external antenna for lg8600

redorgreen · EVDO Fledgling Joined: 08 Oct 2007 Posts: 12

Well, after some great advice from people on this forum, I went ahead and bought the data cable from Alltel (because it came with the drivers) and went with the $25 WLS plan as a feature (didn't want to get locked into a 2 year contract as DSL should be here within 6 months). I am getting decent speeds, but it seems like it is going great and then the phone goes "dormant" and keeps cycling back and forth. I am thinking it is just the way the EVDO is set up (maybe). Or maybe I do not have my phone 'optimized' for the EVDO (when it cycles, it states "call ended. 1x-EVDO data" on the main screen on my phone, then goes dormant, then starts up again). I have 80% signal strength without an external antenna. Is there an external antenna that I could use for this application? Would it increase speeds? Would it make the speeds more consistent?
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks.

redorgreen · EVDO Fledgling Joined: 08 Oct 2007 Posts: 12

And another question... is it possible to set up a wireless system in my house so that I can also use the EVDO on my laptop (and maybe I will get lucky and it will reach the shop as well for my husband's laptop - both are wireless capable)?
Thanks.

mudpuppy93 · EVDO User Joined: 18 Oct 2007 Posts: 42

Its a bit off topic but, I was wondering what kind of speeds are you seeing off of your phone?

redorgreen · EVDO Fledgling Joined: 08 Oct 2007 Posts: 12

It is weird (maybe not, I don't know) about the speeds. At times, it jumps to like 1.6 Mbps, and then nothing... I have always had dial-up, so I am totally digging being able to watch video, and have watched a few shows on abc.com (which is when I see the big speeds). With my last session, the max. transmit speed (which is A LOT slower from what I hear) was 88.9 kbps. The max receive speed was 1024.7 kbps. But it varies so much. Half of the time when I look at my cell phone, it states "dormant", so I don't know if it just 'pulls' speeds when I am activly doing something or if it comes in 'spurts'. I am pretty close to a tower and have all of my bars on the phone for EVDO, even though on the 'Quicklink Mobile' screen (what I have been monitoring speeds from and is part of the Alltel items that the CD put on my computer) is showing that I have 80% signal strength. I do notice that in the evening and late at night, the speeds are a little faster. I am hooked up through the data cable, as I thought it may be faster than going Bluetooth (and my computer wasn't set up for that anyway).
Hope this helps. It probably depends on how far away the tower is and a ton of other things that I have no clue on. Anything that used to take me quite a while to download (cancelled a Napster membership because it took HOURS to download one song on my old dial-up) now takes seconds (although I haven't tried downloading anything big like a misic file).
I can send you a PM and give you a break-down of the speeds if you would like.

mudpuppy93 · EVDO User Joined: 18 Oct 2007 Posts: 42

yeah a PM about the speeds would be great, but your not allowed to PM anyone until you hit 10 posts Sad

So, you can either email me at mudpuppy193 no spam @rocketmail.com (remove to the no spam) or just post it here. Does your phone charge while your plugged into the USB port?

Capt Ron · Posted: Sun Oct 21, 2007 6:45 pm Post subject:

It is normal for your phone to show Dormant at times. It will come back to Packet Data when it needs to send or receive data.
_________________
Ron

redorgreen · EVDO Fledgling Joined: 08 Oct 2007 Posts: 12

Okay, I started this post because of the "dormant" status that kept coming up, even with decent signal strength. Now, it seems I am dealing with frequent disconnects. The first few days I did not experience this. Now, about every hour or so, disconnect. I use my LG 8600 and have a data cable that is tethered to my computer. I purchased the data cable and CD from Alltel. Is there a setting in my phone that I can change to make the disconnects not as frequent, or something with the QuickLink Mobile (the program that was put on my computer)?

And about the speeds to mudpuppy, they are all over the place. I will tell you that I have hit speeds as high as 1.3 Mbps. It seems that it is either really cranking, or it is at 0.00 kbps. The upload speeds are a lot lower, as to be expected. The last time I checked the stat log, the highest download was 189 kbps and the highest upload speed was 89 kbps. It doesn't give me an average, just the max transmit / receive rate and how many total transmit / receive bytes.
Hope this helps.

