How to make a 4G/LTE Router hotspot with Rooter and a Mikrotik Routerboard
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- čas přidán 12. 06. 2024
- Let's build a 4G/LTE hotspot. For this we will use the Mikrotik RBM33G Routerboard, a miniPcie LTE/4G modem and - Rooter. Yes, this is no typo. Rooter is a fork of OpenWrt and specializes on LTE/4G Hardware.
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0:00 What we need to build our own hotspot
0:27 Who would use this ? Why ?
0:38 Use case 1 - off grid
0:52 Use case 2 - Fail over
1:11 Use case 3 - bandwidth aggregation
1:20 Why make and not buy?
2:02 Why use ROOTER and not OpenWrt ?
3:09 Why I used the Mikrotik Routerboard RBM33G
3:31 4 ways to connect to 4G
6:01 How to get Rooter
7:29 how to flash Rooter
11:00 Mount the Modem into the case
12:43 The case and antennas
15:00 How to configure Rooter
17:52 Quick speed test - Věda a technologie
Thanks for another great video, Marc. I have been using OpenWrt and ROOTer routers as LTE to WiFi hotspots for several years I used to live in a countryside. My house is out of normal mobile network coverage, and the only tower in the area is about 11-12 kilometers away, so I can’t even have the mobile connectivity on my phone to make calls or send SMS, but with a LTE modem and directional 1800 MHz (LTE band 3) MIMO antenna I got pretty nice and solid network connection with about 20-40 Mbits/sec DL and 5-10 Mbits/sec UL.
I might add a small note. If a router is supported by both OpenWrt and ROOTer and you plan to use it specifically for LTE connection - pick ROOTer.
Don’t get me wrong. It is completely possible to download and install all the packages on normal OpenWrt, but one big advantage of ROOTer builds over standard OpenWrt is that they include certain kernel modules and scripts and hacks for connection modes like MBIM and QMI which don’t usually work nice and smooth under Linux.
If you use LTE cat.4 sticks like Huawei e3372h-153 or ZTE MF823 that emulate USB ethernet network adapter under the hood, then there will be no difference between OpenWrt and ROOTer. But if you use Quectel modems, like EC25, and especially higher grade LTE categories like EM-12G, then there will be simply a huge difference in performance. ROOTer, as far as I could figure it out, includes proprietary drivers as kmods, and some scripts that apply settings to the modem itself, and in my case Quectel modem worked 10x times faster on ROOTer than on OpenWrt. You can of course make the same setup on clean OpenWrt but why make all this effort if firmware developers already did it for us?
Also folks, don’t forget that not only your router, but also your modem needs to be properly configured, and sometimes even flashed with a custom improved feature-rich firmware. Because for stable and solid connection you surely want to fix the carrier frequency to make sure your modem will not constantly try to search for other towers, hop between towers and make reconnection attempts, and set some other parameters as well.
Thanks again for a video, Marc. This LTE modem to an OpenWrt/ROOTer setup is simply a lifesaver for many people that don’t have a proper FTTB internet in their areas
Awesome feedback, many thanks Pavel! I’ll pin the comment as it contains so much useful information.
Hello Pavel!
May I ask you a few question direct about EM12-G and router board and firmware?
I’m going to buy Keenetic Hero, UniElec 7621-01-AX or smt else.
I just ordered quectel EM12-G from AliExpress and now I have to choose a router or router board. But I don’t know Linux and can’t setup my own firmware. I’d like to talk about better way in my case. So if it’s possible may I contact you direct?
And thank you for video! Really interesting case!
I don't speak English well. But I'd like to get to know why rooter more faster then OpenWRT? And if we are using OpenWRT where we can get manual for setup Quectel EM12-G for example? May I install some packages from ROOTER to OpenWRT or no? It would be interested to get to know!!! Thank you @Pavel Vasiliev and @OneMarcFifty
This is great. I've been using a TP-Link LTE router at home for a couple of years. I wanted to build something like this for my campervan with an antenna on the roof and a wi-fi hotspot inside. Thanks for the inspiration!
