MIFi

[Baz]

£130 for 36 months would be £3.61/month which would be hyper cheap.

I’d like a slice of that.

Thats what i paid, prob been running it 18 months now.
This is best i can see now. Supposed to be for business, but never had any issues using them previously . https://www.amazon.co.uk/Three-Unli...2lkZ2V0TmFtZT1zcF9waG9uZV9zZWFyY2hfYXRm&psc=1

 

[ChasF]

I don't think the TP Link has the option to add an external antenna.
.

Didn’t even notice - we’ll see how it goes. It seems the models with external aerial connections don’t have batteries!

Orange 2nd SIM for €5 with unlimited data is exceptionally good value! I still struggle with travelling to EU as I've never found a PAYG unlimited SIM you can buy in the EU and while I can add 'data roaming' to my Three SIM for £5/day, I have to go through the rigmarole of doing it each day as there's no option to pre-pay for a set period - which is frustrating.

I'll figure it out one day

AFAIK all Orange contracts are unlimited data but it does slow down once you reach your limit - mine is 80GB a month, I pay €15 a month plus €5 for the second SIM. We well exceeded the 80GB on our Spain/Portugal trip in January but didn’t notice any difference in service in our use (radio and navigation).

As for the 150Mbps, that's a maximum and you're likely not to get anywhere near that. My experience in France has been relatively good (better on average than the UK) but you'll likely be looking at realistic speeds of 20-40Mbps (which is still fine) in most places.

As we were discussing yesterday we don’t need much speed. I tested our ADSL here and got 19.6/3.4 and the 4G on my phone was 28.7/0.3 and it does everything we need.

 

[Daffy]

Thanks for that, I shall buy the more expensive version of both router and puck. And I’ll get an extra power plug, though I think it’s a standard type, but I don’t know which one.

A really useful thread. Thanks to all who have chipped in. Appreciated.

An extra power plug, is that an additional way to deliver power to the router or is a gizmo that increases the signal strength - if so i might need one of those - I told you i was a technophobe

 

[SBD]

No, it’s so I don’t have to cut the one off the supplied mains power supply, to run it off the 12V in my boat.

 

[sparkplug]

Well, first refusal on my M1 + Poynting Xpol-1 has been refused My own fault for pointing out to the prospective buyer that it wasn't the best setup for their needs. Honesty doesn't always win a sale! (actually, I believe the opposite is true)

So it's now up for sale if anyone is interested.

Not trying to make money on it, just trying to find it a good home.

Full disclosure, the antenna is a bit yellow from years of being on a van roof but while it's not pretty, it's compeltely functional.

The M1 has a metal plate on the back so can be easily mounted on any magnetic stand.

It's been sat in a box for a while and this thread has prompted me to find it a new home rather than sit in that box until it's of no use to anyone (like so much of my tech ends up)

 

[SBD]

Teltonika RUT260, spare power lead & Poynting Puck 5 ordered. Will sort out a sim next and report in due course.

 

[sparkplug]

They have a ton of official videos which are really well put together. e.g.

I'm always happy to help (or try to!) if you get stuck...

 

[SBD]

Thanks.

 

[wheelnut]

Haven’t read the thread but if no one has mentioned the Teltonika RUT range yet then that would be a good shout. We have one in ours. A 12v connector is available and it works well wired up in the wardrobe without an external antenna. It’s on an unlimited EE sim which seems to give good coveeage.

Edit - too late as usual

 

[Pukmeister]

Fitting the rebranded Teltonika (Avtex) in a caravan/motorhome…..

 

[SBD]

If anyone’s interested in what you get, it looks like this.



The thing with the four-way choccy block is a spare power connector, so I don’t have to chop the one off the mains connector they supplied with it. That’s an extra.

And the puck looks like this, with a variety of mountings. The circular one in the bottom of the box is a mag mount which might be good on a car roof, but will not improve the accuracy of the compass or autopilot on the boat. Might leave that one at home


And is something of a bollox to get back in its box.

Haven’t got a SIM card yet, so can’t play.

Quick start guide here. https://wiki.teltonika-networks.com/view/QSG_RUT260

Cheers

 

[sparkplug]

Haven’t got a SIM card yet, so can’t play.

Chuck the one from your phone in it

What's in the little plastic pouch? Are those TS-9 to SMA adapters (and did they come with the antenna or the router)?

 

[sparkplug]

Here's a tip for you if you ever plan to use it as an emergency spare for home.

Set the SSID and password to be the same as your home one.

