Mobile phone booster for home?

[Another John]

I switched my mobile phone network recently, when I bought a new phone. I switched to the so-far-very-wonderful Giffgaff, which is suiting me just fine. Expect for one teensy thing:

GiffGaff use the O2 network. When at home I can't get a very good signal at all (I was OK with EE). I usually have to go upstairs and stand near a window to get a good enough signal to have a conversation; when people phone me, they often immediately get the GiffGaff "not obtainable: leave a message" line.

I've heard of "mobile phone boosters" which use your router to boost the signal (somehow). I'm just wondering if anyone here is using one of these?

More background: I won't be leaving Giffgaff for the foreseeable: their ?5.00 a month "goody bag" does me fine. Which tells you another thing: I don't use my phone much: it's a useful tool, rather than an intrinsic part of my life.

Also by the way: Giffgaff automatically put me on to G4, as opposed to G3 or G2, if it is available. Don't know if that's a complication that might be screwing the signal??

Cheers John

[philipuk]

I have a Three home signal - which works great. Got all the cell phones in the house registered with it. Not sure that you can get it now as there is an app instead.

Philip

[Martin Brown]

Don't whatever you do buy an external antenna and a passive coupler. The available gain is so marginal as to be useless. I have tried...

They set up a local microcell in your home. Another software variant uses VOIP and an app on the phone but obviously requires wifi enabled to work.

If you are spending £5/month why didn't you haggle with EE before leaving them? They would almost certainly match the deal you left for if you spoke to their retention team. They did for me.

I gave up on O2 after they "optimised" their network post merging by removing all signal from my locality entirely.

[Robert]

The networks "mobile over wifi/internet apps" which sort out the type of issues you have appear to be only available if you have a SIM card direct from the actual network ( ie EE,3,Vodofone,O2). They unfortunately do not appear to be available for virtual networks which piggyback ; like Virgin ( EE).

[Dave Liquorice]

Similar to me, I just have an NFC tag that I wave the phone over when I come in that sets an unconditional divert to the landline. Well it sometimes sets the divert, about 50% of the time I get "not registered on network" as the signal is so bad. Divert costs come out of my inclusive minutes.

A micro/nano/pico cell. Never really caught on, I guess because the vast majority of the population have good indoor coverage, so a rather small market. They produce a low power mobile signal and use your broadband connection to provide the backhaul and connection to the mobile network for authorisation/calls.

More dependant on the phone and what bands it can utilise. I'd expcet a 4G phone to be able to use all the bands avialble so in theory it shouldn't make any difference.

[Ranger]

But because it can use a lot more bands, it may not do as well with a marginal signal on the particular band available there.

[rick]

I have poor Vodafone signal ... but get perfect signal at home, by installing a Vodafone Suresignal device. It works by fooling your phone into thinking there is a nearby base station .. phone switches to it .. and it routes incoming & outgoing calls via my broadband connection.

You can add a large number of users ... as long as they are Vodafone (contract or payg)

You do need a reasonable broadband connection ....... I have only 2Mb but it copes well. For work if I am on a long call I will take email 'offline' as incoming mail, esp if with attachments will kill the audio path.

However for what it is, does the job well.

Neat install .. plugs into a socket ... and plug into router Ethernet port. However it only works on Vodafone network ... other networks have their variant. I got mine on Vodafone deal for £20

[charles]

I've had one of these for 3 years. Works well, but like most "computer" devices it needs re-booting from time to time.

But, it doesn't fool you phone - it provides a micro-cell.

[Bill Wright]

We travel all over the country with an EE phone and an O2 phone and the EE phone works in very many places where the O2 one doesn't, but the converse is not the case.

Bill

[Martin Brown]

Likewise although we found that EE has the best overall coverage in Yorkshire at home the signal is poor and onlye 2G EDGE whereas the coverage on Three is poorer if gives me a much better 3G fast internet connection at home than my ADSL wet string fixed landline.

Data charges sting a little but it is useful especially when as happened this week the bulk milk tanker hit black ice at speed and totalled mains power and phones for the entire village.

We did find one place near Otterburn where O2 won out with no other usable mobile signals detectable at all. They used to be OK here.

[tony sayer]

In article , Ranger scribeth thus

I believe that some phones a Motorola one comes to mind that can use dual SIMS so when one nets down the other one might be usable. Course two sim costs aren't that good;(....

[NY]

And a sizable minority of areas outside large towns have patchy reception even outdoors, never mind inside a house or car. Round here, all the networks have poor reception, an I'm in a village which is 1/4 mile from a trunk A road, three miles from a large market town. I cannot rely on my mobile when I'm out and about to receive calls - many divert to voicemail, even when the signal strength indicator shows that there is some reception. I'm thinking of getting a Vodafone picocell but I'm deterred by the cost of it.

Presumably the two SIMs have two separate phone numbers. So there is a chance that someone will phone you on the number whose SIM is out of range, meaning you miss the call (or it diverts to voicemail). What would be really useful would be to have two SIMs on different networks which share a single number, so an incoming call uses whichever network has reception.

[Muddymike]

In article , Ranger

My iPhone on EE automatically routes incoming and outgoing calls over wi-fi when the phone is connected to wi-fi but has no 3G signal

Mike

[Mark]

You could do with a Femtocell. But I don't think these are available for O2/GG :-(

(Me too)

[Martin Brown]

It is unusual for it to be quite so bad. Unless local topology plays a big part and you are in a deep valley or over the crest of a hill.

Usually even in remote areas of North Yorkshire one network has decent coverage although it may only be 2G. Usually round here it is typically EE or sometimes Three and further up near the borders O2.

Take all coverage map claims with a big pinch of salt.

Even though it is hopelessly out of date the Ofcom map is a useful guide to your nearest base station.

Point is it allows you to make calls without lugging two phones around. My previous Moto G had dual SIM until it bricked itself. The newer 4G one doesn't unless you buy the physically larger model.