Patchy Signal for past month

[Col33]

I live in rural Norfolk and after several failures to get FTTP I left my old provider to try Three's mobile broadband in Feb 2022.

When I received the MiFi my speed increased from an average of 5mb to 12mb. I then purchased a Tp-Link router and external antenna which increased the speed to between 25 and 30mb. 

For 8 to 9 months I have had no issues but the past 4+ weeks the signal has been poor. Some days I get no or 1 bar on the router for hours. I have called twice, the first time they confirmed no issues in the area, same as the web page, got me to re-boot, which I had already done, and then passed me on to technical team that remotely affected my router. During this process I got 3 bars and 25+mb download again. However the next day the same issue although it was a bit drizzly! 

Since then no matter if its sunny, foggy, icy, raining or stormy I will either get 3 bars or 1or none for extended periods. Any suggestions?

Thanks.

Col

P.S. I have re-booted and checked the router and its working fine, I have also put the sim back into the MiFi and that just shows red signal light. 

[JonathanB]

Hey @Col33,

It looks like that "WCDMA" part is indicating you're on 3G rather than 4G, not sure if that's possibly why your connection quality has went down lately.

How does the network look for Coverage and Network Status on our checkers? I'm assuming you were getting 4G before these issues started, does that reflect on the coverage, and is there any fault/maintenance showing on the status?

Thanks,
JonathanB

[Col33]

Network status always shows no issues. The coverage map shows 4G for external only. I did notice that it was showing 3G, I will check next time I get 30mb to see if it's shows 4G. Let's hope 4G improves before they turn off 3G.

[Col33]

Just spent time looking at the cellmapper site which does indicate that there is no 4G signal that covers my area. The only cell towers close are all 3G band 1. Hopefully these will be updated to 4G at some point.

[crypt0ninja]

Cellmapper is awesome 🙂

But you did say that the Three checker says 4G outdoors? If this is not correct then Three may need to update this for your area as its misleading...

[Col33]

Just done a speed test this morning, very windy and wet, and got 26.8 download and 4.1 upload which is about average. Checked the settings and still showing WCDMA and 3G so wonder if that's all I've been getting. Router is 4G and antenna is 5G.

I'll check again next time I get 1 bar or less.

[JonathanB · Accepted solution]

Good point from @crypt0ninja there, we want our coverage estimates to be as accurate as possible.

@Col33, I'll send you a private message to get the location info, and can reach out to a contact that might be able to confirm if there's perhaps a decommissioned mast or some other explanation of why you've been running into these issues.

JonathanB