[TriLUG] Wanted to share my experience with TMobile 5G Home Internet

Thu Oct 5 21:08:22 EDT 2023

After 30 minutes on the phone with T-Mobile Customer Care they told me that
T-Mobile home internet does not support configuring either port-forwarding
or pass-through / bridge mode, so it is not possible† to run a home web
server using T-Mobile home internet. So I returned the Sagemcom 5688W
gateway to the T-Mobile store this evening, and cancelled their home
internet service.

The folks there are looking into selling me T-Mobile Business Internet (not
to be confused with "Small Business Internet"!), with a better gateway, for
$50 + $3 for a static IP + taxes & fees (probably about $5 for the taxes &
fees, they said). So it's a total of about $58, which is more than Home
Internet but still better than Spectrum. They're supposed to call me back
tomorrow.

I asked them to confirm that the static IP is IPv4, but they were unsure.
Brian, do you know?

Dave

† except by doing really ugly hacks... I found this:

On Thu, Oct 5, 2023 at 1:18 PM David Burton <ncdave4life at gmail.com> wrote:

> T-Mobile Customer Care is not inspiring confidence.
>
>
> On Thu, Oct 5, 2023 at 12:51 PM David Burton <ncdave4life at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> Typo correction: "192.168.22.1" should be "192.168.12.1".
>>
>> The 3rd Party app
>> <https://tmo.report/2023/05/new-app-gives-easy-access-to-t-mobile-home-internet-gateway-stats/> doesn't
>> allow access to features like port forwarding or passthrough.
>>
>> I've not yet called T-Mobile Support.
>>
>> Dave
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On Thu, Oct 5, 2023 at 6:56 AM David Burton <ncdave4life at gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> The same happens for me, Mauricio. There are no towers shown on the
>>> coverage map, even when zoomed all the way in.
>>>
>>> But when I picked up my T-Mobile FAST 5688W Gateway
>>> <https://manuals.plus/t-mobile/fast-5688w-5g-gateway-manual#setting_up_the_t-mobile_5g_gateway>
>>> this afternoon, the tower locations were shown on the coverage map screen
>>> which the salesman had open on his tablet. I asked him why he could see
>>> them, but when I'd looked for them at home I couldn't see them. He said
>>> that he thought it was because he was logged into the site with a company
>>> ID, and the public view has less information.
>>>
>>> It looked to me like the towers on his screen were consistent with what
>>> CellMapper showed
>>> <https://community.t-mobile.com/troubleshooting-38/finding-tmobile-cell-tower-locations-42433>
>>> .
>>>
>>> I connected up the gateway without much difficulty, and I was able to
>>> access the Internet using my computer and phone. SpeedTest.net shows
>>> somewhat variable speeds, but generally faster than my "60 mbps" Spectrum.
>>> Unlike fiber, it's not symmetrical, though.
>>>
>>> I'm very annoyed with the gateway's firmware. Although there's an admin
>>> password shown on a sticker on the device, neither the UI (at the admin IP
>>> address, 192.168.22.1), nor the T-Mobile app, provide any way to get admin
>>> access. There's no login prompt at http://192.168.22.1/, and the phone
>>> app seems to have no means for accessing configuration settings, like port
>>> forwarding or pass-through to another router.
>>>
>>> The gateway also has a USB-C port for connecting an external HDD or
>>> flash drive, probably to make it usable as a poor man's NAS... but there's
>>> no way to configure or use it.
>>>
>>> Brian mentioned a 3rd Party app
>>> <https://tmo.report/2023/05/new-app-gives-easy-access-to-t-mobile-home-internet-gateway-stats/>
