I just got my Hologram Nova modem yesterday. Model is:
Hologram Nova US 4G LTE Cat-M1 Cellular USB Modem (R410)
I registered my Hologram SIM last night and set up my account. My dashboard looks good, State says “Live”.
I’m using it with a Raspberry Pi 3+. Install was uneventful and most of the hologram commands return data. Exceptions include “operator” which I assume is a reflection of not being able to connect. I can also connect and issue AT commands and get valid responses. I have a solid blue LED but the red LED never turns on.
From other posts the “Signal strength 99,99” is an indicator of no signal. I used a long extension cord and went out into the street in front of my house and still get the “Signal strength 99,99” message.
What should I try next? I’ve read through the posts and tried the solutions there. Should I try a different antennae? Maybe a different SIM card? Could where I am not have coverage (I’m in suburban San Diego and know people use their cell phones here - my AT&T cellphone works, different network).
Hi, thanks for the suggestion. Yes - I left the system on overnight, kind of hoping I’d be the little kid who comes down the stairs on Xmas morning to find Santa left me good stuff. Nope.
Dumb question time: Is this model limited to Verizon? I found the ordering info and Hologram docs confusing. The other Hologram modem says 2G/3G and appears to be only AT&T, since everything I can see says 3G is going away early 2020 I figured that route was a non-starter. Some post referred to T-Mobile and also somewhere I’m recalling seeing AT&T associated with this LTE modem.
I think I’m going to activate another SIM card. I have an extra since I didn’t realize the modem came with one so I bought one a la carte.
What happens when you run the AT+COPS=? command? what is the output? It should see towers.
No the modem will work on Verizon or AT&T in the US as well as most carriers that have Cat-M1 and are partnered with Hologram. The cell modem itself will pretty much work on any Cat-M1 network in the world, then it depends on Hologram having an agreement with the network. Note Verizon basically has country-wide coverage, their Cat-M1 coverage is basically = to their LTE coverage. So odds are there is a Verizon cat-m1 tower nearby.
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Welcome to minicom 2.7
OPTIONS: I18n
Compiled on Apr 22 2017, 09:14:19.
Port /dev/ttyUSB1, 13:59:18
Press CTRL-A Z for help on special keys
OK
ATE1
OK
AT+COPS=?
+COPS: (1,“310 120”,“310 120”,“310120”,8),(1,“312 530”,“312 530”,“312530”,8),(1)
OK
(not sure why that last OK is bold - really, I wasn’t screaming )
Activating and using a different Hologram SIM card gets the same thing. I may just take a drive outside of my residential area and see if maybe I can get a signal in a shopping center…
Ok so it looks like there may not be any towers nearby that Hologram has an agreement with (or not through their subsidiaries).
For reference the 2 three digit numbers in those lists are MCC and MNC for Mobile Country Code and Mobile Network Code. checkout: http://mcc-mnc.com/ to look them up. Yours are:
310 120 = USA, Sprint Spectrum
312 530 = USA, Sprint Spectrum
My guess is that although Hologram does support sprint networks maybe sprint doesnt let them on their Cat-M1 networks yet. I think this will require someone from Hologram to follow up.
Update: sometime late yesterday, something changed. I had left the system running as it had been - steady blue LED but red LED was off. Signal strength was reporting as 99,99. I shifted my attention to work on some other tasks and at some point when I looked back at this system I noticed both the blue and red LEDs were lit. I now get a signal of 21,99 and the operator shows as:
)