This can cause issues if the home internet is running at the same time (my home office and the van on the drive were close enough that I'd sometimes get problems) but otherwise it means that you only need to make changes to the default set up on the Teltonika once, and you don't need to configure all your various home devices to connect to the Teltonika as they already have that SSID and password saved.

Mrs S was able to start a WiFi video call in the house and continue it seamlessly while getting into the van and carry on after we drove off. All very clever

I'm also a big fan of having a separate Guest network, but that's up to you really. Not difficult to set up.

 

[MrC99]

Thanks Pukmeister. As someone who hasn't had a TV for 14 years, I really don't know much about them!

I'll have to look into Firesticks then....

Coming in a bit late on this but Firesticks being Android devices can run apps such as Kodi so can be used when not in the UK to receive UK terrestrial TV (DVB-S or DVB-T) via an appropriate setup in the UK. This could also be used to get terrestrial TV in a van without the need for a TV aerial - just over 4/5G.

I use a Linux PC in the UK running TVHeadEnd to pipe DVB-T(2) over a VPN to a Firestick plugged into our TV in France. All traffic from the Firestick is routed via the VPN so it can also run all the usual stuff such as iPlayer, UKTVPlay, My5 as well as Apple TV, Netflix etc and it appears to all the providers as if it's in the UK so no geographical blocks.

All to keep SWMBO happy

 

[sparkplug]

More to research! Thanks @MrC99

I've yet to set up a proper VPN on my new home router so this is a good nudge to do that at least if nothing else.

 

[MrC99]

I've yet to set up a proper VPN on my new home router so this is a good nudge to do that at least if nothing else.

For ease of use if nothing else I'm using 2x Asus routers running Merlin's firmware with a peer to peer VPN (supports OpenVPN, Wireguard, IPSec and PPtP). For a simpler use case such as a van the remote end only needs to support a VPN client, or the Firestick itself can run the VPN client (although I'd get one of the more hi-def ones as they've got better cpus). I did experiment with using an Android TV but that didn't work out so well !

 

[sparkplug]

Thanks MrC99

Very helpful.

 

[SBD]

Chuck the one from your phone in it

What's in the little plastic pouch? Are those TS-9 to SMA adapters (and did they come with the antenna or the router)?

They’re adaptors of some description and were supplied with the antenna

I could use my phone sim except it’s virtual…

(And it’s not mine, it’s a work one)

Looks like iDmobile is the way to go if you want to use it in the EU

 

[SBD]

Here's a tip for you if you ever plan to use it as an emergency spare for home.

Set the SSID and password to be the same as your home one.

This can cause issues if the home internet is running at the same time (my home office and the van on the drive were close enough that I'd sometimes get problems) but otherwise it means that you only need to make changes to the default set up on the Teltonika once, and you don't need to configure all your various home devices to connect to the Teltonika as they already have that SSID and password saved.

Mrs S was able to start a WiFi video call in the house and continue it seamlessly while getting into the van and carry on after we drove off. All very clever

I'm also a big fan of having a separate Guest network, but that's up to you really. Not difficult to set up.

I get the suggestion, thanks, but I’m inclined to set it up so they’re not the same - I expect we will only ever have our laptops, iPads and iPhones on both networks and it’s easy to set 6 items up - and if there were ever an outage at home that would keep us going anyway - the other home stuff - desktop, couple of other laptops, printer, Apple TV, are low priority.

I wonder how cheap & fast it needs to be to simply switch off BT internet - I think I’d rather have the physical (glass ideally) connection if available

 

[sparkplug]

Every use case is different. I only mentioned it as it's something most people don't think about!

Mrs S even managed to continue a video call seamlessly walking from the house to the van and carried on while we drove off.

Well, I was driving, obviously, but you get my point!

Virtual SIM. Ah. Yes. Teltonika don't supply an adapter for those (actually one of my only gripes with them is that they provide a set of SIM adapters, which is great, but it's a dual SIM unit so... They could have spent the exta 5p and supplied two sets of adapters)

Adapters - looks like they're TS-9 then (threaded 'nut' on one end going to a smooth cylinder with a hole in the centre on the other?) i.e. anyone looking at the Puck to go with an M1 wouldn't need to buy adapters as they're included now. Pretty cool!

iDmobile are very competitive.

£15/month for their unlimited everything plan - however they have a 'fair use' 30GB limit abroad.

That's pretty good as they use the Three network who have a 12GB limit included when roaming.

What I couldn't see with iDmobile was the option to 'top it up'. With Three I can buy a 'Data Passport' for £5/day which gives me unlimited and unthrottled data abroad.

They might have a similar option, but even Three bury it deep in their description and don't advertise it so it might be worth just getting in touch with them and asking.