[pct-l] cellphone

[Steve Fosdick]

At first, I was very seriously thinking of putting my cell phone on vacation (for about $12 per month with Sprint) and not having the weight for the phone and the charger, mostly because of the Journal from Len Roughgarten, where everyday (it seemed) he reported "no cell service today". But my daughter really wants me to carry it, for her comfort more than mine, so I'll be taking it.
   
  I don't know why this works, but I've experienced times (not necessarily on the PCT, but just in general) when a text message will go through while a phone call won't. Someone once told me it has to do with the "burst" vs. duplex, so you might want to give that a try. If can can't get a signal, try sending a short text message to see if that goes through.
   
  Hikin_Steve
  PCT Candidate - Class of '08 (leaving in 9 days! Yahoo!)
  Blog: 5,800 miles (http:100biketours.blogspot.com)

Brian Lewis <brianle at nwlink.com> wrote:
  "A couple thoughts- Having a triband phone was really useful (Strd signal,
Digital, and Analog). The analog signal carries a lot further than any other
type of signal, so thats what I was using often. Also, having a way to force
analog signal was great because sometimes a weak digital would be there, and
leftto auto-detect, the cell would attempt to use the digital signal and it
was too weak at that distance to connect."


Note that the analog system will be shut down in just over a month (Feb 18th
2008):
http://tech.yahoo.com/blogs/raskin/17134
http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/wireless/?p=171

Does that mean there's equivalent digital coverage now in all locations that
used to be served by analog? Dunno, but I doubt it. If I had the battery
power, I'd consider trying to check at various points this year and list the
coverage available from my carrier, but battery power is likely the rub
there.

Well, that and the tedium of periodically turning on the thing and counting
the number of bars. Even looking at the number of bars doesn't always turn
out (for me at least) to be a perfect predictor of quality of service, and
I'm definitely not planning to hike 2660 miles with the constant mantra of
"Can you hear me now? Can you hear me now?" 

I think it would be helpful though, if those thru-hikers that are bringing
cell phones would periodically log what reception they get when they do
happen to check --- cell company, location, signal strength. If enough of
us did that, someone could collect and aggregate the info, ask for updates.
Not as essential as a water report (!), but it's something that folks are
curious about every year. It wouldn't have to be anywhere near complete,
but it might be nice to know that at a minimum, I can likely get service X
miles down the trail from where I am now at a known spot.



Brian Lewis



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