plan. I live less than .5 miles from two different ATT towers.

But at this point I am second guessing myself.... idk about any of you guys but the chat service has not been working for me, nor do they list a phone number on their website. If you google "otr mobile" they give you an address and a phone number, but the address points you to a shopping center. I also noticed that OTR has really high reviews on google, but all of the reviews have been posted essentially within the last month?

I am really just hoping for someone to reassure me that I made a good choice and OTR is still working. Anyone else noticed anything funky lately?

Appreciate the help in advance,

I've only had minor issues, but nothing lately. One was a bad SIM, that only got 3G service. OTR sent me a new SIM immediately and that was fixed. The other problem I had was with recurring billing, where the status was listed as On Hold and wasn't being processed monthly. Support got that solved quickly and I ended up getting a free month for when I wasn't billed.

I've been more than happy with OTR. I can stream 4k video with no problem and play online games, which I haven't been able to do in 13 years since I lived in the city.

I've had problems with routers never wanting to work, but that's a different issue.

Man, I really deserve some sort of kickback from OTR...

OTR just announced today some changes to their plans. Maybe that's why they weren't responsive. I've never had more than a 20-minute wait in chat, but it's normally under 5 minutes.
https://www.rvmobileinternet.com/otr-mobile-changes-plan-lineup/

OTR is by no means your only option on these plans too. It's just what I chose when I went through the process 6 or so months ago.

Here's a list of other vendors.
AT&T:
https://www.rvmobileinternet.com/gear/att-unlimited-rental-plans/?fwp_cellular_data_plan_carrier=att
Verizon:
https://www.rvmobileinternet.com/gear/verizon-unlimited-rental-plans/
TMobile:
https://www.rvmobileinternet.com/gear/t-mobile-unlimited-rental-plans/
Sprint:
https://www.rvmobileinternet.com/gear/sprint-unlimited-rental-plans/


I also didn't know about this plan that many have had luck with using in hotspots.
https://www.rvmobileinternet.com/gear/att-dataconnect-tablet/

tfunk02 said:

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Man, I really deserve some sort of kickback from OTR...

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A lot of rookies posting on here. Makes me wonder who is watching this thread.

So I live out in the country side and there is no internet provider available besides satalite with very low speeds and low data caps. I want to get OTR mobile but my question is . Can I get a netgear LTE modem NETGEAR 4G LTE Modem - Instant Broadband Connection | Works with AT&T and Alternate Carriers (LB1120) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01N5ASNTE/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_yJMoDbKMNN2CG and then connect a Wi-Fi router or mesh system like the Google mesh system and get pasted the 20 device limit the nighthawk has?. Looking to get up a at home use only system with a couple outdoor cameras, maybe some smart switches for outdoor lights. But want to have room to use tvs gaming systems and laptops here and there. Anyone have a system like this or similar. Thanks in advance. Saw a comment about something similar above but he paired it with a $700+ antenna . Not really in my budget right now. If anything want to make sure this service works before I spend more on accessories . Again thanks

eliucor said:

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So I live out in the country side and there is no internet provider available besides satalite with very low speeds and low data caps. I want to get OTR mobile but my question is . Can I get a netgear LTE modem NETGEAR 4G LTE Modem - Instant Broadband Connection | Works with AT&T and Alternate Carriers (LB1120) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01N5ASNTE/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_yJMoDbKMNN2CG and then connect a Wi-Fi router or mesh system like the Google mesh system and get pasted the 20 device limit the nighthawk has?. Looking to get up a at home use only system with a couple outdoor cameras, maybe some smart switches for outdoor lights. But want to have room to use tvs gaming systems and laptops here and there. Anyone have a system like this or similar. Thanks in advance. Saw a comment about something similar above but he paired it with a $700+ antenna . Not really in my budget right now. If anything want to make sure this service works before I spend more on accessories . Again thanks

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Yes, I believe you can. I did that with the AT&T NightHawk modem. I just put the IP address of my router into DMZ mode. It's easy to do with a quick google if you don't know how already.

From my trial and error, I'd just spend the extra $100ish to get this modem instead of that one. It would be much better for your application.
https://ltefix.com/shop/routers/cradlepoint-routers/cradlepoint-cba850lp6-na-cat6-att-verizon-t-mobile-sprint-refurbished/

On another note, how did you find this thread?