T-Cellular’s new 5G dwelling broadband gateway/wi-fi router issues for one massive cause: It’s a substitute for the cable monopolies that dominate most main markets in the USA. Whether or not it’s a higher possibility than cable is, sadly, a query we are able to’t objectively reply, for 2 causes.
First, what T-Cellular formally calls its T-Cellular Excessive Velocity Web Gateway (5G21-12W-A) is “5G”—and the standard and bandwidth of the wi-fi sign you obtain in your house can be depending on any variety of elements, probably the most vital of which would be the gateway’s distance out of your nearest 5G cell tower. You’ll additionally must steadiness what we discovered in opposition to what your individual, competing broadband ISP delivers. Thankfully, T-Cellular’s plan providing is versatile sufficient you can in all probability create your individual one-month trial.
In my case, cable nonetheless regrettably gives the most suitable choice for my household of 4, dwelling in a home full of streaming media units and gaming laptops. T-Cellular’s 5G router supplied sufficient bandwidth for about half of my household, however not fairly sufficient for all 4 of us and our many units.
To be honest, although, we by no means skilled all that the T-Cellular Excessive Velocity Web Gateway has to supply. Whereas T-Cellular labels my home as ”lined” by its 5G providers, the truth wasn’t fairly as easy.
Mark Hachman / IDGMy son’s room merely occurred to supply the strongest 5G sign, in order that’s the place T-Cellular’s router ended up.
Specs and setup
T-Cellular’s router plan is all-inclusive: after confirming your eligibility, for $50 per thirty days, T-Cellular will ship you a pre-configured router with an activated SIM inserted. (The $50/mo truly features a $10/mo AutoPay credit score, so the precise value is $60/mo.) There’s no annual contract, both. For those who resolve the service isn’t for you, you may merely name T-Cellular, cancel, and the corporate will ship you a pay as you go label to field up and return the 5G21-12W-A {hardware}.
T-Cellular’s pricing is already on par or decrease than even the most affordable cable contracts, and T-Cellular guarantees limitless web with no information caps or throttling in addition. Nonetheless, T-Cellular says that the service is “not supposed for unattended use,” so don’t plan to obtain Linux distributions through BitTorrent.
Due to its protection map, T-Cellular is aware of if your own home can be shut sufficient to a cell tower to obtain a passable sign. For those who’re feeling actually nerdy, nevertheless, you may go to a website like CellMapper.internet and uncover simply how shut the closest cell tower is, and what wi-fi bands these towers use.
Bodily, T-Cellular’s router jogs my memory of the Harman Kardon Invoke, a now-discontinued cylindrical good speaker, that, like T-Cellular’s router, included a coloration show on the prime. It measures 8.5 inches excessive by 4.75 inches in diameter, and is powered by a wall-wart-like plug with a conveniently prolonged six-foot wire. That’s helpful, as you’ll wish to place the gateway as near an out of doors wall or window as attainable to obtain the utmost sign out there. Inside is a Wi-Fi 6 (802.11ax) radio with 4 antennas to create the wi-fi community your shopper units will connect with. It’s also possible to faucet its twin gigabit ethernet ports for wired community connections.
Mark Hachman / IDGThe 2 gigabit ethernet ports and the barrel connector for the ability provide are the one useful ports on T-Cellular’s 5G gateway.
T-Cellular’s gateway does have some quirks: There’s a USB-C port, a UPS port for an unterruptible energy provide, and an RJ-11 phone jack on the again of the router. however none of them are useful—not less than so far as I may inform. I attempted plugging a USB energy provide in, however that didn’t work. I didn’t have a appropriate UPS to check.
The 5G21-12W-A does have an inside battery, which permits the gateway for use cable free—effectively, type of. Organising the router requires first turning it on, letting it boot up, after which strolling it round the home or house to search out the very best sign. The LCD display on prime communicates this sign info in actual time, although it’ll flip off after a number of seconds until you faucet it awake. It’s also possible to “swipe” via a number of screens, which let you know the variety of units related, any service messages from T-Cellular, and extra.
