Spitz doesnt like connecting SA

Technical Support for Routers 4G LTE, 5G NR, USB modems
1

Using metro tablet line (tmobile) and can get on the internet with some manual intervention most of the time. Once i get it to connect it will stay connected with no problems till reboot, then no dice, sim not registered. No problems with lte and nsa as long as i have a ttl 64. Seen some talk about no connections and I wasnt quite sure that it was fixed solution. Thanks if you got any info

Screenshot_20240530_164951_Chrome
Screenshot_20240530_164951_Chrome1080Ă—2340 143 KB

Modem version

RM520NGLAAR03A02M4GA
+QNWPREFCFG: "mode_pref",LTE:NR5G

+QMBNCFG: "List",0,1,1,"Commercial-TMO",0xA01050F,202303091 +QMBNCFG: "List",1,0,0,"VoLTE-ATT",0xA010335,202206171 +QMBNCFG: "List",2,0,0,"TEF_Spain_Commercial",0xA010C00,202302071 +QMBNCFG: "List",3,0,0,"FirstNet",0xA015300,202206171 +QMBNCFG: "List",4,0,0,"Rogers_Canada",0xA014800,202303141 +QMBNCFG: "List",5,0,0,"Bell_Canada",0xA014700,202111051 +QMBNCFG: "List",6,0,0,"Telus_Jasper_Canada",0xA01F900,202304281 +QMBNCFG: "List",7,0,0,"Telus_Consumer_Canada",0xA01FA00,202304281 +QMBNCFG: "List",8,0,0,"Commercial-Sprint",0xA010204,202111051 +QMBNCFG: "List",9,0,0,"CDMAless_Private-Verizon",0xA01FD28,202304271 +QMBNCFG: "List",10,0,0,"CDMAless-Verizon",0xA010126,202304251 +QMBNCFG: "List",11,0,0,"Swiss-Comm",0xA010411,202304261 +QMBNCFG: "List",12,0,0,"Telia_Sweden",0xA012400,202111051 +QMBNCFG: "List",13,0,0,"TIM_Italy_Commercial",0xA012B00,202111051 +QMBNCFG: "List",14,0,0,"France-Commercial-Orange",0xA010B21,202111051 +QMBNCFG: "List",15,0,0,"Commercial-DT-VOLTE",0xA011F1F,202212061 +QMBNCFG: "List",16,0,0,"Germany-VoLTE-Vodafone",0xA010449,202111051 +QMBNCFG: "List",17,0,0,"UK-VoLTE-Vodafone",0xA010426,202111051 +QMBNCFG: "List",18,0,0,"Commercial-EE",0xA01220B,202111051 +QMBNCFG: "List",19,0,0,"Optus_Australia_Commercial",0xA014400,202111051 +QMBNCFG: "List",20,0,0,"Telstra_Australia_Commercial",0xA010F00,202308291 +QMBNCFG: "List",21,0,0,"Commercial-LGU",0xA012608,202111051 +QMBNCFG: "List",22,0,0,"Commercial-KT",0xA01280B,202308031 +QMBNCFG: "List",23,0,0,"Commercial-SKT",0xA01270A,202111051 +QMBNCFG: "List",24,0,0,"Commercial-Reliance",0xA011B0C,202210211 +QMBNCFG: "List",25,0,0,"Commercial-SBM",0xA011C0B,202111051 +QMBNCFG: "List",26,0,0,"Commercial-KDDI",0xA010709,202306131 +QMBNCFG: "List",27,0,0,"Commercial-DCM",0xA010D0D,202301051 +QMBNCFG: "List",28,0,0,"VoLTE-CU",0xA011561,202204211 +QMBNCFG: "List",29,0,0,"VoLTE_OPNMKT_CT",0xA0113E0,202306071 +QMBNCFG: "List",30,0,0,"Volte_OpenMkt-Commercial-CMCC",0xA012010,202209221 +QMBNCFG: "List",31,0,0,"ROW_Commercial",0xA010809,202306011 OK

2

The 5G SA band seems to depend on your sim card

3

Its not like it wont connect at all to SA. The sim card is less than 3 months old. It does connect, sometimes. Never on a reboot will it connect. I have to go through all the different options bands and get it to connect on nsa. Then switch it to SA and NSA a few times and finally it will work.

