***Long write up about this antenna and it's testing***
I have had this antenna for about a week now and here is what I have experienced.
First off lets talk about antennas, to get those big dBi numbers you have to do a couple of things, (1) Stack multiple antennas into an array for big gain, that's why cell site antennas are so big (2 to 8 feet in length). (2) Increase the depth of the antenna by adding signal directors in front of the active antenna element and a reflector element behind the active element (Yagi antenna) to get high dBi gain numbers.
The problem with those antennas they are really big and hard to manage when people want something portable. They are great for a fixed/bolt it to the outside of your home antenna with thick low loss antenna coax going to your hotspot and they do work very well.
The Netgear MIMO antenna here is a portable somewhat easy to use antenna with an average of about 2 to 3 dbi of gain for its size. Considering the antennas inside most LTE hotspots have no dBi gain, but they also have no cable losses to deal with either.
This is a very sturdy antenna just not sure how well the heavy plastic will hold up in extreme heat and direct sun. The suction cups work well for the antenna and I like the fact that I can use suction cups from the hobby/office stores when these no long hold. The antenna cable for the antenna is of good quality with excellent TS-9 push on connectors, most aftermarket TS-9 connectors can be little stiff to connect to the hotspots. The cable lenght is a little shorter then I like (1meter) but what I have found the cable is long enough to reach a table near most of the windows I have tried. I'm not a fan of leaving my hotspot in the windows sill as I have had times during the summer months it will overheat and turn off. This antenna will help with that by getting the hotspot out of the sun.
How well does the antenna improvement my internet experience, first there are LOTS of things that can impact your LTE data service and here is a small list that can impact your data speeds. (Data speeds will vary greatly per area based on signal level RSRP, quality RSRQ, multiple tower pollution, distance from the cell tower, how many users using the tower, how many bands are available, how much bandwidth each R.F. carrier has, carrier aggregation, MIMO capability, QAM capability, back haul from the cell tower, what your hotspot can support and other various items)
Now for the performance of the antenna itself, as I explained about antennas with their high gains and as others have stated in their reviews here this antenna is NOT going to make your signal bars jump from 0 to 5 bars when the hotspot is in the same location as the antenna and you have to have some detectable signal to make some improvement. What I have seen on average is about 4 to 10 dbm improvement in RSRP depending on the frequency band the hotspot is attached too, for example on T-mobile my area has band 2, 4 & 12. On band 2 there is a 6 to 8dbm improvement. Band 4 about 4 to 6dbm and Band 12 about 8 to 10dbm improvement, but the big improvement was on data speeds. Most of the T-mobile towers I tested had a 20mhz wide carrier on band 4, those towers with an RSRP of -90dbm with the antenna I saw about speeds around 60 to 85 mbps, without the antenna and the hotspot placed in the same location as the antenna RSRP of -96dbm with data speeds around 20 to 40 mbps. Testing was done in the early morning hours to have the least amount of users on the tower. Now the towers with bands 2 & 12 were hard to tests as I had to move closer or further away to force thee hotspot pick the other band as the primary server, for example band 12 in my area for T-mobile is only a 5mhz wide carrier so it won't pass data as fast as the 20mhz carrier will, but some data is better then no data for me. Now the other T-mobile tower tested has band 2, 4 & 12 in it with the Netgear antenna attached with an RSRP of -70dbm I saw data speed tests well over 100 mbps and without the antenna I didn't see as much of a speed drop as I expected. This could be that I was very close to the tower and the internal antennas of the hotspot was providing more than enough for the tower to provide the maximum data resources it had available.
I also performed similar tests on AT&T's network detecting bands 2,4,5,12 & 30. Data speed testing varied widely, for example the one test tower has bands 2,12&30. The hotspot would lock onto band 2 without the antenna at -100dbm and fluctuate up and down a few dbm. When I attached the antenna the RSRP was -92dbm, plus it greatly reduced the fluctuating signal, I also noticed that at times with the antenna attached the hotspot would switch over to band 30, which I was never able to get the hotspot to attach too without the antenna. When the hotspot was attached to band 30 RSRP was around -108dbm I would see average speed tests around 75 mbps, but the speeds would fluctuate up and down during the tests so the averages were all over the place, but 75 mbps was the average. I think the fluctuating speed was carrier aggregation adding and removing the weaker bands during the tests.
As for Sprint I was only able to test one of their sites as my area doesn't have a lot the band 41 towers, so I had to travel to an area that had them. The tower I tested had band 25, 26 & 41. The test phone showed there are 3 carriers of band 41, but my old Netgear Fuse does not support carrier aggregation, so I can only test one band at a time and I only tested band 41 with the antenna. I found that I could only get about a 3dbm improvement in RSRP on band 41 with the antenna, it's not much but it did improve the data rates. With the antenna RSRP was -108dbm I saw an average of 45 mbps without the antenna it dropped to about 12 mbps.
One last test for those that are do not completely understand MIMO (Multiple In Multiple Out antennas) The Netgear antenna is 2X MIMO antenna that's why it has 2 cable connections. The Hotspots also have 2 internal antennas and when you connect to the external antenna those internal antenna turn off (according to Netgear) so I wanted to see what would happen if I only used one of the antenna cables and not the other. I then wrapped my hotspot in aluminum foil to unscientifically disable the internal antenna and only use one antenna. The signal results did not change much, but I did see the RSRP fluctuate around more with just the single antenna. The data speed tests is where things changed, with the Netgear antenna attached in MIMO (both cables attached) on T-mobile band 4 I would get an average of about 60 to 85 mbps. Now in SISO (one antenna used at the hotspot) I would average about 28 to 32 mbps. From my testing I could clearly see the benefits of MIMO. Once I get the Netgear MR1000 that has built-in 4X MIMO and 256 QAM then I can see what the data speeds would be for that hotspot using just the 4 internal antennas in the hotspot.
Also for those that use boosters like Weboost and SureCall they make fine products, but just remember boosters don't support Sprint's band 26 & 41. Along with AT&T's band 29 & 30. They also don't support MIMO. This antenna supports all of these bands so if your tower has these bands and your hotspot supports the bands as well you could see some improvement in data speeds with this antenna over the booster on these bands along with the benefits of MIMO. I would like to find a report from someone that has done tests with a mobile booster external like Weboost and then did the same test without the booster and just used a MIMO antenna to see which one proved the better data speeds while the vehicle was in motion. I only use my hotspots in buildings and not much in a vehicle while in motion.
I know this was a long review and not as detailed others have done, but it does show what I experienced in my area with my conditions, your experience maybe different.
Overall the antenna does work and does improve my data speeds. Will I use it everywhere I go "NO, but if I'm in place with questionable WiFi or no WiFi and I can get at least a single bar of LTE signal this antenna is going to find the window with the best detectable LTE signal so I can connect it to my hotspot with TS-9 external antenna ports to give me an increase in my data speeds.
| Standing screen display size | 15.6 |
|---|---|
| Number of USB 2.0 Ports | 2 |
