Hello,
I just upgraded from the old 3g wireless hotspot to the USB551L and have been having some issues with it. We are not in a 4g coverage area, and the upgrade was made purely to save the $10 on the rate. I could call it a bout of forward thinking, but that would be a lie.
First of all, I'm not seeing anywhere near the steady, even signal that I used to see from the 3g card. Its all ups and downs, even though we are in an excellent coverage area for 3G, and despite the fact that the other card performed admirably. I use these cards to play World of Warcraft; the old one worked swimmingly, this one works... barely.
I hesitate to say it, but this is worrysome. It seems like there were a lot of nice perks to get me to upgrade without being able to cash in on the advantages of the new speed. No mention was made of the new card's seemingly subpar 3G performance. In short, I'd say I feel baited.
The other issue is that occasionally the connection will flatline and clicking disconnect gives error WMC605: The device could not terminate connection. The power option to allow windows to suspend USB ports is already off, so this is not the issue. This did not happen with the old card, with the same PC hardware.
We've been pretty satisfied with the service provided thus far, and it is for this fact that I am inclined to be reasonable here. However, we live in the sticks, and since the aircard is our primary home internet, these problems are unacceptable. As it stands, I'm having difficulties with my online classes due to connection issues, and I'm pretty much wasting money on WoW as well. Assistance would be greatly appreciated.
Ok, so we got the speed and reliability fixed by forcing 3g only.
The error and its related disconnects are still very frustrating, and after a couple calls into Verizon, they can't seem to figure out what is going wrong. As I said, I turned off the USB suspend option (which would have been too easy, I guess), I've tried reinstalling VZAccess Manager, etc.
A little more info on the problem, when the WMC605 error occurs, it seems for all intents and purposes that the device is off, although VZAccess Manager still thinks it on and connected. The only way to disconnect is to exit out of the program completely. Upon reopening VZ Access Manager, it tells me that the device is powered down, which is interesting because it kinda doesn't have a power button. I have to unplug and reinsert to make it work.
The other thing is that we use it on 2 PCs, and one doesn't seem to have the problem at all. The working one runs windows xp home while the other one is Windows 7 Ultimate. Again, the old MiFi2200 worked great with both machines.
I'm pretty much at the end of my rope. I made sure everything was updated, including all Windows 7 updates and VZ Access Manager updates, and still no dice. Pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeease help.
I am in the same boat. We are not able to get high speed access (or 4G) where we live either so I went with the USB551L. At times it works fine, but lately it either powers itself off or connectivity will start with 3G through Mobile Broadband (EV-RevAe) and bounce between National Access (1xRTT). Then 2 seconds later I have no signal what so ever. Recently Verizon placed a tower near the marina where I keep our boat, so I took the air card there (less than a mile from the tower) and we have the same issues there. I contacted Verizon this morning, but haven't heard back yet.
Have you had any luck getting this fixed?
Some of the bouncing around seemed to be rectified by setting the device to be locked on 3g. Open VZAccess manager, press ctrl-d, type in "diagvzw" to bring up an options screen. From here, you can set the option to lock on 3g only.
Its a solution to the bouncing to different connections only, though. I still have the disconnects and the random power downs you described.
Talking to VZW on the phone is getting really old too. I told the tech support rep that I was getting the WMC 605 error and he laughed condescendingly and told me "Thats a new one on us" like I was making it up. One representative told us that we do have a weaker signal. Well, I'm here to tell you that unless the signal in our area got weaker the day we got the USB551l, then thats not the problem, because the old one was fine. My whole experience with this new aircard makes me eager to be done with this whole cellular WAN business, or at least with Verizon's version. The phones we have work fine, but this is nonsense. And of course, to get the new aircard for free, we had to sign a two year agreement. Terriffic.
Just started using the USB551L as part of a new 2-year Mobile Broadband commitment. I'm using mine with an HP HPE-510Y desktop. (I'm in the country, so there is no cable or FIOS Internet service available or likely.) I experienced problems similar to the other commenters. Using the VZAccess Manager, I was able to connect but, once I started browsing the Web, the connection often quickly dropped, even though VZAccess Manager indicated that the modem was still connected. As others reported, choosing to disconnect through VZAccess Manager produced the WMC605 error.
It looks like I've solved the problem by adding a USB power booster cable between the modem and desktop USB port; actually two desktop USB ports. By connecting the modem to two ports, this cable evidently supplies more power to the modem. I had a cable available because it came with the Pantech UM150 modem I used previously (provided by my employer to support connecting to their VPN through Mobile Broadband). However, I have to return ii with modem. Luckily, I found a place to purchase one at http://www.cwc-group.com/usbbooster.html. Just ordered mine, but it looks identical to cable I'm borrowing from the old modem.
I'm having the same problems. We've got a verizon 3G that works well. I've got a Novatel 551L piece of junk (did i say that) modem on a Mac Pro. I can't stand poorly design equipment that doesn't work as advertised out of the box. Companies these days take no pride in selling quality products and services. I've spent hours dickin' around trying to get this thing to work, consistently. Is there a way to run the modem without that VZW abcdef... Access Manager? I've seen info that suggest that is the problem; the software. How do you setup a new network connection for the 551L on a Mac Pro?
No problem I found the solution. DataJack.
I had ALL the problems everyone described, dropping connection when it went from 4g to 3g, acting like there was no modem there, etc. Then Verizon did an update yesterday (11/15/11) that not only redid vz manager but reconfigured the modem as well. took 30-40 mins but all of the problems seem to be gone.......Fingers crossed because I was just getting ready to cancel Verizon and go with the new sprint hot spot. So far smooth sailing...
I can understand your frustration with the connection issues that you are having. Have you tried to update the VZAM software with the latest version? If not, go to www.vzam.net and update the software version. If you still want to create a manual connection with you Mac you can follow these steps:
>From the Macintosh desktop, click Apple > System Preferences.
>From Internet & Network, click Network.
>Click the + (plus) (located in the lower left).
>From the Interface dropdown menu, click the desired device (Novatel Wireless CDMA in this example). Enter a desired Service Name (Verizon in this example) then click Create.
>From the Configuration dropdown menu, click Add Configuration
>Enter a desired configuration name then click Create.
Telephone Number (may not be available for all devices)
#777
Account Name
10-digit mobile number @vzw3g.com (e.g. 9995551212@vzw3g.com)
Password
vzw
If a Modem tab is present, ensure the following settings are selected, click OK then skip to step 11.
If the Modem tab is not present then skip to next step
Other
Model
Select the model (e.g.. Verizon 1xEVDO Modem Script)
Enable error correction and compression in modem
Checked
Dial Mode
Ignore dial tone when dialing
Dialing
Tone
Sound
On
>If a WWAN tab is present, ensure the following settings are selected then click OK.
Vendor
Other
Model
Select the model (e.g.. Verizon 1xEVDO Modem Script)
>Click Apply.
>Click Connect.
I hope this helps. Thanks.
I thought it was fixed with the update as well, but I quickly found out the drop outs still occur. Talked to tech support endlessly, filed a couple trouble tickets that never get responses, etc. The only employee who came to this thread is probably responding to someone else, because I don't have a mac. What am I supposed to do? I signed a 2 year contract that got me an object that is too light to be a paperweight, but too awful to be good for anything else. And nobody seems to be able to help. Maybe its time to look into that datajack that was mentioned previously.
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