# T-Mobile 5G Home Internet service



## b4pjoe

There was an existing thread on this but the forum software suggested I create a new one instead of reviving a thread that is over a year old so here it is.

T-Mobile 5G Home Internet service is available in my area (rural Illinois with no possibility of receiving OTA stations and few choices for internet services).

With my current ISP, Spectrum, I have the 200/10 plan for $74.99. There is another local company you can get internet service from but they only have 30 mbps for $36 per month. They don't tell you what upload speed you have. And fiber will most likely never make an appearance here.

So I am now testing T-Mobile 5G Home Internet now. So the black box looks like a small trash can. Has 2 Ethernet ports, one Type C USB port and one Type C power port. The internal IP for the box is 192.168.12.1 and can't be changed. It has an active DHCP server that can't be turned off. (There is a guy on youtube where you can get a hack to turn off the wireless in case you want to use your own router wireless service)

This is the box.










There is not much to it and hardly any settings that can be changed. If you want to use the wireless option for your devices it only has one SSID which servers up both 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz. It uses whatever it deems best so if you have a device that can't do 5 GHz then it will use 2.4 GHz. The downside is if you have a device that can use both you don't know which it is using. One of the features if you don't want the combined SSID for both you can configure it to have one SSID for 2.4 GHz and one for 5 GHz. That way you know which one your device is using. Basically that is the only setting you can change on the box other than the admin password and the SSID password(s).

So all of the devices on my network use the 192.168.1.x subnet so I was afraid I was going to have to change all of my devices to use the 192.168.12.x subnet of the T-Mobile Gateway. A little history here on my Spectrum service. With it the ethernet cable from the Spectrum modem gets plugged into the internet port on my Netgear router and Spectrum assigns an IP address as my WAN IP address and a gateway IP address from Spectrum. I expected the T-Mobile box to be similar but it is not. When I plug the ethernet cable from the T-Mobile box to the internet port on my Netgear router it assigns an IP address from it's DHCP server which in my case was 192.168.12.147 which is a LAN address from the T-Mobile box. It still works though as I have internet service on my whole network of devices on the 192.168.1.x subnet. My local devices are still getting their DHCP address from the DHCP server in my Netgear router and not from the DHCP server in the T-Mobile box. I guess becasue the Netgear DHCP server is the one it find first which is on the 192.168.1.x subnet. If I google "What is my IP" it returns back an IP address on 172.56.58.x which is a T-Mobile IP from Brooklyn, NY. So it actually was dead simple to setup and I didn't have to change any IP's on my network. And so far I am not having any issues with a DHCP Server running on both my Netgear router and the T-Mobile box.

My box is located on the north end of my house next to a window and the signal meter since hooking it up has had 4 of the 5 bars lit up and it shows "Very Good". I have ran several bandwidth tests and the best one was this one which is a lot better than Spectrum. With Spectrum I usually get around 250/10. The upload speed is almost always around 10 mbps. Sometimes a little lower but never higher than 11 mbps. The T-Mobile upload speed knocks it out of the park.










There is some variance in the download speed from around 250 mbps to the 400 mbps shown above. This is day two so if it keeps performing like this for the next couple of weeks (It has a free 15 day trial) I will definitely cancel Spectrum and save $25 per month. Since this is wireless I'm thinking I might have fewer outages than I do with Spectrum. I have lost Spectrum 3 times in the last month for around half a day each time.


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## NR4P

Good review thanks for sharing. I have Tmo cell service but service is so bad in my neighborhood that 5G home wireless like this is not possible. Maybe someday they will fix it. 4 years ago they promised 600 Mhz, still waiting. I will probably get Starlink before Tmobile fills this hole in coverage. BTW, I am not in rural America, just a bad spot in S. Florida.


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## AZ.

Ive had it for 4 months now, ups and downs, not consistent...But cable is ..worse and unreliable...I will stay for now.


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## Phil T

I have tried it twice. When it works it is great but when there is congestion I got no service. I live near a State Park and basically got no service Friday evenings or weekends.


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## dmspen

I keep getting bugged by TMobile to opt in to the 5g internet service. However, they say I'm right between 2 5G towers and should have great 5G. My phone tells me otherwise. No 5G at all. Therefore, I assume I couldn't get their 5G internet service. My Xfinity service has dropped out every morning between 6 and 7 am for the last 4 days. Modem restart is required to get it working again. I wish I could get the TM 5G. I would drop Xfinity like a hot potato!


