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New Three 5G Hub (NR5103E)

Received my NR5103E from CEX and I think i've been sold a dud. :(
Under Cellular Info it reads, Sim Card Status None.

I've tried the card in another router and it works ok.
Tried resetting the Zyxel but same problem. Attached a pic to make sure i'm putting it in correctly.
1000062450.jpg

Yes that looks right Jabra.
Hopefully you can just do a swap over or a return with CEX.

The slot can be particulary fussy depending if you have the SIM completely flat or not, and make sure it does click in place properly.

I usually use the edge of a 1p coin to gently insert or remove the SIM.

If you don't have any luck, hopefully you csn get a replacement unit from CEX soon.
 
Thanks for the prompt reply Wee Bear. They took an age to send it out and then I get a knackered one. Wonder if it's been blocked by Three.

They never have any in the cex near me so unfortunately I'll have to return, reorder and hope for the best. Be nice if they tested these before selling them on.
 
Thanks for the prompt reply Wee Bear. They took an age to send it out and then I get a knackered one. Wonder if it's been blocked by Three.

They never have any in the cex near me so unfortunately I'll have to return, reorder and hope for the best. Be nice if they tested these before selling them on.
Yes you would think they would test them, I've seen some users say that have got them from stores and that they still have a test SIM in them, so I guess some stores are more strict than others might be.

Anyway, I hope when you do get a replacement it will be OK.
It sort of ruins your experience though, very annoying when these things happen.
 
Regarding 'band selection', I have a theory - but I am not sure if it makes sense:

Somewhere else online (and regarding another 5g router) I read that the order of the manually selected bands makes a difference, since the first one in the list will be used for uploads... (not sure if that's generally true)

Now I noticed that the 'service information' tab of my zyxel nr5103e is listing the used bands not in numerical order - so there's a chance that you can define the order of selected bands depending on which ones you tick first. (I don't want to mess around with my current settings to test this, since i am working)

Not sure if this is actually true and that it makes a performance difference, but worth pointing out. Does anyone know more about this?
 
Regarding 'band selection', I have a theory - but I am not sure if it makes sense:

Somewhere else online (and regarding another 5g router) I read that the order of the manually selected bands makes a difference, since the first one in the list will be used for uploads... (not sure if that's generally true)

Now I noticed that the 'service information' tab of my zyxel nr5103e is listing the used bands not in numerical order - so there's a chance that you can define the order of selected bands depending on which ones you tick first. (I don't want to mess around with my current settings to test this, since i am working)

Not sure if this is actually true and that it makes a performance difference, but worth pointing out. Does anyone know more about this?
Fairly sure that is true. If you're using 5G NSA, it'll be the 5G band and the primary 4G band.
 
I skipped 5g and enforced 4g since upload speeds on 5g were so bad, but now i might be back in the race for 5g signal if i can influence the choice for upload bands... fingers crossed
 
Hi all,

Struggling to find a clear solution in the 149 pages.

I have a NR5103E that I'm running an EE sim through. Like others I am only getting LTE and can't access 5g. This is despite playing with the bands.

Any tips would be much appreciated.

Thanks,
Tim

 
Hi all,

Struggling to find a clear solution in the 149 pages.

I have a NR5103E that I'm running an EE sim through. Like others I am only getting LTE and can't access 5g. This is despite playing with the bands.

Any tips would be much appreciated.

Thanks,
Tim

Has this always happened or only recently?

If it's recently, potentially you've used too much data, wait until your next refresh to see it show up again.
 
I wanted to give you all an update on my mobile broadband saga.


Over four weeks ago, my mobile broadband became rubbish. It was sluggish, had crazy latency and jitter. It’s always performed very well and used to have a pretty consistent connection of 125 MBs even as high as 250 with the ex X-POL 2x2. We are 5.1miles as the crow flies from the mast.


These problems were always when 5G was turned on. When 5g was off the connection was a lot more stable but the speeds were only 1 - 10mbs. I turned off the security cameras and all other peripheries and I could use the fire stick and Sonos but everything else had issues.

Initially, I suspected that the issues stemmed from a problem at the mast, which was supported by information from the Three website indicating ongoing maintenance. To eliminate any potential router-related issues, I conducted tests by removing the SIM card from my D-Link router and inserting it into a spare phone belonging to my sister. The same problems persisted, indicating that the router itself was not the source of the issue. My parents also have the same set up as me and live next door and were experiencing the exact same issues.

To add to the chaos, my SIM card got stuck in the D-Link router, complicating matters even more. Luckily, my OH was able to rescue it by taking the router apart. Crisis averted.

