3G USB for You? For me?

[g11tch]

There are a ton of posts right now talking about different issues around the usage of mobile broadband USB dongles. So my question, does ANYONE have a 3G, 4g, or gsm USB dongle working well out of the box? If so, what model? What provider? Currently I am tethering using my pwnphone, but after about an hour, it'll disconnect and I'll have to reboot and start over, so could anyone provide us with an example of a working setup? Also, is anyone else using the pwnphone for tethering?

Thanks ahead of time!

[Paranoir]

Yea, I would like to know this as well.

I'm planning to buy a 3G or 4G dongle soon, so if anyone knows a specific brand/model that works, more or less, out of the box, then please share with us. :)

Edited March 17, 2014 by Paranoir

[Guest spazi]

I seem to remember that the Wifi Pineapple runs on a tweaked version of OpenWRT.
You should be able to lookup certain 3G dongles up on the OpenWRT wiki list of compatiable devices :)

Maybe Seb or Darren can shed some light on this matter.

PS: This is for OpenWRT, might work on wifi pineapple as well
http://wiki.openwrt.org/doc/recipes/3gdongle

Edited March 17, 2014 by spazi

[flynn23]

Here here! I'd like to have some more info on this as well. There's scant documentation, even for the Mark IV, on how to get this up and running. Links to "compatible modems" and "configuration guidelines" are broken. The Mark V is advertised as having support for this "out of box". Apparently that also means "out of luck".

I've been struggling with this for 2 months. Going through the mobile broadband parameters for a 4G LTE stick (LG VL600) on Verizon has been nothing but trial and error. This seems like it shouldn't be nearly this hard. I'd rather be using this time more productively on applying the Pineapple and extending its capabilities. Can we at least create some stickies with posts from users who've found some success? Even with the Mark IV?

[Darren Kitchen]

As of firmware 1.1.1 the supported modems include:

