re: Rural Internet options. Unlimitedville?

Anyone gaming on this? Are speeds consistent enough?

I'm able to play PS4 online with this setup. I play Rocket League and Apex Legends recently. Pings aren't great but it's not awful. It's definitely better when using a LAN into one of my Google WiFi pucks and then setting the PS4 as a priority WiFi device. It's worth noting I get average ATT cell tower signal (between 2-3 bars).

If you look back earlier, he said he was getting 52-82 ping. That's not very good at all for gaming especially for a game like Apex where you'll have even worse ping to their servers.

I get between 4-7 ping with cox

It's perfectly acceptable for Apex. The only time I've seen lag is when the server itself lags and the people I play with are confirming it's the server lagging. I haven't noticed it lagging enough to affect my performance. I'm not sure how many games I've played but I'm a level 49 and have been playing for nearly three weeks straight. Yes, it's not ideal but it gets the job done.

I have Hughesnet for service. Should I use this option instead? I would love to download movies with roku or Netflix. TIA

If you have decent AT&T LTE reception at your house then you should absolutely go with this.

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Can someone explain this step by step for me? I have an old Samsung tablet, so I should have an IMEI to use.

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First step, Samsung tablet is not helpful for you, so don't worry about it.

The nuts and bolts of this is that ATT specifically has a $30/month plan for iPads that is unlimited. So that's where the *plan* comes from.

The wrinkle that we care about is that there is seemingly no check for whether an iPad is *using* that data. So once you enable the SIM for the $30/month ipad plan, you can put it in a hotspot.

So, you can either:

1) pay $30 or so to someone on ebay to get the plan (not optimal, but easier)

or

2) use the landing page referenced previously and either an imei generator or just look up a modern ipad with LTE service on ebay that has pictures that include an imei number.

Once you have your imei and a previously unused sim card, you can go to the landing page to enable service on the sim

Once either of these is completed, take your freshly enabled SIM card and plug it into the Hotspot and confirm that service is functional.

From there, because the hotspot has low signal output and is not designed for whole home usage, you would configure it for pass-through mode and hard wire it to a better Router/Mesh system for your house (ie. Orbi/Google Wifi)...

So in total, items to purchase:

$1-5 - Unused SIM card
$100-150 used - GSM Hotspot - Netgear Nighthawk M1 seems to be the unit of choice here
$$ could vary significantly depending on what you already have - Router and/or Mesh Network setup for Home - (Orbi/Google Wifi are examples, TP-Link makes a cheaper option if you don't mind a little more setup)

$30/month - Ongoing service from ATT - no contract, no data cap (just deprioritization after 22GB but most seem to indicate that it was not noticeable)

Because you're not talking about world class speeds here, an older router would probably be fine if you don't have a lot of home to broadcast to. The larger the house, the more you'll likely need to invest into a modern router/mesh system. Network speeds/configuration not my strongsuit, so someone can correct me if there is any decided advantage in using a more modern wifi router, but seems like any A/B/N router would be fine unless you need more signal coverage?

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Has anyone tried an external antenna on the Nighthawk to get a better signal?

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I'm assuming you're needing an antenna to pull in a better signal from the AT&T towers into your Nighthawk? If that's what you're referring to, nope haven't tried it as I don't need it. I consistently get 2-4 bars reception on my Nighthawk and that's perfectly acceptable for good enough reception stability.

If you are needing something to broadcast a signal within your house, I'd recommend a mesh system or some type of a good broadcast router.

The Nighthawk's broadcast strength sucks. That's why I just use it to catch the AT&T cell tower signal and hardwire it into my whole home mesh router system.

Has anyone tried port forwarding in any traffic? I suspect this isn't available on these cards. I know you won't get a public static but could use a public dns service. But I am sure AT&T is blocking inbound traffic.

Just wondering because I wouldn't mind using it for a remote camera if they are allowing inbound.

ok... i did everything and:

1)the nighthawk device says "Mobile Broadband Disconnected"
2)the attwifimanager site doesnt open or seem to exist and
3) my credit card company sent me a fraud alert confirming that i was using my card for this...

Whats happening