Cell Booster specs

[docque]

Never was a radar guy in the AF. We just connected to them and stared at the screen. Ok, enough of that. I am looking at boosters and I need to know if the booster says it supports band 4 is that universal? Is band 4 the same for all the Carriers? i need one that does 4/66 for T-mobile and the reviews are hit or miss on them.

 

[trailrydr]

Never was a radar guy in the AF. We just connected to them and stared at the screen. Ok, enough of that. I am looking at boosters and I need to know if the booster says it supports band 4 is that universal? Is band 4 the same for all the Carriers? i need one that does 4/66 for T-mobile and the reviews are hit or miss on them.

For best results.....

You need a booster that is specific to your carrier, in this case T-Mobile.

 

[MoonShadow_1911]

One thing to note about boosters: They boost the signal, if it's a clean signal, they boost the clean signal, if it's a "dirty" signal, they boost the dirty signal. Why this is important. For the old cell phone voice protocols (now defunct) that was just fine. With VoLTE (Voice of LTE, which is basically Voice over IP VoIP), you need enough data bandwidth for communications. Cell phones prioritize VoLTE over data transmissions to give a better call quality; so, in a nutshell, you voice calls shold be good with a booster. Now, to the crux of the issue, data. With packetized data, aka Internet data, or TCPIP, you start running into possible issues. With a clean signal, the little bits and bytes (pun intended), for the most part, stay together and all is good. It's when you have a weak or dirty signal that causes the issue. The packets begin to fragment, so the receiver (your computer/cell phone/tablet/etc.) needs to try to put the packets back together upon reciept. There is the header and the checksum. The header leads the packet and tells the receiver what to expect when the checksum arrives. If the checksum doesn't arrive in the packet, due to fragmentation, almost all TCP devices out there will discard the packet and request the sender resend it.

Have you ever been browsing the internet and, say mygrandrv.com, seems to slow down, loading the page? There are a couple of factors, a high volumn of traffic is usually the most common cause, however, packet fragmentation comes a close second. Fragmentation can occur for many different reasons. If you run a trace route (tracert from a Windows command prompt or traceroute from a linux shell) you will see the data must travel through a number of different waypoints to get to you. That is because there are very few, true, point-to-point communications on the internet. At each point, packet lose can occur. If there is high traffic along the route, your connection the the website seems to slow down; when in reality, the speed is a preception vs the actual throughput of the data that has been fragmented. Compound this with a poor signal, either WiFi or cellular data, and it becomes very frustrating.

So keep in mind that if you are boosting a crappy signal, you need to expect crappy performance. How do you tell if the signal is crappy? Without some high-tech equipment and a good amount of knowledge, it's difficult to discern whether or not the signal is crappy. The best thing to do is to run a speed test and look at the latency, or ms response time. If the response time is high, then you have a "slow" connection, if the response time is low and the "speed" is decent (better than 10 mbps), then you probably have a crappy signal. Please note I said probably.

 

[kb0zke]

We bought a cell phone booster for the Foretravel the last year we had it because we found ourselves in parks with poor service inside the coach. The one we bought said it was good for all major carriers. It worked well with our T-Mobile iPhones. I'd like to get another one for the Reflection, but until I figure out how to run the coax I'm not going to spend the money.

I was able to bring the coax in along side of the backup camera coax, and then it ran mostly inside the overhead cabinets. Keep in mind that the Foretravel didn't have any slides to deal with, unlike this Reflection. Yes, I did have to drill a few holes, but no big deal. I mounted the external antenna in the ladder, put the amplifier on the wall in the dining area, and the inside antenna hung out of one of the cabinets when we were parked and sat inside it when we traveled.

Any suggestions for how to run the coax in this trailer?

 

[docque]

One thing to note about boosters: They boost the signal, if it's a clean signal, they boost the clean signal, if it's a "dirty" signal, they boost the dirty signal. Why this is important. For the old cell phone voice protocols (now defunct) that was just fine. With VoLTE (Voice of LTE, which is basically Voice over IP VoIP), you need enough data bandwidth for communications. Cell phones prioritize VoLTE over data transmissions to give a better call quality; so, in a nutshell, you voice calls shold be good with a booster. Now, to the crux of the issue, data. With packetized data, aka Internet data, or TCPIP, you start running into possible issues. With a clean signal, the little bits and bytes (pun intended), for the most part, stay together and all is good. It's when you have a weak or dirty signal that causes the issue. The packets begin to fragment, so the receiver (your computer/cell phone/tablet/etc.) needs to try to put the packets back together upon reciept. There is the header and the checksum. The header leads the packet and tells the receiver what to expect when the checksum arrives. If the checksum doesn't arrive in the packet, due to fragmentation, almost all TCP devices out there will discard the packet and request the sender resend it.

