Anyway to know signal strength at my location?

[streetcore]

Hi, 

I'm in Sarnia, Ontario (in the city, not out in a rural area) and currently have a Rogers prepaid cell plan. Unfortunately, the Rogers signal is very poor at our house. Unless I'm on the second floor or standing outside in the driveway, my phone usually says "no signal - emergency calls only". I'd like to switch to Public Mobile, but I don't know if the Telus network would be any better here. My brother is with Virgin/Bell and gets very good reception here, but I don't know anyone with Public or Telus.

Is there anyway to determine signal strength of a network at particular address? I don't want to go through the hassle and expense of setting up a new account, only to discover I'm having same problem.

Thanks.

[Jb456]

@streetcore  if you put Sarnia in the search bar at the top some older threads come up with people that use PM in Sarnia. Browsing quickly not really any mention of bad signals.

One thing that is mentioned is that since Sarnia is close to USA border that sometimes it tries to connect to a USA provider. That's a quick fix. Instead of your phone settings set to automatic network search you make it manual and select public mobile. I don't know how reception would be in your house however as I didn't read the threads. 

Since Public Mobile is owned by Telus and Telus also owns Koodo. To broaden your search look at Telus and Koodo forums for old threads about reception in Sarnia.

Also PM uses Bell towers as well so I think you should be okay.

[RosieR]

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@Jazz37 wrote:

I solved the same problem at our cottage near Algonquin Park. I bought & installed a refurbished Wilson ‘Weboost’ amplifier with external & internal antennas. It was $219 and works great! Try ‘google’ to track down Wilson Amplifiers.

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@streetcore this one ^^^^ by @Jazz37 could be the solution to your problem.  Check out this thread https://productioncommunity.publicmobile.ca/t5/Phones-Hardware/Signal-booster-repeater/td-p/584506  It might help... or not. lol

[Jazz37]

I solved the same problem at our cottage near Algonquin Park. I bought & installed a refurbished Wilson ‘Weboost’ amplifier with external & internal antennas. It was $219 and works great! Try ‘google’ to track down Wilson Amplifiers.

[Helpershelper]

@streetcore 

To determine signal strength on iPhone:

Step 1: Dial *3001#12345#* on your iPhone then press Call.

Step 2: You'll now enter Field Test mode. You'll notice a signal strength indicator on the upper left hand corner of your screen. You can toggle between signal strength bars and a number by simply taping on it. At this point, press the home button to exit the app or if you would like the feature to be permanent, continue on. Don't worry, the process is completely reversible.

Step 3: Hold down on the Power button until you see the ‘slide to power off' bar. Do not power off the device.

Step 4: Press down on the Home button until the app closes and you return to your home screen.

That's it. Even when restarting the iPhone, the signal strength can be toggled between bars and numbers. The closer your number is to zero, the stronger your signal is.

The lower your number, the stronger your signal—but don't include the - sign when evaluating (so, if the signal says -60, that's better than -90).

To return to the default bars permanently, follow these steps:

Step 1: Dial *3001#12345#* on your iPhone then press Call.

Step 2: Press on your Home Button once.

In Android go to Settings > About Phone (it may be under Network or Status, depending on your phone).

[streetcore]

The coverage maps are useless because they all show complete and total coverage for this area, so thanks for the links to the tower maps. It shows the closest is a Bell tower about 1km to the south. The next closest tower is a Rogers about 2km to the east. That still seems pretty close, but I'm obviously in some kind of dead zone here. Multiple complaints to Rogers over the last few years have resulted no improvements. 

[RosieR]

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@streetcore wrote:

Hi, 

I'm in Sarnia, Ontario (in the city, not out in a rural area) and currently have a Rogers prepaid cell plan. Unfortunately, the Rogers signal is very poor at our house. Unless I'm on the second floor or standing outside in the driveway, my phone usually says "no signal - emergency calls only". I'd like to switch to Public Mobile, but I don't know if the Telus network would be any better here. My brother is with Virgin/Bell and gets very good reception here, but I don't know anyone with Public or Telus.

Is there anyway to determine signal strength of a network at particular address? I don't want to go through the hassle and expense of setting up a new account, only to discover I'm having same problem.

Thanks.

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@streetcore here is a closeup of Canadian Cellular Map in Sarnia.  As you can see, there are a lot more Bell cellular towers  in Sarnia.  As already mentioned above, Public Mobile uses Telus and Bell towers.  I hope this helps.  

[LightThief]

If you need something more comprehensive you could use this app:

https://www.opensignal.com/

It shows a lot of analytical data about the service and coverage. Or if you just want to see the coverage map: https://www.publicmobile.ca/en/on/coverage this would do. 

[Triguy]

PM uses Telus and Bell towers.

Here is a cell tower map.

https://www.ertyu.org/steven_nikkel/cancellsites.html

[JoyLuck]

@streetcore 

Would this help? You can put your address in this coverage map to see if there is coverage:

https://www.publicmobile.ca/en/on/coverage

[computergeek541]

@streetcore Telus/Public uses the same network as Bell.