Rain Table Mountain coverage

[PaulB_]

Hi all..

I was pleasantly surprised to find zero Rain coverage on the top of Table Mountain. The lower cable station, I am able to get signal, but from the upper cable station there is nothing.

One would expect Table Mountain being a tourist area, with people sending photos/videos etc that the top of table mountain should be covered, or at least the parts which is occupied by the most people. I was able to get signal with Vodacom in most places which I walked, but not with Rain, or maybe I am expecting too much, and as Table mountain is high up, why isn't able to pick up reception from the towers on the ground, as it most likely is a direct line of sight to the top of Table Mountain, and there are no obstructions.

Thanks

 

[jbroo]

Since rain is not a voice line operator, it doesn't seem like a good ROI to put infrastructure to cover the top of a mountain only for internet, keeping in mind their package offerings are not billed per MB/GB. At least Vodacom et al can recoup costs with calls and/or data billing?

I dunno. This seems like a frivolous complaint to me. You would not have rain as your primary network on your phone (no GSM) so it would probably be a secondary SIM. Send your pics when you have coverage? Or like, use a few rands and send/receive with your main provider. Not like you live up there...

 

[Gordon_R]

It's probably more to do with physics than target market. Antennas are optimised to broadcast and receive in the horizontal plane (not omnidirectional), since signals pointed upwards are wasted, and those pointed downwards will cause unwanted reflections. The top of Table Mountain is simply outside of the signal plane, while the bottom is in a direct line.

Ping @Geoff.D