Mobile broadband as backup

I’m currently afflicted with a pretty hopeless fibre broadband service. It’s prone to infrequent but prolonged outages (let’s say 24-48h outages every few weeks). Changing provider isn’t really an option*.

What would be the most affordable way of using mobile data as a backup? Ideally I’d want something that provided an Ethernet interface so I could use my existing mesh Wi-Fi. Id prefer something where I could load 50gb payg data as required, rather than a fixed monthly fee. I don’t need seamless failover (nice though it would be be, I’m willing to plug everything in manually).

Currently, when it breaks, I use my phone as a hotspot but that still leaves most of my network devices offline.


*unless I go for mobile data permanently?

How good (have you tested with a recent smartphone) are the various mobile networks where you are?

Saying that I’ve just recently put in a Three UK provided Zyxel N5103E which has a pair of 2.5GbE Ethernet ports on the back. Pretty respectable 4G and 5G performance most of the time. It’s my ‘backup for a backup’ internet connection (also handy for half term getaway to Devon when the landline broadband is poorly!)

There is a huge enthusiastic mobile broadband bunch of folks over at ISPreview forums who I’m sure would be very willing to help too.

Using a TP Link Archer MR600 AC1200, acquired second hand from eBay @£70, loaded with an unlimited EE sim for about a year now with it costing me £25 per month, as we were cheesed off with Virgin at £70+ a month;( and almost signed up with Talk Talk using a newly installed City Fibre network but rejected it thankfully to try out mobile broadband.
In our area we get solid 4G signal and are just outside of the 5G coverage area, but I don't mind because I'm not dependent on high speeds any more. It just does email, surfing and streaming 62.3 download & 12.4 upload speed this morning.
Ordinarily my mobile esim also with EE costing another £10 monthly shares various amounts of data for "free" usually 50 Gb or so with the router.
So far so good. I do not use the 4 port ethernet interfaces just wireless access for several devices.
It has also ventured around the country to the Lake District once, Devon twice, Cornwall three or four times and still provided our "home" network when travelling as its just rank convenient. I would have tried it in France with a 3 data sim but instead I left it in my mobile phone as it was more useful there. Ymmv

I run a security camera, two laptops, an iPad and when needed my Smart TV off the 4G option on this Three page. Have done since I got the camera, as that needs the router because my phone hotspot went out with me.

Completely unlimited data. A remote possibility that frequent over 1TB per month might be regarded as business use.

Note that the initial 6 months is at a discounted price, but the full price is clearly shown.

I have always secured "new customer" or better prices on both that and my phone at contract end with no real fuss. (As required by Ofcom). Also see my sig.

Three 5G here only just arrived and is very dodgy, but I don't need it. There are no other 5G providers available. It works fine on my phone where there is a proper signal.

Edited by pluralist (Sun 23-Oct-22 12:40:41)

Thanks all. I’m going to try the TP Link suggestion and a PAYG SIM in the first instance. The up front cost isn’t too and I can keep the SIM going with a couple of top ups a year. (As things stand, the failures are far more frequent than that but I’m really hoping this will improve.)

Good luck .

(By the way, if it doesn't go well in terms of cost, my Three router has an ethernet port so would drive your mesh system).

It depends on how good your technical knowledge is, but here is how I did it on the cheap.

I binned my Unifi EdgeRouter, and built my own router using OPNSense using a mini PC from China.

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005004641076475.html

WAN1 is my Virgin Hub in modem mode.
WAN2 is my Netgear MR5200 (I know I said cheap, so there are cheaper alternatived to this)

The MR5200 has an unlimited EE Sim in it which I got for a reasonable price as an extra to my main EE SIM.

I use gateway monitors to watch both Virgin and EE to determine their connectivity.

If Virgin drops out, it seamlessly moves over to the EE mobile data connection.
When Virgin comes back up, it moves all traffic back over to that. (Required a little bit of scripting in CRON to make this exactly how I wanted it)

When connected to EE (5G) I get about 350 Mbps down and about 40 Mbps up.

Thankfully though, my Virgin seems to be stable currently, but there was a time it wasnt!!!! Hence doing the above.

Just thought you might like a different opinion on how others have achieved what you are after.

I'm not after anything. Did you mean to reply to xela? Or perhaps xon?

(Remember this is a threaded forum system even if you read in Flat mode. You need to click the Reply button against the post you are replying to . Many users also have email alerts when they receive a reply. I received one for your post. If either of those two also rely to some extent on email alerts they won't have received one).