Hi Wayne - sounds like a nice project ;-) Let us know how it goes ;-)
very interested in new videos about the topics you said in the end! Didn't know about rooter, thanks for this!
Hi, many thanks for your feedback ;-)
YES! This is what i`ve got running in my camper, its an amazing setup!
The exact same setup?
@@OneMarcFifty not at all haha, I went a complicated route with a super annoying fibocom l860 modem, it's cheap but anytime I'm updating the rooter firmware it's a dance to get this dumb modem running 😁 also the router is a zbt-wg259, compact gigabit, works quite nicely.
Awesome - thanks for sharing!
Excellent topic! Look forward to more on the subject.
Hi Michael, thank you very much ;-)
Thank you so much! I learned a lot in this episode. I was intrigued on how industrial modems were built and I wanted to also build one using my preferred hardware. I am also already using ROOter but theres some minor bugs that are hard to pinpoint the cause and fix like network status being stock on connecting (thus no signal information is displayed even though AT+QCAINFO sends back proper information) despite the modem being connected and has a connection. Looking forward to the next episodes!
Hi, yes - it is a pitty that Rooter forked and did not commit back to the OpenWrt project. This way the Rooter project has to incorporate all changes by hand...
Hi Marc, nice work it's good to see another peice of your work. The Rooter FWs are really nice and easy to load, I think I will get me a Microtik board and tinker some. I have had so many people asking about the necessary 2x series Openwrt pkgs for modem/apn settings. I dont know if thats too advanced but would make a great video! keep up the great work!
Obviously meaning maybe too much for veiwers, I know that you are an awesome network guru!
I have a modem install running with OpenWrt- but it’s true that it requires a lot of config. And hey - I’m no guru ;-) just sharing my learnings ;-)
Wow, interesting video. I was thinking of doing something like this. Thanks Marc. I missed to watch this earlier.
Awesome - many thanks ;-)
It's my first day in your class room and I must admit this is heady stuff indeed. I really would love to learn how to use a Raspberry Pi with 4G networks. Thanks a lot and stay well too.
Hey, many thanks for the feedback ;-)
Ein sehr schönes und Informatives Video ich glaube ich werde es nachbauen
People who live in Hull need this as we don't have BT and KCOM have the monopoly $$$.
Hey, I have a stupid question - are you talking about Hull in East Yorkshire?
nice one Marc !! long time
Hey Vineet ;-) Great to see you here - No surprise LTE did catch your attention ;-)
Thank you for all the great videos. I'm learning so much from your channel. Would you consider doing a video on mdns across vlans for things like casting and HA discovery?
Hi, that's on my list - although not very high ;-( I am still thinking of alternatives to mdns repeater (which I am using) - maybe AVAHI with a hand-selected list of services?
Great 👍 as always
Thank you very much
Great video!
Thank you very much.
Thanks for the great content! I have just bought a GL.iNET X750 v2 LTE router using a flavor of OpenWRT 19.07. It's based on the Quectel EP06 modem. Unfortunately the ROOter community has not released a supported version for the X750-v2. I am checking how to get CELLID and supported bands with AT commands. Second step would be to check how to implement Cell Lock and Band Lock to stick with the antennas of my wireless providers that provides best speed in my area. This may vary during the hours of the day depending on number of users attached to each of the possible antennas, as I have large companies offices around. It would be good to show in your video how ROOter is managing the CELLID, Cell Lock and Band lock aspects. Thanks again for your wonderful videos!
Hi, thank you very much! If you do a search for "cellid" in the Rooter Source code then you should find the relevant code snippets : github.com/ofmodemsandmen/ROOterSource2203/search?q=cellid
Rooter also has an option to compile/ build a base install an add your required additional features during the installation. Only thing is that you really have to know what you’re doing when selecting packages. Other than that, the URL is kind of hidden so you’ll have to check the forum for the link… you can even customize and upload your own splash image. Freaking Awesome!!!!
