Re: Clear

Author	All Replies
CLEAR User @supervalu.com	reply to gabriele64 Re: Clear Usually 3 to 6 (90% of the time) ... there have been times that I'll hit 14 or 15 ... those are very very rare. I am sitting in the middle of two towers. One is one mile to the east (as the bird flies) and another is one mile to the south west (as the bird flies). The east one however is sitting in a more densely populated area. It would be "cool" that if I happen to get throttled on one tower ... I just turn my antenna and hit the other. If getting an antenna will get me higher bandwidth ... I may invest in the $200 ... I am thinking more the "hub" and antenna route (versus modifying my M). Thoughts?
	to forum · permalink · 2012-03-20 11:45:56 ·
gabriele64 join:2007-03-23 Fremont, CA	said by CLEAR User : Usually 3 to 6 (90% of the time) ... there have been times that I'll hit 14 or 15 ... those are very very rare. I am sitting in the middle of two towers. If you get that type of signal and you are just one mile away I think (but nobody can be sure until you try) that an external antenna can give you considerable more BW because the modem would step-up up may be from QAM16 to QAM64 modulation. In my office I’m at 300-400 yard from the tower with a lagoon separating me, nothing else. Even in these conditions I can’t get more than 6Mb with the built in flimsy antenna and since I’m in the office 8-10 hours I was able to test it during different times of the day. Including one weekend. At home I went from 3 to 12 with the antenna. Clearly the tower has to have the BW but I would definitely try. I’m not sure what do you mean by “hub & antenna route” but as long as you have an antenna 15-16 dB or better you should be fine. Consider that it means about 40 times gain in power and received signal with much fewer reflections since you can aim at the main beam. You can then try both towers and see where you get the best performance.
	to forum · permalink · 2012-03-20 17:10:41 ·
theoak join:2012-03-20	There are two routes: Send the "M" in to get converted to an external antenna for $200. OR Purchase CLEAR's new "Hub Express" (it has an external antenna adapter) for $100 and an external antenna for another $100. Hence, CLEAR User was stating that they seem to be leaning to getting the "hub" express and an external antenna.
	to forum · permalink · 2012-03-20 21:20:28 ·
gabriele64 join:2007-03-23 Fremont, CA	said by theoak: There are two routes: Purchase CLEAR's new "Hub Express" (it has an external antenna adapter) for $100 and an external antenna for another $100. I think it's the best solution particularly if MIMO is not indispensable. On the CLEAR web site there is the manual, they finally accepted the notion that external antennas could help them to get better customers, however the explanations are a bit funny, they wrote: ~~~~~~~~~~~ Additional Information – External Antenna Port You may attach an external antenna to your device although the antenna may or may not enhance, and potentially could reduce, your device performance. Once you have connected to an external antenna, flip the switch to “Enable” on the back of the device. To revert back to the internal antenna, flip the switch to “Disable”. If you do not have an external antenna attached, please confirm the switch is set to “Disable” ~~~~~~~~~~~~ One important thing is that cable can't be very long with 2.5 GHz signal, however up to 10 meters should be OK particularly if it is a good cable and if the antenna has a good gain. With long cable I would use a 24 dB antenna like those sold by Pasadena Networks...
	to forum · permalink · 2012-03-20 22:35:28 ·
theoak join:2012-03-20	said by gabriele64: said by theoak: There are two routes: Purchase CLEAR's new "Hub Express" (it has an external antenna adapter) for $100 and an external antenna for another $100. I think it's the best solution particularly if MIMO is not indispensable. On the CLEAR web site there is the manual, they finally accepted the notion that external antennas could help them to get better customers, however the explanations are a bit funny, they wrote: ~~~~~~~~~~~ Additional Information – External Antenna Port You may attach an external antenna to your device although the antenna may or may not enhance, and potentially could reduce, your device performance. Once you have connected to an external antenna, flip the switch to “Enable” on the back of the device. To revert back to the internal antenna, flip the switch to “Disable”. If you do not have an external antenna attached, please confirm the switch is set to “Disable” ~~~~~~~~~~~~ One important thing is that cable can't be very long with 2.5 GHz signal, however up to 10 meters should be OK particularly if it is a good cable and if the antenna has a good gain. With long cable I would use a 24 dB antenna like those sold by Pasadena Networks... I almost think the modified "M" would be better. Everything is internal to the box ... antenna and modem. So ... there should be close to zero "cable" between two and thus maximize signal quality. From there you could run 100 feet of network cable without any loss if needed. The antenna advertised is: Transmit Power: 27 dBm Antenna: 2X2 14 dBi gain cross-polarized antennas ... so you should get MIMO benefits also. $235 later though is the kicker ...
	to forum · permalink · 2012-03-26 17:55:29 ·
gabriele64 join:2007-03-23 Fremont, CA	To theoak: You must have an external antenna in order to have any gain. I didn't gain anything from MIMO and I regret putting two antennas (cost, installations, aiming). I was getting the same BW with one antenna but now they are up there and I hope that I'm getting a more robust signal with weather etc. I have about 3 feet of cable from the antenna to the sealex aluminium box where I put the modem, then about 50-60 feet of cat 5. I use the modem IP generation for all my defices so I eliminated the router, I just have a 8 port switch. My wireless (a Ubiquity Networks nanostation 2) is setup as bridge so also the WiFi defices capture an IP address from the CLEAR modem. I currently use about 15 IP addresses. Everything works great, this am it was faster than usual so I checked, I was around 15Mbit/s. Really good for $50 with unlimited traffic .
	to forum · permalink · 2012-03-30 18:39:26 ·

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