networking

T-Mobile 5G: An Experiment with Fixed Wireless Internet Access

t-mobile-gateway-v4-frontIn the next few weeks we’ll crest the first anniversary of Hurricane Beryl, which had quite an impact hereabouts. In the storm we lost power for a less than two days. However, our Comcast/Xfinity internet access was out for a week. As someone who works full-time from a home office, that was a problem for me. As a contract IT worker, no internet access means no money. No buénno.

My laptop, a Lenovo X1 Carbon Gen7 from 2019, has the optional 4G mobile data access module. It’s part of our Mint Mobile family plan. So, at some level I can be online with just the laptop. That provides a minimal level of productivity.

Similarly, I can tether my desktop and perhaps one or two small devices to my mobile phone. That’s ok for an afternoon, but not a good solution for a week or more.

Lenovo X-1-Carbon Ookla 4G

The 4G speed test on the laptop screen reflects 4G LTE access, not 5G. Also, Mint Mobile data rates are often lower than T-Mobile’s own clients. Even though T-Mobile now owns Mint, the MVNO customers are given lower priority on the network.

Then it occurred to me that all the mobile carriers had been promoting fixed wireless service in the neighborhood. In post-Beryl Houston, power was out at our home, but not too far away there was a T-Mobile store that was open for business as usual. They had a 5G fixed wireless devices for $0 with $60/month and no contract term. It seemed like potentially a good solution. At least, there was little to risk in trying it on for size.

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New Gear: JetKVM is really very handy!

Late last year I supported the Kickstarter for JetKVM. This device is a tiny little IP-KVM solution. It’s basically a refined package of everything involved in a PiKVM. Connect HDMI & USB from a computer-to-be-controlled, and Ethernet. Then the web interface on the JetKVM device allows that device to be remote controlled using just a web browser from anywhere there’s IP connectivity.

JetKVM-device-front

I had actually forgotten that I supported the project until one day a pair the wee devices arrived. It happens that I’ve been meaning to work on a KVM solution for my home office.

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Comcast won’t let me be

Comcast Business NotificationWhen the Scientific Atlanta/Cisco CableCard failure occurred on December 1 it was just the push we needed to cut the cord. Since we could not have our beloved Tivo DVR there was no further reason to stay with Comcast. We dropped both Xfinity cable TV and Comcast Business internet access. Both changes were long overdue.

Since then, the company simply won’t stop bothering us. They send us offers in the mail saying how, “they miss us” and, “they want us to come back.” I suppose that’s to be expected. Junk mail.

However, for the past week they’ve been sending me text messages with advice about network upgrade work in the area. We had a Comcast Business account for over a decade and never received anything from them. Now they start sending me messages. A month after we closed the account?!

This is not the sort of thing that inspires. Rather, it highlights just what a senseless and uncoordinated organization they truly are.

As if that’s not annoying enough, they send further text messages asking if the prior messages have been helpful? What sort of idiocy is this? We simply don’t care about a service we no longer use.

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Ubiquiti Unifi UXG-Max Router: The Most Boring Installation in Memory

The transition to AT&T Fiber meant jumping from 60/10 mbps service to 500/500 mbps service. Our old router was SmallWall on a recycled HP T620 Plus thin client. SmallWall is a fork of m0n0wall, which I used for years previously. And a history lesson, m0n0wall was the progenitor of pfsense.

Alas, that little hardware/software combination simply wasn’t up to this new, and much faster, ISP. It could only manage to pass 120 mbps. The CPU tracking in SmallWall didn’t show it to be overburdened. I suspect other aspects of the hardware were the problem. It has a dual-ported Intel NIC. They’re 1G ports, connected to the host via a PCIe x4 connector.

UXG-Max

I could have swapped out the T620 Plus for something newer and faster. However, I decided to extend our installation of Ubiquiti Unifi gear by adding their Unifi UXG Max router. That would allow me to see the ISP/router performance in the Unifi UI, which is handled by the Unifi Controller app running on a local Raspberry Pi400.

We came to use the Unifi line by way of their Wi-Fi access points. That was the end-state of what had been a long-running search to deliver reliable Wi-Fi. When our Ubiquiti PowerAP N died we deployed Unifi AC Pro access points. So began our foray into “software defined networking.”

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Good riddance to Comcast & Xfinity

For many, many years we have been customers of Comcast. We had their consumer cable TV service, which was rebranded Xfinity. We also had Comcast Business Class internet access. We had both services a very long time.

At the time we installed them we were quite happy with both services. As a Tivo household we were compelled to have cable TV service. We adored Tivo. That effectively bound us to Xfinity.

Back in the day (2008-ish) Comcast’s DOCSIS-powered cable internet outperformed the only alternative, which was DSL. It was not without its quirks. We were compelled to switch to business class service because consumer service was badly degraded at certain times of the day. Basically, it slowed to a crawl when the kids got out of school.

In the early days, we’d occasionally hear from some salesperson who claimed to be our new account rep. They came and went. Every time they offered us faster service, it was for way more money. Occasionally they’d have some deal, but the special offer always evaporated if I wanted to use my own cable modem and router. Or if I didn’t want a bundle that included their voice service.

Eventually, they stopped calling on us. We’ve not been bound to a contract since 2012. We’ve just been grandfathered in on a legacy “Deluxe 60/10” service that cost around $100/mo.

Tivo is the glue

We’ve been a Tivo household since 2001. We currently have a Tivo Roamio Pro with 6 tuners. It’s on the main TV in the house. Other TVs are connected to Tivo Mini’s and a Tivo Mini LUX. A total of four TVs can access any content.

Tivo is still the superlative DVR. Nothing else comes even close. Some cable and satellite providers licensed Tivo tech for their own use. Their own DVRs are absolutely lame in comparison. The fact that they could not match Tivo in 25 years is, I think, testament to the fact that they just didn’t care about the user experience.

Our cable TV bill was over $200/mo. If it were not for our investment in, and admiration of Tivo, we would have long ago dumped Comcast.

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POE Splitters Revisited

Around here we make significant use of power-over-ethernet. If something can be powered from the network…it is. Sometimes that means the device itself supports POE. Occasionally it means the device is connected to a “POE splitter.” That’s a little device that receives 802.11af standard p.o.e. and breaks out a 5v or 12v DC feed. This is how we power the little IoT hubs from Philips Hue and Lutron, and some Raspberry Pi’s.

Some time ago I did a little exploration of POE extenders. These are like little network switches that receive ethernet with power from one cable, allowing it to be passed onward to 2-3 POE capable devices. The theory here is that a single run of Cat 5E can power 2-3 IP cameras, up to the load limit of the port on the switch. If the switch is capable of POE+ it can readily handle two or three cameras connected to a single port.

Recently I learned of a different kind of POE splitter. These are a wholly passive arrangement. Just some wires and connectors. They leverage the fact that Ethernet does not use all 8 conductors in the cable. So, by shifting which pins use which wires at both ends of the cable, you can effectively turn one cable pull into two Ethernet drops.

POE splitter combiner

At the switch, a combiner component connects two ports to a single cable. At the far end, a splitter component breaks the feeds out to separate Ethernet jacks. Power can be delivered over both connections.

It’s dead common to have a camera position at the peak of a roof gable, or the corner of a house, where you might like to have cameras looking in each direction. This harness makes that possible without pulling two Ethernet cables. And retains the ability to power cycle each camera by cycling power to the associated port.

While not fancy, these wee beasts are simple and cheap. Just $15 a set. That seems quite attractive for some common situations.

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