MDM0. Say hello to my little modem

A couple of weeks ago I bought one of those no-brand LTE modems off of Aliexpress to network my laptop while I’m away from home. After some time in the electronics box curiosity got the better of me and I wanted to see what makes this thing tick and if, maybe, I could figure out why the USB data rates are so slow (125kbit down!! Upstream data rates look as expected).

I saw this modem being sold in two configurations — one with an external antenna plug and, the one I bought, without an external antenna plug and an integrated antenna.

The enclosure doesn’t have that much going on it, there’s a reset button hidden by a lid, a LED and some connection information. The lid seems rather pointless on this model, but it’s probably a re-used plastic mold from an earlier model, as the recess near the reset button looks wide enough to accomodate a SIM card slot.

A really neat thing about this dongle is that the nano-SIM card slot is inside of the USB plug. Cool!

Next we’ll be taking a look at whats inside of this plastic enclosure and if we can make it dance to our tune ;).