VanguardLH <
V@nguard.LH> wrote
The bars on your phone for signal strength are extremely inaccurate.
Plus, there is no standard on how much signal strength each bar
represents.
I love that people like Vanguard try to help others like The Real Bev.
Vanguard is correct that for cellular and Wi-Fi signal strength, what
people use that is "reasonably accurate are the decibels (aka "dBm").
To help others, here's an example of my Wi-Fi signal strength in decibels.
<
https://i.postimg.cc/4xgmTTgm/wifi01.jpg> graphical radio debuggers
Besides looking at the phone's signal strength reading (not the bars), I
also use the Network Cell Info app.
I used to use Cellular-Z but they started adding ads so I dropped them.
<
https://i.postimg.cc/Hn05bQwG/wifi02.jpg> Cellular-Z by Jersey Ho
I only use free, ad free & gsf free Android tools if/when they exist.
Besides showing me (the same)
signal strength reading with green, yellow, red, and black bands
indicating good, okay, poor, and crap strength levels along with the
actual reading value, it shows my wifi signal strength, too which is currently about -35 dBm which is excellent.
Vanguard is correct it's easy and more useful to get a wavy graph of the
Wi-Fi or cellular signal strength reported by many apps on the play store.
<
https://i.postimg.cc/fLC4zcm6/wifi04.jpg> Many signal strength apps
That is to my home cable modem with wifi on 5 GHz (for faster bandwidth
but shorter distance) although my phone could also use 2.4 GHz (for
greater distance but slower bandwidth).
To add a value to that factual assessment by Vanguard there is also the implication of "noise" (& SNR) which is usually better for 5GHz channels.
I almost exclusively use wifi
while at home to use Google Voice for my phone service. I don't publish
my cell phone number, just my Google Voice number, and all calls to GV
get forwarded to all my phones via wifi/Internet or cellular or telco
(POTS). Even when away from home and off wifi to use cellular, GV is my
main phone number (incoming and outgoing calls use cellular data). A
few times I've had to use cellular voice on outgoing calls when GV could
not sucessfully connect to the other end.
To add value to that assessment by Vanguard, I also use Google Voice as my
main public number also, but I never log into Google Voice on Android
(because GV _creates_ a login account on Android but not when on iOS).
The app also shows a map of nearby cell towers (that contract for
service from your cellular providers). This can show you to which tower
you are connected, and which others are nearby. The app shows a lot
more info, but you'll have to research what all that data means.
Here's more information about the kinds of cell tower maps you can get.
<
https://i.postimg.cc/CKFhMZtS/signal03.jpg> celltower realtime location
https://www.signalboosters.com/blog/how-to-check-your-cell-phone-signal-strength/
Section: What Do I Do with My Signal Strength dBm Reading?
https://www.weboost.com/blog/how-to-test-signal-strength-on-your-phone Section: What is a good signal strength for a cell phone?
In my basement for cellular signal, my phone gets -111 dBm which is a
very poor signal. Elsewhere around home, I get -100 to -105 dBM.
Again, Vanguard is correct in his assessment of the signal strength value.
There's no magic number (as it depends on Signal to Noise also), but in general, anything more negative than around -100dBM is approaching bad.
<
https://i.postimg.cc/Gtywwn8f/signal01.jpg> cell signal strength graph
Despite what the carriers claim in their coverage maps, I'm in a low
level area alongside a major river and in a forested area. The cell
towers on my side are attenuated by trees and buildings. The cell
towers on the other side of the river are elevated on cliffs (towers
have poor downward coverage). When I get out of my residential area,
signal goes closer to 90 dBm, but that fluctuates. Coverage is poor
inside buildings away from windows, and in car park ramps due to all the concrete, and the same for GPS. That's why I rely on wifi/Internet via cellular data for GV phone service at home along with voice service from
my ISP (Comcast Voice) which uses a separate channel from those for
Internet access (so it really isn't VOIP). My GV is VOIP at home: GV
via Internet to Obitalk converted to POTS twisted pair in my home to corded/cordless phones.
Everything Vanguard said above is factually correct, where I too find that
the Google Voice works better than my phone for phone calls even as my
phone might be using the router at any given time to make those calls.
Like Vanguard, I would agree that -90dBM is a fantastic value for cellular signal strength, where here are some real-world graphs of mine at home.
<
https://i.postimg.cc/xCbVQ2pj/signal02.jpg> cell signal strength graph
Some folks will use femtocells at home.
