what is this

[Adam74]

Thanks Sally C... Right after I fill out the questionaire on app numbers, you mention an additional cool app that i NEED. Ha! I haven't figured out yet how to switch towers but I am just starting to play with it. You are right, very interesting indeed.:hail:

 

[SallyC]

Thanks Sally C... Right after I fill out the questionaire on app numbers, you mention an additional cool app that i NEED. Ha! I haven't figured out yet how to switch towers but I am just starting to play with it. You are right, very interesting indeed.:hail:

There's no way to select which tower you want to connect to (I wish!) but if you hit the refresh icon it will warn you that it must break connectivity to search for a new tower. I sometimes get a different one, but I've yet to get one anywhere close to where I live. Even if it's in Michigan instead of Wisconsin or Illinois, it's 45-60 minutes away. I don't know why it doesn't connect to the one that I drive by on the way to my house.

There's obviously a lot about this I don't know. But it's helpful to at least see what it's connecting too and, if it's really far away, see if I can catch a closer one.

 

[Adam74]

I wondered... I found the refresh shortly after my post. Thanks for the information. Very cool app and i had absolutely no idea it existed. I am far enough away from the lakeshore that I do not share your problem, but it is good information to have just the same. Thanks!!!

 

[huskur]

This seems very very very skeptical. Connecting to towers 45 mins to an hour away? That is some kind of record. I am not saying its not possible, I am just saying its not likely. To my knowledge a towers max range is less than 15 miles.

On a side note. "rild" is a battery drainer and it seems to come from 3G/4G switching. Which makes perfect sense it being a radio interface layer daemon. But if you have a 4G phone and you switch it to run 3G only are you not defeating the purpose of 4G? Turning off 4G you will never get 4G signal or speeds. At least with it on you can have the 4G experience some of the time.

 

[94lt1]

Remember, signals travel very well over water.

DROID RAZR MAXXIMIZED!!!! PREPARE TO BE VANQUISHED!!!

 

[Adam74]

Remember, signals travel very well over water.

DROID RAZR MAXXIMIZED!!!! PREPARE TO BE VANQUISHED!!!

I wondered if water played a part. Plus, Sally had mentioned the time on her screen. Obviously, she is catching a distant tower. Michigan is all Eastern. A very small portion of Indiana, Illinois, and across the water is Central. Makes sense to me. I think....

 

[huskur]

Remember, signals travel very well over water.

DROID RAZR MAXXIMIZED!!!! PREPARE TO BE VANQUISHED!!!

Yes, they do indeed since there is nothing to block the signal. I live on the coast and out in the boat on the ocean you lose signal between 9 and 10 miles out. Whether I am in Delaware or Ocean City, MD. it doesn't make a difference. Ocean City is a tourist city and is completely live with 4G LTE and the towers are visable at launch of the boat. Still you only get around 10 miles out and you lose service.

 

[SallyC]

This seems very very very skeptical. Connecting to towers 45 mins to an hour away? That is some kind of record. I am not saying its not possible, I am just saying its not likely. To my knowledge a towers max range is less than 15 miles.

On a side note. "rild" is a battery drainer and it seems to come from 3G/4G switching. Which makes perfect sense it being a radio interface layer daemon. But if you have a 4G phone and you switch it to run 3G only are you not defeating the purpose of 4G? Turning off 4G you will never get 4G signal or speeds. At least with it on you can have the 4G experience some of the time.

I can't speak for the accuracy of the app, but if it is correct, it is now showing me connecting to a tower in South Haven, MI which Google Maps is showing to be around 35 miles away. My signal is at -101dBm 6asu 28%

The water may be the reason it goes this far as, looking at the map, the signal line goes mostly over water as Michigan has a bit of an curve between my location and South Haven so a straight line connecting the two cities goes over a lot of water.

