Network to provide cellphone internet to household

[Pulsar]

4G is the only available high-speed internet in my area, so I'm looking at purchasing a data-plan to allow a cell phone to deliver internet to my house.

I have a Netgear WNDR3700 router with 3 NAS's and a printer wired to it. The router in turn is wired to a modem and antenna - we get our current internet through WIFI/modem from the local water tower, but the speeds suck.

Is it possible to connect the router to the cellphone in such a way that computers can still connect to the router wirelessly and see the NAS's and printer?

Current Setup
Modem <= Router <= NAS / Printer / Wireless connectivity

New Setup
Cellphone Hotspot <= Router <= NAS / Printer / Wireless connectivity

I've read up on Bridging, but that would use the router's wireless to connect to the cellphone hotspot, meaning that I'd need a second router connected to the first to get wireless to the house. Right?

So that would leave me something that looks like this:

Cellphone Hotspot <(wireless Bridge)= Router <(wired)= Router <= NAS / Printer / Wireless Connectivity

This seems needlessly complicated for what I want to do.

 

[Red Squirrel]

What is the cell phone hot spot exactly, does it somehow plug into the cell phone and have an ethernet port? If yes, just treat that like you would treat a modem, and connect a router/firewall to that and it should work. Keep in mind this will be extremly expensive internet unless you are fortunate enough to have the option of an unlimited plan.

 

[ch33zw1z]

Are there settings for the hotspot? IIRC, It should act like your router, giving out IP's and DNS, etc..

The setup is going to look like:

HotSpot>>>>Wireless Bridge/wireless clients>>>>wired clients/switch for additional wired clients/AP for additional wireless clients

HotSpot: serving DHCP/DNS to internal network via wireless to wireless clients and/or wireless bridge.

Wireless Bridge: Could be a DDWRT or Tomato compatible router configured as a bridge.

You could also purchase a wireless bridge. The wireless bridge won't give out DHCP or other network services. The bridge may have 1 port, or more. If it only has one port, you want to plug a switch into it to give you more ports.

AP: Access Point for either extending the wireless network or creating another wireless network.

Check out this site for some tutorials: http://www.ezlan.net/

I recommend running the bridge with either solution DDWRT or buying a bridge, isolating the internal network and keep a single link between the cell phone and the internal network. Running another AP for the rest of the wireless clients.

 

[RLGL]

What you want is WIFI Tether. Go to the forums for your phone to get details how to configure, this may cost extra (above the data plan) depending on the carrier. Check with them.

 

[Pulsar]

No, it's not unlimited, but it's far more than we use a month. Our current internet struggles to open webpages at times.

It does not have a tether - just a microusb connection. So connecting to the hotspot wired is out.

The hotspot does run dhcp and give out IP adresses, etc.

ch33zw1z, I think I understand what you are suggesting. I think you are saying that the hotspot could handle the wireless connections, and I could connect the router in bridge mode as just one more wireless connection to the hotspot, and then the hotspot would hand out IP's for the components wired to the bridge router.

However, the hotspot doesn't have a firewall that I can find, and doesn't allow me to dig into any of the settings: I can't even change the IP range that it assigns or set static IP's. My NAS's and Printer do not have passwords, and connecting the network in this way would expose everything to the outside world if they got through the hotspot.

That's why I think I need an actual router running as a router with a firewall enabled to sit between the hotspot and my wired devices. And since I need the computers that connect wirelessly to be able to see the NAS's and printers, I think I'm right back to this configuration:

Hotspot ====wireless==> router in bridge mode =====wired===> router acting as a router, handing out wireless connections with NAS and Printer wired.

I do have an old buffalo router (hopefully I can find it) with DD-WRT on it that would probably work as a bridge.

 

[beginner99]

http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/wire...int-mbr900-mobile-broadband-n-router-reviewed

 

[ch33zw1z]

No, it's not unlimited, but it's far more than we use a month. Our current internet struggles to open webpages at times.

It does not have a tether - just a microusb connection. So connecting to the hotspot wired is out.

The hotspot does run dhcp and give out IP adresses, etc.

ch33zw1z, I think I understand what you are suggesting. I think you are saying that the hotspot could handle the wireless connections, and I could connect the router in bridge mode as just one more wireless connection to the hotspot, and then the hotspot would hand out IP's for the components wired to the bridge router.

However, the hotspot doesn't have a firewall that I can find, and doesn't allow me to dig into any of the settings: I can't even change the IP range that it assigns or set static IP's. My NAS's and Printer do not have passwords, and connecting the network in this way would expose everything to the outside world if they got through the hotspot.

That's why I think I need an actual router running as a router with a firewall enabled to sit between the hotspot and my wired devices. And since I need the computers that connect wirelessly to be able to see the NAS's and printers, I think I'm right back to this configuration:

Hotspot ====wireless==> router in bridge mode =====wired===> router acting as a router, handing out wireless connections with NAS and Printer wired.

I do have an old buffalo router (hopefully I can find it) with DD-WRT on it that would probably work as a bridge.

You may want to check out prices for an actual Hot Spot. I use a Verizon Jetpack 3g/4g. works pretty well in most places, but it's cell phone connection and isn't always the most stable. basically a little router with a WWAN to the cell tower. It handles DHCP (for up to 10 clients), and gives me flexibility with network configuration. Firewall included...although "limited" in what options it gives.

What you want to try and avoid is Double NAT. Two or more SOHO devices doing NAT. The hot spot will be the first device, another SOHO router acting as a router is the next device.

 

[Enigma102083]

Is this Verizon 4GLTE?

 

[kevnich2]

OP - who exactly is your provider and what kind of hotspot do you have now for your cell internet? What is your budget on buying equipment for this? Lastly, what do you use your internet for? Is it a few laptops all wireless? Some wired? Do you have a VOIP phone you want to connect to it?

 

[spdfreak]

Just went through all of this... my system works perfectly now- of course you have to have the phone at the house for the internet to work, but if you are the only one living there, all you need is the phone unless you want wired connections like I did.
http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2317874

 

[Pulsar]

Ok, more info.

I have Sprint. I have a phone at the house that stays there, on which I pay for the data plan.

We're not going to run VOIP - the phone works as a phone even when it's serving up a hotspot. I verified with my Sprint store that the way I was setting it up was ok.

Our 'current' internet provider is a long distance WIFI company, and our speedtests are generally arond .4 - .5 mpbs. We can't even reliably watch a youtube video on most days.

spdfreak, thanks, I'll take a look.

kevnich2, I already have 3 gigabit / N routers laying around the house from other things, so I don't expect to have to spend much money however I set it up.

 

[kevnich2]

The reason I asked about budget is because to get it to work the best, you'll need a router that can do wireless as wan. A router that can be flashed with ddwrt can also handle this as well as the last I saw, it had an option on the WAN to be a wireless client

 

[Pulsar]

As a follow up, my internet is working very well.

My final layout was:

Home Servers (wired to router) => Wireless Router with firewall, NAT, and wireless WPK2 TKIP/AES enabled (wired to bridge) => Bridge (DAP-1522 revision B) => Cellphone

This allows visitors to connect to the cellphone directly for wireless internet, but protects my Home Servers behind the wireless router (which is what I connect to).

My only current headache is that the cellphone's wireless hotspot capability has a very weak signal, so I have to move my wireless bridge and that will take a bit of wiring.