[chbot] Cellphone reception

[Mark Beckett]

Never seen it, there would have to be a connector for it and it's then a
construction that would never get approval for meeting any radio
regulations. So, no.


Not quite right ... well not at all right.
Some models do have a connector, and you could purchase vehicle antenna's.
It's usually a very small connector sometimes under a cover.
There are some other options and this site has much more 'informed' 
information.
http://www.cellutronics.co.nz/


The phone is hardly likely to exceed the allowable power limits, and 
therefore antenna gain is unlikely to be a factor.
The phones all change their power output depending on the received 
signal strength.

Some phones have a series of characters or more simply
Settings, About and look at Signal Strength.


Volker ... I suggest you might want to try google before hitting reply, 
as false information is worse than none.


Mark


Volker Kuhlmann wrote:
> On Sat 17 Jan 2015 22:41:17 NZDT +1300, Mike Smith wrote:
>
>   
>> Does anybody have experience with cellphone reception in rural areas?
>>     
>
> A little bit. Always a good question to ask *before* buying a phone.
>
>   
>> Are some phones have better reception than others,
>>     
>
> Oh heck yes! Plenty of $1xxx dumbphones have hit the market, including
> from major players like Samsung, that are nifty little pocket computers
> doing everything except slicing bread. Just don't bother trying to use
> them for a phone call... because it's just a piece of electronic phone
> junk before you've even unpacked it. In between getting all the sexy
> stuff to market a good RF design (you'd think that'd be top for a phone,
> wouldn't you?) just didn't make it onto the important features list.
>
> Look at test reports from Consumer etc that include signal sensitivity
> in their tests and have a somewhat acceptable test method for it. Forget
> about online reviews unless it says it's bad, then it's probably ot
> hyped up. These tests are difficult to come by because they are
> expensive, and nobody is able to keep up with phone models. Hearsay is
> usually of no value.
>
>   
>> find much on Google, have been told the the Iphone is better because
>> it has dual antennas
>>     
>
> Dual antennas is still no good if some smartie puts them underneath a
> marketroidal space-grade titanium bla bla metal cover for the thinnest
> phone ever...
>
>   
>> Does anybody use external antennas or anything?
>>     
>
> Never seen it, there would have to be a connector for it and it's then a
> construction that would never get approval for meeting any radio
> regulations. So, no.
>
> If you do any testing yourself you'd have to take the sim card out of
> the first phone and put it into the second one, hoping the phone doesn't
> interfere with carrier selection. If you can't ensure to get the same
> carrier between phone you can't get any useful result about their
> relative sensitivity. You'd probably want some app to tell you some
> signal strength number instead of relying on bars, which is far too
> course. With a dual-sim phone you can test different cards at the same
> time, my 2degrees and vodafone cards frequently give different bars, as
> you'd expect.
>
> HTH,
>
> Volker
>
>