Guys , mnay thanks in advance for your help and know
it will be copious and send me off in many creative directions
to come up with a solution , im looking forward to it

Criteria is to have a unbreakable mobile 3G connection
( via dongle )
( cat5 connection is impossiblity )

Reason is that i require to log into view camera 3/4 times
a day to take images , and the setup is in remote location.
Currently the connection is "hanging" / Breaking at least once
a week and i have a 2 hour round trip to reset everything.

This is NOT data intensive 2/3 GB lasts a month and im
currently using THREE dongles , I have spoken to 3 and
they say they DONT have a solution as their dongles are
NOT designed for 24/7 use and dont have self reset facilities.

Currently im looking for a hardware solution , rather than a
software solution , id rather NOT have a laptop involved
at present

Currentlty the 3G dongle is plugged into into a tp link router
which on paper should have failsafe mechanism , but does
not in reality reset itsself they way it should IMHO.
( TP link 3G - TL-MR3420 )

Camera has DDNS to allow it to be found anywhere
on internet.

Im currently thinking of adding a GSM Remote Control
( "power" controlled by text message ) system so i can
remotely reset everything , in the order it needs reset
( simply applying power at same time to everything
means it does not setup properly , camera needs to be
started 3 mins after router)

Ok , in theory this should work , although to be fair
in theory the MR3420 should be working although it aint

So i need an unbreakable 3G connection and thats
my solution , whats your ideas , or is there a
product out there i have missed that looks to
provide this unbreakable 3G mobile connection.



--
----------------
No links here , nup

Londoncalling wrote:

So i need an unbreakable 3G connection

No such animal.


and thats
my solution , whats your ideas , or is there a
product out there i have missed that looks to
provide this unbreakable 3G mobile connection.



I think 'reboot by mobile phone' option is as good as it gets.

I assume there's no chance of a land phoneline?

You MIGHT be able to do something with a more intelligent system in the
field - something linuxish that could reboot all or part of itself if
e.g. a ping fails.

i.e replace the TPLink with a low power computer with the dongle pugged in.

I have also found that router based DDNS is not always reliable: running
a DDNS client under cron on a linux box works better,

TP link is not the best router in the stable either.




--
Ineptocracy

(in-ep-toc-ra-cy) €“ a system of government where the least capable to
lead are elected by the least capable of producing, and where the
members of society least likely to sustain themselves or succeed, are
rewarded with goods and services paid for by the confiscated wealth of a
diminishing number of producers.

In article ,
"Londoncalling" writes:
Guys , mnay thanks in advance for your help and know
it will be copious and send me off in many creative directions
to come up with a solution , im looking forward to it

Criteria is to have a unbreakable mobile 3G connection
( via dongle )
( cat5 connection is impossiblity )

Reason is that i require to log into view camera 3/4 times
a day to take images , and the setup is in remote location.
Currently the connection is "hanging" / Breaking at least once
a week and i have a 2 hour round trip to reset everything.

What about a digital timeswitch which turns the router off
for 1 minute in every 24 hours, to power cycle/reset it?

--
Andrew Gabriel
[email address is not usable -- followup in the newsgroup]

On Sun, 2 Sep 2012 14:53:04 +0100, Londoncalling wrote:

Im currently thinking of adding a GSM Remote Control ( "power"
controlled by text message ) system so i can remotely reset everything
, in the order it needs reset ( simply applying power at same time to
everything means it does not setup properly , camera needs to be
started 3 mins after router)

KISS. 24hr time switch that kills the power for a minute in the wee small
hours. Power feed to camera through a delay on time switch.

You can probably find both in one module width units that will fit in a
small CU.

--
Cheers
Dave.

On Sun, 2 Sep 2012 14:22:21 +0000 (UTC), Andrew Gabriel wrote:

What about a digital timeswitch which turns the router off
for 1 minute in every 24 hours, to power cycle/reset it?

Great minds. B-)

Depends if the camera gets upset (or will if it just happens to notice)
by the link disappearing for that minute plus reboot plus reconnect time.
I get the impression that it's the dongle that is falling over rather
than the router. I guess the dongle is powered from the router though.

I wonder if this camera is located on a ski slope? Had a similar request
earlier in the week but this one appears to have mains power.

--
Cheers
Dave.

I wonder if this camera is located on a ski slope? Had a similar request
earlier in the week but this one appears to have mains power.

Its for monitoring animal behavior , if i can come up with robust location
i will need to install in 10 sites hundreds of miles apart. Im not
making money from this project just covering costs.

