I had purchased a cellular eWon for customers that do not allow connections through their network, and used it successfully at the first customer’s site. I then had them ship the eWon to another customer to do the same remote diagnosis, but now I cannot get the eWon to go online. I’m not really sure where I should go from here.
Any ideas?
Hi MacSnoogins,
There are a few things you can check. The Ewon should have some LEDs next to the antenna giving a rough indication of the signal strength and connection status. For a more precise measure of signal strength, you could have a customer on-site download eBuddy and connect to the Cosy’s web interface. In the menu Diagnostic → Files Transfer → estat.htm under the name GsmSignal, there will be a value representing signal strength from 0 to 31, which 18 being the recommended minimum for a stable connection. Also using eBuddy, someone on-site can capture a backup with support files for us to analyze. They can do this by selecting the device in eBuddy, clicking backup/restore, and making sure to check “include support files” before clicking through the rest of the dialogs.
For actual troubleshooting, I would recommend checking the physical connections of the cellular equipment. Remove and reinsert the SIM card to make sure it’s installed correctly. If the Ewon is a Flexy with an extension card containing the modem, you can also remove and reinsert the extension card itself. Additionally, it would be worthwhile to check on how the device is positioned. Is it installed inside a metal cabinet? Is it near the bottom of a large building? These sorts of factors might reduce cell signal enough to keep it from connecting altogether. It would also be worthwhile to check on the coverage of the carrier you’re using in the new customer’s location.
For further assistance, I would recommend capturing a support backup as described above so that we can take a look at its logs and configuration.
Best regards,
Hugh
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Please see above, Sir.
The funny part about the GsmSignal is that you said it is a 0-31 signal, but this one was reading 99! I have not had him mess with the eWon physically yet, I was hoping that the backup would reveal something. You can’t always trust these maintenance guys to handle these units correctly, so it will be my last resort to reseat the card/antenna.
Hi MacSnoogins,
A signal of 99 indicates that there is an error of some kind preventing the modem from reporting signal information. In this case, it looks like there are a large number of “GSM network not found” errors in the logs. How is the device installed? Do you know much about the carrier’s reception in the area? It looks like for some reason, like a metal enclosure blocking signals or just very poor cell coverage in the area, the Ewon isn’t able to reach the carrier’s network.
Best regards,
Hugh
The device is installed on a backplane in a cabinet (that has the door open if that matters). AT&T has excellent coverage in that area, at least from their data map. He’s talking to me on his cell phone while we work, so it must have decent signal.
I could possibly have him pull it further out of the cabinet if you think that would help.
Are you not worried about anything internal to the eWon? Settings or otherwise?
It sounds like the device was configured properly and functional at the first site, and only began to have issues when it was set up at the second site. So my thinking was that it was likely an issue with location. From what I can tell, most of the modem settings are still at their default values, and those that aren’t are reasonable and shouldn’t cause problems. I’m also not seeing any errors that point to problems with configuration - it really just looks like the device can’t see the network.
Being installed a cabinet can certainly cause problems with reception, and I suspect that might be the case here. If he can pull it further out of the cabinet, or ideally remove it outright (if only for a short period of time to see if it can connect), I’d be curious to see the result. If it’s necessary for it to be installed within a cabinet, we have a cabled antenna available which will allow you to place the antenna somewhere more suitable and run the connection back to the Flexy. Order code: FAC90901_0100