Right here’s one other quirk: Whereas on battery, neither the ethernet nor the Wi-Fi connections can be utilized. That’s odd, since as I drove round my neighborhood with the 5G21-12W-A gateway to examine sign power, the battery degree solely dropped by a share level or two, that means that it ought to realistically provide web connectivity in case of an influence outage. That’s merely not the case.
You may also suppose {that a} “wi-fi” gateway could possibly be arrange anyplace, in contrast to a wired cable gateway that may solely be arrange close to the coaxial cable’s entry to the home. Sadly not. Usually, the perfect location can be close to a window, one which isn’t partially blocked by a mesh display. And placement does matter, greater than you may suppose: your wi-fi community should even be organized to take the gateway’s location into consideration.
Whereas the 5G21-12W-A gateway reported that my home is bathed in a “weak” (2 out of 5 bars) sign all through, I used to be solely capable of set up a “good” (3 out of 5 bars) sign in a nook of my son’s room, subsequent to his window. And that, proper in the midst of his Legos, grew to become my new wi-fi gateway location!
Mark Hachman / IDGSetting T-Cellular’s 5G gateway up means strolling the router round your house, trying to find the very best sign.
Setup took only a minute or two, overseen by T-Cellular’s smartphone app. As soon as the standard niceties have been accomplished—choosing an administrator password, setting an SSID, and so forth—the gateway was up and operating. T-Cellular’s app gives a fast and straightforward dashboard displaying present sign power, which units are related, and so forth. The online interface (which, by default, might be accessed through http://192.168.12.1 whereas the gateway is related) gives much more element, albeit with out a lot in the way in which of rationalization for folks much less acquainted with 5G and networking tech basically.
Efficiency and on a regular basis use
I used T-Cellular’s 5G21-12W-A gateway for about three weeks, wirelessly connecting leisure units just like the Xbox recreation console, plus my sons’ pill and PC. Given how a lot they’re in use throughout summer season trip, I figured that they’d be a wonderful check of whether or not the T-Cellular sign remained fixed. The sign dropped thrice in that interval, in keeping with my youngsters—normally only a few seconds, however as soon as for a bit longer.
Mark Hachman / IDGT-Cellular cell app lets you maintain tabs in your router always, however the performance is considerably missing.
I additionally examined the pace, after all. With all units disconnected, speeds ranged from a most of 180Mbps to about 120Mbps downstream—once more, on what T-Cellular’s app thought-about to be a “good” sign, or three out of 5 bars. Upstream speeds, which matter for those who’re importing video to YouTube or backing up information or pictures to the cloud, reached just below 50Mbps, which remains to be a lot, a lot quicker than the 14Mbps my cable supplier, Comcast, gives, with its 400Mbps service plan. These exams have been carried out with a wi-fi shopper near the router, with no different units related to the gateway.
My youngsters definitely didn’t report any points whereas gaming or chatting with their buddies through Zoom or Fb Messenger, they usually have been capable of obtain recreation updates usually. I additionally streamed 4K/60fps video from YouTube with out issues. Lastly, I re-ran my video-stream check whereas concurrently performing a pace check and noticed obtain speeds of 111Mbps, this whereas Home windows updates have been wirelessly downloaded to a unique PC. The video stream dropped 102 frames out of 18,000—nothing noticeable. Google’s Stadia gaming service additionally reported a connection of 59Mbps (once more, whereas streaming video) and authorised the connection as a candidate for the service, although I didn’t strive it.
It’s value noting that my T-Cellular gateway was not related to 5G. The T-Cellular app’s “Extra” tab will present you which ones frequency band your system connects to, which was usually Band 4 (outlined by T-Cellular as a 4G LTE band). A mobile sign app on my 5G-capable T-Cell phone additionally confirmed that the telephone (not the router) often related to bands 2, 66, or 71—once more, all 4G LTE bands. T-Cellular does function 5G providers on cell towers aligned alongside Bay Space interstates, however that tower was on the opposite facet of city, and I doubt that the router ever related to it. There’s no means of forcing the router to make use of a specific LTE or 5G band, both.
