RV WIFI

[DavidM49]

We are getting ready to invest in a Class A pusher and want wifi to work while on road. What is the preferred method? Thank you in advance.

[Second_Chance]

Lots of good reading here:

RVmobileinternet.com

You can subscribe to get to more detailed stuff, too (I have a subscription and it has been worth it).

Rob

[Scottiemom]

I have the FMCA hotspot device and it works great. It is $59.99/month for unlimited. Works great and I'm not sure who their carrier is now. They have changed occasionally. I used my phone which has unlimited for awhile. Problem was, it's only unlimited on my PHONE. When I connect another device to it, it is only like 5G. I hate doing anything on my phone.

Dale

[valhalla360]

ktmrfs wrote:
Advantage of dedicated hotspot is doesn't tie up the phone, runs longer on the battery.

For remote locations with marginal cell service we have a weboost cell booster. Doesn't cover everywhere but give us coverage in probably 90% of the places we are.

Historically, we have used cell with campground wifi where it's available and usable (it does seem to be getting better).

The phone being tied up or running out of battery is a non-issue as we just put it on the charger while in use and we can take calls while the hotspot is in operation.

But times are changing...starting this coming summer, we are looking to switch to starlink. For not much more than an unlimited cell plan, you get faster service and it eliminates most of the cell coverage issues. You do have to have a clear view of the sky but if you are down at the bottom of a heavily forested valley, you probably aren't getting cell coverage anyway.

Then we will drop the cell plans back to something cheap like 5GB/month to cover us while we are in motion.

[RedRollingRoadb]

wa8yxm wrote:


Last I knew FMCA had a deal 50/month unlimited 4G as I recall. SPRINT was the carrier when I had it (Now merged with T-Mobile)
...

They dumped Sprint/T-Mobile some time ago and went back to AT&T but with a slight price increase, but still a good deal IMO.

I do not recall all the details but they were also allowing for you to bring your own hotspot but you need to jump through some hoops to do so.

Right now the FMCA site is saying " Due to AT&T hotspots being out of stock we must temporarily shut down TechConnect+ signups. We are being told by AT&T that new hotspots should be back in stock sometime in November 2022, and that signups for the benefit can resume."

I had the Sprint hotspot for awhile and it was useless.

[ktmrfs]

wa8yxm wrote:

ktmrfs wrote:
Advantage of dedicated hotspot is doesn't tie up the phone, runs longer on the battery.

Last I knew FMCA had a deal 50/month unlimited 4G as I recall. SPRINT was the carrier when I had it (Now merged with T-Mobile)

I suggest a hotspot on a DIFFERENT Carrier than your phone. WHY. Well they had not yet merged when I had it and some places one of them was "NO SIGNAL" the other broke the needle on my internet speed-o-meter (Well it's a graphic so it does not break but you get the idea)

In other places.. Reverse the results.

So a T-mobile hotspot if you have verizon phones
or A Verizon hotspot with T-Mobile phones.

Two thigns you need to know
One. IT DOES NOT TIE UP THE PHONE... phone still makes and receives calls but you may lose internet when call arrives (Depends on phone)

Two. Keep the charger hooked up battery life is forever.

In the early days the phone did not properly control the battery charge so if you did that bad things happened.
But today's phones are smarter.. Much smarter.. Way smarter.

yes two carriers is a good idea. Just make sure they don't both use the same system. Verizon/ATT make a good combo and your spot on about often only one or the other working. For a long time we had our cell phones with Verizon and Onstar with ATT phone. good combo.

And a cell booster can get you from zippo signal to signal decent enough for phone/messaging/moderate web use.

Now, don't expect service well enough to stream video, expect service good enough to do most web based stuff, reasonable speeds for file download/upload maybe youtube, but not video streaming.

[wa8yxm]

ktmrfs wrote:
Advantage of dedicated hotspot is doesn't tie up the phone, runs longer on the battery.

Last I knew FMCA had a deal 50/month unlimited 4G as I recall. SPRINT was the carrier when I had it (Now merged with T-Mobile)

I suggest a hotspot on a DIFFERENT Carrier than your phone. WHY. Well they had not yet merged when I had it and some places one of them was "NO SIGNAL" the other broke the needle on my internet speed-o-meter (Well it's a graphic so it does not break but you get the idea)

In other places.. Reverse the results.

So a T-mobile hotspot if you have verizon phones
or A Verizon hotspot with T-Mobile phones.

Two thigns you need to know
One. IT DOES NOT TIE UP THE PHONE... phone still makes and receives calls but you may lose internet when call arrives (Depends on phone)

Two. Keep the charger hooked up battery life is forever.

In the early days the phone did not properly control the battery charge so if you did that bad things happened.
But today's phones are smarter.. Much smarter.. Way smarter.

[ktmrfs]

Personally I don't trust any public wifi, never used it, never will. We use either our phone as a hotspot or our Verizon mifi hotspot. Advantage of dedicated hotspot is doesn't tie up the phone, runs longer on the battery.

For remote locations with marginal cell service we have a weboost cell booster. Doesn't cover everywhere but give us coverage in probably 90% of the places we are.

[agesilaus]

We use a combo of Visible phones and WeBoost Cell booster. Visible uses the Verizon network. That gives us service about 90% of the time. Not always strong service tho. Visible provides unlimited hotspot service but only 5 mb/sec.
You probably should get a combination of Verizon and ATT phones to improve your coverage. You will want a booster too. We ran into some surprising Verizon gaps.

We made 40 stops from FL up thru TN and into MN then west thru SD, WY, UT, NM, TX and back to FL. We have a 20 ft cell phone antenna pole.

If you need consistent strong video then the only real option is satellite