Have you ever been browsing the internet and, say mygrandrv.com, seems to slow down, loading the page? There are a couple of factors, a high volumn of traffic is usually the most common cause, however, packet fragmentation comes a close second. Fragmentation can occur for many different reasons. If you run a trace route (tracert from a Windows command prompt or traceroute from a linux shell) you will see the data must travel through a number of different waypoints to get to you. That is because there are very few, true, point-to-point communications on the internet. At each point, packet lose can occur. If there is high traffic along the route, your connection the the website seems to slow down; when in reality, the speed is a preception vs the actual throughput of the data that has been fragmented. Compound this with a poor signal, either WiFi or cellular data, and it becomes very frustrating.

So keep in mind that if you are boosting a crappy signal, you need to expect crappy performance. How do you tell if the signal is crappy? Without some high-tech equipment and a good amount of knowledge, it's difficult to discern whether or not the signal is crappy. The best thing to do is to run a speed test and look at the latency, or ms response time. If the response time is high, then you have a "slow" connection, if the response time is low and the "speed" is decent (better than 10 mbps), then you probably have a crappy signal. Please note I said probably.

Well, I am looking for something that allows me to be inside the RV and get a signal. I usually get one to two bars outside on my phone but nothing inside. The ones I am looking at work with most of the big carriers. I was just wondering about the band. Is that universal.
Sorry, I am thinking of the old days of modems. Like the US Robotics modem would hit high speed but only with another US Robotics modem.

 

[kb0zke]

docque, the booster we had in the Foretravel was exactly what you are describing. The outside antenna brought the signal to the amplifier, which amplified the signal and fed it to the inside antenna. The information with the set said that it wouldn't help any outside, as it used the walls of the rv to keep the signal inside.

Remember that a cell phone latches onto the strongest signal, so when you are amplifying a signal that amplified signal becomes the strongest one, and the cell phone attaches to it. I think this is the unit we had: https://www.amazon.com/weBoost-4703...jbGlja1JlZGlyZWN0JmRvTm90TG9nQ2xpY2s9dHJ1ZQ==

 

[MoonShadow_1911]

Well, I am looking for something that allows me to be inside the RV and get a signal. I usually get one to two bars outside on my phone but nothing inside. The ones I am looking at work with most of the big carriers. I was just wondering about the band. Is that universal.
Sorry, I am thinking of the old days of modems. Like the US Robotics modem would hit high speed but only with another US Robotics modem.

Those were the "old days". In today's world, open standards have swung the communication gate, wide open.

The WeBoost that [MENTION=36998]kb0zke[/MENTION] linked is a good one. Just keep in mind what I wrote above.

As a consultant, I've had clients ask me why they have full bars and such a crappy, slow, speed. It's was usually because they are boosting a crappy signal.

 

[docque]

docque, the booster we had in the Foretravel was exactly what you are describing. The outside antenna brought the signal to the amplifier, which amplified the signal and fed it to the inside antenna. The information with the set said that it wouldn't help any outside, as it used the walls of the rv to keep the signal inside.

Remember that a cell phone latches onto the strongest signal, so when you are amplifying a signal that amplified signal becomes the strongest one, and the cell phone attaches to it. I think this is the unit we had: https://www.amazon.com/weBoost-4703...jbGlja1JlZGlyZWN0JmRvTm90TG9nQ2xpY2s9dHJ1ZQ==

Thanks for the info. We are not full time yet so I have plenty of time to research. One night I had my phone in the truck and using it as a hotspot.

 

[bsktcas]

MoonShadow_1911, any chance you could give us a hint on what you're using?

 

[Second Chance]

MoonShadow_1911, any chance you could give us a hint on what you're using?

[MENTION=31327]bsktcas[/MENTION] -

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