A cellular data service upgrade prompts new (to this engineer, at least) hardware acquisitions: three models’ worth, four total devices. Smart or superfluous? Read on and decide for yourselves.
When our power went down on December 17, our broadband WAN connection and LAN still remained up for several hours, thanks to our sizeable UPS battery set fueling essential network gear, along with the NUT-controlled auto-shutdown of the multiple power-hungry HDD-based NASs also UPS-tethered. But eventually, the batteries were depleted, Comcast-supplied Ethernet and Wi-Fi both dropped, and we needed to turn to other Internet-access options.
My wife has unlimited data on her Verizon 5G cellular phone account, along with hotspot support (the latter capped at 200 GB max per month, but which my legacy unlimited AT&T 4G LTE cellular phone plan completely lacks). And her service plan is also shared among multiple devices, including several iPads. So that was one option.
AT&T longevity (and stinginess)
I’ve also long (since November 2009, I realized in perusing my email archive while writing this) had a dedicated AT&T data plan, with the associated SIM nowadays normally (at least until recently, that is) plugged into my archaic Microsoft Surface Pro X hybrid tablet/computer:
This plan, originally $29.99/month, increased by $5/month beginning in February 2016. More recently, another change arrived. My original DataConnect plan was 4G LTE-based and unlimited from a data usage standpoint. But in March 2023, AT&T converted me to a 5G successor plan, with the second month of service free and $20/month off the normal $55/month price beyond that point (both perks per my legacy customer status). That said, it was no longer unlimited; the base rate included only 50 GBytes of data use per month. Sufficient in a pinch, although not for ongoing daily usage; we average well beyond a half TByte of aggregate data payload per month on Comcast.
When the network went down, I therefore also grabbed and booted up the Surface Pro X, figuring that I’d spread out the household data usage across the multiple cellular services we were already paying for. To my surprise and dismay, however, the usual cellular data connection option in Windows 11’s network settings was missing. And when I dove into Device Manager, I learned why; “This device cannot start”, whatever that meant:
Microsoft strikes again
I tried uninstalling the relevant driver, then rebooting so that Windows would auto-reinstall it. I also tried searching for an updated version of the driver. No dice; nothing I tried worked. I was pissed, turning to Reddit to vent and seek other suggestions. What I’d already learned there was that the Windows 11 2H25 update had dropped support for legacy Arm processors, including the SQ1 (a Microsoft-branded Qualcomm Snapdragon 8cx SC8180X) and, I assumed along with it, the chipset’s integrated X24 LTE modem. And, because I’d installed Windows 11 2H25 in mid-October and it was already mid-December, I was beyond the 10-day rollback deadline.
More recently though, and on a hunch, I plugged back in the SIM, rechecked the computer’s “Network & Internet” screen and noticed that the cellular data option had magically returned, which a revisit of Device Manager confirmed:
🤷♂️ I have no clue what caused it to resurrect, far from what had led to its (temporary, it turns out) demise in the first place. And, by the way, after further pondering I now suspect that the now-shorter list of supported Arm processors and chipsets in Windows 11 2H25 only affects fresh installations, not upgrades of existing activated builds. It’s all for naught, however; I’ve already moved on. For any of you who wondered what I’d been doing with the SIM before I temporarily “plugged it back in” to the computer, as I intentionally teased a paragraph earlier, read on for the solution to the mystery.
Standalone hotspots: still relevant
I’ve dabbled with mobile cellular hotspots before, owned by others. And truth be told, I didn’t have to buy one this time. Last January I’d purchased on sale from Amazon two NETGEAR LM1200 cellular broadband modems, one for teardown-to-come and the other for precisely the scenario—premises power-loss connectivity backup—that I experienced in mid-December. They aren’t as-is usable, requiring tether to a router. But I have plenty of those in inventory. And had we stuck around the home more than one night I probably would have pressed the modem-plus-router combo into service, fueled by a portable power unit.
