Wireless / Mobile > Verizon Wireless > [Equipment] Verizon 4G LTE for gaming in my area.

[Equipment] Verizon 4G LTE for gaming in my area.

1. The Verizon coverage maps are very good. They are not perfect. They are based on both actual testing and engineering estimates. I know of one area where the estimates, for any type of Verizon Wireless service, were off by 0.5 mile. There was a dead zone whose radius needed to be increased from 1 mile to 1.5 miles. After months of input from dropped calls they finally changed the map. If you are in the center of a large LTE area, you are probably at 99% confidence of getting LTE. If you are at the edge of a large LTE area, you are probably at 1% confidence of getting LTE. The LTE network is not completed and has suffered outages. It is a work in development.

Put in your exact address into the Verizon coverage map service and see where you are within the LTE service area. Make sure to check the LTE coverage box and then click the refresh map button. You must be in the regular LTE service area. I do not know what the LTE extended coverage area is, but I bet it means more money out of your pocket.

I put in Frankfort, IL and got the intersection of West Nebraska Street and South Locust street. 3G EVDO territory. You are on the boundary of LTE at the intersection of Route 45 and West Nebraska.

2. Efficient? In terms of what? Electricity? Time? Money? Radio frequency spectrum usage?

3. Gaming. I do not do gaming. The people I know who have EVDO RevA 3G Verizon service and do gaming say it is better than nothing, but varies too much to be enjoyable consistently. I suspect that LTE will be the same. Maybe in the future when LTE is fully mature it will be an enjoyable experience consistently.

4. Yes, if the content you are transferring (upload and download combined) is 10GB, you will go over. This is because of resent data packets, which are normal on the internet. You also have address bytes which direct where packets go. Then there are firmware updates. The good thing is that the overage charges have gone from $50/GB under 3G EVDO to $10/GB for LTE. There is a danger in that, it seems to me from reading the LTE terms of service, you can be charged at the $50/GB rate if you have overages that are logged on the old 3G EVDO network or 1XRT network. You really want everything to be on the LTE network.

5. The Pantech 4G LTE USB Modem UML290 gets the best reviews for just a modem and has an external antenna port. The Verizon Jetpack™ 4G LTE Mobile Hotspot MiFi® 4510L has an external antenna jack and is a mobile hotspot. You are restricted to 5 WiFi clients.

External antennas can range from small $40 magnetic mount ones to $400 large direction roof mounted ones. I use several for EVDO Verizon service. I have small magnetic mount, large parabolic grid, external truck mirror mount, small desktop sector, and flat window mount. There are fewer available designs for LTE, but more are being developed. Here is one website's list of LTE antennas »3gstore.com/antenna_frequency/7m···nas.html.

Now for my totally biased opinion. Go visit Millenicom at »www.millenicom.com/page/plans#advanced_plan. You get 20GB of 3G Verizon service for $60/month. Ignore any of the other plans. Too many headaches. Get a Cradlepoint MBR95 wireless router »3gstore.com/product/3029_cradlep···r95.html or »www.cradlepoint.com/products/sma···g-router. Wait a couple of years for Verizon to fix the problems with LTE coverage and operations. Then see what is available.

On my coverage map I am covered by the standard LTE coverage and like .2 miles SW it turns into extended coverage.

By efficiency I mean how fast is the speed once connected and does it fluctuate often and drop.

Even if it was for strictly online gaming I would run over? But I've read that it shouldn't be an issue if its for gaming online and that is all its used for. Even Verizon told me that I would be fine.

Now is 3G viable for online gaming because I have seen people playing console games online and running almost flawlessly.

If its okay for console, why not PC because based on your above logic of the receiving and sending of data packets I would encounter an issue (in terms of overage) and that you get dropped and that it is too inconsistent.

I will definitely look into Millenicom if I find that 3G is viable for gaming.

I'm really only doing this to make sure that my internet is stable and fast enough for SWTOR, that is my MAIN concern. So basically if 3G will work with an MMORPG or SWTOR specifically (been having a hard time finding this info).

I am really trying to cover all bases because I am sick of Hughes Network. What probably going to happen first before we even get on a contract for a usb modem is were going to run a hardline from our Hughes network modem into my desktop and see if that eliminates some ping to make it viable (I doubt it).

reply to afh1121
Compared to Hughes Network you will be enthralled with the 3G EVDO OR 4G LTE network performance. Ping times are much lower because you are not trying to communicate with a satellite 22,236 miles away. I was basing going over monthly GB allowances on gamers who have to download lots of games or updates. The speeds will vary for both 3G EVDO or 4G LTE. It is a cellular/mobile shared resource. When I download files, the speeds for 3G can fluctuate from 0.02 Mbps to 2.0 Mbps. I imagine the speeds for LTE might vary from 0.1 Mbps to 10.0 Mbps. It depends how crowded a particular tower is and what the crowd is using it for. As more people use Verizon LTE devices, the severe crowding will get more frequent.

You could use Verizon's trial period to see if you like the LTE service. But you have only 3 days of trial without the activation fee being charged, You still pay for data and any applications bought. After 3 days but before 14 days you pay the activation fee. Subtract 1 to 2 days to allow for Verizon's notorious screwups and you are down to 1-2 days of no activation fee and 12-13 days of no ETF fee. Make sure you know the exact time of activation in the store and make sure you get back well before that time. I would show up 24-48 hours early and then add in a couple hours time for waiting on a customer service agent to process your request. You do not want to pay fees for a service that is not going to work for you.