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## AZ.

dmspen said:


> I keep getting bugged by TMobile to opt in to the 5g internet service. However, they say I'm right between 2 5G towers and should have great 5G. My phone tells me otherwise. No 5G at all. Therefore, I assume I couldn't get their 5G internet service. My Xfinity service has dropped out every morning between 6 and 7 am for the last 4 days. Modem restart is required to get it working again. I wish I could get the TM 5G. I would drop Xfinity like a hot potato!


They have a 15 day free trial see what happens?...I needed to see if it even worked on Sundays during tourist season, and it was better than my last 2 providers...


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## b4pjoe

Still looking good here. Haven't seen any major slow downs other than it may drop down into the 300's down and 89-90's up at times and I haven't lost the signal at all that I know of. Also people say the placement of the box is critical. A matter of a couple of inches can make a big difference. Mine has been so good I am afraid to try it anywhere else.


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## NashGuy

b4pjoe said:


> My box is located on the north end of my house next to a window and the signal meter since hooking it up has had 4 of the 5 bars lit up and it shows "Very Good". I have ran several bandwidth tests and the best one was this one which is a lot better than Spectrum. With Spectrum I usually get around 250/10. The upload speed is almost always around 10 mbps. Sometimes a little lower but never higher than 11 mbps. The T-Mobile upload speed knocks it out of the park.
> 
> View attachment 32248


Wow at those speeds! I'm doing a 30-day free trial of Verizon 5G Home internet, which I got yesterday. So far, it's pretty good but my download speeds are maxing out around 300 Mbps on wifi 6 (much slower on ethernet for some reason) while upload speeds are stuck in the measly 9 - 17 Mbps range. Download speeds over wifi do seem to vary somewhat depending on device and location around the house and maybe also time of day. (There may be less 5G bandwidth available from the tower during rush hour?)

IDK, I might get a little better performance if I moved it near a window, although I have to think the 5G signal is plenty strong given the ~300 Mbps download speeds that my Apple TV 4K sitting next to it gets. I just plopped it where I had my old gateway, turned it on and the little signal light stayed solid white after 5 minutes, which means it has a good, steady signal. (It doesn't show signal bars like the T-Mo gateway.)


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## b4pjoe

Yeah I've been impressed by my upload speed. It flies compared to Spectrum at 10 mbps. It makes my backups to the cloud much faster. I'm really surprised T-Mobile is allowing upload speed at 100+ mbps. On their website they list their speeds as:



> *What speeds can I expect from T-Mobile Home Internet?*
> 
> T-Mobile 5G Home Internet customers see typical download speeds between 33-182 Mbps, which is great speed for streaming video, surfing the web, working from home and most types of online gaming. Speeds can vary depending on location, signal strength and availability, time of day, and other factors. Our speed projections are based on our analysis of internal and third-party data. See T-Mobile.com/OpenInternet for more information.
> 
> *What kind of upload speeds can I expect with T-Mobile Home Internet?*
> 
> Typical upload speeds are between 6 Mbps and 23 Mbps.


Maybe they slow it down after the 15 day free trial. I hope not!


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## AZ.

b4pjoe said:


> Yeah I've been impressed by my upload speed. It flies compared to Spectrum at 10 mbps. It makes my backups to the cloud much faster. I'm really surprised T-Mobile is allowing upload speed at 100+ mbps. On their website they list their speeds as:
> 
> 
> 
> Maybe they slow it down after the 15 day free trial. I hope not!


Mine never did.....If I get 30 to 40 down and 10 up thats incredible for out here....Its just not consistent, like another poser, its more on demand....I live in a tourist town.


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## Taxi77

I've had TMO Home Internet for a year now. It has never gone down, had to reboot the modem 3 times in a year when the speeds drop to 100 down, that immediately fixes it. Average is 500 down, 100 up. Couldn't be happier, only other choice was CentuyLink DSL, which was 10/3.


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## RichardS

Phil T said:


> I have tried it twice. When it works it is great but when there is congestion I got no service. I live near a State Park and basically got no service Friday evenings or weekends.


I was in the same boat. I would get 200/50 for about an hour, then the speeds would drop to 18/8. Reboot and the same result. This was with the square-ish Arcaydian device and not the first gen round Nokia device. T-Mobile shipped out a replacement, as the tech support agent felt I had a bad device. Nothing changed. I dropped the service, shipped the device back to T-Mobile, and went back to Comcast.