I have access to mains power at all locations but no access
to any internet/cat5 at any locations , that would have made
it too easy !

if i can come up with robust location

note that should have read , "robust solution" , not "location" :-)

Currentlty the 3G dongle is plugged into into a tp link router
which on paper should have failsafe mechanism , but does
not in reality reset itsself they way it should IMHO.
( TP link 3G - TL-MR3420 )

Guys im kinda answering my own question here

my interpretation of failsafe in the TP link manual i beleive
was wrong , it switches from wan to 3g , and 3g to wan but
it does not seem to reboot to restart

it seems those magical keywords im looking for are ...


" 3G router - ping reboot ! "

Londoncalling wrote:
I wonder if this camera is located on a ski slope? Had a similar request
earlier in the week but this one appears to have mains power.

Its for monitoring animal behavior , if i can come up with robust location
i will need to install in 10 sites hundreds of miles apart. Im not
making money from this project just covering costs.

In which case I strongly recommend you design something custom, as I
described

The learning curvve is steeper, but in the end you can design it to cope
with whatever is in fact happening.


I have access to mains power at all locations but no access
to any internet/cat5 at any locations , that would have made
it too easy !


Yerrs.

I personally would apprich it thos way

- get a Atom based Mini ITX bioard in the smallest case you can find and
install a boring Linux on it,. Debian stable
- set it up as a router using various 3G dingles,
- sit it on your desk or bench and every time it ****s up, look in the
logs to see why
- and work out how, short of a reboot, it can be made to go again. Even
if it DOES need a reboot see if software reboot works. I HAVE seen USB
lock up badly so only power recycling works. That's the worst case, but
from memory a 3G dongle looks just like a modem, and with luck you can
send it the disconnect and reconnect command if its wedges








--
Ineptocracy

(in-ep-toc-ra-cy) €“ a system of government where the least capable to
lead are elected by the least capable of producing, and where the
members of society least likely to sustain themselves or succeed, are
rewarded with goods and services paid for by the confiscated wealth of a
diminishing number of producers.

Londoncalling wrote:
Currentlty the 3G dongle is plugged into into a tp link router
which on paper should have failsafe mechanism , but does
not in reality reset itsself they way it should IMHO.
( TP link 3G - TL-MR3420 )

Guys im kinda answering my own question here

my interpretation of failsafe in the TP link manual i beleive
was wrong , it switches from wan to 3g , and 3g to wan but
it does not seem to reboot to restart

it seems those magical keywords im looking for are ...


" 3G router - ping reboot ! "


If that works its the best answer yet!

--
Ineptocracy

(in-ep-toc-ra-cy) €“ a system of government where the least capable to
lead are elected by the least capable of producing, and where the
members of society least likely to sustain themselves or succeed, are
rewarded with goods and services paid for by the confiscated wealth of a
diminishing number of producers.

In article ,
The Natural Philosopher writes:
Londoncalling wrote:
Currentlty the 3G dongle is plugged into into a tp link router
which on paper should have failsafe mechanism , but does
not in reality reset itsself they way it should IMHO.
( TP link 3G - TL-MR3420 )

Guys im kinda answering my own question here

my interpretation of failsafe in the TP link manual i beleive
was wrong , it switches from wan to 3g , and 3g to wan but
it does not seem to reboot to restart

it seems those magical keywords im looking for are ...


" 3G router - ping reboot ! "


If that works its the best answer yet!

I don't use 3G very much, but on Vodafone, I find it sometimes connects,
and then I can get only a few hops into Vodafone's network before
everything is dropped, which is useless of course. Repeatedly dropping
and restablishing the PPP session will eventually get me connected to
a part of the Vodafone network which can actually get packets to/from
the Internet. It used to work much better.

--
Andrew Gabriel
[email address is not usable -- followup in the newsgroup]

On Sun, 02 Sep 2012 17:25:06 +0100, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

i will need to install in 10 sites hundreds of miles apart. Im not
making money from this project just covering costs.

In which case I strongly recommend you design something custom, as I
described

The learning curvve is steeper, but in the end you can design it to
cope with whatever is in fact happening.

For 10 off this seems sensible.

- get a Atom based Mini ITX bioard in the smallest case you can find
and install a boring Linux on it,.

Strikes me as an ideal project a Raspberry Pi. Small, cheap, low power,
USB and ethernet on board. Quick google shows several means of getting a
3G USB dongle to work.

--
Cheers
Dave.

Dave Liquorice wrote:
On Sun, 02 Sep 2012 17:25:06 +0100, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

i will need to install in 10 sites hundreds of miles apart. Im not
making money from this project just covering costs.
In which case I strongly recommend you design something custom, as I
described

The learning curvve is steeper, but in the end you can design it to
cope with whatever is in fact happening.

For 10 off this seems sensible.

- get a Atom based Mini ITX bioard in the smallest case you can find
and install a boring Linux on it,.