03f0:002a

0421:060c

0421:0610

0421:0622

0421:0627

0421:062c

0471:1210:uMa=Philips

0471:1210:uMa=Wisue

0471:1237

0482:024d

04bb:bccd

04e8:689a

04e8:f000:sMo=U209

057c:84ff

05c6:1000:sVe=GT

05c6:1000:sVe=Option

05c6:1000:uMa=AnyDATA

05c6:1000:uMa=DGT

05c6:1000:uMa=Option

05c6:1000:uMa=SAMSUNG

05c6:1000:uMa=SSE

05c6:1000:uMa=Vertex

05c6:2000

05c6:2001

05c6:6503

05c6:f000

05c7:1000

072f:100d

07d1:a800

07d1:a804

0930:0d46

0ace:2011

0ace:20ff

0af0:6711

0af0:6731

0af0:6751

0af0:6771

0af0:6791

0af0:6811

0af0:6911

0af0:6951

0af0:6971

0af0:7011

0af0:7031

0af0:7051

0af0:7071

0af0:7111

0af0:7211

0af0:7251

0af0:7271

0af0:7301

0af0:7311

0af0:7361

0af0:7381

0af0:7401

0af0:7501

0af0:7601

0af0:7701

0af0:7706

0af0:7801

0af0:7901

0af0:7a01

0af0:7a05

0af0:8200

0af0:8201

0af0:8300

0af0:8302

0af0:8304

0af0:8400

0af0:8600

0af0:8800

0af0:8900

0af0:9000

0af0:c031

0af0:c100

0af0:d001

0af0:d013

0af0:d031

0af0:d033

0af0:d035

0af0:d055

0af0:d057

0af0:d058

0af0:d155

0af0:d157

0af0:d255

0af0:d257

0af0:d357

0b3c:c700

0b3c:f000

0cf3:20ff

0d46:45a1

0d46:45a5

0df7:0800

0e8d:7109

0fce:d0cf

0fce:d0e1

0fce:d103

0fd1:1000

1004:1000

1004:607f

1004:613a

1004:613f

1004:614e

1004:6190

1004:61dd

1004:61e7

1004:61eb

1033:0035

106c:3b03

106c:3b05

106c:3b06

1076:7f40

1199:0fff

1266:1000

12d1:1001

12d1:1003

12d1:1009

12d1:101e

12d1:1030

12d1:1031

12d1:1414

12d1:1446

12d1:1449

12d1:14ad

12d1:14b5

12d1:14b7

12d1:14c1

12d1:14c4

12d1:14c5

12d1:14d1

12d1:14fe

12d1:1505

12d1:1520

12d1:1521

12d1:1523

12d1:1553

12d1:1557

12d1:1c0b

12d1:1d50

12d1:1da1

12d1:1f01

12d1:380b

1307:1169

1410:5010

1410:5020

1410:5030

1410:5031

1410:5041

1410:5059

148e:a000

148f:2578

16d8:6281

16d8:6803

16d8:6804

16d8:700a

16d8:700b

16d8:f000

198a:0003

198f:bccd

19d2:0003

19d2:0013

19d2:0026

19d2:0040

19d2:0053

19d2:0083

19d2:0101

19d2:0103

19d2:0110

19d2:0115

19d2:0146

19d2:0149

19d2:0166

19d2:0169

19d2:1001

19d2:1007

19d2:1009

19d2:1013

19d2:1171

19d2:1175

19d2:1179

19d2:1201

19d2:1216

19d2:1224

19d2:1517

19d2:1520

19d2:2000

19d2:bccd

19d2:ffde

19d2:ffe6

19d2:fff5

19d2:fff6

1a8d:1000

1a8d:2000

1ab7:5700

1b7d:0700

1bbb:f000

1bbb:f052

1c9e:1001

1c9e:6061

1c9e:9200

1c9e:9800

1c9e:9e00

1c9e:f000

1da5:f000

1dd6:1000

1de1:1101

1e0e:f000

1e89:f000

1edf:6003

1ee8:0009

1ee8:0013

1ee8:0040

1f28:0021

1fac:0032

1fac:0130

201e:1023

201e:2009

2020:f00e

21f5:1000

230d:0001

230d:0007

8888:6500

If you lsusb your modem and it's on that list -- it'll modeswitch for use as mobile broadband. /etc/The settings you use are dependent on your ISP.

/etc/hotplug.d/usb/20-modeswitch will modeswitch and dial your modem upon detection. /etc/pineapple/mobile-keepalive will maintain the connection.

I use a Novatel MC760 from Ting. It's VID & PID are 1410:5030. When modeswitched it becomes 1410:6000. For me the settings are:

interface name: ppp0

protocol: 3g

service: cdma

device: /dev/ttyUSB0

username: internet

password: internet

defaultroute: 1

ppp_redial: persist

peerdns: 0

dns: 8.8.8.8 (or you can use whatever)

keepalive: 1

pppd_options: noauth

We just switched the modem list over to the wiki and I'm going through my 3 or 4 known good modems to test and will update the page at http://wiki.wifipineapple.com/index.php/Compatible_Modems

A lot of the settings are common among the modems however there are usually ISP specific settings like APN and user/pass that will change.

[flynn23]

Thanks Darren. That gives me a lot of information that I've been unable to compile on my own. I'll post my details when I get a chance to dig into this more.

[flynn23]

Okay, had a chance to dink with this a bit.

My modem is not on the list you posted above. I've upgraded to 1.2.0 and applied the patch for the broadband support that just came out. Still no dice.

lsusb reports the device as Bus 001 Device 005: ID 1004:61aa LG Electronics, Inc. Still, I'm unable to invoke 20-modeswitch to see if that recognizes it and I don't see any other way to map that device to any /dev/tty. My dial config is pretty close to yours, but obviously set to support Verizon (what I can gather is needed to support Verizon's LTE on the LG stick).

I know this stick works great, because I use it on my MBP all the time. There are drivers for it available for Linux, so it shouldn't be that big of a deal. It's not an sd card reader or anything complex like that, so this should be pretty pnp, but I still can't get it to work. What direction can you point me in?

[petur]

Is there any info on what needs to be done to support additional devices?

I'd like to use my Nokia n900 in 'pc suite mode' (0421:01c8) - this works fine as USB modem out of the box on all linux ditributions I used so far, so my feeling is it should be possible.

I'm not an expert in this area but maybe with a few pointers I can figure it out?

[flynn23]

Alright, I've grown pretty frustrated at the lack of documentation and support for this feature. I've used several usb sticks and I cannot get anything to work. There's no documentation of what tools are available for troubleshooting or even configuration. The wiki link Darren points to above has NEVER been updated and there's no info there to start with. This is an advertised feature and one that I specifically bought the mk5 for, yet after **6 months** of cranking on it, I've yet to find a working configuration. C'mon guys!

My questions are simple:

1) what devices (brand and model) are supported plug n play? I don't want the hex addresses out of lsusb. That doesn't help me find a support device. Specifically I'm looking for 4G LTE devices on Verizon.

2) for devices that are not supported, what tools are available to add support? Surely there must be the ability to add drivers or just additional configurations just like any other device you'd add to a linux system. The lack of documentation for BusyBox is appalling.

Without some help here, I'm gonna have to abandon the pineapple altogether.

[cooper]

There's good info and there's bad info here.