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## Gila

I’ve had Tmo home internet for 3 years. I was in their pilot group which was 4G LTE only. I consistently got around 100 mps download and 25 mps upload speeds. Coming from Century Link DSL, it was great and a lot cheaper. In January of this year my gateway gave up the ghost and Tmo sent me a 5G gateway. Since then I average 400-600 mps download and 55 mps upload speeds. I’m in Tucson just at the eastern edge of the city limits with 3 cell towers within 0.25 mi. I have a Linksys Velop mesh system plugged into the Tmo gateway. Consistency is the biggest benefit for me and I have rarely had to restart the gateway.


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## mjwagner

I really don’t understand why these providers insist on you using their gateway/router/WiFi device. All I want is a wireless broadband modem that I can just plug into my existing network. Basically just replace my cable modem. Seems to me it would be a simpler and cheaper device for them to provide. All I want is their data pipe…


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## b4pjoe

Basically the T-MO device is almost that. There is a way to turn off the wifi if you don't want to use it. I am not using the T-MO wifi for any devices and just plugged the ethernet cable from the T-MO box into my router internet port so it is basically just functioning like a cable modem in my case and my router is doing all of the networking and firewall.


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## mjwagner

b4pjoe said:


> Basically the T-MO device is almost that. There is a way to turn off the wifi if you don't want to use it. I am not using the T-MO wifi for any devices and just plugged the ethernet cable from the T-MO box into my router internet port so it is basically just functioning like a cable modem in my case and my router is doing all of the networking and firewall.


Unless you can turn off the router, effectively put it in bridge mode, you will be double NATed. While that would be fine for many it won’t work for me. Also AFAIK not all these gateways (the Verizon one and possibly AT&T as well) allow you to completely disable WiFi. Net is for me if any of them would just supply a wireless cellular modem that I could just plug into my existing network I would try them out in a heartbeat. Until then it’s a hard no for me. I think their are enough folks like me that they are missing an opportunity.


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## b4pjoe

The T-Mo gateway software does not give you a way to disable the wireless but a guy on youtube has found a way to do it. Right now the T-MO box is plugged into the internet port on my router via an ethernet cable and works the same way my spectrum modem did. It is double NATed but it isn't an issue on my network as all my devices are on my router NAT 192.168.1.x subnet. The IP the gateway gives to the router WAN port is 192.168.12.x instead of the actual T-MO WAN IP. But if Google "My IP" it gives the T-Mobile WAN IP. If I did use the wireless connection on the T-MO box it would assigg IP addresses in the 192.168.12.x subnet but since I'm not using the wireless from the T-MO box it isn't an issue.


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## kkl

mjwagner said:


> Unless you can turn off the router, effectively put it in bridge mode, you will be double NATed.


 This is true but doesn't really matter as they use CGNAT and the hotspot's IPv4 address isn't publicly routable anyway. A workaround for some users is a reverse tunneling service like ngrok - Online in One Line or Pagekite - The fast, reliable localhost tunneling solution. Some have gotten IPv6 to work.


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## krel

NashGuy said:


> Wow at those speeds! I'm doing a 30-day free trial of Verizon 5G Home internet, which I got yesterday. So far, it's pretty good but my download speeds are maxing out around 300 Mbps on wifi 6 (much slower on ethernet for some reason) while upload speeds are stuck in the measly 9 - 17 Mbps range. Download speeds over wifi do seem to vary somewhat depending on device and location around the house and maybe also time of day. (There may be less 5G bandwidth available from the tower during rush hour?)
> 
> IDK, I might get a little better performance if I moved it near a window, although I have to think the 5G signal is plenty strong given the ~300 Mbps download speeds that my Apple TV 4K sitting next to it gets. I just plopped it where I had my old gateway, turned it on and the little signal light stayed solid white after 5 minutes, which means it has a good, steady signal. (It doesn't show signal bars like the T-Mo gateway.)


your better off waiting for verizons ultra wide band. speeds are insane there nation wide 5G sucks


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## NashGuy

krel said:


> your better off waiting for verizons ultra wide band. speeds are insane there nation wide 5G sucks


Meh, pretty sure I'm just going back to AT&T Fiber before my 30-day trial with Verizon 5G is up...


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## krel

NashGuy said:


> Meh, pretty sure I'm just going back to AT&T Fiber before my 30-day trial with Verizon 5G is up...


What about Google fiber can you get that


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## NashGuy

krel said:


> What about Google fiber can you get that


They've been in Nashville for ages now but it's not in my neighborhood. But honestly, I'd rather have 300/300 for a regular $55/mo from AT&T than 1000/1000 for a regular $70/mo from Google. Both have unlimited data and good equipment. I'd get zero additional real-world benefit from that extra $15/mo to go with the full gigabit from Google. Plus AT&T offers a few hundred bucks in cash back for new sign-ups...


