Internet on a boat
External environment
Cellular companies have limited bandwidth. They sell some limited data plans to make a buck, but their networks are currently not set up to handle home or business networking on a mass scale. So, they sell plans to individuals, change them frequently, sell to small third parties who re-market and then go out of business sometimes. So, this market changes quite a bit, even monthly.
Add to that the issue with boats being on large bodies of water, sometimes in very rural areas, and the reception of one carrier versus another can vary greatly. Different wavelengths used by the carriers for different services 3G, LTE, "5G" also complicates it.
Finally, hardware selection can also be problematic, as the manufacturers grapple with the fast changing cellular industry.
The solutions posted in this thread are distilled from several websites including Seabits.com, panbo.com, milltechmarine.com, mobilemusthave.com, and several others. To a large extent, I have come to the realization that most of these sites are trying to use work arounds with service and technology that is ever changing and/or enhanced frequently. That folks can design work arounds that work most of the time is pretty cool, but does require learning a bit (sometimes a lot) about technology, or using the advice from those who do, and mirroring recommended setups that can work well, most of the time. Again, dependent upon geography, and the ever changing market.
I would suggest that satellite internet may be the best, though that also has some issues. The first issue is cost. Really, really high, for hardware and plans, and many times not that great a speed. And, weather dependent sometimes.
Develop a Use Case
It is critical to determine your personal "use case". My two use cases follow.
1) I am retired.
I don’t “need” internet except when planning at night. Using my cell will work most of the time, which would be “ok”. A good quality MiFi would work, and I would be fine with that. However, I also plan to get a TV satellite dish and subscription. My wife likes to watch her shows, and we will use it during college football season when traveling. That will greatly reduce streaming on a cellular based plan with data caps.
2) Working while boating.
If I want my good friend (still working) or my brother in law to ride along (wife won’t always be with me...grandkids, home and friends) then I need a better connection. Same with my son and son in law, who both can work from "home". A more reliable connection is absolutely necessary. So, a modem router which can receive cellular and/or wifi and supports dual SIMS with two different cards becomes an option so that the connection is as a reliable as possible.
Complexity means more options and a higher level of service. The way to think of marine cellular is to remember the hit and miss days of dial ups, and the advent of the router allowing a wireless signal. Simplicity means a cellular hot spot or MiFi with their internal antennas, and the associated (sometimes limited) connections to them.
Now, on WiFi usage. If you can receive and use a WiFi signal at a home or transient dock, and the signal works well enough, then using it will prevent burning up the fairly meager allowance granted by the carriers for their data cellular plans. Those plans weren’t intended for a full time workaboard. a home or a business network. Cellular companies have limited capacity. It also makes sense for the home port, for when you aren’t traveling. Passwords are typically supplied by the marina/restaurant, etc that you are tied up to. A quality VPN will help protect your data if you are on an open (no password) connection. I use Nord VPN.
So, the short answer is that defining your personal use case for your needs is the first step. I enjoy traveling with others, and since my wife can’t be aboard full time, then my plan (boat arrives in April) is to make it as easy as possible for others to travel with me. If you don’t need that solution, no reason to go to the expense.
Boat Environment
Do you want people to easily connect to a Local Area Network when on your boat? Or are the few connections on a MiFi sufficient for you?
Do you want to connect to DC power or is a modem router that is AC ok?
Will your connection be always on? Or shut off when you leave the boat?
Do you have systems that you want to be able to look at when off board? Anchor alarms, battery health, shore power, bilge pumps, and on and on. Will those systems allow the use of the ship's LAN?
Antennas can require more holes in the boat. Are you ok with drilling more holes? Do you have a place on the boat that you can place the antenna(s) internally that will give you a "good enough" signal?
What areas of the boat will create interference with both inbound signals and outbound signals?
Carriers
Carriers switch plans all the time. The cost per gig goes up and down, plans are halted new ones started, some require prepay, others are post pay.
Some attach to your current cell plan, some don't.
Some plans require you to use their router or modem. Some say they do, but don't. (You can get help with this on some of the sites listed. Some RV sites do a lot of reporting on this) It can be discouraging at first, but once resolved is typically good for a few months to years.
Third party resellers can provide comparably great plans, only to go out of business a few months later.
T Mobile currently has the most complete "5G" network. 2G and 3G towers are being removed as we speak by all the carriers.
