LTE Band Lock
In some rare conditions, such as between two different cell towers, we need to lock the 4G router to works on a specific band to achieve a stable connection or faster speed.
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In some rare conditions, such as between two different cell towers, we need to lock the 4G router to works on a specific band to achieve a stable connection or faster speed.
Last updated
Note: The below tutorial works for a firmware version greater than EV3117. If you use a legacy firmware version, please update to the latest version EV3121. You can download and check the upgrade tutorial at https://ezen.link/firmware.
Go to the mobile interface page under "Network > Interfaces" (as the below right-side image shows).
The below tutorial is based on the "Mobile Data" protocol. Ensure the router uses the "Mobile Data" on the protocol option.
After accessing the router admin, go to "System > Terminal" or use PuTTY to access the SSH terminal.
Firstly, use the below command to check the current dialing sequence number of the cellular modem.
mmcli -L
Use the below command to check the mobile modem's working status and supported bands. The last digital number should be the same as the dialing sequence number on the return value of the last command.
mmcli -m 0
The modem connects to the mobile networks by the configured mode and then chooses the network bands with the strongest signal strength.
For example, the above demo modem uses the default mode of allowed 2G, 3G, 4G, preferred: 4G.
We can use the command below to lock only the router connected to 4G mode.
mmcli -m 0 --set-allowed-modes="4g"
If you need to revert the above 4G-only mode to default settings, please use the below command.
mmcli -m 0 --set-allowed-modes="2g|3g|4g" --set-preferred-mode="4g"
Before deciding on the specific network band, we must check its signal strength. You can refer to the tutorial to check the signal bands on a mobile phone APP. Field Test 4G Mobile Signal Strength
We can use the below command to lock the band, for example, eutran-1.
mmcli -m 0 --set-current-bands="eutran-1"
We can also lock the router to work on multiple bands. Make sure to use a double quotation mark to define all of the multiple bands with | symbol between each band.
mmcli -m 0 --set-current-bands="eutran-1|eutran-8"
The utran bands are the 3G standard networks, and eutran are the 4G LTE networks.
The set bands command will return a success or failure message. Then, we use the commandmmcli -m 0 to verify the current working bands.
If the mmcli command returns a failure message, please recheck your input commands, make sure to use the correct format, and the modem must support the band. Please run a hard reset by unplugging the power supply to activate the new settings.
If the modem returns inregular value, please try to reboot the router. You can also use mmcli -m 0 --reset to reset the modem settings to the default value.