I have both a femtocell and a cellular repeater inside my home because I
argued successfully that Internet outages (femtocell) affect me differently than our frequent power outages (cellular repeater), but I live in the
Santa Cruz mountains where we don't have cable on our power line poles.
<
https://i.postimg.cc/QCNqss9T/femto-ooma-switch.jpg> My ooma & femtocell
The cellular repeater picks up cellular signal from dozens of miles away,
while the femtocell creates its own cellular signal inside my home.
<
https://i.postimg.cc/YqTk0q1T/ap.jpg> Cellular repeater & home Wi-Fi APs
This converts cellular signals
to digital traffic over Internet directed to a specific provider.
As an added-value bonus point, I asked T-Mobile if the femtocell can be
used by anyone and they said yes - anyone near your house will use your femtocell as the nearest tower (if they're close enough that is).
So, in a way, you're giving free bandwidth to the cellular carrier as it
goes over your Internet lines (where my Internet is WISP, not ISP).
Some
major carriers offer femtocells for free, or for lease, because they
want to keep you as a customer instead of you switching to another
carrier that a nearer cell tower contracts for different service.
It used to be all the major carriers offered one or more of three:
1. T-Mobile would give you a free Wi-Fi router (long ago), or,
2. T-Mobile would give you a free cellular repeater (less long ago), or
3. T-Mobile would give you a free femtocell (also called a microcell).
I have all three, although only the latter two are from T-Mobile.
Cell towers are not owned by cellular providers.
Up here, there are companies that rent the land under the tower from the
people who own that land - which is a nice way to make money on the side.
They contract with the
tower to offer their service from there. Several, but not all, carriers contract at the same tower. You can also try a cellular signal booster
aka repeater, but you'll also be helping your neighbors with their poor signal strength.
While I agreed with every factual assessment Vanguard said so far, the only thing I'd correct is both the femtocell & cellular repeater should "help
your neighbors" as far as I can figure out. They're both small cellular
towers, as far as I can tell. If your neighbor is close enough, both the cellular repeater and the femto/micro cell would allow them to connect.
The problem there is you need a tower or pole to get
higher than the surrounding trees and buildings to capture a stronger
signal. Boosting a weak signal doesn't work well, like using a cup
instead of pressing your ear against a wall to snoop on a conversation.
What T-Mobile told me to do with the cellular repeater is put the first box
as high as I could in an upstairs window - and then put the second box as
close to the center of the house as possible.
That way the first box captures the signal from dozens of miles away, while
it only has to send that signal to the amplifier elsewhere in the house.
Since I have both GV (VOIP) and land-line (ISP voice) service at home, I don't need a tower+booster or femtocell. If I didn't have GV, I might consider a femtocell if my cellular provider provided one for free.
I have personally helped my neighbors get the femtocell for free in the
past, where the arguments have to be more insistent as the carriers try to
earn some money while my argument is the people are already paying for
service they're not getting - which they usually relent & give it for free.
However, my cellular provider is an MVNO (Tracfone), so no such perk
from them. I'd have to go with a more expensive major carrier to get a femtocell that works with their service.
I've never used an MVNO. I've had Verizon and then AT&T and then T-Mobile
but none others for my cellular service. All are about the same in service.
With GV, I use an Obitalk to
convert from VOIP to POTS inside my home. If GV ever stops working with Obitalk (their home products entered EOL back on Dec 2021, and they're
going forward with just their commercial products), I'll have to switch
to Ooma.
I have Ooma but it costs about five bucks a month in taxes and worse, it's
not that great in signal because of the jitter in my WISP that I can't do anything about because I get my Internet from many miles away from me.
<
https://i.postimg.cc/VvqLKQtQ/wifi.jpg> Typical range is about 10 miles
Both work with other VOIP operators than just GV, but GV is
still free in USA. With both, you have to buy their VOIP converter, but thereafter there are free and paid service tiers. At the time I looked
at Obi and Ooma, the converter box at Obi was half the price of Ooma
(and now Ooma is about half price, $56, at Amazon). Been using
GV+Obitalk for about 9 years. If Obitalk stops working, it'll be due to
some change at GV.
I'm similar to Vanguard, but different also in that I live in the boonies,
but we have a view of hundreds of square miles, so we can more easily use cellular repeaters and WISP antennas than can Vanguard in the valley trees.
This shows each person needs to assess their needs and apply the kind of solution that fits them - where I would agree with everything Vanguard
said, and I appreciate that he, like I, tries to be purposefully helpful
and very generous with our time and excellent knowledge of radio tech.
--
There are two kinds of people on this newsgroup, where one kind is here
merely for their own amusement while the other tries to kindly help others.
--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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