Hi, many thanks again - I'll look out for that. It's a pitty that they did not just build rooter as modules for OpenWrt. That would be so awesome....
@@OneMarcFifty Agreed!
@Tone Baxter can you post the link for the customization?
I've never heard of Rooter. Cool vid
Hi, many thanks for the feedback ;-)
Great video Marc!
Couple of questions:
1. Would PCEngines be better suited for a multi-modem setup? I would like to build a cellular bonding router with 2x or 4x cellular modules.
2. Do you look into whether a Low Noise Amplifier (LNA) and RF isolator improved the performance?
I give like before see the video because you rock!
Thank you very much- that’s a lot of confidence;-)
@@OneMarcFifty is you fault I wish you make mikrotik videos to I love you way of doing stuff
Great video! More lte rooter videos please!
Hi Luke, thanks a lot for the feedback ;-)
Thank god Its a ROOTER not a Router. Routers are for wood ! Nice work Marc Keep up the Good fight fantastic info !
Haha - yeah - I know - brits vs. yanks, right ? ;-)
I like this video. Maybe in a not far future I will test this thing
Hi, great to hear from you - that's excellent ;-)
Any updates on the project mentioned at 18:45 in the video - where you said you were going to install "plain" OpenWRT on the PC Engines card, and then add the Rooter bits & pieces? That sounds like it could be very useful for getting my Gowin GW-R86S-G3 (which comes with OpenWRT installed) to work with a USB 3.0 connected 5G modem. Thanks!
Would be great to have demo of the usb adapter with sim on raspberry and openWRT. But this one was also great - I did not know about rooter, I might build my home backup connectivity like this. Thanks!
Hi Robert - just be aware that if you do use Rooter then you can't use any additional Kernel modules as the way they built it is independent of the main OpenWrt tree (which is a pitty really...)
@@OneMarcFifty Kernel modules are only compatible with a kernel from the same build. When doing a custom build, if we generate the firmware again, the kernel gets a new hash, and the installer will refuse to install kernel modules which don't match that hash. While it is safe to overwrite existing modules, adding new ones might not work or lead to kernel panic, since the old kernel was not compiled to support them.
One of the reasons I use only preconfigured custom build firmware.
Looking forward for plain OpenWRT.
Hi Leonardo - many thanks for the feedback, it's noted ;-)
Hi, Marc, can you talk a bit about your external antenna? I assume they were inside the house, did they work well enough through the walls? Could you get better performance by moving them outside with clear line of sight to a tower?
Hi, yes - indeed - I am using paddle antennas inside the house (under the staircase of the ground floor). They do work quite well even through concrete walls. I most certainly do not get the same throughput like under the roof but it is quite OK. For my parents I am still thinking of getting those two Yagis mounted....
Excellent! I have a very niche implementation that this may help me with. Our building is considered historical, so no cable or ISDN can be run to it. This looks like a much more robust solution than our current setup. I have two Hotspots tethered to an RPI running OPENWRT via USB, and as you say, the powered USB hub is a weak link. A dedicated "Rooter" implementation on a board with PCIE LTE sounds much easier to manage! I may have missed it in the video, but do you have more information on how you chose your antennas or models to consider? Thank you for the video.
Hi, many thanks for the feedback - you could still use plain OpenWrt - just the init scripts of the modems might need to be tweaked a bit. W/r to the antennas - I did not really have any hard criteria for the antennas - I was just looking for paddle antennas similar to the TP-Link 4G routers because I knew they worked quite well...
I've used my Synology RT-2600ac with a USB LTE dongle plugged in for years and it works perfect 👌 about 50 Mbit/s down and about 20 up. My kids stream kids shows and we stream movies and lots more just as if we had cabled internet. Can recommend the Synology routers if you don't want to build your own.
Thank you very much. Are you using it with stock firmware or any kind of open firmware?
