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New Paradigm 340RL - Issues with WiFi Ranger Osprey Router

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Dan54

Member
New member here as we are new to Alliance ownership. Our first fifth wheel, which we still own, is a Heartland Landmark, which we love. Many of the components in it have been obsoleted however & replacement parts are not available, most notably the level up system & the collapsable rooftop dish antenna. Therefore we decided to relegate it to campground only duty at our Ohio River campground.
We recently purchased the 340RL & we are having the dealer install some options. We plan to pick it up in April & take it on a shakedown trip soon after. My first question is concerning the Wi-Fi router. It looks like the Osprey WR-0S12 is an improvement over the Winegard Gateway GW-1000. Have any of you purchased either of these & what can you tell me about your experience? Ease of installation, use & quality of reception, etc Thanks!
 
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Hotrodjohn

Well-known member
I used a peplink router and a netgear gateway and a Poynt roof antenna. I didn’t tap into the winegard originally but kinda sucked. 2023 340
 
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Dan54

Member
I ended up going with the Osprey router. We are now on our shakedown trip From Ohio to Florida. Mixed results with the Osprey router. My frustrations are compounded with the piece of crap Insignia tvs they put in these trailers. The user interface with these tvs is for s—t. Anyway on to my experience with the Osprey. There are three ways of getting to the internet via the router. First if you have your phones hotspot on the router can scan for available Wi-Fi, find your hotspot & you use the phone’s internet. The router broadcasts its own Wi-Fi signal which you can link to let your tv, etc have internet access. Trouble with this method is very often the scan picks up my phones hotspot then two minutes later it drops the connection. When I look at the scan results my phone no longer even appears & when I manually initiate a rescan my phone doesn’t show up either. Second method is you can plug your phone into the usb port on the router. This connection is more reliable but your phone is always occupied with this function. Since the router is in the ceiling & the phone is plugged in there is no convenient place for the phone to sit because even a 10 foot cable gets in the way, hanging down, etc. The third way is installing a sim chip in the router for dedicated data access to the internet. This connection is very intermittent as well. Very frustrating to put the iPad down for a few minutes, come back & find the connection has been lost. Compounded with the fact that when connection is restored the tv doesn’t recognize it automatically & you have to spend 5-10 minutes restoring it’s connection. Obviously I’ll learn more with time, rereading the manual & calling the help line (I hope) but right now if I had to do it over again I wouldn’t.
 
Oregon_Camper

Oregon_Camper

Forum Moderator
Staff member
KingTide said:
Hello! 292RL arriving soon. Researching Starlink. Can you share experiences/recommendations? Looking at Standard vs High Performance.
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We have had the Standard version for just under 2 years. Works great. Used it from Oregon to Indiana and back for the Alliance National Rally last year and had great service. Then took it for a 8 week trip around Oregon, Montana, Idahoe....worked very well for us on that trip. We have the "RV" service package, which allows you turn it off when no longer needed. Ours was off from Oct 2023 and I just turn it back on last weekend.
 
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Dan54

Member
Can you provide some particulars on Starlink? Initial & monthly cost, equipment provided/required, setup. Do you use it for streaming video? Any other comments. Thanks!
 
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Dan54

Member
Additional comments on our Wi-Fi Ranger Osprey router. When I talked to tech support about the intermittent connection when purchasing data thru the SIM card they checked my usage & discovered we had burned thru the10 gigs of data I had purchased in one night. I only recall watching one hour long streamed tv program that night but even if it was more $50/day for internet is too expensive for my tastes. Starlink may be much more affordable by comparison. My immediate plan is to switch our cellular to the unlimited data plan, add an additional phone by firing up our retired iPhone 7 & taking the SIM card out & placing it in the Ospray router. Theoretically that would give us unlimited data streaming at $30/mo. We’ll see.
 
Jim Beletti

Jim Beletti

Owner Experience Liaison
Staff member
Hi @Dan54 - sorry to hear you had a negative experience with the WiFi Ranger Osprey. I've never had one so I can't weigh in on it. That said, I have had many brands of routers, including cellular routers over the years. I've had the best luck with Peplink routers. You may want to give it a try - especially if you can return your Osprey. I can get you a small discount code at MobileMustHave.com if you're interested.
 
KingTide

KingTide

New member
Oregon_Camper said:
We have had the Standard version for just under 2 years. Works great. Used it from Oregon to Indiana and back for the Alliance National Rally last year and had great service. Then took it for a 8 week trip around Oregon, Montana, Idahoe....worked very well for us on that trip. We have the "RV" service package, which allows you turn it off when no longer needed. Ours was off from Oct 2023 and I just turn it back on last weekend.
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Great recommendation. Thank you!
 
Oregon_Camper

Oregon_Camper

Forum Moderator
Staff member
Dan54 said:
Can you provide some particulars on Starlink? Initial & monthly cost, equipment provided/required, setup. Do you use it for streaming video? Any other comments. Thanks!
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heck, I think you can buy Starlink hardware all over the place now...Best Buy...Home Depot? If you have a good clear shot of the sky, streaming video is no problem....we do it all the time.