But my time is correct! :biggrin:

 

[Adam74]

I can't thank you all enough. i am just amazed at how much I DON'T know, even if the ex's tell me all the time how much I don't know. Today has been very imformative. Very cool. :icon_ lala:

 

[94lt1]

Yes, they do indeed since there is nothing to block the signal. I live on the coast and out in the boat on the ocean you lose signal between 9 and 10 miles out. Whether I am in Delaware or Ocean City, MD. it doesn't make a difference. Ocean City is a tourist city and is completely live with 4G LTE and the towers are visable at launch of the boat. Still you only get around 10 miles out and you lose service.

That's interesting to know... I wonder how solar activity would factor in to all of this??

My dad used to be heavy into c.b. and ham radio. He always talking about shooting skip at certain times of day and during.certain solar cycles... hmm, I think I feel some research coming on...

Thanx for the inspiration husker

DROID RAZR MAXXIMIZED!!!! PREPARE TO BE VANQUISHED!!!

 

[Adam74]

Signal distances, the effects of water on signal distances, and now SOLAR activity?? I can only learn so much a day! Dang!!! Use small words for me! So cool...

 

[TisMyDroid]

Wow Sally, you did it again! Another great app! And if you go to their website, very very interesting information. For instance, as rural as I am, verizon has me covered.

Sent from my DROID RAZR Maxx using Droid Forums

 

[FoxKat]

Water is an excellent Ground Plane for signal travel, since it's "relatively flat" and free of large signal reflecting objects. Signal (Radio Frequency Transmission) can "skip" great distances over water and under the Ionosphere cover. I am a former CB Radio operator and have QSO cards from people I've talked to that are in countries thousands of miles away from me here on the East Coast. Skip, or "DX" as it is also called is far more common in the longer wavelengths such as CB.

The frequencies that Cellular radios operate in are less likely to "skip" the great distances that longer wavelengths, but another phenomenon known as Tropospheric Ducting will cause typical line of sight transmissions (which would normally begin to dissipate near ground level as distances increase), to instead "bend" and follow the curve of the Earth, allowing even short wavelength signals (UHF, VHF), to travel as much as 500 miles in some cases, where normally they would continue in a trajectory line of sight and would have long since dissipated at ground level under normal circumstances.

Think of it this way, take a ball (as the Earth is round), and hold it up, and then look over it. The line of sight you are looking at from where it touches the top of the ball to where your eyes hit the wall across the room is the Line of Sight. Since you can't see past the top of the ball down around the back of the ball, likewise signal won't reach that part of the ball. Tropospheric Ducting would allow your eyesight to "see" the back of the ball beyond the top of the curve.

 

[huskur]

Water is an excellent Ground Plane for signal travel, since it's "relatively flat" and free of large signal reflecting objects. Signal (Radio Frequency Transmission) can "skip" great distances over water and under the Ionosphere cover. I am a former CB Radio operator and have QSO cards from people I've talked to that are in icountries thousands of miles away from me here on the East Coast. Skip, or "DX" as it is also called is far more common in the longer wavelengths such as CB.



The frequencies that Cellular radios operate in are less likely to "skip" the great distances that longer wavelengths, but another phenomenon known as Tropospheric Ducting will cause typical line of sight transmissions (which would normally begin to dissipate near ground level as distances increase), to instead "bend" and follow the curve of the Earth, allowing even short wavelength signals (UHF, VHF), to travel as much as 500 miles (correction) in some cases, where normally they would continue in a trajectory line of sight and would have long since dissipated at ground level under normal circumstances.

Think of it this way, take a ball (as the Earth is round), and hold it up, and then look over it. The line of sight you are looking at from where it touches the top of the ball to where your eyes hit the wall across the room is the Line of Sight. Since you can't see past the top of the ball down around the back of the ball, likewise signal won't reach that part of the ball. Tropospheric Ducting would allow your eyesight to "see" the back of the ball beyond the top of the curve.

That is understandable. What is not is being connected to a tower 35+ miles away and you have towers within 5 to 10 miles of you. I find it highly unlikely a tower is 35 or more miles away and that is the "stronger" signal of the two.

 

[zencyl]

Great explanation FoxKat, thought i was on a ham radio forum there for a minute, had to double take the url haha.