Winegard 360+

[BtownTraveler]

We recently purchased an Avalanche 295RK, it has a Winegard 360+ for a TV antenna. In our previous 5th wheel we had a omni directional digital TV antenna and a KingWiFi setup to connect to campground WiFi. I was looking up the Winegard Connect router as a possible replacement for the King. I found wildly varying reviews. Our intent for it is to provide WiFi boosting for campground WiFi and possibly using the cell boost feature as well.

Has anyone used it for those purposes? I'm not interested in the other features it has.
Thanks

[NH_Bulldog]

The 360+ is an omnidirectional radio and tv antenna. To take advantage of wifi or cellular features you need to buy the Winegard gateway which runs about $350. On top of that, you need a data plan for it if you want cellular data service, but with the gateway alone, wifi reception might be okay.

You pay a high price for having everything neat and tidy, with what many describe as an underwhelming experience. If performance is more important, there are better alternatives at a lower cost and things can be kept tidy.

My business gave me a Netgear Nighthawk MiFi hotspot/router and a WeBoost Drive X cellular booster, both of which have external rooftop antennas and the hardware mounted in a cabinet out of sight. It serves me well for what I need it for (working remotely and streaming tv through my Firestick). But you do need a cellular or WiFi signal to be able to boost it.

Lastly, for what it costs for the Winegard integrated system components and ongoing fees, I will probably be getting a Starlink for my next setup when the time comes.

[Jonahex2099]

We've tried the GW1000 router in our rig (Passport GT) w/the connection into the 360 and it was meh at best wrt boosting the campground signal...the cell option didn't work well for us either because we camp in a lot of places that have mediocre cell signal at best. We bit the bullet and got Starlink Roam - worth every cent imo.

[RickV]

I installed the GW1000 router in my ceiling got the sim card for it and a data plan. Every three hours or so I'd have reboot it. After a few days of that I took it down and returned it. Picked up a refurbished Verizon Jetpak and got it activated. Works great. Have thought about about adding a WIFI Booster like NH_Bulldog was talking about but, have yet to b e somewhere the Jetpak didn't get signal. As for Campground WIFI 99% of em don't have the bandwidth for anything more than checking email.

[jxnbbl]

I've had the opposite results with some of the previous posts but got rid of the gateway. I found that the wifi signal was better at campgrounds with the gateway/Winegard combo and when I had to use the cellular it was fine...but too expensive for my use/liking.

If spending the money I would look at the Osprey which is a wifiRanger product bought out by Winegard. This is integrated with the antenna and does work (imo) better. The other feature it does have is allows tethering a cellar device directly into it instead of activating the onboard cellular. I used this with/without (95% of the time without) a weboost cell antenna and my $25/month Visible service for 5 weeks without a hitch.

Worked on the road and streamed programs when the campground internet got bogged down or was not fast enough.

[dutchmensport]

I replaced a Razyor antenna after the 3rd one broke again with a Wingard 360. I did not get for for the wifi, I got it just for the over-the-air television antenna. It has served it's purpose very, very well. As an over-the-air antenna, it works great. It's nice not having to point the antenna in different directions now.

I never bothered dealing with the wifi feature of it though. We already had Visible, a ZTE dedicated phone and a portable router with wifi for the phone to connect multiple devices, and a WeBoost cell phone booster that also works very well with our AT&T phone hot spots.

The initial cost for unlimited wifi was pretty steep, especially for the WeBoost set-up. But now, the only cost is the $40 for Visible. We still use our AT&T phones for everything else. The ZTE phone is strictly dedicated for ONLY wifi.

For us, this was our solution. It's worked well for us.

I've never had starlink, but if you camp in really remote locations, this is going to be your best solution.

[jsb5717]

Personally, I wouldn’t buy the Winegard inside router. We have the 360+ and have used all of the features.

OTA TV - This works about as well as any other omni-directional antenna.
WiFi - it’s just an antenna and still needs to connect to some kind of WiFi booster/router. I connected ours to the KING KWM1000 WiFiMax, which has proved to be a good wifi router. It’s still connected and still works. I connect to it via it’s own WiFi signal and can point it the best available WiFi in the area.
4G - I had this connected to a Verizon Hotspot, running through Xfinity. It worked but was deprioritized enough to make it too slow. I ended up taking that out and bought a used phone that works on Visible. No outdoor antenna but it’s worked reasonably well. I use the King wifi booster to connect to the Visible phone hotspot and it serves well for our connectivity needs. However, since Visible is on Verizon’s network, it only works as well as the signal strength we get for Verizon. No Verizon signal, no wifi.

Bottom line, there are times that we can’t get any OTA TV and/or Cell reception for wifi. At that point if the park we’re in has wifi we’ll suffer with that…some are better than others. We’re retired so don’t have any mission-critical need for connectivity so we will just suck it up until we move to a site that has it. Don’t get me wrong, we enjoy our connectivity and prefer to have it. But if we don’t we watch DVDs and play games until we have it again.