3g inconsistant in my area

[wizdumb]

this might be a stupid question, but why is my only sometimes picking up the 3g signal in my house?

more often than not, i have to balance my phone on the window frame to get a 3g signal, and that sometimes doesn't even work.

i use my w850i as my modem only when it has 3g connection, seeing as dial up is soooooo slow

maybe its the area i live in

 

[kingrob]

maybe its the area i live in

Either that or your phone might be having problems.

 

[Donny31]

Doubt it's your phone. I have the same problem with my N73. Actually mailed Vodacom earlier this morning about the exact same problem. Will let you know what they say.

 

[Syndyre]

Its called cell breathing, as load on a 3G cell increases it effectively contracts to serve a smaller area and then you lose signal.

 

[acidrain]

May be the phone because there's two data cards running in my house (one not being mine which is a novatel) Now the novatel was getting a good 3G signal and lately just crashed.... only getting gprs but my Huawei card is still going strong and the cards are less than 5m apart (having to share my connection now )

Clearly huawei is a better brand

 

[Jonny Two Shoes]

I have seen a 3g symbol on my phone once at home around 3 months ago obviously wasn't worth getting excited about as now theres hardly any normal signal for voice or GPRS, no matter the phone.

 

[Deenem]

Me 2, at work I either get 1-2 bars or 4 bars, yesterday I had 4 bars and actually got the 'theoretical maximum' download speed of 1.8Mb/s.

I was downloading a ~50Mb file and most of the way the download speed was 180KB/s.

Glad to see that theoretical maximum is not so theoretical after all

 

[MBB]

I am at Moddefontein right across the road from the Modderfontein Road 3 tower, I am consistently having 619 problems. I can qoute several reference numbers in this regard, but it still goes on.

 

[Poynting1]

If you have some kind of signal indoors (even very weak) you can normal go to full signal using an external antenna. Just make sure it is one which covers the 3G bands as well (many external antennas were designed for voice only).

There are also laptop external antennas for people on the move - these gives an improvement on typical internal antennas. They have a short cable which plugs into the modem with an antenna which clips to a laptop screen. These are no comparison to the external antennas, which really turn a marginal signal into a blast.

 

[kaspaas]

If you have some kind of signal indoors (even very weak) you can normal go to full signal using an external antenna. Just make sure it is one which covers the 3G bands as well (many external antennas were designed for voice only).

There are also laptop external antennas for people on the move - these gives an improvement on typical internal antennas. They have a short cable which plugs into the modem with an antenna which clips to a laptop screen. These are no comparison to the external antennas, which really turn a marginal signal into a blast.

Welcome to the Poynting rep on the forums!

 

[wizdumb]

for the last week or so, my phone has showed me once to have had 3g signal

if it wasn't so cold, i would put a table outside a few meters from window, so that i can try and have 3g