Let's start with the bad: Unless someone else on this forum has managed to get one of those things working themselves, the best answer you're going to get is that it _should_ work for certain devices with, as you mention, specific vendor/product ID codes. You can look up what those codes are here but that site doesn't know about all devices out there so it's almost certainly incomplete. Provides a starting point though.

So let's move on to the slightly better news. In this thread instructions are provided to get the Pantech UML 290 4G LTE USB modem going with Verizon from Linux. Way at the bottom there's a complete list of instructions to follow to get up and running with the noted caveat that if there's 4g coverage in your area it ought to work right out of the box. That's about as close as you can get to having guarantees it will work: someone back in 2011 managed to do it so it ought to work for you. Ought to.

Can't make it any prettier than that.

Maybe Sebkinne or someone can answer this bit:

That Pantech device is 106c:3718 which gets modeshifted to 106c:3714 and the question is if this is supported by firmware 1.4.0?

Edited May 21, 2014 by Cooper

[Darren Kitchen]

Alright, I've grown pretty frustrated at the lack of documentation and support for this feature. I've used several usb sticks and I cannot get anything to work. There's no documentation of what tools are available for troubleshooting or even configuration. The wiki link Darren points to above has NEVER been updated and there's no info there to start with. This is an advertised feature and one that I specifically bought the mk5 for, yet after **6 months** of cranking on it, I've yet to find a working configuration. C'mon guys!

My questions are simple:

1) what devices (brand and model) are supported plug n play? I don't want the hex addresses out of lsusb. That doesn't help me find a support device. Specifically I'm looking for 4G LTE devices on Verizon.

2) for devices that are not supported, what tools are available to add support? Surely there must be the ability to add drivers or just additional configurations just like any other device you'd add to a linux system. The lack of documentation for BusyBox is appalling.

Without some help here, I'm gonna have to abandon the pineapple altogether.

You're right - our lack of documentation and support for this feature is appalling. Getting a USB Modem can feel like magic when you get one working, because so many don't and the ones that do require a lot of tweaking. This is a very difficult feature to tackle because there are so many variations from manufacturer to product to product version plus all of the carriers.

I have 4 or 5 that work great, and have more on the way. It's sort of the thing that once you find one that works you just stick to that.

I'll be picking up some more today and should have a video up tonight on the ones I have in my collection. It's my hope that we can put together a list of supported out-of-the-box modems from which you can select default configs from a drop-down in the mobile broadband menu. Doing to will require breaking the menu out into an updatable infusion and adding some way for others to share their known working configs. I'm all ears on a good method for this.

One of the issues is that carriers, at least here in the states, have for the most part dropped traditional usb modems. Mostly what you see now are "personal wifi hotspots" like the MiFi since consumers couldn't figure out how to install windows/mac connection software *facepalm*. Thankfully some of these support usb tethering, which is actually a better solution for us as we don't need to micromanage the connection.

There's good info and there's bad info here.

Let's start with the bad: Unless someone else on this forum has managed to get one of those things working themselves, the best answer you're going to get is that it _should_ work for certain devices with, as you mention, specific vendor/product ID codes. You can look up what those codes are here but that site doesn't know about all devices out there so it's almost certainly incomplete. Provides a starting point though.

So let's move on to the slightly better news. In this thread instructions are provided to get the Pantech UML 290 4G LTE USB modem going with Verizon from Linux. Way at the bottom there's a complete list of instructions to follow to get up and running with the noted caveat that if there's 4g coverage in your area it ought to work right out of the box. That's about as close as you can get to having guarantees it will work: someone back in 2011 managed to do it so it ought to work for you. Ought to.

Can't make it any prettier than that.

Maybe Sebkinne or someone can answer this bit:

That Pantech device is 106c:3718 which gets modeshifted to 106c:3714 and the question is if this is supported by firmware 1.4.0?

Per the USB Modeswitch device reference: http://www.draisberghof.de/usb_modeswitch/device_reference.txt

#######################################################
# Pantech UML290
#
# Contributor: Davis Ford

DefaultVendor= 0x106c
DefaultProduct=0x3b11

TargetVendor=  0x106c
TargetProduct= 0x3718

MessageContent="5553424312345678000000000000061b000000020000000000000000000000"

So yes, it should be supported. That said you'll need to know the carrier specific configuration options. I can only guess at those as I don't have Verizon service nor this dongle.

I'm going by T-Mobile today to buy their latest dongle for *hopefully* approved and fully supported status. I'll see if I can't do the same with Verizon.

