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Advice on 4G/LTE possibilities in rural area

outofmyshed

Casual Member
Seeking some advice. As a family we are currently considering relocating from an area of London where we have reasonable and very stable FTTC (50/15ish) as well as very good 5G/4G options, to a rural property in Weardale, County Durham. The ability to work from home enables the whole thing, therefore a stable connection with reasonable speeds is essential, ideally no worse than what we have now.

The property’s copper line has much poorer FTTC speeds quoted in the Openreach checker - 18Mbit down / 1Mbit up(!). Whilst the downstream is probably liveable with, the 1Mbit upload has me very concerned, particularly as I have a family who like their iPlayer and Netflix like any other, and my wife and I need to work at the same time (Zoom calls and large uploads etc). Relying on this FTTC seems like an unfeasible option.

Openreach have quite a bit of FTTP to some properties in the neighbouring villages but it could be years before they ever (if they ever) fibre up small clusters of houses off the main road.

There is LTE coverage - according to CellMapper EE have a mast with bands 3 & 20 2km away across a valley, and two others 3-4km away. Other networks’ cell sites are all about 3-4km away in the nearest towns of Wolsingham, Tow Law and Crook. I did some quick speed tests on my EE phone and a cheap Voda mifi when I last visited the property, and didn’t get more than 10-15Mbit/s down or 3-4Mbit/s up on either network, but it’s not a reliable test.
Opensignal data says that 4G speeds around the local main roads are good, but the property is in a bit of a dip with no LOS to any of the masts, and I’m concerned this means that the chance of ever obtaining a usable LTE signal on band 3, with an external omni or directional antenna and (for example) a Huawei/DrayTek router is next to none. Although I’ve just discovered Mikrotik’s LTE kit and the LHG LTE6 device looks very interesting..

My main question is - am I being too pessimistic about what could be achieved with LTE here? I’m willing to invest in the right kit, but if I’m likely onto a no-hoper in gaining usable speeds then it’s not really worth us considering buying the house in the first place, and to hold out for a unicorn rural property with better FTTC stats or ideally FTTP.

Any advice (or options I’ve not considered) much appreciated!
 
Before we dwelve more into lte.. Have you looked at starlink?
 
Also, can you share a post code for your location?
 
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About 90£/m .. but you'd be getting 100mbps ish. Perhaps share it with a neighbour to keep costs down.
 
Anyway, it's worth doing some tests on LTE with either the Mikrotik you linked or a Huawei + external aerial.

I wouldn't rely on the mifi too much. If you put the VF SIM in your phone, does it yield better speeds? Obviously try both indoor (upper floor too), outdoor etc.
 
Yeah I’m aware there can’t be any certainty without testing in situ with the right kit - main issue is I’m 300 miles away 😄 I’ll likely drive up there just to do some real tests when I get time.

I guess I’m wondering if significant gains are even likely from external antennas or the Mikrotek kit given the remoteness of the area and distance from the masts - 2 to 4 km, without line of sight that I can tell. If so it’s worth pursuing even if I have to fit a tall pole!
 
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It's likely an outdoor antenna/router will improve the experience, if not resulting in better speeds at least providing better stability.
While you may not get blazing speeds, it may be enough for your day to day.

You mentioned about buying the house, now if the house ticks all your other checkboxes, I wouldn't let this get in the way. As I said, worse come to worse there's Starlink to fall back on and that should give you all the speeds you need.
 
Also worth looking at the likes of Speedify and MPTCP to aggregate upload. I average 30/20 on VOD in rural area. Bonding quickly approaches the costs of Starlink tho.
 
@bonehead999
Bonding also adds complexity, especially if you want to terminate it into a VPN server of your own and then you'll get other issues, like IP blacklisted in Netflix as they only allow residential ranges etc.

It's not really an option unless you're very technical and don't mind getting your hands dirty.

I see on youtube Starlink in UK can already reach 400 Mbps, latency same as LTE.. that's pretty good. Find a neighbour to share it with and you're golden.
 
DL15 8DP is showing on Three as having excellent cover for 4G and supports Supervoice so that's band 20 which is good at long ranges but limited in download capacity. So Band 3 and 20 at the mast, the only issue it would seem are buildings etc getting in the way or Three issues with local congestion.
 
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Thanks for mentioning bonding - that's something I mucked around with years ago in ADSL Max days, bonding two lines with a Linux box - it was never very stable and I'm not keen on the additional complexity personally.

I think I'd keep the FTTC service anyway as a backup/last resort, on the cheapest unlimited deal I can find, and perhaps invest in a Draytek-type router that supports failover between LTE and DSL.

Starlink doesn't quite cover the postcode yet but it looks like it will before the year is out so it's good to know it's a possibility.

Openreach native FTTP is present and active right at the edge of the nearest village (Fir Tree), only 1.2km away by road. They appear to be slowly working their way west from Crook. That's irritatingly close but not quite! There are so few other properties on the road I'm looking at that I can see only a FTTPoD build being viable if I or the (potential) neighbours can shoulder the cost..

Thanks for the comments and advice. I think a bit more local 4G testing on EE and Three is required, if I can get up there again, and perhaps learn to live with rubbish FTTC speeds initially.
 
Were you inside the property when you tried testing and what was the signal like ?

Height will be your saviour, we ge ta huge improvement from having the microtik up in the loft even through the slate roof compared to a mobile phone or the same microtik device pointing out of the 2nd floor window.

If or how much better you can get is almost impossible to guess, but it might be more than you're expecting.
 
Were you inside the property when you tried testing and what was the signal like ?

Height will be your saviour, we ge ta huge improvement from having the microtik up in the loft even through the slate roof compared to a mobile phone or the same microtik device pointing out of the 2nd floor window.

If or how much better you can get is almost impossible to guess, but it might be more than you're expecting.
I tested both inside & outside - outside was definitely better, but hamstrung by the kit I had to hand for sure (iPhone XS, and crap Huawei mifi).

I've since found out the actual measured VDSL2 speed to the property is 8.7Mb/s down / 1.2 Mb/s up - so even worse than projected on the download. Maybe could be improved with some wiring/modem upgrades but probably only very marginal gains due to the line length.

There's a good loft space and also scope for a pole outside, so I'm thinking the Microtik LTE6 or a Huawei router + Poynting omni antenna combo would be by far the best route to start with out.
 
A Huawei router with poynting antenna (not the 5g one) might be preferable if you go with Three or Vodafone, as they support the extra bands they use (700 and 1500mhz) in case they ever get enabled locally.
 
My local Three mast has been recently upgraded with Band 32 (1500mhz) and aggregated with Band 3 or 20 it gives a good uplift in speeds. Its a download only band and your router needs to support B3+B32 or B20+B32. I use a Huawei B715 with LTE-hmonitor running on a laptop to fix the bands on the router.
 
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