Cell phone boosters and antennaes

[tool]

I did a search on the subject and found some threads that are a few years old, I know this technology changes quickly so I thought I'd start a new thread.

At my rural Saskatchewan property I have spotty cell signal at best, leaving it difficult to impossible to make calls or use the internet (cell is my only source of internet)

Because I have a spotty signal I believe a booster would benefit me, what is an easy to setup and affordable system to help with this problem?

I see a wide variety of products and price points on the market.

[Dean2]

Like you said, tech in this area changes rapidly, and so does what is needed for 4G vs 5G etc, along with data speed required. Best bet, phone your cell phone provider and get them to tell you what booster, Dish or antenna etc works best with their gear, the data type you have and the Baud rate you are trying to hit. When I needed a booster, Telus provided the gear and install free and it really cleaned up the cell service.

[tool]

This is always the problem on public boards when some Jackalope emotes their opinion to ask someone else for help, it makes people who have experience and knowledge on the subject afraid to reply or offer advice.


The carrier is Telus, they are little help to me because there are no Telus stores in rural Saskatchewan, best you could ever find is a mall kiosk in a major centre. I have contacted Telus many times over the course of many weeks and they have nothing to offer other than telling me to continuously reset my carrier data settings which I have several times and it does nothing.

The only products that a carrier is going to offer you are the ones that they sell and the ones they have in stock.

Being as this is an "outdoorsmen forum" I know there are many people who use the technology available to amplify or improve their cellular signals to get better voice calls and data transmission.

At my rural property I have a cell signal but it is weak and hit or miss for both calls and data transmission. I know that amplification from cell boosters will benefit me.

For those that have been in the same position, I'd love to hear what has worked for you, where you got it and what you did to improve the data transfer.

Sasktel has a booster that they cell for about $650 and works with LTE and 5G signals. I forget the name of it, I will check and report back.

Thanks for your help.

[WV911]

I had a Surecall Fusionhome 3 booster.

When we first moved here we had very weak signal that was always dropping my wife's calls and it improved it.

There is a new tower closer to us now so I don't use it.

I think there still needs to be some amount of line of sight to a tower for a booster to work but I am not sure of that.

[TheFall]

I have a portable weBoost Overland unit in my truck.
I do use it in my house on occasion as well.

It works extremely well, with the caveat that there still needs to be service available for it to boost. That part of the equation can be a little difficult to sort out as I have noticed there are a ton of places that my phone will have no bars and no service before flipping on the booster. Once the booster is on I can get up to full bars in places where I could not make a call or send a text without the booster. This works will all available bands in my area and the phone automatically takes whichever band is the strongest (LTE vs 4G vs 5G, ext)

Places where there is truly no service, there will be no service to boost so the booster will not make a difference. With the non-mobile versions, it is possible to create service in a dead zone if the antenna is high enough (or far enough away to reduce the obstacles blocking the signal) to receive a signal that you may not have access to on the ground. This is largely a line of sight equation, more plays into it than that but rule of thumb is the signal can only go through so much before it is too weak to work so you need to be "Line of Sight" from a tower for the booster to work.

In my experience, just working with the mobile versions, it is well worth the money. I have next to no dropped calls now unless I am in an area that does not have service to begin with and it has really reduced the distance that I have to drive to find service when I need to make a call. It works fairly well in my house as well, provided that my phone is close to the inside antenna and that I have replicated the conditions in a vehicle (antennas needs to be separated adequately). I use telus and I have a pixel 6 pro phone, my wife has a newer iPhone on Rogers and it also works just as well as my phone.

Provider should not matter for cell phone boosters, if there is a cellular signal available, the booster will boost it.

[DoePolicyAnalyst]

One alternative to consider is Starlink internet.

We had used a Telus internet hub and cell service on our acreage, which worked well for quite a while until changes (coincidentally or not) over to 5G tanked our signal for both. We have since switched over to Starlink and use Wi-Fi calling on our cell phones, which has been a game changer. Better internet and great call quality without having to mess around with cell boosters or constant resetting of our internet hub.

Only downside is that it is more expensive than the Telus hub was, but well worth it for the better internet, in my opinion.

[1hogfarmer]

Another vote for starlink here. “Wifi Internet Calling” is a complete game-changer for the farm here.

[Au revoir, Gopher]

If you were closer, I could give you a heck of a deal on a SolidRF unit that is surplus to requirements. We used it for a year a the old place, but the new place has decent cell coverage.

The old place was right at the fringe of coverage; there were a few places in the yard where you could get a signal and in the house (with metal siding) you could only get a signal if you stood by a window... and not always then.

Installed the antenna on a 15 foot pole (not tall enough to clear the trees), made sure it was far enough away from the booster itself, and pointed it towards the cell towers. Made a huge difference in the house (less so in the yard because the booster was inside the house). Wife was with Fido and I was with Koodo, both worked fine. The one thing a booster can't fix is overloaded cell towers. There were still time when you would have a strong signal, but couldn't make a call because the tower had no capacity.

ARG

[campingnut]

i have the weboost unit in my truck, it comes with a cradle so only 1 phone at a time but they have a model that will do the whole vehicle. It works great and there around 300, if your looking for a area of coverage similar to wifi, starlink is the best by far option but its pricy

[tool]

Yeah Starlink sounds like a good option, works well from what I hear.

I do think it's about $140/month plus the equipment though isn't it?

$1,764/ a year plus the equipment cost is a fair bit but maybe the way I need to go.

I'm certain a good booster would fix my issue at hand, there is cell signal it's just poor.