@@OneMarcFifty Just the stock. Was about to upgrade it because I needed VLAN support, but then Synology send out the 1.3 update with VLAN support 👌 so it just works to good to change anything 😂
Correction: They send out the BETA of 1.3 (but it works fine for me)
I get 170 Mbit/s down when the signal is good, and 40-50 inside. My old iPhone 7 Plus is USB tethered to OpenWRT.
@@GeorgeValkov nice 😊 I used to have an old phone tethered as well but the battery suddenly swelled up (because of months of charge discharge I guess). So I replaced it with a dongle but I actually had better speeds with the phone. I think it is difficult finding a good dongle. Waiting on a good 5G dongle.
Thanks for covering even antenna placements, useful project. What would you use to also use 5g?
Hi Bernd, I have not yet looked into 5G really. Even though I got quite jealous when my neighbor showed me his data transfer rates on his phone...
hey sorry to butt in, just want to share. Im also using ROOter with a 5G modem connected via PCIe on my board. It was a modem from quectel RG500x I think. Its Qualcomm x55 based modem. And ROOter do support these 5G modems
Support from 🇮🇳
Thank you very much.
I don't understand anything about this networking stuff but I enjoy watching your vids.. I might use your words to tilt 45° of antenna for better reception I think on my V4 MIMO feedhorn. What do you say Sir? Will it increases the performance or not?
Hi Ralph. It depends on the distance between the antennas etc. The power that is transmitted as such will go down 30%. So if there was a big influence between the antennas then it will improve. If not, you might lose 30%
I’ve made several projects with rooter and the same module ec25 with a cheap router, we826 from alixxx… Fun time…👍🏾❤️
PS. I also used to have a pretty decent business selling these routers on eBay. Really Fun Times…
Hi, that's awesome feedback - thank you. It's just a pitty that hardware has become so difficult to get an so expensive...
I love this project. I assume you will as well use a second LTE modem and bundle the throughput. That might be nice for vacations at the beach, where fibre still isn´t available. A solution for 4 weeks a year...don´t see that for myself. For the moment I am using a GL-Inet router with a huawei E3372 modem stick. Which is not getting close to this performance.
Hi, yes - there are a lot of variations that can be played here ;-) I know that there are a lot of smaller devices sold - but as I said - it's so much nicer to build than just buy ;-)
Thank you for the video! I’m building this right now for home internet and I bought a DW5821e modem that’s m.2 but after reading the manual for the motherboard it says it’s for only storage. My question if you could help me is will it still work if I install the modem in the m.2 slot? Or can I buy a mini pcie to m.2 adapter to use it in the mini pcie slot? Or would it be better to get a usb3 to m.2 adapter? Thank you so much!
Hi, I can't really tell I am afraid. I have never tested that. In general, the board and modem need to use the same port architecture and also support it.
Did you get a chance to make the video on how to add the Rooter bits and pieces to an OpenWRT install on an APU board?
Thank you for these videos, I always learn something.
Hi, this is actually a bit more complex than I thought. I would love to fork the Rooter bits and just integrate them as a module into OpenWrt. Unfortunately, a lot of the user interface parts in Rooter are written in lua while the LuCi project has since moved to a javascript model. Using the script parts of the modem inits etc. still needs to bee done on a per case basis.
GOD!!!My broo
Hey, thanks for the feedback ;-)
Great video! I use a similar solution in the car with EP06 modem and for navigation and tracking I use luci-app-gpoint! An excellent modem and even with GPS on board makes it only better!
Hi Marc, first of all, thank you very much for your videos. I would LOVE to see a raspberry pi implementation. I specifically have the use case for it so I'd appreciate it very much!!!
Hi Gabriel, it's noted - many thanks for the feedback.
@@OneMarcFifty thank you for giving us the possibility of learning so much and in such a detailed manner
great video Marc... again...
how about a video on the same line but for 5G networks... how it compares to LTE... ?distance to antenas
?are there already any PCIx/USB 5G devices to accept a SIM... or even a eSIM/vSIM (and operator support analysis)
Many thanks for the suggestion!
