Slow 4G in Wellington CBD with Huawei E5776

Forums › Spark New Zealand (including Skinny and BigPipe) › Slow 4G in Wellington CBD with Huawei E5776

timmmay

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#148480 20-Jun-2014 14:37

I'm in a tall building in the Wellington CBD on The Terrace, quite high up. On Telecom 4G we're getting 4Mbps down and typically 0.4Mbps up. As we move the router around the downlink speed stays much the same, but occasionally we get up to 20Mbps up. Ping is 25 - 45ms.

My S4 in the same location gets 10Mbps down and 3Mbps up.

Any thoughts/suggestions? The Huawei is on defaults, other than I've told Wifi it can be use 40Mhz channels, which was probably pretty pointless.

PeterReader

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#1071012 20-Jun-2014 14:37

Hello... Our robot found some keywords in your post, so here is an automated reply with some important things to note regarding broadband speeds.

If you are posting regarding DSL speeds please check that

- you have reset your modem and router

- your PC (or other PCs in your LAN) is not downloading large files when you are testing

- you are not being throttled by your ISP due to going over the monthly cap

- your tests are always done on an ethernet connection to the router - do not use wireless for testing

- you read this topic and follow the instructions there.

Make sure you provide information for other users to help you. If you have not already done it, please EDIT your post and add this now:

- Your ISP and plan

- Type of connection (ADSL, ADSL2, VDSL)

- Your modem DSL stats (do not worry about posting Speedtest, we need sync rate, attenuation and noise margin)

- Your general location (or street)

- If you are rural or urban

- If you know your connection is to an exchange, cabinet or conklin

- If your connection is to a ULL or wholesale service

- If you have done an isolation test as per the link above

Most of the problems with speed are likely to be related to internal wiring issues. Read this discussion to find out more about this. Your ISP is not intentionally slowing you down today (unless you are on a managed plan). Also if this is the school holidays it's likely you will notice slower than usual speed due to more users online.

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timmmay

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#1072333 23-Jun-2014 08:10

Still interested in any thoughts or options from people who know about this stuff. The 4G connection on my phone is significantly faster. What's really odd is the 0.3Mbps upload, with the occasional 22Mbps upload. It was purchased to give a VPN connection back to home base for an IT team, so we don't have to go over the locked down wired connection in a customer corporate office.

I've tried the 4G dongle all over our floor, looking out over the harbor, the hills, etc. The best I get is 6Mbps down and 0.4Mbps up. My S4 gets 12Mbps down and 10Mbps up. Is the Huawei just rubbish?

timmmay

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#1073954 25-Jun-2014 09:28

Here's our speed test result... it's not flash. I've changed the APN to internet.telecom.co.nz to match my S4 but it made no significant difference.

Here's the speed test result (you may need to click to see it)

Here's the admin screen showing we get 4/5 bars of signal strength on 4G

Help! This is really substandard for a 4G connection.

Cbfd

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#1073957 25-Jun-2014 09:37

How high up are we talking

timmmay

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#1073988 25-Jun-2014 10:01

15 floors. We can see over the top of the intercontinental hotel, which is at sea level, and we're near the height of the top of the state insurance building.

jaidevp

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#1074124 25-Jun-2014 12:10

If that's quite high up (I am in Auck) you are probably experiencing no cell dominance, and your device will be seeing coverage from sites it normally wouldn't and is constantly switching between them.

timmmay

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#1074217 25-Jun-2014 12:55

So if I made it directional it might work better? I could bring in an old pot to block out some signals, since there's no way to plug an aerial into it directly. Good idea or bad idea?

You'd think it'd lock onto one tower though wouldn't you? It can probably see a large number of towers though. I've tried it in every window and corner of the building.

timmmay

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#1074760 26-Jun-2014 07:43

It's definitely something to do with height. In the foyer of the building we get 20Mbps down and 12Mbps up, give or take. I couldn't get near a window half way up the building, but we got 4Mbps down and less than 0.1Mbps up, on 3G. Up top again we got up to 8Mbps down but 0.2Mbps up.

I'll try the shield idea when I find something suitable, but you'd think cell sites in Wellington would be designed to work with buildings up high. It's still strange my S4 works fine, I guess the Huawei is just rubbish.

I might try a Vodafone SIM card, see what happens.

jaidevp

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#1075129 26-Jun-2014 17:17

Don't think you'll have much luck trying to block signals. Yes it can be dependant on device antenna/radio capabilities, some tend to hold signal better than others. The answer for better performance for tall buildings is something like a indoor coverage solution (internal antennas etc), if we were to tune CBD sites for tall buildings then it would be at a detriment to all other users.
There are some buildings (Auck) where a site that has the capacity a antenna maybe pointed towards it for better performance.

Cbfd

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#1075170 26-Jun-2014 18:21

Most panels around cities have a tilt directed more towards the ground for obvious reason

Cbfd

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#1075171 26-Jun-2014 18:22

Most panels around cities have a tilt directed more towards the ground for obvious reason

timmmay

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#1075241 26-Jun-2014 20:45

I guess it's a tradeoff between the people walking around the street and the mass of people in the buildings. I think the Huawei is just poor quality, since the S4 works pretty well. Thanks guys.