If it was me, I would not use the LTE because you are too close to that LTE Extended Service Area. The Verizon maps for LTE may not be that accurate at the boundary and the operational LTE area may have to be changed to reflect real world usage. The Extended coverage areas revert to 3G EVDO service at times. I also would like the known quality and reliability of the Novatel 760 USB 3G EVDO modem.

Whatever cellular/mobile service you choose, Verizon or Millenicom Advanced, you will be way happier than with dialup or satellite. I have helped several people get off of satellite or dialup with these companies and they all said it has gone well. But each one took some planning and proper equipment purchases. You might want to look at EVDO Tips and Tweaks at »evdotips.blogspot.com/ for more information.

I usually get around 90-120 ms ping. Perfectly good for online gaming.

Is that 3G EVDO REV A or 4G LTE? Or both?

reply to davidhoffman

reply to Metatron2008
3G or 4G LTE? Do you have issues with data overage?

reply to afh1121

reply to afh1121
If the VZW maps are showing you in regular LTE coverage with extended coverage being available just down the road, you stand a very good chance of getting a decent 4g signal. I am about 1 mile OUT of the extended coverage zone, but using an antenna I still manage to pull in 1-2 bars of 4g.

Now as to your questions, and this is coming from my personal experience only
1. See statement above

2. Efficient as in what? Not sure what your meaning there

3. The speed is more then enough for online gaming at 4g, with 3gEVDO(assuming your not on a completely crowded tower) has more then enough speed for any online game, but I'm assuming you mean the latency. My latency varies game to game but I've yet to find a game that I have trouble playing. In World of Warcraft my latency is around 90-150ms, in League of Legends my ping usually is 95-105ms and in Battlefield I hover in the 80-98ms area all of which is certainly playable.

4. If your only online gaming, I highly doubt you would go over your plan, especially with 10gig plan, the biggest concern there would be the updates for the games. With WoW, the major updates can be a couple of gigs.

5. As far the modem, I only have experience with two of them, the LG VL600 and the Pantech UML290 and I personally prefer the Pantech. I've never had any problems with it and it has performed flawlessly for me.
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Finally, LTE! From 300Kbps to 10Mbps...Like day and night
Desktop Computer: Alienware Area-51 ALX
Laptop: Acer 5570Z
Netbook: Acer Aspire One AO532H

How would I find out if my tower is crowded?

Efficiency as in dropping and any inconsistencies. Like how viable it is.

reply to hitachi369
How can I track my data usage?

reply to afh1121
You can tell your on a crowded tower by severely slow 3g speeds. So far I'm unaware of any crowding issues with 4g, all the speeds I've seen have been at least 5+mbps.

My connection is rock solid, besides the few outages my connection is always up. I use a 4g router and I stay at 99% uptime. Weather has yet to affect it in any way.

You can check your data usage in two simple ways, if you connect using vzw access manager everytime you connect it will show an estimate of data usage, or you can simply sign in to My Verizon(www.vzw.com) and check usage there. They will also email you alerts when you have used 50% of your allowance, 75%, and 90% and then of course when/if you exceed
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Finally, LTE! From 300Kbps to 10Mbps...Like day and night
Desktop Computer: Alienware Area-51 ALX
Laptop: Acer 5570Z
Netbook: Acer Aspire One AO532H

reply to afh1121
I'd check out Clearwire & Sprint too, they both appear to have coverage in your area.

reply to afh1121
pick up a 4g LTE booster/repeater... your connection will be as consistent as possible.

I'm using a custom rom'd galaxy nexus on verizon ... and it does fine playing bf3 online.

A guy a few floors down from me has one of those 4g booster things (about 350 dollars installed) and he consistently gets 20mbit/20mbit speeds just using his phone as wifi hotspot with the razr. He pings at 80ish ms. Not perfect for online gaming ..but certainly better than hughesnet or 3g or clear.

reply to afh1121
Cradlepoint MBR95 WiFi capable router at »www.cradlepoint.com/products/sma···g-router has modem data transfer usage monitoring function. Also see »3gstore.com/product/3029_cradlep···r95.html

reply to afh1121
For a better signal try using a antenna. This post might help.

»LTE with Antenna Results

reply to StLCardsFan
How often do you play BF3, whats your data plan? What are you racking up in terms of data per month? You ever go over?

Or do you have grandfathered contract?

i have a grandfathered data plan. I've never really checked how much data I use. I guess that could be an issue given the updates for most PS3/XBox 360 games are generally 1gig or better.

Basic figures for you to go on...

Netflix HD streams .. about 1gb/hour (this isn't exact, but its easy to figure)

online gaming ... I don't really know but it certainly isn't 1gb/hour.

I don't know what kind of compute use you have ... but its generally next to nothing if you aren't torrenting or downloading huge attachments ...or uploading huge files to a cloud.

some other figures:

matroska encoded blurays are generally 4.37gb (scene 720p) or about double that for the 1080p versions ...

a standard 1:1 bluray rip is anywhere from 25gb all the way to 50gb ..and even more if all layers are used on the disc.

most mp3 albums are somewhere around 100mb @ 320kb depending on the length and number of songs obviously.

FLAC albums - 1:1 lossless can be quite large 700mb and greater

hope some of these data figures helps you decide how much you typically use..or at least maybe a ballpark figure on what you need.

I'm running a custom PC build,
Z68 motherboard with Intel 2nd gen i5
Nvida GTX 560 2GB of Memory
8GB RAM

Would it possible for you to check how much data your using when playing online? Like say a days worth of gaming.

I generally game on the weekends and occasionally on weekdays, on weekends I can do like 10-14 hours straight depending on the day, and on weekdays during the school year, when I am not in any extracurricular activities, I do maybe 2-4.