****The Official 5G Home Broadband Thread**** (Three/EE/Vodafone/etc)

Okay, I have gotten further with this.

The VPN works fine on our current Ubiquiti setup, with FTTC --> Draytek Vigor 130 bridged --> Ubiquiti USG --> Unifi Wi-Fi
The VPN works fine through 5G --> ZTE router in standard router mode --> Wi-Fi.
The VPN does has a problem with 5G --> ZTE Bridged mode --> Ubiquiti USG --> Unifi Wi-Fi

The ZTE router in bridge mode is the weak link.

Might just buy the TP-Link Archer NX210 and give that a go.
Good detective work.

Yeah I think it's £199 at the moment.
 
Annoyingly, looks like Three have locked me down to 120mb. I was getting 300-500mb. Doesn’t matter what APN I use or bands.
Lame.
 
Okay, the TP-Link Archer NX200/210 doesn’t have bridge/modem mode it seems. The Deco X50-5G (AX3000) does, but before I pull the trigger, any others I should consider?
 
Some further investigation suggests I may have a potential NAT issue. There's a few private IPs in all hops within Three.

5q1dl1G.png
 
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After a (extremely painful) chat with Three technical support, they have made a change on the network for my account regarding IPv6. Now, I know there is some issues with their IPv6 vs IPv4 networks and they swap people between them depending on setup, area and issues. So Who knows, when I get home, it might be better, we'll see.
 
Woop, just got my business SIMs

500GB x 24 months for 2 SIMs
£8 exVAT for each SIM

saves me finding a SIMO sim when my contract expires in 4 months

cheers @Journey
 
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Perhaps instead of a phone a small portable 5g travel router might be a better compromise.

Well, I gave the old S20FE 5G a try in ethernet tethering and it is working out rather well.

Used old Steamdesk dock which gave it the PD it needs and a gigabit port. Connected to the existing router and working fine. Using a Talkmobile (Vodafone) £16pm unlimited 5G 30-day rolling contract and getting the following with mobile phone on a windowsill.

2025-06-06.png


It'll do for now as moving in the next few months and don't want to be shackled by a contract.
 
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Anyone used any MikroTik gear before?
 
I saw on Vodafone’s website that they offer “5G Ultra”.

Do any of the MVNO’s offer this service? Are there any 5G modems (which support bridging) that support it?

EDIT: Looks like Voxi support it. Still interested in modems that do.
 
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I saw on Vodafone’s website that they offer “5G Ultra”.

Do any of the MVNO’s offer this service? Are there any 5G modems (which support bridging) that support it?

EDIT: Looks like Voxi support it. Still interested in modems that do.
It's just Vodafones name for 5G SA, so I imagine most of the modems support it? My NR5103EV2 definitely has settings for 5G SA and a bridge mode - I've never used the SA part though since I'm on 3.

I know that when I was on onestream VDSL and wanted to leave to 3 they offered me vodafone 5G Ultra. They don't offer it on their site though so I think it was only for retention purposes.
 
It's just Vodafones name for 5G SA, so I imagine most of the modems support it? My NR5103EV2 definitely has settings for 5G SA and a bridge mode - I've never used the SA part though since I'm on 3.

I know that when I was on onestream VDSL and wanted to leave to 3 they offered me vodafone 5G Ultra. They don't offer it on their site though so I think it was only for retention purposes.

Thanks!

Unfortunately it looks like the Vodafone coverage checker is wrong, because my wife’s Lebara SIM won’t connect to 5G here and a few neighbours confirmed the same. The website says we have good coverage for 5G both indoors and outdoors :(

My Virgin Media contract is up in January and I refuse to continue to put up with their awfulness. Openreach fibre is “due to be built within the next year” so I’m looking for a stop gap.

EE 5G isn’t awful here but the upload is pretty bad. Thinking that that might impact our ability to have web conference calls for work. The 1TB AUP is also limiting.
 
Thanks!

