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Choosing a Quality Cellular Amplifier
April 09, 2009
Wilson Electronics reportedly has issued seven guidelines to help customers select a cellular amplifier that boosts signal strength, ramps up dual direction data rate transfer and eliminates dropped calls.
The popularity of a mobile handset is almost pushing it into the essential commodity category since it provides an instant and near constant means of communications convenience at the bare minimum. In 2008 alone 1.21 billion mobile handsets, including 171 million smartphones, were sold globally, as reported by TMCnet, and this figure brought the total number of mobile phones to approximately 4 billion.
Factors that work against mobiles providing seamless anytime communications include battery charge depletion, the Faraday cage shield effect that is sometimes experienced in certain buildings and lifts, poor bi-directional signal strength, intermittent downlink reception sensitivity, weak uplink output strength, signal oscillation interference and cell tower signal overload.
Cellular amplifiers are seen as impacting tools that help, except for battery charge depletion, all the above problems and most of the Faraday cage shield effect scenarios by significantly boosting wireless telecommunications signal strength within the home or office environment.
Wilson cautions that customers can easily get duped in to buying an inferior quality booster that really does not serve the function it was intended for because uniform global standards are still in the process of being drawn up and agreed to, and some companies that manufacture and sell these devices are yet to cover all currently recommended standards.
“The lack of appropriate industry standards for cellular amplifiers allows for numerous products on the market that, while holding FCC (News - Alert) approval, do not have the technical specification to deliver on their claims to improve cell signal quality to any significance,” said Joe Banos, COO at Wilson Electronics (News - Alert). “If a product does not meet six core elements, the user is at risk of purchasing a technology that cannot deliver on its promises.”
Even though Banos mentions six guidelines in the statement, Wilson actually added one more to bring the total to seven. The seven guidelines are: Bi-directional amplification to significantly boost downlink and uplink signal strength, high downlink receiver sensitivity to enhance clear sound signals, high uplink output power to avoid dropped calls, oscillation detection and shutdown to avoid cellular interference and possible signal chopping, cell site overload protection to avoid garbled communications, purchase only money-back guaranteed products, and the customer must carefully read all the fine print to make sure the guarantee is legitimate.
Wilson also insists that oscillation can make cell sites shut down and cell site overload impairs service to a large number of surrounding users violate FCC regulations, attract fines and could result in equipment confiscation by law.
Don’t forget to check out TMCnet’s White Paper Library, which provides a selection of in-depth information on relevant topics affecting the IP Communications industry. The library offers white papers, case studies and other documents which are free to registered users.
Vivek Naik is a contributing editor for TMCnet. To read more of Vivek's articles, please visit his columnist page.
Edited by Michael Dinan
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