4G home setup help - newbie

[nickdex10]

Hello everyone I hope some one is able to help. I have recently moved home and am getting very poor fibre broadband which is causing issues with remote working. I am looking to move to a 4g setup. Any advice in what isp and router to use would be great, I have done a bit of research and generally sounds good but there seems alot of issues with console gaming (PS4/Xbox) over 4g setups? EE seems to be the best but I don't think that the FUP of 1tb is enough...? Smarty seems the most cost effective but again not sure it works with console gaming. Any help or advice would be much appreciated!

 

[Buggerlugz]

I'd recommend getting a bunch of sims from different carriers and trying them out on an sim unlocked mobile or tablet first, do some speed tests from where you think you'll plug your router in.

Also do your speed tests every 3 hours so you can find out which carriers are oversubscribed during peak times.

This will give you some idea which carrier will provide the fastest and most reliable connection for you.

As for router, I expect you'll get one which will do a good job with the contract you go with.

 

[nickdex10]

I'd recommend getting a bunch of sims from different carriers and trying them out on an sim unlocked mobile or tablet first, do some speed tests from where you think you'll plug your router in.

Also do your speed tests every 3 hours so you can find out which carriers are oversubscribed during peak times.

This will give you some idea which carrier will provide the fastest and most reliable connection for you.

As for router, I expect you'll get one which will do a good job with the contract you go with.

Thanks for your response, im probably going to buy the router separately so will get a sim only deal as they seem to offer better value.

 

[MrDave]

Three will give you no issues with gaming. Vodafone and EE will as they have strict NAT.

 

[Buggerlugz]

I'd like to add, at times Three can be very unreliable. During those periods if you want to download a 100gb game to play it can literally take a few days or you may just give up waiting.

Also depending on your connection at any given moment your ping may be either an acceptable 50ms (at best) or useless 1000ms (at worst). You may see 80Mbps or you may see 5Mbps depending on how the moon is shining, or the trees are swaying.

I'd say on three, if you think you can just happily sit down for an hour before bed, download something and thrash it out with friends during that period you could end up very frustrated. Then again on the following evening it may work out for you.

Reliability is a real issue for three.

 

[nickdex10]

I'd like to add, at times Three can be very unreliable. During those periods if you want to download a 100gb game to play it can literally take a few days or you may just give up waiting.

I'm quite near to a mast and will monitor it over a couple of days first, I was promised 14-25mb from BT which stil isnt great but after an openreach visit the engineer said the most I will get is 10mb. Im currently getting 25-50mb speeds in the test through 3.

 

[Buggerlugz]

I think 25-50mb is best you can hope for from three until they upgrade your mast so you can get 4g+ on bands1 and 3 simultaneously, or are in range of 5g.

Due to the U.S. response to Huawei blocking chip sales, It appears all Huawei 5g kit is not going to be installed in the UK now, so I'm not holding my breath on the latter.

 

[nickdex10]

I think 25-50mb is best you can hope for from three until they upgrade your mast so you can get 4g+ on bands1 and 3 simultaneously, or are in range of 5g.

Due to the U.S. response to Huawei blocking chip sales, It appears all Huawei 5g kit is not going to be installed in the UK now, so I'm not holding my breath on the latter.

To be honest I'll be happy if can consistently get around 30mb, much better then the speeds BT have dealt me so far! Do you have any advice in which stand alone router would be best to get?

 

[Buggerlugz]

One with the highest CAT rating possible and probably future proofed to include 5g would be my advice.