I turned to the forum for advice. I decided to go down the Stalrlink route. I got some great advice from the forum and decided it was the best thing for me. I had a word with OH who said that he would look into it. Having done some research, he decided that it would not be right for us as the electricity costs were too high, as well as the monthly fees. He said was willing to go along with it, but only after I’d exhausted the other possibilities, i.e. buying a new router.
Despite my skepticism about buying a new router it seemed that the only thing to truly rule out the issues was to throw more money at the problem and buy a ‘soap dispenser’.


After setting up the new router and following the forum's tips to connect my X-POL 2x2 antenna with pigtails (ports 1 (top) and 3), the difference was like night and day. My speeds shot up to 600 Mbps, with a ping of 30.

I’m honestly rather blown away!

I can’t thank everybody on this forum enough as I’ve read so many posts it’s really rather unbelievable. This has been the first place I come on a morning and the last place I come on an evening to read through and get as much advice as possible. The satellite broadband and mobile broadband forum have been amazing to me and put a great deal of effort into everything they’ve told me.

Thank you everybody so much. To anybody who is reading this without an NR5103e
and you are struggling with mobile broadband, maybe give it a try as it worked for me even when everything else pointed at an issue with the mast.
 
I wanted to give you all an update on my mobile broadband saga.


Over four weeks ago, my mobile broadband became rubbish. It was sluggish, had crazy latency and jitter. It’s always performed very well and used to have a pretty consistent connection of 125 MBs even as high as 250 with the ex X-POL 2x2. We are 5.1miles as the crow flies from the mast.


These problems were always when 5G was turned on. When 5g was off the connection was a lot more stable but the speeds were only 1 - 10mbs. I turned off the security cameras and all other peripheries and I could use the fire stick and Sonos but everything else had issues.

Initially, I suspected that the issues stemmed from a problem at the mast, which was supported by information from the Three website indicating ongoing maintenance. To eliminate any potential router-related issues, I conducted tests by removing the SIM card from my D-Link router and inserting it into a spare phone belonging to my sister. The same problems persisted, indicating that the router itself was not the source of the issue. My parents also have the same set up as me and live next door and were experiencing the exact same issues.

To add to the chaos, my SIM card got stuck in the D-Link router, complicating matters even more. Luckily, my OH was able to rescue it by taking the router apart. Crisis averted.

I turned to the forum for advice. I decided to go down the Stalrlink route. I got some great advice from the forum and decided it was the best thing for me. I had a word with OH who said that he would look into it. Having done some research, he decided that it would not be right for us as the electricity costs were too high, as well as the monthly fees. He said was willing to go along with it, but only after I’d exhausted the other possibilities, i.e. buying a new router.
Despite my skepticism about buying a new router it seemed that the only thing to truly rule out the issues was to throw more money at the problem and buy a ‘soap dispenser’.


After setting up the new router and following the forum's tips to connect my X-POL 2x2 antenna with pigtails (ports 1 (top) and 3), the difference was like night and day. My speeds shot up to 600 Mbps, with a ping of 30.

I’m honestly rather blown away!

I can’t thank everybody on this forum enough as I’ve read so many posts it’s really rather unbelievable. This has been the first place I come on a morning and the last place I come on an evening to read through and get as much advice as possible. The satellite broadband and mobile broadband forum have been amazing to me and put a great deal of effort into everything they’ve told me.

Thank you everybody so much. To anybody who is reading this without an NR5103e
and you are struggling with mobile broadband, maybe give it a try as it worked for me even when everything else pointed at an issue with the mast.
That's a happy ending for you Powerful, you gotta love the old soap dispenser. 🥰

All's well that ends well.😊(y)
 
That's a happy ending for you Powerful, you gotta love the old soap dispenser. 🥰

All's well that ends well.😊(y)
Indeed - even without the antennae it works amazingly. 250mbs instantly from that bad boy.

I’m lost for words to be honest. Thanks to you personally for all your old and new posts 👍🏼

WB - I’d still LOVE to know why I was having such a problem and why my parents still have the same issue -although their speed is much better than mine was due to the location next door that has a much better view of the mast area.
 
Indeed - even without the antennae it works amazingly. 250mbs instantly from that bad boy.

I’m lost for words to be honest. Thanks to you personally for all your old and new posts 👍🏼
Aw, you're very welcome Powerful, I'm so glad you found some helpful posts in the forums, it's always nice to hear users success stories. (y)🥰
 
Totally guessing here but it sounds/feels like you originally had n28 (5G DSS) which Three reverted to B28 (4G) only and probably were then left with n1 DSS instead and the DLink was then struggling to pick up (hence your unstable 5G recently).

I would also guess that the DLink's external antennas are n78 only and all other frequencies use the internal antennas, which as they are not able to get a suitably high signal level (as shown by the 1-10MBps you mentioned when set to 4G only) the n1 5G bearer isn't being allowed to connect, let alone the n78 one.