Equipment
It is important to know how a Pepwave modem router works. It gathers inbound cellular and wifi signals through antennas. passes them through the SIMs and creates a Local Area Network (just like inside your home) on the boat side. It decides which inbound signal to use, based upon criteria you use to set it up. All of this can be invisible to the users on the boat. All they know is that there is a network on board.
Pepwave BR1 Pro 5G CAT 20 $1,499
Handles 5G and TMobiles's 71MHZ channel. Has 4 cellular antennas, 2 WiFi, and 1 GPS. Has Prime Care which is 1 year warranty and speed fusion, which will fuse to incoming signals to get the fastest connectivity.
https://5gstore.com/product/10890_pepwave_max_br1_pro_5g.html
Pepwave Max Transit Cat 20/5G $1,199 Handles 5G and TMobiles's 71MHZ channel. Has 4 cellular antennas, 2 WiFi, and 1 GPS. Has Prime Care which is 1 year warranty and speed fusion, which will fuse to incoming signals to get the fastest connectivity.
https://5gstore.com/product/10666_pepwave_max_transit_5g.html
Pepwave Max Transit Cat 18 $749
Handles TMobiles's 71MHZ channel. Has 4 cellular antennas, 2 WiFi, and 1 GPS. Has Prime Care which is 1 year warranty and speed fusion, which will fuse to incoming signals to get the fastest connectivity.
https://5gstore.com/product/9906_pepwave_max_transit_cat18.html
Antennas
An antenna's strength is measured in gain or DB. A discussion with a 5G store representative suggested the Poynting antennas will give you a better signal than the Pepwave 42G (4 cellular, 2 wifi(2.4 and 5.x) and a GPS (used by industry to track the attached asset) or 40G (4 cellular, no wifi) and a GPS.
There are several caveats with antennas. The first is length of cable from the antenna to the modem/router (signal loss measured in DB), quality of cable for same (NMEA workshops stated that the LMR 400 are the best). The number and quality of connections also affect gain.
So, you have competing issues. The closer the SIM Cards are to the antenna(s), the better signal you will have. The higher and clearer view the antenna has, the better the signal. So, compromises are necessary.
In my opinion, the best way to decide what antenna(s) you want, is to settle on the modem/router, decide what you can live with in terms of antenna placement and then talk with an expert at the 5G store, or Milltech for a recommendation. I am now leaning towards Poynting antennas.
A single separate antenna is a “better” solution than a puck or grouping, for a particular wavelength, for the same reason that it is “better” to have separate antennas for AIS and VHF. For example, VHF antennae’s are tuned to 156 mhz while AIS is tuned to 162 mhz. So, as an example, for the Vesper Cortex, which uses one antenna for both, Vesper offers an antenna tuned to 159 mhz. A 159 mhz antenna will never receive as well as a 156 mhz antenna for VHF, nor as well as a 162 mhz antenna for AIS but is typically considered good enough.
The downside of the Pepwave 42G and 40G is that crowding all of those antennas into one puck may cause interference with each other. That is why the Poynting sometimes get the nod. However, the downside to the Poyntings is more mounting locations, and possibly more holes in the boat for cabling.
A live example that people say gets good results, is the Pepwave 42G antenna cables connect to the 7 antenna connections on the Pepwave modem/router. Signals are received from those antennas connected to those cables either through cellular connections or WiFi connections. The Pepwave modem router uses those inbound connections to connect your boat to the internet. It also creates a wired and wireless Local Area Network on the boat. The beauty of the Pepwave is that it decides which signal to use, and switches seamlessly between the access signals as conditions change without the user (LAN) seeing the change.
The only variable is whether you want to pay for a 5G capable device. I think I will, with the hope that I dont need to change until StarLink solves its problems with low orbit satellites. and gets to a reasonable price.
So to summarize, Use Case, Boat Environment, Equipment, Tolerance for a changing landscape, Cost, and Antenna management are all issues to consider. The solutions range from your cellular phone all the way to satellite internet (a very expensive solution). All dependent upon your use case.
I know this post is a lot to absorb, and I apologize for the length of it, but when I started looking on the sites I listed above a few months ago, all I saw were solutions, without a full explanation of varying use cases, and without explanations as to why a certain product may be better than another. Please pass along any questions that it might generate and I will try to answer them. Hope this helps!
