Verizon LTE Internet and Home Phone

[Timon]

I'm wondering why more RVs haven't looked at the Verizon LTE Internet and Home Phone? There are so many advantages to this device.

• It has its own phone number and you can connect standard phones to it.
• It has a builtin NAT router.
• It has an ethernet output so you can connect hard wired devices.
• It has external antenna jacks so you can feed an external antenna.

Not to say it the end all be all but it's has all the features of a MiFi plus the ability to have phone service. Still it needs more looking into.

[firedoc]

This sounds interesting but can some one more tech advanced explain to me why this would be better than my current iPhone where I can make calls, connect to Internet, and use as a hot spot?

[Timon]

Originally Posted by firedoc

This sounds interesting but can some one more tech advanced explain to me why this would be better than my current iPhone where I can make calls, connect to Internet, and use as a hot spot?

Several reasons.

• External Antenna capable without buying a repeating amplifier.
• Is always working in your coach so even if you're not there you can still connect and monitor your coach.
• Can use any standard cordless phone, or multiple ones, from any location in your coach.

For me the second option is the best especially if you need to leave your pets in the coach when going out. If you want you can also put a camera looking out the front that takes picture every second or so to plot ones trip to the Internet kinda like David Bott does but without using your phone.

[TVS]

I have this device and have an antenna plugged in to it. It's then wired into a powerful wifi router which provides my wifi.

External router bypasses the device limit (I think it's 10?) and gives me control over the in-house wifi. The Verizon device has only basic and limited settings.

I bought a unlimited SIM card off of eBay to put into the Verizon router.

With all of the above, I watch internet tv daily, download movies, work from the rv (Dropbox, large email attachments, etc), check on my Arlo camera when I'm not in the rv, and it feels like I have a regular ISP.

It's a great little router!

[Timon]

Originally Posted by TVS

I have this device and have an antenna plugged in to it. It's then wired into a powerful wifi router which provides my wifi.

External router bypasses the device limit (I think it's 10?) and gives me control over the in-house wifi. The Verizon device has only basic and limited settings.

I bought a unlimited SIM card off of eBay to put into the Verizon router.

With all of the above, I watch internet tv daily, download movies, work from the rv (Dropbox, large email attachments, etc), check on my Arlo camera when I'm not in the rv, and it feels like I have a regular ISP.

It's a great little router!

Not having one I could only go by what I saw in the manual so I wasn't sure what option one could set when using an external router.

• When you added your external router did you find a way to set the Verizon unit to just act as a bridge or did you still have to double NAT?
• Were you able to totally shutdown it's WiFi for both 2.4 and 5GHz?
• I think it uses an external power brick but the manual wasn't clear on that. Do you have the voltage and current that the brick supplies to the device? It swould be on the brick. Also, what type of connector is used for power? I really don't want to power the device from AC but directly from the coaches 12V DC side just like the rest of the networking.
• Who's outside antenna did you end up using?

I plan to use a router that accept multiple WANs so I can set priority on them. I've used professional routers that do this but they are a bit pricy.

On a side note. We've got the old unlimited plans but Verizon keeps putting up roadblocks to make having them not easy to work with. The latest is that I was going to get our new iPhones on the Apple upgrade program except Apple can't activate them on an existing unlimited account, only Verizon can do that. Apple can't sell the phone on the upgrade plan unless t's activated due to the lender that supports the program requirement. That leaves only a full price purchase from Apple then gong to Verizon to do a no charge activation.

Oh, and remember, do't use over 100GB or Verizon will deactivated your account for being a "Hog".

[TVS]

Sorry, I had to wait until I got back to the RV to give you specifics...

The power supply is 5v, 3.5A - you are right, it's a brick. I'm sure you could get there converting 12v to 5v with a step-down transformer found on just about any electronics site. It does have a battery, but the battery only runs the telephone side of the router during power outages. I don't use the phone side of the router at all so I can't speak to it's abilities.

The router cannot be placed into a bridge mode, and placing your other router into access point mode doesn't really give you much of a benefit unless range is an issue (wouldn't be for an RV). You would be correct that there would be a double NAT. I haven't noticed any negatives with how I have things set up, however. Speed has never been an issue unless I get bad cell - which I can double check on my phone.

The antenna ports are SMA female. I bought a weboost antenna that has a FME female, then bought a SMA male to FME male adapter. It's just a 8db magnetic base antenna. If cell reception gets real low, or if speeds aren't what I need, I pull out my weboost system to give me a bit of a boost. Works nearly every time as long as there's LTE to be had.

You can't shut down the WiFi, but you can make it hidden, which is how I have it. I have no need for it. It doesn't have 5G, just 2.4. Like I said, it's router settings are very limited.

Hope that answers all of your questions!

[Timon]

Originally Posted by TVS

Sorry, I had to wait until I got back to the RV to give you specifics...

The power supply is 5v, 3.5A - you are right, it's a brick. I'm sure you could get there converting 12v to 5v with a step-down transformer found on just about any electronics site. It does have a battery, but the battery only runs the telephone side of the router during power outages. I don't use the phone side of the router at all so I can't speak to it's abilities.

The router cannot be placed into a bridge mode, and placing your other router into access point mode doesn't really give you much of a benefit unless range is an issue (wouldn't be for an RV). You would be correct that there would be a double NAT. I haven't noticed any negatives with how I have things set up, however. Speed has never been an issue unless I get bad cell - which I can double check on my phone.

The antenna ports are SMA female. I bought a weboost antenna that has a FME female, then bought a SMA male to FME male adapter. It's just a 8db magnetic base antenna. If cell reception gets real low, or if speeds aren't what I need, I pull out my weboost system to give me a bit of a boost. Works nearly every time as long as there's LTE to be had.

You can't shut down the WiFi, but you can make it hidden, which is how I have it. I have no need for it. It doesn't have 5G, just 2.4. Like I said, it's router settings are very limited.

Hope that answers all of your questions!

Thanks for the info. Verizon has gone through several versions of this device but to date i've not needed one. But when we get this house sold and get the heck out of CA and get the RV it becomes something I might want.

BTW, I check the manual again and it looks like there is a WiFi On/Off setting on the WiFi setup page. You might have a older firmware revision. Also, not that it really matters, I think you can have a lot more than 10 devices running as it seem like the 10 limit is only for WiFi and not for ethernet connected devices.

[Dale & Mark Bruss]

A couple of points. One, because of the way it is powered, it has more transmit power than your smartphone because the smartphone is throttled power-wise to make the battery last longer.

I have a friend with one and he likes that way he can attach regular wireless phones with multiple extensions so he and his wife can easily talk to a family member together.

[wildtoad]

Seems like it's one more phone number and device to deal with. I'd still need two iPhones in addition to this thing, and if the wife and I want to talk to the same person at the same time, we just switch on speaker phone.

Other may have more needs than us, and for them this may be a good option.

[firedoc]

Let me get this straight, this uses cell data? And you do all that streaming, etc.? No wonder it's so hard to get any bandwidth.

[TVS]

Originally Posted by firedoc

Let me get this straight, this uses cell data? And you do all that streaming, etc.? No wonder it's so hard to get any bandwidth.

How is it hard to get bandwidth? It's a pretty good bet that I'm not even in the same state as you right now... Would you rather I be streaming my netflix on the campground's WiFi? It's a safe bet that Verizon has a stronger network backbone than the RV park - so my usage wouldn't be noticed by you.

Also, between my multiple accounts, I pay over $400 a month in cellular charges. I think I'm paying my own way here.

Good try though!

[firedoc]

You don't see it, do you?