Nighthawk MR5200 (M5) - We need your feedback!

Good day Nighthawk Community, I'm reaching out to you today in hopes of soliciting your help. If anyone is experiencing any issues with the Nighthawk MR5200 (M5) Mobile Hotspot we want to hear ...

flyingtotoro
Nov 03, 2022
Hi,
maybe it is possible to also help with the issue we experience.
We own two MR5200, let's call one "old" and the other one "new".
We use to run "old" with a Vodafone (Germany) SIM which originally came from a "Vodafone GigaCube", some kind of relabeled HUAWEI 5G Router. This setup was running fine for about 12 Month or so, but recently we started to experience interruptions of LTE connections after 12 to 24 hours. Only a reebot of "old" would help getting reconnected.
So we bought "new", used the very same SIM card with it. We experienced, that "new" wouldn't even connect to LTE nor any other band.
So we ordered a fresh SIM card and used in "new" but experienced the very same behaviour. "new" wouldn't connect to any band.
When using the fresh SIM card in "old", we were back to a connect time of about 12 to 24 hours, but then again interruptions of the connection.
JohnPengcould you take a look at the model.json stats if we upload them?
Many thanks in advance!

steveXXX

Apprentice

Apr 06, 2022

I've written a program to read the model.json file from my mr5200.

It reads it once a minute then parse info of interest. I'm having a hard time understanding

some of the data. A sample output line:

10:40 > cell: 97602709 - 5GSUB6 Nr5gService,     rsrp:    -103 dBm  rsrq:    -14 dB  sinr:   12 dB  rssi:    -73 dBm
        nr5g: attached: true,  sigValid: true  - sigRsrp:  -79 dBm  sigRsrq: -12 dB  sigSnr:  5 dB
        lte:  attached: true,  sigValid: true  - sigRsrp: -103 dBm  sigRsrq: -14 dB  sigSnr: 12 dB  sigRssi: -73 dBm
1

Note that the diag info says that the nr5g signal is attached and valid. It claims an nr5g rsrp of -79dBm.

But the "generic" rsrp is listed as -103dBm, the value listed for the lte signal...

Note that it also claims to be using "currentPSserviceType" 5GSUB6 and "currentNWserviceType" Nr5gService

Am I missing something, or is this an issue. or ...

I ask because I am having an problem with the m5 switching from very good cells to poorer cells (as measured with Speed Test).

It seems to happen when the lte sigRsrp dips below -100dBm, as if it were tracking that instead of the nr5g signal.

Retired_Member

Apr 09, 2022

I finally had enough of dropped connections with the MR5200 and decided to pull out an old
mofi 4500 V2 to find if the netgear was really the problem. I pulled my AT&T sim card out of
the netgear and installed it into the mofi. Booted up the mofi and based on the cell towers
in my area, I band locked the mofi onto 12/17, pointed my poynting antenna to one of the towers,
3 miles from my location, and for 2 weeks had no uninterrupted internet connection. I now have
consistent 3 bar connection, (not the greatest) but because of all the trees and my location,
I’ll take it all day long! Even though the 700 MHz frequency is not the fastest, it is the
strongest I can lock onto. After 2 weeks of a sound connection with the band locked mofi, I
returned the MR5200 back to amazon for a full refund.

Since the Mofi 4500 cell module is old and not capable of 5G when they roll it out in my area
and many other 4G LTE bands, I decided to purchase a Sierra Wireless pre-built EM9191 NR Sub-6
GHz (CAT20) modem module with adapter enclosure from the guys over at The Wireless Haven for
less than the MR5200. Granted it does not have router capability, but I have enough routers
laying around. I installed their recommended GoldenOrb (OpenWRT fork) firmware onto a
Linksys 1900acs V2 router for testing, which will then allow me to control the modem from it.
Their website has a list of compatible routers that the firmware supports and can be loaded onto.
Many Asus, Netgear and other routers

I will be installing either wireguard or the express vpn ovpn firmware on the router’s firmware
tonight so all my network traffic flows through the vpn, and wait until the new Sierra Wireless
modem arrives . The modem has all the current 5G NR sub-6 bands n1 on up to n79, along with 4G
LTE bands B1 on up to B71, so I should not have any problem staying connected since I will also
have the capability to band lock and enable carrier aggregation if required.

When I was troubleshooting the MR5200 and I would watch the signal become very low or when AT&T
would switch bands and/or towers on me, (tower ID visible from their GUI), the express vpn would
interpret that as a lost signal and kill the connection which would require a reboot. Band
locking has eliminated that issue for me using the old mofi 4500.

I will update this post once I receive and test out the Sierra Wireless modem module.

Update: I have been running the new cellular modem from The Wireless Haven now for 2 weeks with
NO disconnects!!! I had them build the modem using the latest sierra wireless 5G EM9191 module
and it is rock solid even when only using the 4 paddle antenna’s that come with their modem.
Running express vpn on the router slows my speed somewhat but I chose security over
speed any day. Looking forward to deploying this setup in a 5G location soon and adding 2 of
their 2 x 2 mimo antenna's to connect to the 4 sma ports on the modem for better reception.

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Nighthawk MR5200 (M5) - We need your feedback!