Please do a plain openwrt edition of this video, thankyou very much.
I had thought about this. The thing is, that different modems behave in very different ways. Rooter covers this with a years-long experience and user feedback. There is however an article on that in my cheat sheet repo on Github - maybe that helps.
Please cover the RBM11G board from routerboard. This board is POE and the gigabyte LAN would work awesome for my 4G LTE WWAN as it puts the modem 6inches away from the Antenna which I need for max signal and flexibility.
Hi, the process should be the very same really. I think the RBM11G and the RBM33G have pretty much the same hardware (CPU/Memory/Wifi), just the RBM11G has only one mPCie slot if I remember it well.
Could you recommend any internal antennas, looking to make a travel router...
Hi, not really - there are a bunch of those on ebay and the like, but I have never tested them
I looking somethng for livestiming on the way so need good stable conection by LTE, can you recommend something for that or some DIY project with cellular bonding ?
Hi Karol, if I understand you correctly then you want to stream live video over an aggregated/bonded LTE line, correct ? Would your primary concern be higher bandwidth (i.e. higher resolution) or higher availability (i.e. maintain a second connection if the first one goes down)?
@@OneMarcFifty Yes you correct. is more important higher availability. In some cases during some event can be lots of people...
Does Rooter support NCM? If so, I might try to somehow port this to my OpenWRT ZTE LTE router. UI looks nice, and I am sick of using janky UIs to manage bands and SMS.
Yes - It supports Sierra, QMI, MBIM, NCM and PPP
@@OneMarcFifty Thanks for the reply, i might actually give it a try but first i'll try the "bolting packages from rooter to existing openwrt install" thing, because installing openwrt itself was a nightmare to this router, but my guess is its not going to cut it.
For fixed installations(even on vehicles), why not Starlink? The power of LTE is that it fits in your pocket, if you take that away there are better solutions.
Starlink is 20 times the price of cheap LTE here per month ;-)
Would it be possible to upgrade a Archer C7 with a LTE modem? Which would be supported?
It might be possible on the V1 but I haven’t tried. It’s not possible on the V2 as it has no usb wiring on the mpcie slot. The v5 does not have mpcie at all
Thanks for this video! Do you know if any of the Rooter supported devices have a USB-3.0 port? I've got a Sierra Wireless EM9191 5G Modem, in a USB-3.0 connected enclosure. I've just updated my home PC to Kubuntu 22.04 LTS (kernel v6.0.1), and am trying to get the EM9191 working directly with it, but would rather it be hooked to the router, as my Internet uplink. I'd like to get an IEI Puzzle M902, but I can't find it in the USA (clicking on their USA E-Shop link takes me to the QNAP store, where a number of IEI devices are available, but not the M902). A less expensive (and less capable) option would be the NanoPI R5S.
Hi David, I am sorry - but ad hoc I do not have the answer to your question. I am afraid that you would have to cross-check the OpenWrt ToH openwrt.org/toh with the Rooter supported devices in order to find that out ;-(
Raspberry pi 4 for sure
Nanopi neo3
@@OneMarcFifty - I've just read an article about the Gowin GW-R86S-G3, which is a mini PC with an Intel N6005 CPU, 3x 2.5GB Ethernet ports, 2x 10GB SFP+ ports, 16GB RAM, 128GB EMMC Storage, M.2 slot, TF Card slot, WiFi 6, Bluetooth 5.2, HDMI 2.0 port, & 2x USB 3.0 port. It comes with OpenWRT pre-installed, and is available for $465 from the Electric Mii Store on AliExpress. There are less expensive models, that have fewer features, and a slower processor.
where is the sim card slot on the RMB33G?