It would be an advantage to have full time internet on site though, could have surveilance cameras and that kind of thing.

[edmsmith]

We went the route of star link instead of boosters. Are you out at the cabin full time? You could maybe pause your star link subscription for the months you won't need it?

[1hogfarmer]

Easy to take the starlink home with you too if that’s a decision you’d like as well.

Ya you can pause your subscription from the app

[Tannerdog]

I have the "Wilson" cell boosters. A small one (12v) that I take out camping and it turns one bar with dropped calls to full bars and good internet service. Only down side is you need to be fairly close to the boost antenna. The larger "office" model (110V) works the same and with a bit more range.

[tool]

Interesting Tannerdog, I don’t suppose you have a link to the model you are using?

[fordtruckin]

Originally Posted by DoePolicyAnalyst

One alternative to consider is Starlink internet.

We had used a Telus internet hub and cell service on our acreage, which worked well for quite a while until changes (coincidentally or not) over to 5G tanked our signal for both. We have since switched over to Starlink and use Wi-Fi calling on our cell phones, which has been a game changer. Better internet and great call quality without having to mess around with cell boosters or constant resetting of our internet hub.

Only downside is that it is more expensive than the Telus hub was, but well worth it for the better internet, in my opinion.

Thats what I was gunna suggest. Do you have an iPhone? You can do the WiFi calling on iPhones. Probably can with others as well I’m just not familiar with others.

[Tannerdog]

Originally Posted by tool

Interesting Tannerdog, I don’t suppose you have a link to the model you are using?

The models have change a lot since I bought mine, which was about 10 years ago. Assume new models are better?? Don't know but this is their website with a lot of options, not as cheap as I remember, but they do work.

https://wilsonamplifiers.ca/home/

[dodgeboy1979]

Wilson switched to weBoost a few years ago and I have found the quality of their products terrible. I go now with Sure Call boosters for my work truck.

[tool]

So available locally in SK I can get a Surecall Fusion 2G05G for $699.95


Telus offered me a weBoost home room signal kit for $650 or a weBoost Multiroom booster kit for $800

[Tungsten,]

Funny,it says Signal boosters work best when the signal outside your home is strong.

So your SOL if you dont get a decent signal to begin with.

[tool]

Originally Posted by Tungsten,

Funny,it says Signal boosters work best when the signal outside your home is strong.

So your SOL if you dont get a decent signal to begin with.

Yeah totally, I think it would likely be ok in my situation because there is a spotty signal, if that spotty signal was boosted I'd assume it would work.

[JB_AOL]

Originally Posted by fordtruckin

Thats what I was gunna suggest. Do you have an iPhone? You can do the WiFi calling on iPhones. Probably can with others as well I’m just not familiar with others.

Wifi calling is provider dependent (ie Telus/Rogers/etc), not phone (well as long as your phone isn't 10yo) dependant. And yes wifi calling + starlink is the way.

Cell towers only have a certain amount of "capacity", and if u are further from the tower when new tower users come into range, you can/will get dropped. This is no diff with boosters, although less regularly.

[MountainTi]

Originally Posted by dodgeboy1979

Wilson switched to weBoost a few years ago and I have found the quality of their products terrible. I go now with Sure Call boosters for my work truck.

That's too bad to hear that. I've always had wilson boosters in my trucks and they work well. Last one I bought is 8ish years ago and still works pretty good in fringe areas

[TBark]

I likely have the same one as Tanner, Wilson 12v, palm size.
Turns 1 bar into 3-4.
And ya, you gotta be right on it, or beside it.

TBark

[A207X2]

I'm in the telecommunications industry. I've been working with RF for nearly 50 years.

I'm sorry for this long answer. The very short version is that there's no such thing as a cell phone "booster".

You are dealing with the RF equivalent of the Laws of Physics. Forget for the moment about boosters, etc. Radio waves all work the same way. The transmitter puts out a certain amount of signal/power. It is sent out in a certain polarity (i.e. vertical or horizontal). It can get sent out omni-directionally or directionally. In the case of cell phone towers they will have multiple antennas pointing in different directions. A directional antenna will send a signal further than an omnidirectional (there are exceptions but for this discussion it will hold true).

So the phone company sends out its signal from the cell phone towers. No real magic here. It's the RECEIVING end where the magic is made. Radio receivers have circuitry built into them that helps clean up the signal. The cleaner the signal, the better the reception, and thus better voice, video, and data. Receiving antennas play a significant role in improving reception. People get their PhDs in antenna design! That's how important a role they play.

Electronic noise also plays a key role. The quieter the radio environment the better the signal can be received. So if you build a quiet radio, with great discrimination circuitry, and use a directional antenna, with the correct polarity, that radio will receive your signal and process it much better than a radio that isn't built as well. There's not a lot more that you can do.

Taking that same discussion to a cell phone, a manufacturer has to build all that into a phone and price it where it can sell, so again not a lot more that you can do.

So the short version is that you can't change the transmitter power, and with the exception of changing your mobile phone antenna (which won't make it very "mobile"), you've very little to help the situation.

The "boosters" are snake oil. What exactly are they boosting? Not the cell phone towers power. The only thing they're doing is possibly amplifying the received signal. The problem with that is that they're also amplifying the NOISE. Where exactly in the radio receiver circuitry are they "boosting" your signal? Short of cracking open the phone and redesigning the receiving circuity it's not going to do any good.

That's the long version.

Wi-Fi Calling plans with your carrier over Starlink if you're really out of cell phone coverage. Make sure your phone also supports Wi-Fi Calling.