Cell C says MF668 drivers for Mac are faulty

[MX-JRDN]

My wife is having a problem staying connected when using her MacBook Air and the MF668 speedstick.
She has 4 bars of HSPA + signal but the connection rarely stays up beyond 30 seconds.
After phoning Cell C support they told her that this particular speedstick has a driver issue when using it on a Mac.

Ok, so now what?

 

[Viva]

Have you tried using the speedstick on a different (Windows) computer? Do this to determine whether it's a driver problem with the Mac or a network issue. If it's a network issue, report it here.

 

[GreGorGy]

Mmmmmmm - there is of course a possibility that another driver might fix this issue. So, how brave are you? If you are up to the task, you could try installing unbranded ZTE drivers from within the package of other software. I'll quickly lookup how to do this and report back.

 

[GreGorGy]

(1) Download Launch2Net from here.
(2) Mount the downloaded disk image (if it has not happened automatically)
(3) Summons up some courage and right-click on Install launch2net Premium to produce the contextual menu.
(4) Select Show package contents
(5) Navigate to Contents » Resources
(6) COPY archive.zip to the desktop
(7) Close all those contents folders and even eject disk image if you want
(8) Double-click archive.zip on the desktop to expand it.
(9) In a new Finder window, navigate to Macintosh HD:System:Library:Extensions
(10) Copy the two ZTE .kext (ZTEUSBCDCACMData.kext and ZTEUSBMassStorageFilter.kext)files from the archive folder to the Macintosh HD:System:Library:Extensions. If the Finder prompts you to replace then rather cancel, copy the old items out of the extensions folder and then replace with these new ones from the archive folder.
(11) Restart for good measure

Report back if this helps. L2N often has the most up-to-date drivers as part of its software bundle.

 

[MX-JRDN]

Viva: Yes I've used the speedstick on my own MacBook Pro at a different location and it worked fine for me. My wife has also now gone and tested it on her MacBook Air at a different location and it has also worked without problem. I think it's therefore safe to assume that neither the Speedstick nor the drivers are faulty, and it must be a tower related issue. Thanks for providing the link, we will now report the issue to Cell C.

GreGorGy: I'm intrigued by these unbranded ZTE drivers you have so kindly posted the details for. Unfortunately this process is going to be a bit difficult for my wife to handle (she's in JHB, I'm in CPT - Else I would do it for her). I will however file this away for later use and report back should I have the opportunity to use these instructions. Many thanks for your efforts though, I think this is definitely going to come in handy at some point.

Cheers, Max

 

[GreGorGy]

Viva: Yes I've used the speedstick on my own MacBook Pro at a different location and it worked fine for me. My wife has also now gone and tested it on her MacBook Air at a different location and it has also worked without problem. I think it's therefore safe to assume that neither the Speedstick nor the drivers are faulty, and it must be a tower related issue.

No problem - at least if someone else comes looking, they may find it useful. Now, back to these towers...If she downloads latest mAcme, it will tell her all the details for identifying the tower, which can also help. The statistics tab MIGHT tell her how often it changes towers, which can also be indicative of problems. I say "might" because I have not fully tested this part on ZTE modems as my ZTE is in my office and I am far from it at the moment.

 

[MX-JRDN]

Thanks GeGorGy, will see if she is up to installing mAcme then. Appreciate the help.