3g parabolic dish

[RobertBosch]

Just wondering if anybody knowledgable has an idea whether it is possible to use a parabolic dish (or edge/corner type dish) to increase the gain of the 3g data cards.
I have a novatel u630 and am trying this out when my external PCMCIA adapter from Elan arrives. The 3g card is horizontally polarized (i think - since the patch antenna and pigtail are so aligned) and will try this out. I am a non-practicing radio ham and the frequencies of these allow simple dishes to be used (2.4 GHz range).

 

[ajax]

Hi RobertBosch!

Welcome to the forum!

This sounds like an interesting test. AFAIK, polarisation diversity is used on all GSM systems, so it does not matter what polarisation you use.

Keep us posted!

 

[arf9999]

Just wondering if anybody knowledgable has an idea whether it is possible to use a parabolic dish (or edge/corner type dish) to increase the gain of the 3g data cards.
I have a novatel u630 and am trying this out when my external PCMCIA adapter from Elan arrives. The 3g card is horizontally polarized (i think - since the patch antenna and pigtail are so aligned) and will try this out. I am a non-practicing radio ham and the frequencies of these allow simple dishes to be used (2.4 GHz range).

Hi RB.

Sentech's MyWireless which uses a 3G UMTS system works exceptionally well with a dish antenna. I'm not sure of the frequencies of Vodacom's 3G tho'. In the case of Sentech MyWi, the 2.5GHz frequencies allowed for the use of off-the-shelf 802.11 antennae.

If you search the forums, there is quite a bit of discussion on this.

-A

 

[RobertBosch]

Thanks - will keep you posted. Will do some gain calculations and measurements etc.