Multiple Input, Multiple Output (MIMO) technologies, including LTE, 5G and Wi-Fi , enable all cellular and Wi-Fi antennas to send and receive data simultaneously. The best practice for both cellular and Wi-Fi antenna usage requires:
The antenna includes the full cellular or Wi-Fi frequency range capability that matches a given Cradlepoint device's capabilities.
All antenna ports are occupied with a compatible antenna.
In addition to assuring optimal cellular and Wi-Fi performance, having all antenna ports occupied helps protect against future network changes that could impact compatibility.
Attaching only a portion of the cellular or Wi-Fi antennas impacts the device’s functionality, up to and including reduced throughput, signal drops, and instability. For example, connecting two antennas on a Cradlepoint 2x2 MIMO modem may provide 40 Mbps throughput, compared to only connecting a single antenna, which could result in 15 Mbps. Additionally, the Cradlepoint device could experience connectivity issues such as completely dropping the cellular signal, either for periods of time, or as the modem is trying to cycle through available technologies (for example, fallback to 3G), up to and including fully disconnecting.
For customers that choose an antenna configuration not compliant with best practice, Cradlepoint continues to provide best effort support until encountering a technical challenge identified as directly related to the antenna configuration. Such challenges may include changes (implemented by the network operator) affecting the use of cellular bands, newly required MIMO cellular communication, cellular frequencies put into use by a carrier network and modem not supported by the selected antenna, excessive noise, any of which could also cause a modem to failback to a previous generation of cellular technology. Any of the above may also inhibit Cradlepoint Support’s ability to engage beyond a reasonable effort and require the customer to change the model of antenna in use.