But another limitation, bandwidth, was the same one that already soured me on the Surface Pro X’s integrated modem (along in the ones in my Intel-based Surface Pros, for that matter). The LM1200 “only” supports 4G LTE, which is likely why I bought them (on closeout, I suspect) for only $19.99 each a year-plus back, versus the original $49.99 MSRP. As you’ll soon see, I used a similar “buy a generation-or-few old” stratagem with the mobile hotspots! 4G LTE support was sufficient when that’s all my AT&T service supported (and the unlimited per-month allocation was a nice bonus). But once AT&T upgraded me to 5G…well, you know what they say about shiny new objects… Truth be told, I actually bought three mobile hotspots, for reasons I’ll discuss in the following sections.
The NETGEAR Nighthawk M6 MR6110
I’ll start with the highest-end device, Netgear’s MR6110 (PDF), the entry-level member of the company’s Nighthawk M6 family. Versus its higher-end Nighthawk M6 siblings (this Mobile Internet Resource Center writeup provides a comprehensive comparison), not to mention Nighthawk M7-family successors, it:
- Is carrier-locked to AT&T, and doesn’t support a sufficient diversity of frequency bands (presumably due to firmware versus silicon limitations) to deliver robust support for other cellular carriers, anyway
- Is sub-6 GHz only from a spectrum standpoint, not additionally comprehending mmWave support (which, interestingly, NETGEAR dropped entirely in its Nighthawk M7 generation devices) and
- Supports only Wi-Fi 6, not more advanced protocols
Then again, it only cost me $84.99 plus tax gently used from a legitimate eBay seller (just as I’ve mentioned before with cellular phones, you need to be careful when buying preowned goods to ensure that you haven’t acquired a device whose IMEI has already been banned by the associated cellular carrier). I also sprung for a $24.99 two-year extended warranty. And in case you’re wondering what behind the gray square “doors” at both ends of the front panel in the above stock photo, they’re TS-9 connectors that mate up with NETGEAR’s model 6000451 omnidirectional MIMO antenna, a gently used example of which I bought for $24 off eBay:
I live in a rural region outside of (and above) Golden, Colorado, with trailing-edge cellular technology deployed and spotty coverage for all carriers. To wit, using the NETGEAR MR6110’s internal antenna, I was only able to tune in LTE service…what’s the point, since I’ve already got the NETGEAR LM1200 modem-plus-router combo? But connect the external antenna, tether my laptop to the MR6110 over USB-C, and:
Huzzah! Consider me sold!
The Franklin A50 (model RG2102)
Next up…or down, depending on your perspective…is another AT&T-partner piece of hardware, Franklin’s A50. No integrated Ethernet, although you can still wired-tether to a single device over USB-C, and to an Ethernet-based router via a USB-C-to-Ethernet adapter plus a Cat5e cable. And “only” support for 20 concurrent devices, versus the NETGEAR MR6110’s 32. But user reviews rave about its battery life. It touts diverse 5G band support, and is claimed carrier-unlockable via services such as Cellcorner and Unlocklocks. That’d be convenient in case, for example, I ever wanted to switch my service to Google Fi, a T-Mobile MVNO (mobile virtual network operator). And it only set me back $34 (plus tax) used on eBay. How could I refuse?
The Franklin T9 (model RT717)
This last, lowest-end one—two of them, actually—I bought solely for experimentation purposes, both hacking and teardown. No integrated Ethernet, again. No 5G support this time, either; it only comprehends LTE. And as you can tell from the photo, this time it’s out-of-box locked to T-Mobile. But believe it or not, it’s (unofficially, again) user-unlockable for use with other carriers, not to mention user-hackable to both tweak its default settings and expand its overall feature set. Check out the following example links (in Google search results priority order) for more information:
And did I mention that each complete kit, in brand new condition this time, cost me only $13.98 plus tax (with free shipping!) on eBay? Once again, how could I resist?
More to come
As you’ve hopefully already noticed from the two photos I shared earlier, I’m already happily exploring the NETGEAR MR6110, with the other two devices to follow in short order. I’ve also already invested in carrying cases for all three, plus inexpensive spare batteries for both the MR6110 and Franklin A50 (each Franklin T9 kit came with one, so I’m set here), since all three hotspots’ portable power cells are easily user-accessible for swap-out purposes. Stay tuned for more coverage to come in the coming months. And for now, I as-always welcome your thoughts in the comments!
—Brian Dipert is the Principal at Sierra Media and a former technical editor at EDN Magazine, where he still regularly contributes as a freelancer.
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