Any info regarding the frequent disconnects would be greatly appreciated. I spotted a few posts about disconnects, but it seemed that the "fixes" were more geared for those with the data cards.

Thanks.

redorgreen · EVDO Fledgling Joined: 08 Oct 2007 Posts: 12

Okay, I started this post because of the "dormant" status that kept coming up, even with decent signal strength. Now, it seems I am dealing with frequent disconnects. The first few days I did not experience this. Now, about every hour or so, disconnect. I use my LG 8600 and have a data cable that is tethered to my computer. I purchased the data cable and CD from Alltel. Is there a setting in my phone that I can change to make the disconnects not as frequent, or something with the QuickLink Mobile (the program that was put on my computer)?

And about the speeds to mudpuppy, they are all over the place. I will tell you that I have hit speeds as high as 1.3 Mbps. It seems that it is either really cranking, or it is at 0.00 kbps. The upload speeds are a lot lower, as to be expected. The last time I checked the stat log, the highest download was 189 kbps and the highest upload speed was 89 kbps. It doesn't give me an average, just the max transmit / receive rate and how many total transmit / receive bytes.
Hope this helps.

Any info regarding the frequent disconnects would be greatly appreciated. I spotted a few posts about disconnects, but it seemed that the "fixes" were more geared for those with the data cards.

Thanks.

Big Twin · Posted: Tue Oct 23, 2007 2:46 pm Post subject:

Have you checked your speeds with speedtest.net as opposed to QLM? If you do, you'll notice that speeds vary depending on the server. The same is true using QuickLink Mobile. When I was tethering, I was noticing dormant times, but it would go back online when the demand warranted it. You might try CS to make sure your QLM settings are right on your LG.

mudpuppy93 · EVDO User Joined: 18 Oct 2007 Posts: 42

redorgreen,

Thanks for the reply. Does your phone charge through the data cable? I called Alltel support tonight and asked them about specific models and they said that none of them charge or are capable of charging when plugged in as a modem, which I know is not the case but there seems to be very little info out there on using a tethered phone...

redorgreen · EVDO Fledgling Joined: 08 Oct 2007 Posts: 12

Mudpuppy93,

The cable that I bought from Alltel does not charge the phone itself, but does have a "plug-in" on the side of the indicator box (it is a black box with a red light on it with 'LG' printed on it) and the travel charger (home charger - and why do they call that a travel charger) fits into it... so, it does have the capability to charge while in use, you just have to plug the travel charger into the box within the USB cable (hope that makes sense).

I will check on speedtest.net to see what kind of speeds I am getting and post those as well for your info (thanks Big Twin for that website).

redorgreen · EVDO Fledgling Joined: 08 Oct 2007 Posts: 12

Mudpuppy93,

The cable that I bought from Alltel does not charge the phone itself, but does have a "plug-in" on the side of the indicator box (it is a black box with a red light on it with 'LG' printed on it) and the travel charger (home charger - and why do they call that a travel charger) fits into it... so, it does have the capability to charge while in use, you just have to plug the travel charger into the box within the USB cable (hope that makes sense).

I will check on speedtest.net to see what kind of speeds I am getting and post those as well for your info (thanks Big Twin for that website).

redorgreen · EVDO Fledgling Joined: 08 Oct 2007 Posts: 12

The closest place for me to speed test was Phoenix (I am in northwest NM, so Denver might be closer). Here are my results from the Phoenix server:

redorgreen · EVDO Fledgling Joined: 08 Oct 2007 Posts: 12

Here are the results (according to speedtest.net) from Denver. The distance on the Phoenix test was off, I am at least 400 miles away from Phoenix and probably around 350 from Denver.

And from what I hear, the speeds are slower when there are more people on the system (please correct me if I am wrong) and right now is probably one of the busier times for the carrier - as kids get out of school and such. I will test again tonight (when I am online most of the time) and post those as well for you mudpuppy93. I think a lot of it has to do with how far you are from the tower, and I am pretty close to it (within a few miles of it).

mudpuppy93 · EVDO User Joined: 18 Oct 2007 Posts: 42