Unfortunately it looks like the Vodafone coverage checker is wrong, because my wife’s Lebara SIM won’t connect to 5G here and a few neighbours confirmed the same. The website says we have good coverage for 5G both indoors and outdoors :(

My Virgin Media contract is up in January and I refuse to continue to put up with their awfulness. Openreach fibre is “due to be built within the next year” so I’m looking for a stop gap.

EE 5G isn’t awful here but the upload is pretty bad. Thinking that that might impact our ability to have web conference calls for work. The 1TB AUP is also limiting.
Shouldn't need much upload for web conf calls. If you can get around 5MB you'd be fine for a group call at 1080p. Less for 1 on 1 calls.
 
What is your current issue with VM? Are you getting outages or slow speeds, etc?

For what it's worth 3 5G has been good, but there have been a good many 1 day outages, perhaps 1 day a month (but not at a regular interval, they come in little bunches). I've had a month long ping issue which eventually resolved its self.

I'm basically on this until our fibre rollout next year my current choice being 3 5G (200mbit / 100mbit) or VDSL (20mbit/2mbit) so I'm happy to take the outages (since VDSL wasn't without fault either, maybe 1 day a quarter). But unless your VM service is *really* bad I'd be reluctant to move off the fixed line if it were me.

Perhaps you could get a modem from CEX which you can re-sell later and then just use the mobile internet with a preloaded sim to fill in the gaps if it's outages?
 
I recently gave this a go with my virgin broadband contract ending I've checked usage we use about 2tb a month mostly streaming, got ID mobile unlimited data £15 rolling monthly uses Three and I think three are the only ones that truly don't have fair usage so pretty much the only option

Speed wise I'm getting between 100mb - 450mb the faster speed is like 1am till 9am on average during normal hours it averages around 150mb and upload averages 20-30mb after testing it for around a week I've had no issues streaming 4K and few other devices streaming, browsing at the same time

I've a spare 5g phone which I plugged into Asus router via usb so keeps using same WiFi and no need to reconnect any devices :)

I could get ID SIM cheaper going with 12 months £10 per month with no price increases but I'm still unsure about it's reliability

Also seen on eBay people selling the outdoor three router unlocked wonder if having it stuck on Window outside to get better speeds

I'll see what Virgins retention offers I put in cancellation notice I'm not actually not concerned it ending as I've got a back up
 
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What is your current issue with VM? Are you getting outages or slow speeds, etc?

For what it's worth 3 5G has been good, but there have been a good many 1 day outages, perhaps 1 day a month (but not at a regular interval, they come in little bunches). I've had a month long ping issue which eventually resolved its self.

I'm basically on this until our fibre rollout next year my current choice being 3 5G (200mbit / 100mbit) or VDSL (20mbit/2mbit) so I'm happy to take the outages (since VDSL wasn't without fault either, maybe 1 day a quarter). But unless your VM service is *really* bad I'd be reluctant to move off the fixed line if it were me.

Perhaps you could get a modem from CEX which you can re-sell later and then just use the mobile internet with a preloaded sim to fill in the gaps if it's outages?

Getting a lot of intermittent packet loss with VM, and they just don’t seem to want to fix it. They were supposed to replace a cable outside on 01 Sept but they never turned up. After chasing them it’s been rescheduled for 16 Sept but I’m sceptical. I’ve had about 8 or 9 engineer visits in the past 15 months and I don’t want to put up with another 24 months of it knowing that Openreach will install fibre in that timeframe.

I can get the full 76/20mbit with FTTC so that’s probably the most sensible option, but the whole reason for going with VM was that some content on Plex was buffering because of the high bitrate.

 
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Thanks!

Unfortunately it looks like the Vodafone coverage checker is wrong, because my wife’s Lebara SIM won’t connect to 5G here and a few neighbours confirmed the same. The website says we have good coverage for 5G both indoors and outdoors :(

My Virgin Media contract is up in January and I refuse to continue to put up with their awfulness. Openreach fibre is “due to be built within the next year” so I’m looking for a stop gap.

EE 5G isn’t awful here but the upload is pretty bad. Thinking that that might impact our ability to have web conference calls for work. The 1TB AUP is also limiting.
Vodafone coverage checker is wrong. It is worthless Voda love telling porkies.
 
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