Why is internet speed faster on my phone than on my jetpak?
Smann7685
Enthusiast - Level 2

At my house, in the same room, my Samsung Galaxy S7 will have data rate multiple times faster than my Jetpack AC791L. I'm on the New Verizon Unlimited Plan where the speed will decrease after a certain amount of data but this phenomenon occurs even when we have full speed access. Any ideas?

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Re: Why is internet speed faster on my phone than on my jetpak?
3BAMAM
Newbie

I am not sure why but I also notice this same issue with our hotspot. We run a roku, amazon tablets and a Dell desktop through the hot spot and noticed more issues with the dell then the others. One thing  that doesn't help is the Unlimited data thats not really unlimited and the throttling hurts us tremendously!

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Re: Why is internet speed faster on my phone than on my jetpak?
glitchedpixel
Specialist - Level 1

You do realize unlimited is for the data and not high speed, right? You aren't being charged any different between using 1GB and using 100,000GB.

The reason why the speed drops off is after 15GB (20GB on Above) of data use, speed goes from 4G to 3G speed. This is so customers like myself on a 2GB plan (any fixed data plan really) isn't left with atrocious service by those trying to use wireless data like it's their personal home internet.

Like most people, I have a real internet connection through a major ISP. Data usage in this house ranges between 400 - 600GB data a month through Comcast. It's selfish to expect that from a wireless provider with millions of customers. You get slowed down to not give everyone horrible service. You aren't the only customer.

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Re: Why is internet speed faster on my phone than on my jetpak?
3BAMAM
Newbie

Yes you're right about data versus speed however don't advertise "unlimited data stream away" then penalize people for going over a data cap. For "most people" who have a landline internet source I get it for others like myself who live out in the country wireless internet is our only option other than satellite. Don't be mistaken, they can handle the data load and we're all paying  for it by the little fees needed just to have a smartphone. I get the times of congestion but they are localized, there are areas that don't see high work loads yet once your cap is met your automatically throttled. Verizon just swapped one thing for another and it made for good marketing.

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Re: Why is internet speed faster on my phone than on my jetpak?
Smann7685
Enthusiast - Level 2

I realize all the limitations of the data plan and have made this comparison when I knew that the data caps had reset. The question is why my phone gets better data rate than the Jetpack under the same conditions. This is not an occasional thing, it's always true. It's not impressive like a cable or fiber connection that friends have but it satisfies our pretty modest needs (no gamers, occasional Netflix, mostly web surfing). Sometimes the jetpack is so slow it won't even load a website before it times out. If that happens I can turn on the hotspot in my phone and use it for whatever device was trying to get online.

I'm wondering if adding external antennas to the jetpack would improve its performance.

By the way, we live in the country and the wifi provider we used to use was wiped out in our area when the electric utility decided to use the same bandwidth for their wireless metering and basically locked up their wifi transmitter that reached our house.

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Re: Why is internet speed faster on my phone than on my jetpak?
3BAMAM
Newbie

I'm thinking the hotspot can't handle the amount of traffic on it from your

devices. Think of a large garden hose that you hook up to four other hoses.

The pressure that you once saw from the large hose no longer exist with the

four smaller ones hooked up. You still get water but not as fast as when it

was one hose. So your cell phone is getting direct feed from the tower and

you using it as a hotspot for one device is no issue same is true with your

hotspot until you start adding more devices then it gets congested. Think

of going from a four-lane divided highway down to a two lane all those cars

can't go through the same spot at the same time. so I don't think an

external antenna will help much. If you're getting two or more bars I think

you're about average. So many variables a lot of it has to do with

bandwidth and how well apps like Netflix and Hulu can compress HD files

down so they can fit through that small pipeline.

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Re: Why is internet speed faster on my phone than on my jetpak?
Smann7685
Enthusiast - Level 2

Only one device connected to jetpack when I ran the tests. Usually no more

than two devices ever connected at the same time. It is amazing how the

video can be compressed, most of the time we can stream with no buffering,

occasionally it is so slow that we spend more time buffering than watching

and we quit. I've run the test with the same device connected to jetpack

and via my phone's hotspot. The phone just has higher data rates, operating

from the same tower, and the same traffic.

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Re: Why is internet speed faster on my phone than on my jetpak?
3BAMAM
Newbie

Wow I guess I'm stumped, not sure how long you've had the hotspot or if

it's always been that way. On throttling we can still watch Netflix and

youtube but most other apps we can't nothing but buffering. Good luck to

you shop around it never hurts.

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Re: Why is internet speed faster on my phone than on my jetpak?
vzw_customer_support
Customer Service Rep

Smann7685, we want to ensure you have the answers you need. I welcome the opportunity to address your inquiry. Your Galaxy S7 has a quad-core processor and is therefore designed to move data through quickly. Obviously, that will also be reliant upon network loads/data traffic on the tower. A Wi-Fi hotspot doesn't rely on a processor but functions primarily off of the radio signal/frequency. Accordingly, the network technology in the jetpack can play a factor based on the frequency it's using. There's no instructions however that tells it how fast to move or where to put the data moving through it like the processor does on your cell phone. As a result, your phone is a bit more intelligent in moving that data along since it has a brain that tells all the data coming through where to go. Compression rates will also play a factor especially based on what type of data is being used but overall there's too many variables as to why the data can be faster on your phone than on your jetpack or vice versa. I hope this information helps. 

 

Ebony_VZW
Follow us on TWITTER @VZWSupport
If my response answered your question please click the _Correct Answer_ button under my response. This ensures others can benefit from our conversation. Thanks in advance for your help with this!!

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Re: Why is internet speed faster on my phone than on my jetpak?
Smann7685
Enthusiast - Level 2

So, are there smarter Jetpacks available? My assumption was that either the

phone was smarter or it has better reception thus less dropped data

packages. Other traffic seems to have a much higher impact on the Jetpack

also. There are times of day when it is worse yet it doesn't seem to make

much difference to my phone, although I don't have quantitative data on

that, it's just too unpredictable.

Thanks for your help, we'll probably have to live with it until something

else comes along. We live in the country and don't have access to cable.

the only other option is satellite and I did use that for a while several

years ago. The data rate was great for a couple of years then it went

totally bad. Went to wifi which was tolerable for a few years then it went

totally bad. At least the cellular service hasn't changed that much, it's

no worse than when we started with it about a year ago. Time will tell.

On Thu, Oct 11, 2018 at 8:41 AM vzw_customer_support <