Phone & internet boosters

[Guest]

Must apologise, im sure this has been done BUT i cant revive anywhere. We are trying to find a decent not too expensive internet and phone reception booster to use onboard, we use 3 and it will only work here, Hinckley when the phone is up against a window, any suggestions welcome, other half uses 02 with no problems. Cheers

[mrsmelly]

1 hour ago, oats said:

Must apologise, im sure this has been done BUT i cant revive anywhere. We are trying to find a decent not too expensive internet and phone reception booster to use onboard, we use 3 and it will only work here, Hinckley when the phone is up against a window, any suggestions welcome, other half uses 02 with no problems. Cheers

I used to have 3 but also now have o2 there is a reason 3 is the cheapest.

[Richard10002]

1 hour ago, oats said:

......... other half uses 02 with no problems. Cheers

O2 then ??

Joking aside, it tends to be horses for courses. Three have a fairly good reputation on the canal network, but there will always be areas where any individual network wont work. In Heckington in Lincolnshire, (where there are no canals), the only network that gets a signal of any kind is Vodafone but, unless I lived or worked in Heckington, I wouldnt use Vodafone if you paid me.

EE also have a good reputation network wide, but there will be some areas where they dont work.

As to a booster... it's difficult with a phone as , by its' very nature, it's mobile, so difficult to connect a wire and an external aerial to it. Many of us have a separate data sim, which is inserted into a Mifi gizmo, some of which have connections for an external aerial, (I have a Netgear Mifi, but Huawei are perhaps more popular).

I used EE for data up to a couple of months ago, (£30 a month for 50Gb a month), but now use Three, as I get 100Gb a month for my £30. The signal on my Mifi shows 3 bars inside the boat with no aerial connected. This increases to to the max of 4 bars when I connect the aerial. I use a MIMO aerial which cost £77 from Solwise, but there are offerings on ebay for ten to twenty pounds or so. Whether they work or not, depends on which reviews you read.

I think I've heard of phone signal boosters, where you have an external aerial, and a repeater inside the boat that distributes the signal... but I also think I read that they are illegal, but cant recall why.

[nb Innisfree]

15 minutes ago, Richard10002 said:

O2 then ??

Joking aside, it tends to be horses for courses. Three have a fairly good reputation on the canal network, but there will always be areas where any individual network wont work. In Heckington in Lincolnshire, (where there are no canals), the only network that gets a signal of any kind is Vodafone but, unless I lived or worked in Heckington, I wouldnt use Vodafone if you paid me.

EE also have a good reputation network wide, but there will be some areas where they dont work.

As to a booster... it's difficult with a phone as , by its' very nature, it's mobile, so difficult to connect a wire and an external aerial to it. Many of us have a separate data sim, which is inserted into a Mifi gizmo, some of which have connections for an external aerial, (I have a Netgear Mifi, but Huawei are perhaps more popular).

I used EE for data up to a couple of months ago, (£30 a month for 50Gb a month), but now use Three, as I get 100Gb a month for my £30. The signal on my Mifi shows 3 bars inside the boat with no aerial connected. This increases to to the max of 4 bars when I connect the aerial. I use a MIMO aerial which cost £77 from Solwise, but there are offerings on ebay for ten to twenty pounds or so. Whether they work or not, depends on which reviews you read.

I think I've heard of phone signal boosters, where you have an external aerial, and a repeater inside the boat that distributes the signal... but I also think I read that they are illegal, but cant recall why.

Only network providers can legally transmit on the mobile network frequency so a repeater to be legal must be provided by them but it seems they are reluctant to do so.  I would think private low powered repeaters though illegal are unlikely to attract the attention of the providers if they don't interfere with anyone. 

[Sea Dog]

I must just be a lucky kind of guy in the Radio Frequency spectrum, cos I just use my (3) mobile phone and rarely have a problem with reception. If the signal isn't up to snuff, I use one of those car windscreen mounts with a  sucker to stick the thing in the window.  I use it to watch the odd catch up TV prog, to stream radio, as a WiFi hotspot or with Xperia link to my tablet.  If there's ever an odd day when this doesn't work,  my life seems to continue.  I know a MiFi wotsit might be a boon for those who need an Internet umbilical for work reasons, but otherwise...?

[MtB]

How do you make a phone call with it stuck to the window?? 

[rusty69]

Bluetooth possibly 

[john6767]

1 minute ago, Mike the Boilerman said:

How do you make a phone call with it stuck to the window?? 

You know the answer to that, Bluetooth headset, but who makes phone calls though.

[MtB]

25 minutes ago, john6767 said:

You know the answer to that, Bluetooth headset, but who makes phone calls though.

 

That nice Mr Athy makes phone calls apparently. Although I grant you he uses the GPO telephone on the telephone table in his hallway, I suspect...

[BWM]

I have found Giffgaff to be good in most areas, they use all the above networks, 02, EE and 3.

[Sea Dog]

2 hours ago, Mike the Boilerman said:

How do you make a phone call with it stuck to the window?? 

Unusually for a bloke, I read the instructions so I know how to get the phone back out of the holder!  

(obviously I'm good at reading Chinglish)

[Guest]

2 hours ago, Mike the Boilerman said:

How do you make a phone call with it stuck to the window?? 

You have to get up out of a chair and talk into the phone without moving the phone, surely thats not difficult to understand, 

[Sanddancer]

1 hour ago, BWM said:

I have found Giffgaff to be good in most areas, they use all the above networks, 02, EE and 3.

I thought they only used O2

 

[rgreg]

2 hours ago, Sea Dog said:

I must just be a lucky kind of guy in the Radio Frequency spectrum, cos I just use my (3) mobile phone and rarely have a problem with reception. If the signal isn't up to snuff, I use one of those car windscreen mounts with a  sucker to stick the thing in the window.  I use it to watch the odd catch up TV prog, to stream radio, as a WiFi hotspot or with Xperia link to my tablet.  If there's ever an odd day when this doesn't work,  my life seems to continue.  I know a MiFi wotsit might be a boon for those who need an Internet umbilical for work reasons, but otherwise...?

I also use my 3 phone / hotspot for all my internet requirements. I've travelled extensively throughout the network and rarely haven't had an adequate signal. Like you, I find that hanging the phone in the window normally is enough in weaker signal spots (I use one of those trouser hangers to clip the phone to).

[BWM]

2 hours ago, Sanddancer said:

I thought they only used O2

 

You're right, I don't know where I got that information from but it's not correct, thanks for flagging my error. I'm still very impressed with the coverage, it often performs better than the two other phones on the boat-one on 02, the other on EE.

[Richard10002]

4 hours ago, BWM said:

I have found Giffgaff to be good in most areas, they use all the above networks, 02, EE and 3.

I think they only use O2. I used to use GiffGaff, but found an area I go a lot with work had a poor/nil signal. Switched to Plusnet which uses the EE network and its a bit better, (but not much  )

6 hours ago, Sea Dog said:

I know a MiFi wotsit might be a boon for those who need an Internet umbilical for work reasons, but otherwise...?

I pay for a data sim and put it in a mifi because I want lots of data, for streaming TV mainly - netflix, Amazon Prime, Virgin Go, (or whatever its called). Phone sims dont tend to allow more than 15-30Gb at most.