Estimated LTE Data Utilization in Failover Scenario

Thu Aug 1 18:05:57 UTC 2019

To clarify, the test was done around 1PM and was simple speed test, probably
could have gotten more throughput at the end of the day but these are used
as backups and if the primary connection goes down, I don’t have the luxury
to pick when that happens. I mainly used these as backups and I make sure
the customer knows that this is a temporary solution, the speed/latency will
not be as good as the primary connection. If the customer understands this,
then 4G LTE is a great solution especially for a backup. It's also great for
getting branches up ASAP while waiting for fiber etc.  I haven't tried
T-mobile LTE but that seems really high.  

Paul

-----Original Message-----
From: NANOG <nanog-bounces at nanog.org> On Behalf Of Kenny Taylor
Sent: Thursday, August 01, 2019 10:23 AM
To: nanog list <nanog at nanog.org>
Subject: RE: Estimated LTE Data Utilization in Failover Scenario

We did some testing with VZ and Sprint earlier this year.  Sprint provided
rates around 20-25 mbit down and 2-3 mbit up *if* it was an area with decent
coverage and the connection was on band 41.  Much lower rates on band 25/26.
We noticed that their regular unlimited hotspot plans perform well up until
the 50 GB mark.  The evening after we'd hit the 50 GB mark, throttling
kicked in and pinned the connection down to about 128 kbit, regardless of
cellular network congestion.  VZ seems to throttle the connections after
hitting the 25 GB mark, but it's gradual and appears to be more
deprioritization than shaping.

We tried VZ in a couple of rural areas and quickly discovered that there
wasn't enough bandwidth to those particular towers.  We could pull 20 mbit
down regularly around 6:00 am, then by lunch time we'd get less than 1 mbt
down.  We deployed an ISR router with LTE NIM and a linux box running iperf
hourly to do that testing.  Don't base your rate estimate on afterhours
testing, and I'd echo the other comments that the cellular network will get
slammed during an outage/disaster scenario and will undershoot your
estimates.

Worth noting, I can pull 45-60 mbit on my T-Mobile phone all day long.  Does
anyone have experience using T-Mobile plans for LTE backup?

Kenny

-----Original Message-----
From: NANOG <nanog-bounces at nanog.org> On Behalf Of Paul Amaral via NANOG
Sent: Wednesday, July 31, 2019 9:54 AM
To: 'Shaun Dombrosky' <SDombrosky at blackfoot.com>; nanog at nanog.org
Subject: RE: Estimated LTE Data Utilization in Failover Scenario

In my experience with LTE is that it's never enough. We have bank branches
with 20Mbs metro lines and on rare occasion when that circuit drops 4G LTE
will provide you with 10mbs at best also note that latency is much higher
which can mess with ipsec/VOIP etc. I don't think you can pick how much
bandwidth you will get with 4G LTE. From the testing I have done with VZ 4G
I get 10mbs down and 2/3 up with a -65 RSSI. It's still better to have LTE
for a backup then not to have it. 

I have used cradlepoint and now switched to cisco ISR 1111. I find the
crandlepoint to be not as reliable as the cisco ISR. The cradlepoint will
get extremely hot, go down for no reason and has poor signal compared to the
ISR 1111 with LTE.  I would stay away from the cradlepoint and find a Cisco
LTE solution. 

Again like I said a backup of any kind even if not sufficient in bandwidth
is better than nothing.

Paul

From: NANOG <nanog-bounces at nanog.org> On Behalf Of Shaun Dombrosky
Sent: Tuesday, July 30, 2019 12:06 PM
To: 'nanog at nanog.org' <nanog at nanog.org>
Subject: Estimated LTE Data Utilization in Failover Scenario

Good Morning,

First time NANOG poster, apologies if I breach etiquette.

Does anyone have any first-hand data on how much data a small-medium
business (SMB) can expect to consume in a failover scenario over a 4G/LTE
connection?  Retail, under 50 head count, using PoS, maybe cloud accounting
software, general internet activity, 8 hour time period.  Wonder if anyone
is using a Cradlepoint or SD-WAN solution that could pull a few quick
numbers from a dashboard for me.  I haven't had much luck in my searches.

Appreciate any info anyone can provide.

Thanks,

Shaun Dombrosky
Data Network Engineer

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