Modem issues on CF-19

Hi all.

After purchasing a secondhand TB with Vista business installed the only issues I had were with the three buttons on the front of the TB, these did not work and the modem whilst recognising my SIM the speed was very very slow, in fact 70 odd kbps slow with a GPRS connection? The same SIM in the supplied dongle (Telefonica Spain) gets 3.5G and 3.6 Mbps and is fine for where I live (mountain areas).

You can read the looooong purchase and mod history story here:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/panasonic/622087-got-one.html

Therer was a modem already installed that was for the American market, I installed a modem designed for the EU and this made no difference. The dongle when plugged into the USB gave the usual 3.5 G along with 3.6 Mbps.

So two different modems, the small DIP switches have been tried in all possible postions again to no avail.

I have now installed Win 7 and whilst this did increase the speed (200 kbps) it is still woefully slow. Whilst I am still having issues with the WIN 7 install I would also like to run this thread separately in an effort to get assistance.

FWIW the dongle will NOT work with WIN 7 so I am contacting Telefonica tomorrow to try and get a more up to date dongle.

My ultimate aim is to have a GPS unit and internet access all 'built in' as such.

I do not want a GPS unit hanging outside of the TB perimeter and will consider buying a modem WITH GPS capability, if I can get it too work I would be a very happy bunny.

Many thanks in advance

Tranquillo

 

I have some helpful insight on this below:

1) GPRS runs around 220kbps = 19kbps downloading stuff off the internet
2) a 3.6mbps HSPA card will cap out downloading stuff around 200 - 250, so that is normal man!
3) a 7.2mbps hspa card (which is what I have on ATT) can download stuff up to about 650kbps!

With that being said, if you have an EU860 card, you can update the firmware on it to get 7.2M HSPA, which would essentialy DOUBLE your speed. This firmware is available from my server here: Index of ./860U Firmware Update to 7.2M/

Also note that not all cell providers are equal. If the cell provider can't support 7.2M then it won't even connect at that speed even if you have the card to do it!

Hope this helps.

Good luck!

 

probably the antenna inside the toughbook is not tuned on the frequencies of ur provider. They are different in the US and Europe. So if the signal is too bad, because of the mistuned antenna, the card is falling back from Hsdpa to umts to edge to gprs to no signal
Which card was in the laptop before and which one are u using now?
Who is ur provider?

 

Which card was in the laptop before?....Novatel EU860D.

and which one are u using now?....Novatel EU870D.

Who is ur provider?....Telefonica Movistar....900/1800/(3G) 2100Mhz

What ya' think?

o.g.

 

So u had chosen the correct card. The US uses a different frequency than other countries. Also if u have a look inside the wings, u will see, on the antenna is a text: US WWAN .....
I would buy two WWAN-antennas (maybe from an other laptop, mobile phone or from ur stick) and soldering this instead of the US-optimized standard antennas into the wings of the display.
My DIP-setting is OFF ON ON OFF.

 

Think I remember doubt being expressed on the forum as to whether GPS on (some?) WWAN cards works without a signal from the provider.
Was it you who wrote that you wanted to have the option of using it to "walk out" of, presumably, a remote desert region in the event of a vehicle breakdown?
If I'm right on both counts (and that would be rare these days) the least you'll want is to know your GPS doesn't rely on your cell service provider.
Having vehicle diagnostics, movies, broadband, GPS etc. all built in to one device running W7 will certainly increase its resale value so it's worth attempting if only for that reason.
In preparing for the extremely unlikely event that I might decide to walk out instead of staying with the vehicle... I think I'd choose a mobile phone usable with the local service, a wristwatch GPS, a compass and a map instead of a CF-19.
Together they weigh a lot less than the 19 so I could carry more water.
Each is still useful if the other three are lost or broken.
Not as useful as a satellite phone and air conditioning though

ps. are you certain you have the correct APN for the HSDPA service?

 

That is a VERY astute suggestion there, dude. And since you were so smart, I'm gonna suggest the stupid... well, ok, ignorant... well, ok, incredibly obvious thing...

Trace out the entire length of your WWAN antennas; look for nicks and evidence of places that are or were at one time kinked sharply. The reason for looking for nicks is obvious; but kinked spots, even once straightened out, can cause unseen damage to the inner insulator which acts like a short at these freaky high frequencies. Unless you've got a 3 Gigahertz sweep analyzer on your bench, you'll never be able to say for sure that's not your problem.

Also, make sure you have the WWAN connectors plugged into the correct places on the sub-boards in the tray and in the bottom of the laptop; you never know what some OTHER fingers have done before you got this unit.

As an alternate means of testing, since the WWAN cable routing on these requires some pretty extensive disassembly, you could buy a set of EU-Tuned WWAN antennas on fleaBay and connect them directly to your WWAN card just long enough to troubleshoot. If the cable wants to pinch routing out past the tray and slot, use a toothpick or two beside the cable to make clearance and protect the cable.

If this has all already been suggested, feel free to whack me on the snout with a rolled up newspaper and send me back to my cave.

mnem
*Pointing out the incredibly obvious since Nineteen-mumblety-mumble*

 

Yeah....quit watching "Coronation Street"....& start watching "Bear Grylls".

Bear Grylls - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

o.g.

 

OK, sorry for any delay in replying guys and thanks so much for the ideas, at least it will send me down another route. Also of note is the dongle from Moviestar will not work with WIN 7 so that needs to be changed but that is not really an issue, I will get around to that sometime this week.

Thanks o.g. for filling in the blanks on modem/provider ect.

Thanks all

Tranquillo

 

Thanks for that Rob, as you may have guessed the BIOS password has thrown a spanner in the works at the moment so I will follow up when this 'bit' is sorted.

Tranquillo