Strikes me as an ideal project a Raspberry Pi. Small, cheap, low power,
USB and ethernet on board. Quick google shows several means of getting a
3G USB dongle to work.

still needs a case/PSU


--
Ineptocracy

(in-ep-toc-ra-cy) €“ a system of government where the least capable to
lead are elected by the least capable of producing, and where the
members of society least likely to sustain themselves or succeed, are
rewarded with goods and services paid for by the confiscated wealth of a
diminishing number of producers.

En el artículo , The Natural Philosopher
escribió:

still needs a case/PSU

Loads available, you can even build one in Lego which it fits
surprisingly well.

http://www.raspberrypi.org/archives/1515

--
(\_/)
(='.'=)
(")_(")

On 02/09/2012 14:53, Londoncalling wrote:
Guys , mnay thanks in advance for your help and know
it will be copious and send me off in many creative directions
to come up with a solution , im looking forward to it

Criteria is to have a unbreakable mobile 3G connection
( via dongle )
( cat5 connection is impossiblity )

Reason is that i require to log into view camera 3/4 times
a day to take images , and the setup is in remote location.
Currently the connection is "hanging" / Breaking at least once
a week and i have a 2 hour round trip to reset everything.

This is NOT data intensive 2/3 GB lasts a month and im
currently using THREE dongles , I have spoken to 3 and
they say they DONT have a solution as their dongles are
NOT designed for 24/7 use and dont have self reset facilities.

Currently im looking for a hardware solution , rather than a
software solution , id rather NOT have a laptop involved
at present

Currentlty the 3G dongle is plugged into into a tp link router
which on paper should have failsafe mechanism , but does
not in reality reset itsself they way it should IMHO.
( TP link 3G - TL-MR3420 )

Camera has DDNS to allow it to be found anywhere
on internet.

Im currently thinking of adding a GSM Remote Control
( "power" controlled by text message ) system so i can
remotely reset everything , in the order it needs reset
( simply applying power at same time to everything
means it does not setup properly , camera needs to be
started 3 mins after router)

Ok , in theory this should work , although to be fair
in theory the MR3420 should be working although it aint

So i need an unbreakable 3G connection and thats
my solution , whats your ideas , or is there a
product out there i have missed that looks to
provide this unbreakable 3G mobile connection.

An entirely different approach to the problem why not have the system
reboot itself periodically say just after midnight and use two timers
one for the router and another for the camera (or custom electronics). A
neater solution would be to monitor traffic and have a watchdog timer
that counts down to zero and is reset whenever an image is transferred.

--
Regards,
Martin Brown

On Sun, 02 Sep 2012 21:42:18 +0100, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

Strikes me as an ideal project a Raspberry Pi. Small, cheap, low
power, USB and ethernet on board. Quick google shows several means of
getting a 3G USB dongle to work.

still needs a case/PSU

Case can be a plastic project box for a couple of quid. PSU is a bog
standard USB thing again for just a few quid.

--
Cheers
Dave.

On Mon, 03 Sep 2012 08:54:16 +0100, Martin Brown wrote:

An entirely different approach to the problem why not have the system
reboot itself periodically say just after midnight

That's assuming that a simple warm start will reset the dongle when it
has locked up. From what the OP says I get the impression that the dongle
requires a power cycle to get it going again.

Having said that having the box shut itself down properly then kill it's
power might be better than just yanking the power via a time switch.

--
Cheers
Dave.

Londoncalling wrote:

Currentlty the 3G dongle is plugged into into a tp link router
which on paper should have failsafe mechanism , but does
not in reality reset itsself they way it should IMHO.
( TP link 3G - TL-MR3420 )

The problem seems to be the router rather than the 3g dongle. I have a
similar setup for a remote farmhouse providing 24/7 internet connection.
In the "advanced" router set up control panel it is possible to select
"dial on demand' options to drop the 3g connection when there is no
traffic and to redial on demand.

I don't have the problem that you have been experiencing, the conection
stays up for months on end.

I also don't like TP-link products, so I may be prejudiced against them,
I use a Digicom router at the moment because it was the only one on
offer locally. It's not that good and I would have preferred to use a
Draytek 2920 which is far better IMO. Vigor capability, robustness and
security features are generally better than other makers.

On Tue, 4 Sep 2012 21:16:48 +0100, Steve Firth wrote:

I have a similar setup for a remote farmhouse providing 24/7 internet
connection. In the "advanced" router set up control panel it is
possible to select "dial on demand' options to drop the 3g connection
when there is no traffic and to redial on demand.

So how do you tell the router to "dial on demand" from the internet so
you can download an image?

