Unreliable home internet

It’s possible you may also be dealing with an overheating modem.

How distressing for you, and puzzling. Your metrics are good to excellent. You should be getting speeds of over 200Mbps down because you have the more desirable n41 on the Secondary (5G) and a good signal strength.

If you have an external router plugged in, try it without it plugged in, just using the gateway’s built-in router.

It is easy to reset the gateway’s connection by restarting it via the button on the side, after making any changes and just to refresh things. I’ve read that the Modem Storage message on the top of the gateway doesn’t mean anything. Some people got rid of it via the reset.

If you aren’t using an external  router, and you have a laptop or computer with an Ethernet port, plug the computer into the gateway that way with the provided CAT cable, thereby bypassing the wifi to rule out wifi being the issue. If you got speed that way, you will know something is wrong with either your wifi setup or the wifi function of the gateway.

When setting up your system, it’s good to get one device working properly, before adding all the smart devices on. Since you were trying to set it up when the tower was undergoing maintenance, you could try a hard reset of the gateway and starting all over again. By hard resetting, I don’t mean just restarting the gateway, but by depressing the reset hole at the top of the black insert panel on the side of the gateway, using a paperclip or pin, holding for four seconds, and releasing. Then you will need to re-enter all your setup data. I think if you haven’t done it, a hard reset like this is worth trying, given that you set up the thing at a time the tower was not functioning properly because of maintenance.

Do you by any chance have a 5G phone on T mobile, or a friend who does, and does that work at your house doing a speed test? That is a sure sign, if it works well, that you have a problem with the gateway and need to request a replacement.

One more thing I thought of...you said work on your tower has come and gone, according to a service rep you called. What kind of time are we talking about here? A few days, a week. Their tower maintenance issues can last from a few hours to a month, it seems. If they did a new n41 installation, the tuning of that can take days. Perhaps someone who knows more about this stuff than myself can clarify, it it possible to get these kind of good metrics and there be something missing with the connection to the backhaul or something, that would account for getting a 1 or 2Mbps speed?

Another thing, I used to have my DSL modem/router two rooms away and it worked fine, full speed. This gateway’s wifi will not work that way. You need to be 20 feet or less from the gateway to be sure the wifi will reach you full speed.

A few days before you got your gateway in the mail, did you get an email sent to you by T mobile that is entitled:

Your account is active: order (12 digit number here)

If you did not get activated, and never received this notification, and I have seen a tech oriented guy on video with this problem, the setup goes fine, and everything looks normal until he tried to use the internet, then data isn’t flowing properly. Maybe it’s no data or maybe it’s a crawl connection like you have.

If you did not receive that email, then your account was not activated and you should call them up to activate it. I assume in your hours of calls, they checked this, but you never know so that’s why I’m mentioning it. Just search in the header of your email’s inbox for “Your account is active.”

Also, the gateway comes with an ethernet cable, and I suggested you plug that into a port on the gateway, and the ethernet port on a computer, bypassing the wifi on the gateway, just to see if you get a fast connection on a speed test that way. If you do, that would mean your wifi is not working because you have a defective gateway. I understand that some people can’t try this because they don’t have a computer with an ethernet port and are using a notebook computer or tablet which doesn’t have this port.

The modem portion of the gateway -- it is a modem/router -- seems to be working fine, as I said before all the data from the various metrics is very good.

You mentioned your streaming TV buffering constantly. Of course it would if you’re getting only 1 to 3Mbps. Streaming HD smartTV requires at least 5Mbps minimum and 4K streaming smartTV requires 20Mbps minimum. As I mentioned before, it’s pointless to even add other smart devices to this  until you get your connection up and running on one device normally, on what for a person with your metrics should be speeds over 200Mbps.

Hmm, it’s a close call, but 13Mbps is a lot better than 3, isn’t it. It still stinks though, except for your upload, which is reasonable. Only because they told you that work had been done on your tower recently, and you’ve got your old connection to rely on for work at home and other things for another week or two, you could wait a few more days probably, to see if the download kicks in.

When you do exchange a gateway, they’ll mail it to you but they allow you to return the old one to a Tmobile store, if that’s more convenient. My gateway works fine, doesn’t overheat without a fan, so I’m just basing this on the many people who have tried exchanging their gateway.

Another way to test the gateway  is to take your gateway and computer (or phone, set to wifi) to another person’s house, maybe someone closer to a tower, or if you have a portable power supply, you can do it in the car. All you need to do is turn it on and it should work. It’s just like using a cell phone in another location.

T mobile has a warning that the gateway is to be used only at one location, but lots of people have tried it in other locations with no problems, just as experiments, and I don’t think they care when you’re using it for just a short period in another location. Hundreds of people have tried this and I haven’t heard of one person saying T mobile revoked their subscription. The point of this would be that if you can get blazing speeds when right near youraT mobile 5G tower, well then you’d know your gateway works great and it’s time to turn the whole business back to them and use another provider.

If you can take it near another T mobile tower and it works great there, but not right next to the T mobile tower nearest your house, then you know there’s still something not working with your tower, and that  your gateway is fine. It’d be something you can do on the weekend, nothing you have to rush out and do.

From what I’ve read, about 9 out of 10 people who exchange their gateway, suspecting something may be defective about it, there is nothing wrong with it. But for that one person where it is a defective gateway it can send their speed soaring.

I think that’s a good sign. Yeah, scratch the gateway exchange for a while. Having done work on the tower, they could be tuning the equipment at the tower, and will power up to full power soon.

All, I am thrilled to say I fixed this problem by adding a fan under the unit. I bought this one from Amazon, and it did the trick! No more slow downs! Consistent speed. It seems the lack of a fan causes overheating and slow speeds.

https://smile.amazon.com/dp/B07R659J8Z?psc=1&ref=ppx_yo2_dt_b_product_details

I have similar issues with unreliable T-Mobile home internet. When I’ve spoken to the folks at T-Mobile about it, I get contradictory answers: towers update in my area not causing internet problems; tower update in my area is causing internet problems; my area is good for T-Mobile Wi-Fi service; my area is not good for T-Mobile Wi-fi; internet traffic on tower not cause of issues; amount of traffic on tower affects internet, etc. This has been going on for the 2+ months that I’v had T-Mobile home internet. I finally called and told them that they had won whatever they were trying to win. I’ve called one of their competitors to try their service. The price is similar and I also get several TV channels included (not cable TV). I have lost all confidence in T-Mobile home internet and I highly recommend that you avoid T-Mobile at all costs (make sure you search for complaints, including BBB complaints about T-Mobile home internet before you decide).

Like I said, nothing but excuses.