>>> which might solve these problems. I've not tried it yet. If it doesn't
>>> solve the problems then I'll call T-Mobile support during business hours.
>>> If I can't find a solution then I'll have to return the gateway and cancel
>>> my service, because I run a web server in my home.
>>>
>>> It appears that the gateway probably originally had reasonable
>>> configurability, but T-Mobile customized the firmware and deleted the good
>>> stuff. My guess is that doing that sort of crap probably simplifies their
>>> customer support scripts, so that the people who "support" their customers
>>> don't need much training. From my point of view, the only good thing about
>>> it is that it might mean the Chinese manufacturer couldn't have slipped in
>>> any spyware.
>>>
>>> Dave
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On Wed, Oct 4, 2023 at 3:31 PM Mauricio Tavares via TriLUG <
>>> trilug at trilug.org> wrote:
>>>
>>>> I have hit zoom until it can zoom no more and see not a single tower
>>>>
>>>> On Tue, Sep 26, 2023 at 3:53 PM brian mullan via TriLUG
>>>> <trilug at trilug.org> wrote:
>>>> >
>>>> > Yeah, to see the Towers I had to click the + button to scope deeper
>>>> into
>>>> > that Map.   Keep
>>>> > clicking the + button until they show up.
>>>> >
>>>> > On Tue, Sep 26, 2023 at 3:34 PM David Burton <ncdave4life at gmail.com>
>>>> wrote:
>>>> >
>>>> > > On Tue, Sep 26, 2023 at 12:37 PM brian mullan <
>>>> bmullan.mail at gmail.com>
>>>> > > wrote:
>>>> > >
>>>> > >> *#1*
>>>> > >> Regarding Distance from a TMobile 5G tower.
>>>> > >> My house is perhaps 3-4 miles away from the nearest TMO 5G Tower
>>>> shown on
>>>> > >> their coverage map.
>>>> > >> You can look up TMobile's 5G Coverage Map: *
>>>> https://www.t-mobile.com/coverage/coverage-map
>>>> > >> <https://www.t-mobile.com/coverage/coverage-map>*
>>>> > >> Just enter  your Zip code and the map will show all TMobile Towers
>>>> > >> nearby  (5G Ultra, 5G extended range & 4G)
>>>> > >>
>>>> > >
>>>> > > Thanks, Brian.
>>>> > >
>>>> > > When I do that it doesn't show me the tower locations. Here's a
>>>> screenshot:
>>>> > >
>>>> > > <https://sealevel.info/TMO_coverage_map_2023-09-26.png>
>>>> > >
>>>> > >            *  (click image to enlarge)*
>>>> > >
>>>> > >
>>>> > > Do I need to select an option of some sort, to get it to display
>>>> the tower
>>>> > > locations?
>>>> > >
>>>> > >
>>>> > > On Tue, Sep 26, 2023 at 1:41 PM Peter Soper via TriLUG <
>>>> trilug at trilug.org>
>>>> > > wrote:
>>>> > >
>>>> > >> I hope you have a better experience than I've had. With my setup
>>>> after
>>>> > >> roughly a year it is my opinion that Tmobile has no concept of QOS
>>>> or the
>>>> > >> word "availability". I've kept my pitiful DSL so I can fall back
>>>> during
>>>> > >> frequent outages. Vaguely 2-3 a month requiring fallback and a
>>>> half dozen
>>>> > >> outages lasting just a few minutes. Also, my service makes me
>>>> appear to be
>>>> > >> in Charlotte or Atlanta and that's a separate PITA.
>>>> > >>
>>>> > >
>>>> > > Thanks for that info, Pete.
>>>> > >
>>>> > > Do you know how far you are from the nearest TMO antenna tower?
>>>> > >
>>>> > > Dave
>>>> > >
>>>> > >
>>>> > --
>>>> > This message was sent to: raubvogel at gmail.com <raubvogel at gmail.com>
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>>>> that address.
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>>>> --
>>>> This message was sent to: Dave Burton <ncdave4life at gmail.com>
>>>> To unsubscribe, send a blank message to trilug-leave at trilug.org from
>>>> that address.
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>>>> Welcome to TriLUG: https://trilug.org/welcome
>>>
>>>