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Zyxel NR5103E ports , which does what?

Eagle

Regular Member
Hi , I currently have my Zyxel disassembled and mounted into a EPNT-2 , the signal improvement was massive without the 12m cable run , saw it briefly read -96 RSRP on N78 and it was -126 RSRP before the upgrade.

I have the internal antenna ports hooked up to U.fl - SMA male connectors so it can connect to EPNT-2.

Does anyone know which ports do 4G/5G any information at all about it?

I've been really struggling trying to figure out what port does what, I want the best possible upload / download and that will come from N78 band but I can't seem to figure out which port corresponds to what. This is what it looks like.

The only semi-working combo I got was putting con4 (main1) to the CELL-02 main on the EPNT-2 which is a 5 dBi weaker omni antenna. And putting con2(main2) into the CELL-01 main on antenna which is the uni directional one, ideally the one I want to use.

Note the latency and download speed improvement from that combo though , never saw latency like that. I need to get it back to that if nothing else.

When I changed bands it went back to reading -120 RSRP -20 RSRQ and -18 SINR

Weird behavior I can't figure out at all.

My disassembly thread here:
https://www.ispreview.co.uk/talk/threads/zyxel-nr5103e-disassembly.38870/

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ZvSfHPi.jpeg

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Unfortunately not sure what to suggest, being unfamiliar with the router and all, but very happy for you, amazing latency and very reasonable speeds.

Looks like you'll need to do a bit of "combinatorics" and see what works best.

Maybe @ShanePoy from Poynting has some suggestions.
 
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When it works it's great , finally got a semi working solution. My issue is now the router /antenna behavior... Improved my N78 signal from -126 to -96 RSRP by eliminating the 12m of coax cable run and mounting Zyxel in EPNT-2.

When I first boot it up it works amazing , but if I leave it idling it'll drop the NSA connection and signal will go to -123 RSRP , seems like the antenna changes what one it uses or god knows what happens. I'd love to figure out this weirdness because I got a huge upgrade if it'd stay. I was getting 80 Mbps max on a saturday evening on 4CA LTE before. Now I'm hitting what I might get on LTE on an empty cell at 4am with 4CA at any time of day when it works.

9zt5R0Q.png
 
When it works it's great , finally got a semi working solution. My issue is now the router /antenna behavior... Improved my N78 signal from -126 to -96 RSRP by eliminating the 12m of coax cable run and mounting Zyxel in EPNT-2.

When I first boot it up it works amazing , but if I leave it idling it'll drop the NSA connection and signal will go to -123 RSRP , seems like the antenna changes what one it uses or god knows what happens. I'd love to figure out this weirdness because I got a huge upgrade if it'd stay. I was getting 80 Mbps max on a saturday evening on 4CA LTE before. Now I'm hitting what I might get on LTE on an empty cell at 4am with 4CA at any time of day when it works.

9zt5R0Q.png
When NSA drops and you get -123 RSRP, which LTE bands do you see connected?
 
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Additionally it appears these are the port mapping with the help of Seán again. Note this is with wiring directly to the internal antennas instead of the external but there is PCB traces maybe they are similar.

This is by far the best working combo I had from all the testing I did.

Con1 - 4G Diversity
Con2 - 5G Primary
Con3 - 5G Diversity
Con4 - 4G Primary



ZvSfHPi.jpeg
 
When NSA drops and you get -123 RSRP, which LTE bands do you see connected?
It'll be B20/B28 as that's the only anchor bands that Three IE use for 5G. It's usually like this here after I either idle for ages that it drops , or reboot/change bands causes the same mess up.

82QAbD3.png
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Maybe there's a way to keep it active, i.e not let it idle - maybe keep a radio station or youtube running 24/7 with the sound off?
 
Additionally it appears these are the port mapping with the help of Seán again. Note this is with wiring directly to the internal antennas instead of the external but there is PCB traces maybe they are similar.

This is by far the best working combo I had from all the testing I did.

Con1 - 4G Diversity
Con2 - 5G Primary
Con3 - 5G Diversity
Con4 - 4G Primary



ZvSfHPi.jpeg
Would this suggest the external antenna ports are 2x2 4G + 2x2 5G? If that's the case I should probably get another 2x2 antenna just to drive the 4G anchor.
 
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Would this suggest the external antenna ports are 2x2 4G + 2x2 5G? If that's the case I should probably get another 2x2 antenna just to drive the 4G anchor.
That has indeed been suggested -- as has another alternative, that the ports are split across different RF bands rather than 4G/5G as such.
AFAIK there's no definitive answer -- other than that the best/safest option is to use either a 4x4 MIMO antenna or 2 2x2 MIMO ones...
 
@Eagle , just going through your thread on confusedbird.

If I understand correctly, you're saying that ports 1 and 4 are for 2x2 MIMO on 4G and ports 2 and 3 are for 2x2 5G MIMO.

However, Sean mentions that by reverse switching them, you can achieve a 4x4 MIMO on both 4G and 5G. How would this be even possible, unless as @IJD mentions above the ports are split across different RF bands.