Screenshot_20240530_164428_Chrome
Screenshot_20240530_164428_Chrome1080Ă—2340 140 KB

4

cover up your phone number

ROW_Commercial

Let's switch MBN to this and let's see

5

Whats the steps for that

6

try this

7

The 5G SA band can sometimes be connected, but restarts are definitely not registered?

8

Correct. And really im only trying to connect sa 41 just cause i know it works and most of the time NSA try 41

9

hello
Technical Support via GoodCloud.tar (192 KB)

Can you share your device with GoodCloud? quectel has a recent beta firmware that seems to fix this issue, can I upgrade it to test it on your device?

10

Yes i have it connected to goodcloud.

11

This is very similar to the behavior I've seen with a Metro line as well. LTE always works, NSA NEVER works, SA will sometimes work ipv6 only. I can dual stack LTE no problem, but 5G is where things break down. I've tried a few quectel firmware's so I'd be interested if you can share the version at-least so I can see if I have it in my list that I have access to flash.

I seemed to make a little more progress today tweaking manually with AT commands and manual openwrt config, but the gl.inet scripts/tools seem to stomp that from time to time. I'd much prefer if I can get it working without deviating from a mostly "vanilla" install with minimal modification (for upgradability/long term living with reasons). IF there was main release openwrt support for these things I'd probably switch the modem into MBIM mode and run vanilla openwrt w/modemmanager since I do run wifi disabled on my X3000's - They feed into a peplink. That said I love that you guys make these things - The dollar value of the hardware mixed with how polished they are considering the diversity of mobile carrier configurations is great. My other unit running on ATT is rock solid with 5G NSA consistently and reliably even running fq_codel to knock down some buffer bloat upstream from my peplink.

12

Check out this website,quectel updates the firmware and I will update it in real time
https://fw.gl-inet.com/download/RM520GL-modem_firmware/RM520NGLAAR03A03M4G_BETA_20240521C_01.200.01.200.zip
you can try this

1 Like
13

I'll flash that to my unit with the Metro by T-Mo sim in it later today to see if that improves the 5g situation. Testing the sim back in the donor Samsung 5G phone it does connect to NSA and SA so I know the sim will allow it.

14

I got mine working with this modem firmware -

image
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After flashing that version on the modem and doing a fresh upgrade over itself with 4.4.9 I did still need to install the 464xlat package along with a few additional modem/usb packages that I cannot remember off the top of my head (they honestly probably aren't needed so next upgrade I'll see if I can avoid installing anything). IPv6 in passthrough mode with nothing configured from luci or manual AT commands outside of changing to ROW_Commercial. I consider this a win!

If I notice stability issues I'll do more playing with the Beta firmware, but this configuration seeming works ideally at the moment with no band locking. As we travel I'll also keep an eye on it, but we're not slated to take any trips in the near future so it's just providing connectivity at our rural property.

15

Does this firmware not work?

16

It did not, but neither did the current firmware version on it until I re-installed 4.4.9 on it. I can reflash to the BETA firmware later today to see if 5G is still functional - I just didn't have a ton of time as I also needed to build an 802.11s mesh with the collection of Flint2's I have for another project.

17

I was initially very unhappy that I had attempted the new firmware as my unit would no longer connect to any bands on any modem firmware after that. What I discovered that seemly worked - Flash BETA Firmware to the RM520, Use AT commands to get it on the Commercial-TMO MBN and set the APN, Reinstall 4.4.9 release onto the X3000, set APN to Metro APN/TTL/HL/MTU/etc, reboot again, 5G is now working dual stack with no extra packages.

I've noticed for whatever reason the reinstall of 4.4.9 is a hard requirement to get the module to come up after a firmware flash - why I have no clue, I've never seen this before with OpenWRT and Sierra wireless modules, but eh I have working 5GSA and NSA now so I'm happy.

1 Like
18

I spoke too soon. The module seems to crash after a while (looks to hang and no longer expose itself to the system) and requires a reboot after-which 5G is broken until I re-flash both the RM520 and the X3000. I'm going to re-lock it down to LTE only again as I don't have the time to keep fiddling with the thing.

Honestly this is why in linux hosts I always switch to MBIM and let modem manager manage the modem - Especially with T-Mo and their CLAT. I usually find that leads to more reliable connectivity on T-Mo.

