Mobile Phones Poor signal strength at home , advise needed

silverdale

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There's 5 mobiles in our house on 3 different networks and were all struggling for a signal unless your stood at the front door. We must be in a black spot for signals and it's pissing us off big time.

Tesco sim (o2) ;- Not too bad but still there's black spots all round the house. kitchen a no go , we don't take mobiles in there but if it's in your pocket or you forget no texts will come through or send.

Asda (EE) Total utter crap in the house, fine outside the majority of the time.

Virgin (EE) Don't ask me why but even though it's on the same EE provider as Asda's it's by far the worse of the 3. I'm on it and tbh I'm lucky if I get any signal at all and constantly miss calls or texts or they all come through when I go out.

Were all on sim only deals so my question is;-
How can we improve the signal for all the providers legally and non-legal ?. Some of us are on promotional really good deals like the Tesco ones from a few years ago and don't want to change them , we just wan't a better signal for all.

I looked as the repeaters on offer but £265 !

your thoughts anyone
 
Thanks for that , I'm not sure how to read into that. It reckons I've a Vodaphone tower at my backgate and one bang in the middle of the football pitch next to us.Just had a look , not there :)

by the looks of it were on the edge of a larger housing estate and looking at the hotspots hardly anything near us
 
Try clicking on the tab in the top right which says "Back to good 'ol map" Might give you a better picture
 
will do thanks but just looking at the coverage were we are it doesn't look that good as I'm near fields

The thing is though oily , how can we improve it without spending a fortune ?. When you're spending a tidy sum each month on 5 phones and you can't make a call or recieve a text without standing at an open front door. It feels like were throwing money down the drain
 
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I got a sure signal box which plugs into my router for EE handsets, But I dont know if virgin and asda work with it but it boosted my signal from 1 bar to five bars via my wifi. You would need to phone EE to find out as box has to be registered with them to work.
 
im on giff gaff o2 and its shite most of the time
Last night i done a speedtest 0.01 download 0.02 upload
texts never get sent and phone cuts out regular yet it says im in top spot for signal and you cant phone anyone from giffgaff to explain
 
What I have done in the past is in the mobile settings go to network/mobile networks then network operators and you can either select search networks and select the network that is yours or select automatically once you have done this it will re register device onto network and I always get a much better signal.
Also check your network mode like GSM/wcdma/lte auto or GSM/wcdma auto..select the one that your devices network or device is compatible with.
 
What I have done in the past is in the mobile settings go to network/mobile networks then network operators and you can either select search networks and select the network that is yours or select automatically once you have done this it will re register device onto network and I always get a much better signal.
Also check your network mode like GSM/wcdma/lte auto or GSM/wcdma auto..select the one that your devices network or device is compatible with.
Thanks, I'll give that a go. Does anyone use a signal repeater at home ?
 
Thanks, I'll give that a go. Does anyone use a signal repeater at home ?

Yes, I have one in my basement (workshop) for obvious reasons. I think I paid just under £100 for it 5 or 6 years ago. I run the transformer (12V) off the lighting circuit, so it's only on when I am down there (and of course when I forget to switch off the lights lol!). Funnily enough I did unplug it a couple of weeks ago to see if it was still making a difference and yes, the signal dropped from 4 bars (/5) to 'no service'.
The thing claimed to cover 200m² which was a bit of an exaggeration- it barely covers the 100m² of my workshop, but as I sited it near to where I usually am, it does the job.
I have also found that different handsets vary enormously in sensitivity. iPhone4 is far better than my newer Sammy S5 mini or Xperia Z1 compact.
 
Oops, I didn't know they were illegal!

Neither did I until I read it yesterday on Ofcom's site or somewhere similar.


edit, also dont you have to have a 4g signal ( for each different mobile network you intend boosting inside of your house ) outside of your house/office to make this work inside???

Also Silverdale, network signal can be affected by the type of phone and the software installed.
I.E. the version of firmware and version of baseband radio etc. I had a HTC on Vodafone and the signal was crap when they released the phone.
3 month down the line they released a new Radio firmware via an OTA update which sorted it , but I'd already read about it on another site and installed the european radio firmware instead of EE and it worked perfectly.
 
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Apparently it's OK to manufacture them, sell them, own one, but not use one. Can you imagine if they use that theory with crystal meth ?
 
I have tried my sim in a few phones and all give the same results , rubbish reception. It's at the point now I can't take a call so I will have to move provider.
I was intending taking us all over to Virgin mobile due to the good sim only deals but that's definitely not an option.
EE do a repeater for about £80ish and people on the virgin forum reckon they work fine with Virgin. There's also the option of some cheaper repeaters on Fleabay from China but they are illegal.
I know one thing , at the moment I might as well head for the grid in the street and stick my £15 a month down it.
 
The EE Repeater?? do you mean the EE signal box? if yes? then this is what I use but it is connected to my router via an RJ45 cable. Where do you live @silverdale, NE England?
Yeah , same thing, I'm in the NW
 
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I'll have to ask round but off the top of me head I don't. Their going for about £80 I Might just go to China and take a punt and hopefully improve everyone's
 
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