Thank you for keep updating with this extremely educative videos. I have a question, will be possible to use Voip with this firmware to make phone calls using the Sim card, Looking forward your answer, God bless you
Hi Juan Carlos, whether you can do VoIP or not does not necessarily depend on the firmware of the router but rather on your mobile provider - if they filter it or not. You could of course install asterisk or yate or anything like that on the router and have your own VoIP / SIP gateway.
I would like to know how to have 4G LTE as a backup when the main connection drops. I think it is done with mwan3. It would also be nice to save mobile data with a squid proxy.
Hi Franco - the backup scenario is also something I have on my list for a long time. But you give me a great idea here with caching squid - yes, if the device has a lot of disk that would definitely save traffic (at the expense of storage and cpu of course, but hey ;-) )
@@OneMarcFifty I appreciate you considering the comments. Many greetings!
I bought the T-mobile 5g gateway. It was cheapest and most efficient solution. I would love to build one, but I wanted one that was easy to restart. My parents only need to unplug the power and replug it to restart the router.
Hi, yes - it's a valid argument - the FAF (Family acceptance factor) needs to be taken into consideration ;-)
This is certainly nice but it should be mentioned that if you have a modern android phone with a data service plan; and you are in a desperate need of a connection, you can use the hotspot feature in it to turn it into an LTE router (no need for USB tethering) to save yourself from a predicament. It probably wont be as fast and extensive as this, but it will get the job done.
Hi, yes - absolutey - for mobile use you could use your phone (or any other hotspot) - just as I say in the video - you will come across a couple of challenges (Antennas, MU-MIMO and the like)
In big cities with many APs, Wi-Fi tethering over 2.4 GHz could get 10-20 times slower than USB: 3 Mbit/s vs 170. That's just 5 meters of direct sight.
I've added a hotplug script so that pressing a button toggles the 2.4 GHz radio between AP and client.
I prefer clean official OpenWrt for the LTE. Rooter is a bloatware and based on snapshot. So installing additional kmods might be a problem. And OpenWrt has more Quality Gates...
Hi Imya, it’s a valid point - as I agreed with many other commentators- having rooter as a software module for OpenWrt would be top ;-)
great video!! please sir, on the next video make instalation with rpi 4 and lte hat from waveshare! and can it connect only with gpio ports?
Hi, afaik unfortunately the 4G shield needs a USB cable on top of the GPIO connection - which is a pitty because it ruins the form factor ;-)
@@OneMarcFifty thanks sir
I love the project but is a bit expensive! I have my self 1 openwrt portable with Nexx WT3020 but is only 2.4ghz and is to slow and offcorse i use usb dongle for 4g.
Fair point. There are definitely cheaper solutions.
@@OneMarcFifty maybe in future u will do some more cheaper solution
Could this be doable for 5G ?
Hi, presumably yes if you have the right modem ;-)
I would love to build my own 5G modem. I already have some antenna on my house outside. I use a really expensive Huawei 5G CPE Pro 2 but because it gives me 800 megabit 5G instead of the cable company that can just about give 300 but also mainly because the 5G gives me 100+ megabit upload but the cable gives 20 up. I think the 5G modems are too expensive and you can't control them very well like you can with open source equipment and you can't add external antenna to the Huawei that I have without modifying it. A linux based 5G open router would be awesome.
Hi Matt, many thanks. I haven’t investigated on 5G devices yet but might have a look into that soon
Great video... great info...
please consider a video on implementing a Captive Portal in openwrt...
I know there is a software (opennds) to do that in openwrt... but is that the best solution,,, are there better alternatives... and a demo would be very welcome! ;-)
I do have opennds on my list - captive portal comes up every now and then as a suggestion
It makes me sad to hear that people in Germany still use DSL. We abandoned that unreliable technology 12 years ago. I use unlimited data on my phone for the entire home.
Marc, you might consider that topic: OpenWRT USB tethering using iPhone, Android, and LTE dongle.
Hi George, I wouldn't call DSL unreliable as such - the availability of my Internet line the last 15 years is excellent. It does have its flaws though if you compare to fiber (higher latency and the like) - Phone tethering is on the list for sure ;-)
Sadly gl inet mudi and spitz (v2 ) are not supported 😢
Are you referring to support for Rooter firmware? You can definitely use Rooter on the Spitz!