The router facet of T-Cellular’s gateway works effectively, inside cause. In my home, a split-level tucked right into a hill, Wi-Fi indicators are inclined to get misplaced within the maze of partitions, flooring, and ceilings. My conventional ISP gateway constructed into the basement struggles to push sign all through the house with out repeaters. I used to be considerably shocked to see my telephone’s sign app report a 65Mbps Wi-Fi hyperlink from the router alone, however my pocket book PC struggled to attach.
I had much better luck connecting T-Cellular’s gateway to a discrete mesh router. Coincidentally, I additionally acquired Vilo’s ultra-low-cost mesh networking system for analysis, so I merely related the tiny little mesh nodes round my home. That was an efficient, cheap complement to what T-Cellular supplied, blanketing my dwelling with Wi-Fi protection.
T-Cellular’s Wi-Fi providers and administration instruments, nevertheless, are decidedly missing. Whereas T-Cellular does a pleasant job of telling you which ones units are related, you’ll end up searching via the app’s UI to both disconnect every system individually, or else schedule a time to show them off. I additionally couldn’t discover any choices both within the app or net interface to create a visitor community, which is solely desk stakes for dwelling networking nowadays.
Mark Hachman / IDGLastly, I couldn’t connect with my workplace VPN, GlobalProtect, through the T-Cellular router. This bug, not less than, is effectively documented and attributed to an IPv6 configuration problem. Whereas I used to be capable of join by adjusting some networking parameters on my PC, a longer-term repair entails rolling again the router’s firmware. The router additionally doesn’t appear to work with Hulu + LiveTV, in keeping with T-Cellular’s customer-support boards.
Who ought to join T-Cellular’s dwelling web service?
I approached my hands-on with the T-Cellular Excessive Velocity Web Gateway (5G21-12W-A) from what now’s a really well timed perspective—breaking the stranglehold cable suppliers have on American shoppers. The Biden administration is already taking intention at broadband monopolies, however it will likely be as much as the FCC to enact change.
From my expertise, I can’t say what the total potential of T-Cellular gateway could also be. I think about there are few locations the place 5G is accessible, however cable isn’t. For now, the efficiency benefit in all probability lies with cable broadband (or the even harder-to-get fiber broadband service). People dwelling in rural areas, in the meantime, in all probability received’t have any extra of an opportunity to get 5G broadband than they do cable broadband or fiber, leaving them to the mercy of DSL or satellite tv for pc service suppliers or—in the event that they’re fortunate—an inexpensive, high-performing WISP (Wi-fi Web Service Supplier).
Nonetheless, not everybody wants ultrafast broadband. For those who’re a small family that streams video, checks electronic mail, and downloads Home windows updates within the background, T-Cellular’s router is totally value testing. Most broadband connections can already accommodate these wants, and high-speed broadband (larger than 200Mbps) is extra of a requirement for bigger households with a number of energetic streaming units or laptops in use.
After which there’s pricing, after all. Right here, issues change dramatically. A value of $50 per thirty days is kind of engaging, particularly in comparison with cable payments that may simply prime $100 per thirty days (together with TV service). Add information caps and attainable overage charges, and prices additionally shortly climb there, too.
Bear in mind, T-Cellular isn’t asking you to cancel your cable, and even change broadband suppliers. For $50, you may merely name or contact T-Cellular and join a month’s value. A T-Cellular consultant stated that after a month’s time, for those who select to cancel, T-Cellular will ship you a pay as you go label to return the T-Cellular Excessive Velocity Web Gateway (5G21-12W-A), and credit score your invoice accordingly. Even with T-Cellular’s present limitations, that’s an attractive provide.
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