Cellular Battery Powered Device Upload Timeouts

To provide finer control of upload power use for battery powered devices, 3 settings are exposed in the System Parameters:

1. Network registration timeout (seconds): the maximum time allowed to register on a network. Home or roaming registrations are counted as successful registrations. The default value is 180 seconds - optimised for NB-IoT
2. Upload timeout (seconds): the maximum time allowed to complete the upload. The default value is 420 seconds - optimised for NB-IoT.
3. Max connection attempts: the maximum number of connection attempts allowed per session. The default value is 0, which disables the connection limit.

Registration Strategy: sets the registration strategy (Auto, Balanced, Low Power, Ultra Low Power). Lower power modes will give up faster in weak signal conditions. This provides the ability to detect early when the device is out of coverage, and quit the upload early, which will provide savings in battery life. The Yabby Edge is Balanced by default while the others are set to Auto.

• Auto - The device recognizes if the SIM being used is a roaming SIM or home network SIM. If it is a roaming SIM it sets the strategy to Balanced. If it is a home network SIM it will set it to Low Power.
• Balanced - The device will scan all bands continuously until it registers, or the network registration timeout has expired.
• Low Power - The device will scan all bands enabled and gives up after one scan through the bands if no connection is made. This mode works best when there are fewer bands enabled. For example, with the bands limited to Telstra CAT-M1 and NB-IoT bands, this timeout triggers after 40 seconds which is 5x shorter than the default 180 seconds. With all bands enabled this generally takes 2 minutes so there is only a marginal power saving. 
• Ultra Low Power - The device scans for bands that the device used when it last connected. The device will remember the bands and look for the same network. If it cannot connect on that network, it will give up. This process is typically done within 5 – 10 seconds.  

When using a roaming SIM, it should be set to either Auto or Balanced. Home network SIM cards, and devices that do not move between regions/countries, the Ultra Low Power, or Low Power settings should be used. It is worth trying the Ultra Low Power setting if you use a home network SIM (i.e. Telstra). Monitor the device, if uploads begin failing, you can move back to Low Power, and then Balance if required.

NB-IoT Settings

The default parameters are optimised for the slower download speeds of NB-IoT, specifically allowing the device to complete a firmware download which can take up to 6 minutes. Potentially you can decrease these settings, and only increase them if and when you would like to update the firmware. If that is the case, then you can lower these timeouts. Please read the warning below before doing so.

2G/3G/Cat M-1 Settings

If you are not using NB-IoT, then these are the suggested settings:

1. Network registration timeout (seconds): the maximum time allowed to register on a network. Suggested starting value is 0 which disables this timeout.
2. Upload timeout (seconds): the maximum time allowed to complete the upload. Suggested starting value is 180 seconds.
3. Max connection attempts: the maximum number of connection attempts allowed per session. The default value is 0, which disables the connection limit.

To establish the network conditions, monitor a device with GSM Debugging set to Info. This will give an idea of the time requirements. This may not represent the conditions everywhere, so be cautious. Bear in mind that devices connect much faster when already in coverage, than when entering coverage for the first time. The initial startup connection will ignore these timeouts. The worst case for unusually low settings is a reset after 3 days. After the reset, an upload with a 10 minute timeout will be done. Thereafter, the upload settings above will apply.