{"id":1868,"date":"2016-06-06T22:59:52","date_gmt":"2016-06-06T22:59:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thewachs.com\/wachsacrossamerica\/?p=1868"},"modified":"2016-06-11T11:28:17","modified_gmt":"2016-06-11T11:28:17","slug":"working-from-the-road","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/thewachs.com\/wachsacrossamerica\/2016\/06\/06\/working-from-the-road\/","title":{"rendered":"Working from the road"},"content":{"rendered":"

Awhile back in our life on the move<\/a> series I promised that I’d give some more details on some of the logistics of doing work from the road, in particular how we’ve stayed digitally connected. \u00a0This was something that I worried about quite a bit before we left because I rely heavily on an internet connection for work and I had absolutely no concept of how much data I used on a regular basis or the reliability of 4g data. \u00a0The good news is that the solution for me turned out to be pretty simple and the price, while a little high, was definitely doable.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The Punchline<\/strong><\/p>\n

I’m going to go into quite a bit of detail here but if you just want the short story….what I would recommend to someone going nomadic then here it is:<\/p>\n

Get yourself a good 4g mobile hotspot from Verizon and figure on using 20GB per month (assuming you adopt a healthy data diet). \u00a0In my experience that is all you really need. \u00a0You can always add more later if you feel the need.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The Hardware<\/strong><\/p>\n

There are lots of folks who travel full time and have done extensive write ups on the hardware they use and such. \u00a0After reading those I figured I would get<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. a mobile hotspot from AT&T or Verizon,<\/li>\n
  2. the WiFi Ranger antenna and router<\/a>, and<\/li>\n
  3. and 4g\/3g range extender<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    When it got closer to go-time and we had unexpected tow vehicle expenses the prices of those items became a bit too hard for my tightwadness to swallow. \u00a0Of those three, (1) was the only absolutely critical piece and fortunately it was the least expensive (at least for the hardware). \u00a0I ended up going through Verizon (more on that later) and bought the top of the line unit, the Jetpack AC791L<\/a>, because it got great reviews and it had jacks for an external antenna (in case I got the range extender). \u00a0All the Verizon sales people want you to do the contract “because then, the hotspot is free\/cheaper!!”. \u00a0Uh, no its not…you are simply financing it at 0% interest. \u00a0And that would be a good deal except I was not planning on keeping the service for the 2 year length of the contract. \u00a0If you dig deep enough in the fine print you find the early termination fee which starts decreasing by $5 per month after the first 6 months. \u00a0Go ahead and do the math if you like, but the folks at Verizon aren’t dumb, they have calculated it such that whether you buy the device outright, you pay for it over 2 years, or you terminate early you’ll end up paying the same amount for the device. \u00a0For the consumer the only way you really pay more is if you do the contract and cancel withing the first 7 or 8 months. \u00a0So for me and my 6 months I planned on using the service it was better to buy the unit outright. \u00a0This boggled the sales people’s minds why I would\u00a0fork over all that money right now…oh well.<\/p>\n

    Most people agreed that (2) was valuable mostly because of the router. \u00a0The antenna did a great job of pulling in available WiFi but campground WiFi was usually so unusable that they ended up using paid data through their hotspot anyway. \u00a0So I decided to rely mostly on my paid data and any campground WiFi we did get would just be gravy.<\/p>\n

    I also noticed that review sites for campgrounds, particularly those at Campendium<\/a>, showed signal strength for AT&T and Verizon and often showed\u00a0good coverage at places we were interested in without the need for range extenders. \u00a0So, I decided that (3) could wait. \u00a0If it became an issue it was readily available on Amazon and I could have one in my hands within a few days.<\/p>\n

    In the event that we did come across usable campground WiFi I wanted a way to use it from the safe side of my own router and firewall. \u00a0Instead of getting the more popular and expensive Go2<\/a>\u00a0router from \u00a0the WiFiRanger kit I got a PEPWave Surf SOHO<\/a>. \u00a0It’s just like the router you have in your house except instead of getting internet through a physical CAT5 cable from your provider, it gets internet through the air waves. \u00a0On paper I could also hook my mobile hotspot to this unit and it would automatically switch between public WiFi and my hotspot based on priorities I set and the signal availability. \u00a0However, this did not pan out. \u00a0Yes, it did work…but putting the PEPWave between the hotspot and connected devices made the connection painfully slow. \u00a0PEPLink support was more than willing to help but it required me having a hardwired ethernet connection for them to remotely debug…but I did not find this issue\u00a0out until we were on the road with no hardwired ethernet connections available. \u00a0When campgrounds have had WiFi the PEPWave was nice as I could get it connected to campground WiFi and then everyone’s devices just worked as they always connected to the same hotspot, ThisOlBoxOnRoad. \u00a0Honestly, we could have done without this device…it was mostly for convenience and safety.<\/p>\n

    To summarize our hardware:<\/p>\n

    \n