And thats where the 5103e comes in - I think its external antennas cover more frequencies, allowing a stronger 4G primary/anchor which then allows 5G to be aggregated.

The only way to back any of these guesses up would be to be able to know the connected cells/bands of the DLink and their raw signal metrics before and after the changes; something I don't think the DLink software shows...

I would imagine you're probably best looking for a different device for your parents too - assuming they also have a similar setup (DLink/antenna)
 
Thank you for the insight Gavin. You could well be right there as it certainly seems to make sense. I know that the current cell 5103E is connected to is the same as the d-link was, but other than that I am lost as the information provided in the D-Link software is very limited.

The 5G of the Dlink was originally perfect and one Sunday nearly 5 weeks ago. It went off. It came on nine days later showing perfect signal and I thought we were fixed. However the latency was high and the speed was low, and it’s never been the same. This also backs up your theory.
 
Thank you everybody so much. To anybody who is reading this without an NR5103e
and you are struggling with mobile broadband, maybe give it a try as it worked for me even when everything else pointed at an issue with the mast.

£120 for my "soap box" was well spent IMHO. No external antennae and the speed I get from 2km away surprises me. Speed tests may be limited by my WiFi as I don't have an ethernet port on my laptop (Acer Swift Edge) and my USB to ethernet connector is an old USB2.1 which definitely wouldn't keep up.

I do notice that selecting 4G only boosts the signal strength on the occasions they're working on the mast.

This forum has been so much help - I got my daughter on 4G Internet very cheaply, got a Sercomm 4G hacked for EE so I could use cheap Lyca SIMS, and now a NR5103E for top-notch connection.
 
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Hi all! Apologies if this is a bit of a stupid question (I am not very technology minded!) and it has already been addressed on this thread, but would you recommend (i.e. which is the best?) either the NR5103, NR5103e or the NR5103ev2 to use for home wifi? Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks
 
Hi all! Apologies if this is a bit of a stupid question (I am not very technology minded!) and it has already been addressed on this thread, but would you recommend (i.e. which is the best?) either the NR5103, NR5103e or the NR5103ev2 to use for home wifi? Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks
Hi Turin, welcome along to the forums. (y)

Not a stupid question at all.

While I can't comment on the V2 router as I have the original router, I'd just like to say that for me, the Zyxel NR5103E's WiFi is really good compared to my previous ZTE and Huawei routers.

They all struggled to work in the garden, while the Zyxel only drops 1 or 2 bars and works really well, and that's on the 5 GHz band.

I've just tried it on the 2.4 Ghz band in the garden and it remained at full strength.

It will depend on your own particular circumstances of course, wall thickness, garden distance etc, but for me the V1 has excellent WiFi.

Hopefully you'll get a report from a V2 user soon. :)
(You'd like to think they'd be very similar)
 
Hi all! Apologies if this is a bit of a stupid question (I am not very technology minded!) and it has already been addressed on this thread, but would you recommend (i.e. which is the best?) either the NR5103, NR5103e or the NR5103ev2 to use for home wifi? Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks
The V1 NR5103E Is the better router (Lots of people call it the NR5103 even if it is an 'E' so best way is to check the branding. If it's got the Three logo it's an E. If it's got the EE Logo it's the regular NR5103.

Both of these two models work just as well as each other. But the Three branded one is less locked down for you to play with the settings. The EE one is more restrictive - But if you don't want to mess around with band locking and other such settings then it's no big deal and just pick whatever you can get at the best price really.

The NR5103EV2 Is an inferior product where costs have been cut in production. While it is smaller which will appeal to some people, it's got smaller antennas inside which also seem to be more directional. If I compare the two side by side, the V2 tends to be noticeably slower for download speeds.
 
The V1 NR5103E Is the better router (Lots of people call it the NR5103 even if it is an 'E' so best way is to check the branding. If it's got the Three logo it's an E. If it's got the EE Logo it's the regular NR5103.

Both of these two models work just as well as each other. But the Three branded one is less locked down for you to play with the settings. The EE one is more restrictive - But if you don't want to mess around with band locking and other such settings then it's no big deal and just pick whatever you can get at the best price really.

The NR5103EV2 Is an inferior product where costs have been cut in production. While it is smaller which will appeal to some people, it's got smaller antennas inside which also seem to be more directional. If I compare the two side by side, the V2 tends to be noticeably slower for download speeds.

I can vouch for the directionality of the NR5103Ev2 - it's very sensitive to direction, which in my case with not-great signal and quite a few buildings around is annoying as the optimum direction seems to change from day to day! (probably some weather component maybe affecting the signal?).
The v2 also only has 2 external antenna ports vs 4 on the NR5103E, and from memory the v2 has 2 1x gigabit LAN ports whereas the 5103E has 1x gigabit and 1x 2.5 gigabit?
 
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