I have a 4x4 Poynting antenna. Just have some ts9/sma pigtails on order and will test the 4G out, as Three only have 4G in my area. However, as far as I'm aware, Three have not yet rolled out 4x4 MIMO across the UK as yet?
 
I'm not saying what is right or wrong here, but...


"If its the Zyxel Router it will have 4 x Antenna Ports, again not easy as it depends which 5G NR Bands you are getting (5G n78 Band will use a different Port to 5G n28 Band)."


"There is still some confusion on the EE Router as to how the Ports are paired and configured, my belief is it dependant on the 5G Freq Band and how its switched, ie 5G NR Bands n28 (Low 700mhz), Bands n1, n3, n7 (Mid 1800 to 2700mhz) and n78, n79 (High 3400 to 3800mhz), all very confusing as EE have started to use all of these Bands now but in different Locations in 5G Coverage."

"If youve got 2 lots of 2x2 Mimo Antennas to play around with, Im assuming they are both 4/5G Full Spec, I would use Ports 1 and 2 for one and Ports 3 and 4 for the other, lets also assume 1, 2 is 4G and lower Band 5G and 3, 4 is Upper Band 5G, so try and concentrate on the 4G first then see if you can also pull in any 5G might be doing but your about 7 miles away from 5G according to the EE Coverage."

"As said before my theory on these Ports is that 2 of them are for 3.5ghz Only (Band 78 5G which you won't get without a 4G Connection) the other 2 are for 4G Bands (to pull the Signal in on for 4G in poor Signals areas so as to use the 4G as an anchor for the 5G NSA. The same 4G Ports will also potential cover 5G Band n28 (700mhz) as well as EE's Re Farmed 4G to 5G in the future."
 
Would this suggest the external antenna ports are 2x2 4G + 2x2 5G? If that's the case I should probably get another 2x2 antenna just to drive the 4G anchor.
I definitely can't say for certain what the ports are, I'm just saying what combo works by far the best for B28,B3,B1,N78 I used and what we speculated the ports may be going by the speeds + latency. No other combo worked for me with the above bands as good as what I mentioned.
I also think the theory IJD said makes sense from the behavior I've witnessed.

I tried every single combo painstakingly , nothing came close. I'm not using the TS9 ports for external antennas though. I have IPEX-SMA male connectors hooked up to the ports for the internal antennas of the Zyxel as the TS9 ports are 3 dB worse in signal loss from testing.

But one thing I know for sure is , "con2 main2" was giving me 13-18ms when connected to 5G but when I was using main1 con4 it would be double that latency every time.

Another strange behavior I have noticed is, I boot up my router I get -103 NR RSRP on N78 and everythings great.

But if I idle and let the 5G NSA connection drop back to LTE-A. It'll drop to -120 NR RSRP and it'll not come back until I power off the router and leave it for at least 15 minutes. Seán thinks it might be swapping the MIMO pairs while idle which would put the 5G MIMO on the weaker omni antenna in the EPNT-2. I ordered a 2m cable XPOL V3 to mount in a diamond shape as my second antenna as the omni has literally 0 gain on N78.
 
Unfortunately, I didn't have much success with the pigtails and the Poynting. RSRP was at -97, SINR was at 6.

I then removed the pigtails, reset the router and went back to stock internal antennas. Here are the stats:

stats.webp


Pretty amazing for the internal antennas. However, this mast is saturated and I can only get around 34mbps download and mbps upload. That's 3 for you :(
 
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Additionally it appears these are the port mapping with the help of Seán again. Note this is with wiring directly to the internal antennas instead of the external but there is PCB traces maybe they are similar.

This is by far the best working combo I had from all the testing I did.

Con1 - 4G Diversity
Con2 - 5G Primary
Con3 - 5G Diversity
Con4 - 4G Primary



ZvSfHPi.jpeg
Just to be clear -- as far as the external antenna ports are concerned, CON4 is at the top and CON1 is at the bottom?

This would give the following external ports:

CON4/main1 (top) - 4G Primary
CON3 - 5G Diversity
CON2/main2 - 5G Primary
CON1 (bot) - 4G Diversity

Doesn't make any kind of sense though... :-(
 
Just to be clear -- as far as the external antenna ports are concerned, CON4 is at the top and CON1 is at the bottom?

This would give the following external ports:

CON4/main1 (top) - 4G Primary
CON3 - 5G Diversity
CON2/main2 - 5G Primary
CON1 (bot) - 4G Diversity


Doesn't make any kind of sense though... :-(
On the EE Version there is a User Manual you can download (PDF) from the Routers Admin Web UI Area, although I never managed to get my hands on it yet.

Does the Three Router have simular and if so any Info in there about External Settings.

As you say the Combi you have doesnt make sense, on the EE version I have always advised on the EE Forum, Ports 1 and 2 as one MiMo Pair and Ports 3 and 4 as the other MiMo Pair, which has generally worked for most peeps.
 
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Nothing in that user guide about external antennae... :-(

Has anyone got a copy of the Zyxel (not EE) manual?
 
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