@@maukaman yep, only de v1 version, note the v2, that's available on amz
Hi, many thanks for your feedback(s) - w/r to the gl inet routers - they do come with OpenWrt right ? Now I know that it's not vanilla OpenWrt but "close to tree" OpenWrt - but you should be able to use it for a lot of scenarios. I might (in the future) have a closer look on how to make rooter functionality available for mainstream OpenWrt - I guess that would solve so many challenges.
you can connect & disconnect modem on miscellaneous menu
Yeah, thank you - I had tried that but it didn’t work. The modem init scripts on rooter are quite complex - I figured out later that the qmi init was not terminating ;-(
how to downgrade openwrt? or change openwrt to another version
why exchange Routeros against Rooter? Routeros has all features of Rooter and is by far superior with everything it offers. This is like replacing a V6 engine of a BMW with the engine of a VW Beetle.
Hi, many thanks for your feedback. the question is legitimate in the sense that you would need to evaluate if you are getting an advantage by changing to a different OS and if it is worth the effort for your specific use case. However, I personally would not want to make a general statement that the one is "by far superior" to the other - even though both OS's are based on Linux, there are so many differences. We should hence be careful to not compare apples to oranges. Very often, the debate around operating systems is very emotionally loaded and may lead to strong opinions, worst case potentially lacking objectivity. Just to give two or three arguments for Rooter that _might_ be (but don't have to be) valid for specific use cases: with OpenWrt / Rooter you can chose from roughly 20,000 software packages (OK, I counted the modules as well, let's say 5,000) - that's _objectively_ speaking not possible with Mikrotik. Now - do you need it ? Up to you to chose. As I said, it depends on the use case. Furthermore (more specific to Rooter rather than OpenWrt) - the Rooter team has a very long history in supporting a huge variety of GSM/3G/4G modems and has covered so many specific situations with the various protocols (QMI, MBIM etc...) that they are close to a "plug and play" solution for nearly any LTE device. Have a look at github.com/ofmodemsandmen/ROOterSource2102/tree/main/package/rooter/ext-rooter-basic/files/usr/lib/rooter and you'll see what I mean. Last but not least, it is up to everyone to take their own decision on whether they prefer free and open source to a proprietary system or not ( there are good reasons for both courses of action).
@@OneMarcFifty ok I completely forgot about additional software packages. But for this I could say that you can use containers in Routeros and have a bigger choice of software to run on it. BUT: Because of security not everything should be run on a router/firewall.
I did use Openwrt extensively in the past. Actually I am familiar with almost all mainstream Wlan & Router OSes, which are out there (Cisco, Ubiquiti, Asus, Netgear, D-Link etc). At the end I always ended up with Routeros as best solution. Routeros is more for network pros who really know what they are doing as not everything is just done with one click but it can do everything in the network if you know how to do it.
I think, I must compare supported 4G Hardware with Rooter and Routeros. But if I use Mini-PCIe cards then I dont think that I need to worry about support in Routeros.
But yes, if you are used to Rooter and its ease of use, it is a valid solution. Could you tell me your favourite things why you choose Rooter besides the two points you already said?
