Cell phone repeater

[texbaylea]

I have been given a cell phone repeater for my birthday. The manufacturer calls it a range extender. I am going to need some help in installing so that will wait until the family is here for Thanksgiving.

My question: Has any body used one of these and what was your experience? We are in a marginal signal area - some time operating is no problem other times forget it. Even T-Mobiles signal map says forget it. But it really wouldn't take much improvement for us to have reliable cell phone service.

Comments?

Vernon

 

[dooleysm]

We have them at work to get cell phone signals inside the buildings. I don't believe the repeater will help you unless you have good reception at the location where you place the receiver. They work great for us at work though. No reception at all inside the steel framed buildings without them, but perfect signal with them. If you go outside away from the building though, you have great signal.

 

[mikim]

Comments?
I'll be real curious how you come out with it. I plan on putting one on a tower at my place. Antenna on the tower - repeater inside. When I was having the well dug - the drillers phone would ring but he had to scramble up the rig to get reception - he had 1 bar or none on the ground - but up 20 - 30 feet and he had 3-4. I normally get nuttin' til I'm out on the road driving away - then I'll get 3 bars. So I may be in an area very similar to your stituation.

 

[Spark_man]

I've installed 2 at work to bring signal into the building. You need to find out where the closest cell tower is to your location. Most cell phone repeater manufacturers offer a Yagi (directional) antenna which I have seen work well up to about 5 miles.

Check out Digital Antenna Marine & Cellular Antennas Cell Phone Signal Amplifiers Repeaters Boosters Accessories XM Satellite for Boat RV Car Truck Home Office

 

[texbaylea]

I've installed 2 at work to bring signal into the building. You need to find out where the closest cell tower is to your location. Most cell phone repeater manufacturers offer a Yagi (directional) antenna which I have seen work well up to about 5 miles.

Check out Digital Antenna Marine & Cellular Antennas Cell Phone Signal Amplifiers Repeaters Boosters Accessories XM Satellite for Boat RV Car Truck Home Office

The closest tower in right at 5 miles. The manufacturer does not offer a yagi on its site. Wi-Ex -- Cell Phone Signal Booster Systems Extend your Cell Zones™ for your Home, Office, and Auto They do offer a higher gain "panel" external antenna if I am reading the words correctly.

I am going to try doing what I can with the co-linear antenna they provide and wait for Thanksgiving to put an antenna up with the TV antenna.

Vernon

 

[texbaylea]

Mike

I will keep you posted on how I set this up. My knees are bad enough that I won't be climbing a ladder any time soon so I will start with an attic installation. That I can manage.

Vernon

 

[goaliedad]

no first hand experience- but worked in cellular and two way radio and related fields for some time- I think you will find that having the repeater with a vehicle mounted antenna will be a big help. Even if the repeater does not boost the power to more than .6 watts ( that of a hand held I believe ) the extra umph from a good antenna should be noticable. We had a lot of customers that used hand helds with a simple mag mount stick that loved them. Then we "upgraded" our system to a new and improved digital format-the new phones did not have the antenna connections- long story short- lots of very upset customers.

 

[texbaylea]

goaliedad

Not having an antenna connector is what got me into this repeater approach.

Vernon

 

[Spark_man]

The regular antenna that came with your unit might work OK for you if you can get it up high enough.

Even if the company that you got the repeater from doesn't sell a Yagi, you can probably purchase one from another distributor that would work with your set up.

Digital Antenna sells Yagi's (they specialize in antennas) and there tech support folks are pretty easy to talk to when you can get ahold of one.

If the standard antenna doesn't work for you, I'd try a Yagi.

Good luck!

 

[texbaylea]

I plan on going with an external antenna eventually, around Thanksgiving, but the best location is over on my shop building which has a clear view toward the tower. There are a bunch of hardwood trees right behind the house and in wet weather they even degrade the TV signal.

The problem is that the cable run from the unit to the building and up 30-40' on a bracketed tower will approaching 200'. This unit specifies no more than a 60' run. Do you have a suggestion for a booster/amplifier usable for the 1900MHz band.

Thanks
Vernon