LTE band selection on nRF9151

[Artnia]

Hi,

I have a question related to connection quality in LTE with nRF9151: How to achieve best connection? The devices will be deployed in different locations and in best case every device shall use its optimal band. I read optimizing-lte-connectivity-on-nrf9160-dk-band-selection-antenna-considerations-and-tower-switching but I'm still not sure.

What I currently do is: read and set bands with xcband and xbandlock. Then rsrp and snr can be measured per band and the best one can be selected. Currently 17 bands are reported, but only 3/8/20 seems to have connection. This procedure take a lot of time.


 

XCBAND -> (1,2,3,4,5,8,12,13,18,19,20,25,26,28,66,85,106)

Is this the way to go? What does the modem do if band is not set manually? It seems that of the three available bands (3,8,20) band 3 is chosen all the time if nothing is done manually.

Best

[Benjamin]

Hi,

There is no need to lock to a a single band. The modem handles band selection automatically using advanced algorithms. When moving to a new location, it will typically start by scanning the band it used last time it was operational, then use its algorithms to determine which band to scan next.

However, if you know the device will only operate in certain regions, you can restrict bands to match local carriers. This may reduce scan time and power consumption.

Best regards,
Benjamin