The main reason why I chose Rooter for this video was the ease of use with 4G/LTE. I have an OpenWrt router in my home with a fall-back LTE connection. Does OpenWrt recognize the modem ? Yes it does. Still it took me long hours to get it work reliably. Will RouterOs recognize it ? Presumably yes. The real issue with those 4G/LTE modems though is that you don't know which state they are in, as most of them are fully fleshed Android devices. Your modem is working perfectly, you restart all network connections, and it stops working. You reboot the router (without actually powering it off), you lose IPv6 and move over to IPv4. Weird things can happen. The router says the modem can't connect but that's because it is already connected and the init script does not capture it. All init procedures on the Router are imperative, not declarative. So - in a nutshell - it's not enough to just check if the modem is supported. It's really important to test all circumstances. And with regards to that, Rooter has a lot of advance against most other solutions. Now - would I recommend Rooter for a complex infrastructure (e.g. 200 Rooter devices)? No. I'd use something else. But if that infrastructure would need one single LTE fail over point over a dedicated VLAN then this endpoint might be Rooter. Or I would use OpenWrt and use the init scripts of Rooter. You see - Rooter started in Australia (where mobile connection very often is the only way to get internet in rural regions) about 9 years ago. Since then they have collected so much feedback from users and implemented fixes for this (they have added a queuing system for AT commands to OpenWrt for example to avoid interfering statements). Also - they have a lot of knowledge about different operators. They don't do everything in the "right" way but they do 4G/LTE _really_ well. With regards to using Docker - you can do that with Rooter/OpenWrt as well - But just running a software in a Container does not give you a nice UI integration ;-)
@@OneMarcFifty thx very much for your answer. that was the info I was seeking!
I will remember Rooter if I have to work with some usb 4G modem which makes problems. Until now I avoided all USB modems as they make problems everywhere and instead used devices which already came with built-in 4G or had recommendations what to use like Mikrotik devices.
Are you having Heartburn (Sodbrennen)? Because you swallow so often mid-sentences. The sound of that is really disturbing because your mic picks it up very clearly. Maybe use tablets against it, like Rennie (is that available in Germany too?) Or cut/mute these parts in post editing. ;-)
Hey, many thanks for the comment - no, I don't have heartburn or anything of the like ;-) It is true, I had realized that the Lavalier picks up every single noise - and I added post-processing filters in the last 5 or 6 videos to suppress it. This video had been recorded in January already, so the filter had not been in place by that time. If you check one of the latest videos such as czcams.com/video/jlG_nrCOmJc/video.html that does have a noise filter applied ;-)
@@OneMarcFifty Ahh yes, I've seen that video as well and indeed that sounded much better (less distraction). Your content is always awesome and of high quality, so thank you very much!
@@IgnoreMyChan And thank you for your comment - it's the type of things that no one would dare to point out but after all it's one of the silly things that could cost me a lot of views and ultimately drive people nuts ;-) I just realized much too late that the new Lavalier mic is much more sensitive than my old one. Thanks again mate ;-)
I think it’s just a breathing pattern. Germans speak in one long breath whereas Americans breathe more often when speaking. I learned this many years ago from my first German, English dictionary.. Viele grüße nach Deutschland… ❤
Rooter is a horrible abomination. I have no idea what the developers have done to break an otherwise very good OS. You can’t create your own network configurations contrary to the defaults, it will destroy and rename everything you’ve done and revert them. I found this really frustrating. It’s littered and bloated. I don’t see the advantage over vanilla OpenWRT.
Hi Eric, you have a valid point in your argument in the sense that Rooter has been built based on OpenWrt without respecting a couple of things (such as branching, forking, committing back to the project etc.) - I do agree it would be nice if the added functionality could just be integrated into OpenWrt using a software package. However, I think the terms you use are a bit harsh ;-) The advantage over vanilla OpenWrt lies in the experience they have with different modems which has gone into a lot of LTE init scripts (if you check github.com/ofmodemsandmen/ROOterSource2102/tree/main/package/rooter/ext-rooter-basic/files/usr/lib/rooter you'll see what I mean) - but again, I agree - if it was built on top of OpenWrt rather than forcefully replacing it, that would be much better for everyone.
I know a few things about routers but I am not sure what to think about these 🫚-ers
You mean the Router board or the suggested 4G setup ?
@@OneMarcFifty I was referring to the usage or root-ers instead of routers. looks like the tree root emoji may not have shown up.
Oh - cool - I did think it looked like ginger or something ;-) Yes, Rooter is a tough decision if you know that you basically move a good distance away from main stream OpenWrt by using it.