D

[flynn23]

whatever became of this effort? I noticed you did a video around this same time (suggestion: it would've been great had you included a link to that in this thread. I just happened upon it a few days ago) and came to the conclusion that the mobile hotspots were the way to go when set to tethering mode. I can see the appeal, although it's kind of dumb to have the Pineapple supply power to the hotspot, since they all have built in batteries. In any case, the wiki page you splash in the video looked all nice and updated, but I can't find it on the current wiki. Has the 2.x firmware improved on this feature set any? I know I keep harping on this, but the Pineapple just sits and collects dust for me without being able to deploy mobile connectivity.

Edited December 28, 2014 by flynn23

[Darren Kitchen]

Nearly every modern modem I've tested since visiting this last supports cdc_ether or RNDIS. There are still some funky ones out there, but it's becoming more rare when it comes to carrier sold modems. We're in the same boat as every other openwrt (or Linux for that matter) project. My advise, get one that supports tethering. Sure the serial based ones on the supported list work - but why do the heavy lifting of managing a complex mobile broadband connection on the pineapple side when the newer modems manage themselves. My favorite right now is the Huawei E355. It enumerates at eth1 and "just works ™"

[Smart-Aswood]

I have a Nov 5510L with Verizon that works solid as a rock tethered. Right out of the box? No, and not with the MK5 web setup. Darren posted some CL stuff awhile back - simple stuff - that makes it work hotplugged. One thing I can tell you is that it's worth the trouble. It's solid, stable, and awakens an Easter egg of sorts with regard to the Verizon 5510L. Here's what that is:

I get consistently and significantly faster speeds as a MK5 wireless client than I get using the hotspot direct-wireless. I think that has to do with the 5510L bypassing a lot of internal buggy wireless hotspot crap when tethered. Suppose I could tether it to my laptop and compare speeds, but what fun is that?

It does provide clients connected to the MK5 seamless and stable internet. So much so that I have to portion its use or the clients will use up my 10 monthly gig quickly if I screw up and leave the MK5 tethered and on for a couple of days.

Had people doing Windows updates on my dime. I don't blame them. My MK5 was a lot faster than the hotel Wifi.

[Smart-Aswood]

The 5510L is called the "Jetpack" in Verizon marketing-speak. Lives up to that name when tethered to the MK5. Even with a full host of PineAP running, the MK5 is twice as fast as the 5510L's internal hotspot AP.

[cheeto]

Hey guys, I have an Samsung S4 that I'd like to tether via USB (rather than wifi teather)

Has anyone tried this before? Is it possible?

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Cheers

[sud0nick]

Hey guys, I have an Samsung S4 that I'd like to tether via USB (rather than wifi teather)

Has anyone tried this before? Is it possible?

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Cheers

I have a GS4 as well and I've tried multiple times to no avail. I even posted a question about it awhile back with zero response so if you get it working please let me know. I may take another shot at it again soon.

[cheeto]

Yeahh I plugged my S4 into my Mkv and at first my phone started freaking out.

Afterwards all was ok. No internet connection though. :(

A great alternative to USB tethering would be allowing the mkv to connect to a hidden AP.

I had my Samsung S4 tethering in hidden mode but the mkv can't seem to see it. :(

[sud0nick]

I thought about using the hotspot service on my phone but Sprint wanted to charge me an additional $21/mo for data I already pay for. I guess I could always root my phone, maybe that would work, but I should still be able to tether it.

[cheeto]

hmm, I rooted my S4 a while back. Do you think that might help me tether? Android 4.4 has the option to tether via wifi/bluetooth/USB.

Today i was looking around Amazon for a Hotspot device. I think you could buy unlocked ones, can't you?

Cheers!

[cheeto]

I got it to work on my Samsung S4!!!

THIS IS AWESOME!!!!

[sud0nick]

hmm, I rooted my S4 a while back. Do you think that might help me tether? Android 4.4 has the option to tether via wifi/bluetooth/USB.

Today i was looking around Amazon for a Hotspot device. I think you could buy unlocked ones, can't you?

Cheers!

I only mentioned rooting because I've read I can use my phone as a hotspot without paying the additional fee to Sprint if my phone is rooted.

[cheeto]

Guys, I just bought and installed a Huawei E173.

I bought this one because it was one of the few available in the country that im residing in and above all, it was in the Pineapple Wiki recommended modems.

It works GREAT!! Very easy to install.

My only doubt is, how do i disconnect my 3G connection?

Thanks!!!

[chreestopher]

I just wanted to add to this post , I have a tmobile ZTE mf96 (also refered to as Sonic 2.0) , when I plug it into my pineapple, it shows up as eth1, and just needs me to udhcpc -i eth1 in order to work. However, sometimes the device requires me to login to its management page and click connect in order for it to get internet access. But I would definitely consider this as working "out of the box" and you guys should add it to the wiki as a known out of box working via usb tethering.