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## harsh

mjwagner said:


> I really don’t understand why these providers insist on you using their gateway/router/WiFi device. All I want is a wireless broadband modem that I can just plug into my existing network. Basically just replace my cable modem. Seems to me it would be a simpler and cheaper device for them to provide. All I want is their data pipe…


When you discover that this isn't about you and your personal preferences, this will all become clear. This is about TMobile gaining customers any way they can while still having some hope of the control they need so that nobody's unhappy.


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## harsh

mjwagner said:


> Unless you can turn off the router, effectively put it in bridge mode, you will be double NATed. While that would be fine for many it won’t work for me.


The right VPN protocol will make this a non-issue. Being insulated from the Internet is becoming more and more attractive as time goes by.


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## mjwagner

harsh said:


> When you discover that this isn't about you and your personal preferences, this will all become clear. This is about TMobile gaining customers any way they can while still having some hope of the control they need so that nobody's unhappy.


I was using myself as an example. While their are others out there just like me who won’t even give these service a try unless they can just be plugged into an existing network, obviously their aren’t enough of us for these services to care. And honestly I guess folks like me aren’t really the target market. The target is more than likely folks that really don’t understand the technology and/or just want a plug and play solution.


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## mjwagner

harsh said:


> The right VPN protocol will make this a non-issue. Being insulated from the Internet is becoming more and more attractive as time goes by.


Sorry, not a viable solution in many instances. Like I said, for lots of folks double NAT is not really an issue…and lots of folks wouldn’t even know what a double NAT is…LOL. Which is more like the target market they are going after anyway.


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## NashGuy

mjwagner said:


> Sorry, not a viable solution in many instances. Like I said, for lots of folks double NAT is not really an issue…and lots of folks wouldn’t even know what a double NAT is…LOL. Which is more like the target market they are going after anyway.


Definitely. Folks like you who have those sorts of concerns (_any_ concerns about having to use an MSO-issued gateway rather than their own equipment) are WAY overrepresented on online forums such as this. Not saying it's an insignificant slice of the public but a relatively small slice of it.


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## b4pjoe

As I was afraid of...during my 15 day free trial my speeds were on average around 400/100. Since the free trial ended on July 13 I am averaging about 200/30. So they do throttle the speeds once your free trial is over it seems. Still not horrible but rubs me the wrong way.


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## MysteryMan

b4pjoe said:


> As I was afraid of...during my 15 day free trial my speeds were on average around 400/100. Since the free trial ended on July 13 I am averaging about 200/30. So they do throttle the speeds once your free trial is over it seems. Still not horrible but rubs me the wrong way.
> 
> View attachment 32285


Looks like the grass wasn't as green as expected.


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## AZ.

b4pjoe said:


> As I was afraid of...during my 15 day free trial my speeds were on average around 400/100. Since the free trial ended on July 13 I am averaging about 200/30. So they do throttle the speeds once your free trial is over it seems. Still not horrible but rubs me the wrong way.
> 
> View attachment 32285


I dont get anything like those speeds....My test was on a Sunday during tourist season...I didnt see any difference in my speeds....You can cancel when ever its $50 for the month...


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## b4pjoe

MysteryMan said:


> Looks like the grass wasn't as green as expected.


Well the price and upload speed is still better than Spectrum but the download speed is quite a bit lower now but still not horrible. Just a sleazy way to do business if T-Mobile is intentionally doing it.

Still have a couple of weeks on my Spectrum account to decide which to stick with. I will keep an eye on the speeds to see if they come back up. If not might just stick with Spectrum.


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## b4pjoe

AZ. said:


> I dont get anything like those speeds....My test was on a Sunday during tourist season...I didnt see any difference in my speeds....You can cancel when ever its $50 for the month...


What kind of speeds are you getting. I have already paid for the first month so there is no getting around that. But there is no contract so I can cancel at anytime. They just won't cancel until the month paid for is up.


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## AZ.

b4pjoe said:


> What kind of speeds are you getting. I have already paid for the first month so there is no getting around that. But there is no contract so I can cancel at anytime. They just won't cancel until the month paid for is up.


Fastest I ever saw was just over 100 down and 30 up( middle of night on off season)......Regularly its more like 20 down and 2 or 3 up.....Nothing I can get here has been reliable or cheap....


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## AZ.




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## harsh

mjwagner said:


> Sorry, not a viable solution in many instances.


There's always a viable VPN solution (assuming you have a modern router).

Of course there may be the age-old prohibition against running "servers" depending on the provider's policies.


