Smartphones - best reception

Colliewobble_2

Hi all,

I'm nearing the end of my Orange contract - it expires in July - but I'm always one for doing loads of research before I jump into any long-term contract.

My current phone is an HTC Hero - which is a lovely little phone but suffers really poor reception. I can be at full signal one minute and nothing the next!

This is particularly a problem at my home. I've checked the reception maps and it appears that with Orange I'm in a 'very good' reception area (rather than 'excellent') ditto with TMobile and Vodafone.

The best appears to be Three (which I'm loathe to go with) and 02 (with whom I could use a special 02 Open voucher through my company).

My friend has been to visit with his iPhone on Tesco Mobile (02?) and he only got two bars in my living room.

Anyway my question is two-fold (!) can anyone recommend a good smartphone that doesn't suffer too much in the way of signal reception problems and b) do any of the mobile phone companies offer signal boosters to customers for their homes?

To be honest I'm at a loss to work out why the signal is so poor with Orange here - I live in a standard 1930s semi, not too far from the transmitters of a number of different networks and with no hills or large buildings in between my house and the towers.

Sorry for my waffle!

Hope you can help!

CW

watcherman

Don't go on signal strength alone, ie your friends iPhone, go on the ability to make/receive and hold onto calls.

Vodafone

Hi Colliewobble,

It's great that you are looking to get a new smartphone.

You can check the Vodafone coverage here, however we also offer a device called Sure Signal which you may find useful if coverage at home is an issue.

It plugs into your home broadband connection to give you a full 3G signal for up to four different phones used at the same time in the household. For more information, take a look here.

Best wishes,

Heidi
Web Relations Team
Vodafone UK