I guess the OP could set things up such that the latest image gets FTP'd
somewhere on the net every so often thus forceing the dial on demand but
that could use up the data allowance for images that aren't required. A
ping somewhere remote would also bring the link up but sods law says that
the link will be down when you want and image and will have to wait for
the regular ping to bring it up...

--
Cheers
Dave.

In article , Steve Firth
scribeth thus
Londoncalling wrote:

Currentlty the 3G dongle is plugged into into a tp link router
which on paper should have failsafe mechanism , but does
not in reality reset itsself they way it should IMHO.
( TP link 3G - TL-MR3420 )

The problem seems to be the router rather than the 3g dongle. I have a
similar setup for a remote farmhouse providing 24/7 internet connection.
In the "advanced" router set up control panel it is possible to select
"dial on demand' options to drop the 3g connection when there is no
traffic and to redial on demand.

I don't have the problem that you have been experiencing, the conection
stays up for months on end.

I also don't like TP-link products, so I may be prejudiced against them,
I use a Digicom router at the moment because it was the only one on
offer locally. It's not that good and I would have preferred to use a
Draytek 2920 which is far better IMO. Vigor capability, robustness and
security features are generally better than other makers.

Very good those Draytek's they are. I wonder if it might be the high
contention ratio such 3 G systems have. Take the average 3G site and the
area of which it covers say in suburban areas a mile radius.

Now think of the possible number of subs in that area all loading the
site?..

I've yet to hear of anyone who's used a 3G system for net connections of
anything like the stability and thruput of a half decent wired
connection..

--
Tony Sayer

"Dave Liquorice" wrote:
On Tue, 4 Sep 2012 21:16:48 +0100, Steve Firth wrote:

I have a similar setup for a remote farmhouse providing 24/7 internet
connection. In the "advanced" router set up control panel it is
possible to select "dial on demand' options to drop the 3g connection
when there is no traffic and to redial on demand.

So how do you tell the router to "dial on demand" from the internet so
you can download an image?

Set it to ping at set times. Set the devices to push video/stills. As you
indicated.

If that doesn't please use always on.

tony sayer wrote:
[snip]

I've yet to hear of anyone who's used a 3G system for net connections of
anything like the stability and thruput of a half decent wired
connection..

Not in this country, but in Italy I have a Huawei E353 21.6 Mbps with a
Digicom (spit) router. The connection achieves 6-8MB ps throughput which is
as good as the DSL I can get in the UK.

Since it's line of sight to the mast in Italy I don't have problems with
poor signal and dropouts.

Dave Liquorice wrote:
Strikes me as an ideal project a Raspberry Pi. Small, cheap, low power,
USB and ethernet on board. Quick google shows several means of getting a
3G USB dongle to work.

Already being done, by London Zoo:
http://www.maggiehosmcgrane.com/2012...berry-jam.html
(via satphone not 3G)

Theo

In article -
september.org, Steve Firth scribeth thus
tony sayer wrote:
[snip]

I've yet to hear of anyone who's used a 3G system for net connections of
anything like the stability and thruput of a half decent wired
connection..

Not in this country, but in Italy I have a Huawei E353 21.6 Mbps with a
Digicom (spit) router. The connection achieves 6-8MB ps throughput which is
as good as the DSL I can get in the UK.

Since it's line of sight to the mast in Italy I don't have problems with
poor signal and dropouts.

Yes of course "delivery" via radio can be problematic but it seems to me
the contention ratios are rather high. I've seen it around 6 odd megs in
the middle of the night whereas a few 10's of K during the day when I
presume the systems well loaded....


--
Tony Sayer

On Thu, 6 Sep 2012 10:26:08 +0100, tony sayer
wrote:

Not in this country, but in Italy I have a Huawei E353 21.6 Mbps with a
Digicom (spit) router. The connection achieves 6-8MB ps throughput which is
as good as the DSL I can get in the UK.

Since it's line of sight to the mast in Italy I don't have problems with
poor signal and dropouts.

Yes of course "delivery" via radio can be problematic but it seems to me
the contention ratios are rather high. I've seen it around 6 odd megs in
the middle of the night whereas a few 10's of K during the day when I
presume the systems well loaded....

Yep, contention is a bugger.
I'm now on a wireless 3G link, installed under a Government Broadband
Scheme for rural areas. Luckily, there's also an ADSL enabled exchange
in the village, so the contention for the 3G isn't too bad. As I'm at
the end of 5km of copper wire, ADSL reached 1.7Mbps but no higher.
On 3G I get 5Mbps most of the time with very rare lapses - however, I
await the transfer of some more landline owners over to the wireless
as it's considerably cheaper to run.
It won't be as much then, when every bugger and his dog is fighting
for a share.