We have the RV service package, which is $150 a month with unlimited data. Starlink does/can potentially throttle the "RV Package" data, if you are in a dense area and their "high tier" customers are there too. Now...in the 2 years we've had Starlink, we have never had this happen.

Setup is very easy. Get the app...turn it on...point to clear sky....surf the web. :)
 
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Dan54

Member
Jim Beletti said:
Hi @Dan54 - sorry to hear you had a negative experience with the WiFi Ranger Osprey. I've never had one so I can't weigh in on it. That said, I have had many brands of routers, including cellular routers over the years. I've had the best luck with Peplink routers. You may want to give it a try - especially if you can return your Osprey. I can get you a small discount code at MobileMustHave.com if you're interested.
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Thanks but for now I’m going to keep trying to work with the Osprey. I’m sure some of my problems stem from user error & lack of familiarity with the product. Our Paradigm is back at the dealer getting some warranty work handled. Hopefully when they finish I can spend some time figuring it out.
 
Jim Beletti

Jim Beletti

Owner Experience Liaison
Staff member
Dan54 said:
Thanks but for now I’m going to keep trying to work with the Osprey. I’m sure some of my problems stem from user error & lack of familiarity with the product. Our Paradigm is back at the dealer getting some warranty work handled. Hopefully when they finish I can spend some time figuring it out.
Click to expand...
When do you think you're be in Elkhart to pickup your Paradigm? I arrive on May 17 and will be in to finalize plans for and co-produce the National Rally. Maybe we can meet up.
 
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exps01

Active member
I have the Winegard GW-1000. Went with it since the Air360 antenna was already installed from the factory. I got a sim card from my phone carrier (AT&T) and just added a line for it. The installation was very straight forward. Only problem I ran into was the cabling from the antenna through the ceiling wasn't attached to the temporary ceiling cover and the wires weren't visible. I ended up getting a small endoscope camera for my cell phone and found them in the ceiling, then making the hole bigger to reach them. Wasn't super difficult, but more annoying that they weren't fished through the hole properly and attached to the cover plate at the factory. Hooking it up and getting on the ceiling was very easy.

The interface once you've got it installed is pretty terrible. It's such a poor interface and figuring out the screens, how to navigate around, etc is just awful. It's only capable of 4G speeds and the highest I've had so far was around 5mb/s. Not terrible, but not great. I can stream on the TVs in 720p, though sometime it stutters and has to buffer. It's adequate to get basic internet, but I've already been planning upgrading in the future to a Peplink router and a different antenna capable of 5G speeds. the Mobile Internet Resource Center is a great source of info for all things internet for RVs. They go in depth on reviews of each device type. I'd check it out: https://www.rvmobileinternet.com/
 
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Dan54

Member
Jim Beletti said:
When do you think you're be in Elkhart to pickup your Paradigm? I arrive on May 17 and will be in to finalize plans for and co-produce the National Rally. Maybe we can meet up.
Click to expand...
Not going to Elkhart, my paradigm is at my dealer, General RV
 
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Dan54

Member
exps01 said:
I have the Winegard GW-1000. Went with it since the Air360 antenna was already installed from the factory. I got a sim card from my phone carrier (AT&T) and just added a line for it. The installation was very straight forward. Only problem I ran into was the cabling from the antenna through the ceiling wasn't attached to the temporary ceiling cover and the wires weren't visible. I ended up getting a small endoscope camera for my cell phone and found them in the ceiling, then making the hole bigger to reach them. Wasn't super difficult, but more annoying that they weren't fished through the hole properly and attached to the cover plate at the factory. Hooking it up and getting on the ceiling was very easy.

The interface once you've got it installed is pretty terrible. It's such a poor interface and figuring out the screens, how to navigate around, etc is just awful. It's only capable of 4G speeds and the highest I've had so far was around 5mb/s. Not terrible, but not great. I can stream on the TVs in 720p, though sometime it stutters and has to buffer. It's adequate to get basic internet, but I've already been planning upgrading in the future to a Peplink router and a different antenna capable of 5G speeds. the Mobile Internet Resource Center is a great source of info for all things internet for RVs. They go in depth on reviews of each device type. I'd check it out: https://www.rvmobileinternet.com/
Click to expand...
I thought about just getting a SIM card from AT&T which is my carrier as well. They quoted around $24/mo for a SIM card but the trouble with that is they are subject to a limited amount of data. On our current plan (which is an older grandfathered plan)) our limit is 50 gig/mo shared but as I said we would go thru that very quickly. If we switch to the new unlimited data plan hotspot data is limited, phone data is unlimited so that’s not a solution. May take a SIM card out of a phone & place in the router to take advantage of the unlimited phone data. Thanks for the link. I’ll check it out.
 
Oregon_Camper

Oregon_Camper

Forum Moderator
Staff member
Dan54 said:
Thanks but for now I’m going to keep trying to work with the Osprey. I’m sure some of my problems stem from user error & lack of familiarity with the product. Our Paradigm is back at the dealer getting some warranty work handled. Hopefully when they finish I can spend some time figuring it out.
Click to expand...
Dan..I created this WiFiRanger video a little over 5 years ago, but maybe there might be a bit of information to help you with your issue(s)??

 
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