EDIT*

Playing with the beta firmware is bringing me back to my notes on why I never would buy Quectel modems - These things still have nasty bugs with the profile for T-Mo. They seem to have fixed it for LTE, but 5G is still messy. The BETA firmware seems to have cleaned up 5G SA enough to be semi reliable, however, 5G NSA is hopeless broken. What I noticed is that 5G NSA requires a generic profile to engage, but latency is downright horrible when CLAT want's to work. 5G SA requires bouncing from the 3GPP profile to the T-Mo Commercial one to kick it in the teeth and get it to do CLAT right with bandlocking the modem to SA. Basically if it comes up and IPv4 is anything other than 192.x.x.x - You're gonna have a bad time. You have to flip it from the generic profile to the T-Mo commercial profile until it lights up doing CLAT correctly - seeing the 192.x.x.x IP. Once there don't touch anything at all!. No AT commands, gui checking stuff, just let it sit - It's fickle once it comes up, you really don't wanna poke it. Once you reboot, loose connection, etc - Even with the BETA firmware, it takes doing the profile dance to bring it back about 50% of the time it would seem.

19

hello
I am sorry for the trouble caused by the firmware of this module
From the phenomena described, the TMO commercial configuration seems to be more suitable for you, but it is not stable
Can you share your device to goodcloud if it's convenient for you?
I'll check it remotely
thank you

20

Unfortunately due to the nature of some of the traffic riding over it for my work I cannot without isolating that X3000 from the rest of the network. That being said it does look like there is a positive aspect to the BETA firmware - If you don't poke it it does stay connected to 5G SA with the band lock in place. This is the longest I've had stable connectivity on 5G SA so it's very much a step in the right direction on Quectel's part. That said on NSA it's now broken (I'll take the trade off for now).

IMO I think the biggest problem is the nature of how T-Mo works their IPv4/IPv6/CLAT by APN (including the NVMOs). AFAIK working from memory you have a few configurations that are possible so perhaps if you exposed more APN control in the GL.Inet Openwrt build/interface/tools/scripts we could better control the behavior of the modem through setting the APN appropriately.

LTE - IPv4 Native, IPv6 Native, CLAT Optional - On T-Mo LTE AFAIK ALL APN's will allow for Native IPv4, Native IPv6, and Optional CLAT.
5G NSA - IPv4 Native (ONLY SOME APN's - From memory TMHI and Business APNs only), IPv6 Native (All APN's), CLAT (Optional on some APN's, Only option on other APNs like Metro AFAIK)
5G SA - IPv4 Native (NO APN's), IPv6 Native (Required), CLAT (Only way to get IPv4 on all APN's AFAIK)

In order to roam between LTE, NSA, and SA - Monitoring how a Galaxy 15 does it on Metro and Consumer T-Mo - It's always running IPv6 w/CLAT. It never pulls a native IPv4 address from LTE. What I notice on the RM520 in this X3000 is the following -
LTE - NEVER uses CLAT, Pulls a traditional IPv4 address
NSA - If LTE Pulled a traditional IPv4 address, it's going to fail connectivity, if SA came up 1st and it retains the CLAT configuration then it will work.
SA - Has to come up SA only on the BETA firmware to have a chance of engaging CLAT correctly - This is where bouncing between the 3gpp profile and the Tmo-Commercial profile "kicks something over in the modem" to get CLAT working.

If I look at what the GL.Inet config tools are putting into the modem they're setting the APN's to IPv4V6 - If we had a toggle so that it was dumping the APN contexts in as IPv6 only it should force the modem to always do CLAT like the phone seemingly does for consistent connectivity across bands with a consumer APN.

CGDCONT's as set by the GL.Inet interface on my X3000 -

+CGDCONT: 1,"IPV4V6","fast.metrobyt-mobile.com","0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0",0,0,0,0,,,,,,,,,"",,,,0

+CGDCONT: 2,"IPV4V6","ims","0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0",0,0,0,0,,,,,,,,,"",,,,1

+CGDCONT: 3,"IPV4V6","sos","0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0",0,0,0,1,,,,,,,,,"",,,,1

+CGDCONT: 4,"IPV4V6","tmus","0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0",0,0,0,0,,,,,,,,,"",,,,0

+CGDCONT: 5,"IPV4V6","h2g2","0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0",0,0,0,0,,,,,,,,,"",,,,0

+CGDCONT: 6,"IPV4V6","pcweb.tmobile.com","0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0",0,0,0,0,,,,,,,,,"",,,,0