MK3 Tether vs MK2 Sim Card

I’m stuck trying to decide between the Soho Surf MK3 and the MAX BR1 MK2. Let me explain my use case.

We have a trailer at a campground in an area where cellular can be spotty, The campground, however, is at the top of a mountain and the cell tower is at the top of the next mountain over. So in the campground reception has always been great(based on 3 years of experience). Then there is the campground wifi. It’s generally good from Sunday night until Friday afternoon. When the place fills up over the weekend, forget about it.

We have two verizon cell phones and an 8800L hotspot each with an “unlimited” plan capped at 30g. So we have 90g plus the campground wifi to play with. Over the past 3 years I would go around and manually switch over devices when one of the plans maxed out. That is the main problem I’d like to solve.

My thought is to define the 2 cell phones and the campground as wifi wan. The main question is about the 8800L. Should I define that as wifi wan or usb tether it to the Soho Surf MK3. Or, in a perfect world, I could take the sim out of the 8800L and put in the MAX BR1 MK2.

I have some IT experience and I fully understand that the fewer links in the chain the better. That leads me to the BR1. However, I’ve seen on this forum, and in others, that we do not live in a “perfect world”. Especially when it comes to Verizon sim cards.

So two questions:

  • Which am I more likely to get working with the least amount of pain: sim card in the MK2 or tether the MK3?
  • I want to be able to switch easily from wan resource to wan resource. Can I define 4 wan resources ahead of time (and possibly a fifth)? I’m fine with manually switching over as I’d have to turn on the phone’s hotspot if the 8800L (or its sim card) plan maxed out.

Thanks,
Tom

Let me throw an alternative option at you – what I use at my home. Go on ebay and search for “grandfathered unlimited unthrottled verizon sim”
You will find a few people LEASING these accounts. i.e you are paying them, they are paying Verizon. I pay $140 a month for one. I average 550G a month.
Be sure the seller states that is has no cap, or possibly one at 600G or 800G.
Until starlink comes through of course.

If you stay with current plans, and can put the sims directly in the pepwave, then IT can switch over based on usage. i.e. after 30G on A switch to B. After 30G on B turn that off and then it can fail over to wifi as wan

John Scully

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