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## dbailey220

AZ. said:


> They have a 15 day free trial see what happens?...I needed to see if it even worked on Sundays during tourist season, and it was better than my last 2 providers...


 IF YOU TRY THE TRIAL BEAWARE TMOBILE WILL NOT REFUND THE MONEY IF IT DOES NOT WORK.


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## b4pjoe

The trial is free. You don’t pay anything until your two week trial is over.


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## dbailey220

I tried T-mobile 5G hotspot, and it was terrible. I returned the product 2 days after I received it. Now T-mobile says they won't refund me. When I signed up, they said it was fully refundable if I returned the device and cancelled within the trial period which I did. Horrible company that does not stand behind its word.


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## b4pjoe

This thread is about T-Mobile 5G Home Internet Service. Not T-Mobile 5G Hotspot service. For their internet service they do not charge anything until the two week trial is over.


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## OneMarcilV

dbailey220 said:


> I tried T-mobile 5G hotspot, and it was terrible. I returned the product 2 days after I received it. Now T-mobile says they won't refund me. When I signed up, they said it was fully refundable if I returned the device and cancelled within the trial period which I did. Horrible company that does not stand behind its word.


Same I moved mine to 7 different spots in the house and even outside. The highest bar I received was 1. I also sent mine back.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk


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## Jon W

We had the tmobile 5g internet for about 6 months. It was dirt cheap at $30 a month with subscriber discounts. At first we were getting almost 300 down and about 20 up. The problem was it would crash for no reason. This was always fixed by restarting the modem but it was a real pain and randomly happened about once every couple of days. Apparently this is a known issue and there really is no fix. The speeds also slowed but weren’t horrible. About 50 down on average. We switched when fiber finally became available in our area.


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## b4pjoe

I had Spectrum for a few years before switching to T-Mobile 5G home internet. Spectrum service is pretty good. I see they just raised the price here from $74.99 to $79.99. I'm paying $50 per month for the T-Mobile. The service has been very stable. I get as high 350/50. The lowest I have seen it get is around 150/20. On average I'd say it is around 250/40. I have had it since late June and haven't had an outage since signing up. If you follow T-Mobile users on reddit there are plenty of people that do have major speed issues with it. If you are on a congested tower you won't like it. If you do a lot of online gaming you won't like it. If you need to do any kind of port forwarding you won't like it because you can't. It is not for everybody but it suits my needs currently and is $30 per month cheaper than Spectrum.

Also we do not stream TV full time as we have DirecTV Satellite. But our household of 3 does stream from HBO Max, Discovery+, Disney+, Paramount+, Peacock, and Netflix. And a few others and we always a little over 1 TB per month. If we watched TV full time I would guess that would jump considerably. Luckily the T-Mobile service is unlimited.


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## whorne

Been a T-Mobile subscriber for over two years and been thoroughly impressed with the coverage for me. So, I thought I would give their internet a try. I had been a Spectrum internet customer for many years with no real complaint other than pricing. Tried the TMHI for a few months at the $30/month rate and dropped Spectrum. TMHI for the most part was good but at times the speed would drop and my conf calls and online meetings would be impacted. My issue was the consistency and the gateway constant jumping from Band 41 and Band 71. Band 41 had speeds up to 250 but 71 would be around 60 and lower. Wished there was a way to band lock. I would have keep the service. In the end, this inconsistency did not work for me. The good news was that I was able to go back to Spectrum and get the Ultra package for $49/month for three years. I will give TMHI another try later.


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## b4pjoe

whorne said:


> Been a T-Mobile subscriber for over two years and been thoroughly impressed with the coverage for me. So, I thought I would give their internet a try. I had been a Spectrum internet customer for many years with no real complaint other than pricing. Tried the TMHI for a few months at the $30/month rate and dropped Spectrum. TMHI for the most part was good but at times the speed would drop and my conf calls and online meetings would be impacted. My issue was the consistency and the gateway constant jumping from Band 41 and Band 71. Band 41 had speeds up to 250 but 71 would be around 60 and lower. Wished there was a way to band lock. I would have keep the service. In the end, this inconsistency did not work for me. The good news was that I was able to go back to Spectrum and get the Ultra package for $49/month for three years. I will give TMHI another try later.


Yeah TMHI is GREAT in some places and not so great in other places. I've been lucky as I am always on Band 41 and staying consistently around 250-300 down and 30 - 50 up. I have had one outage since I signed up last June and it was only for about 20 minutes. And I can see the tower strobe lights from my backyard so that probably helps I am that close to the tower.


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