boosting cellular signal in costa rica with huawei e166

[anon2]

friend in Costa rica has very poor signal . Currently has huawei u166. Is thinking of using option globe surfer 3 and adding a yagi but doesn't know which frequency he needs 800-850 or 1850-1900. He is 3 or 4 miles from tower but has very bad signal cause the terrain is very rugged.

[anon2]

Other options 'falling apart' and I want to purchase correct Globesurfer III WITH HIGH GAIN ANTENNA. I have BOTH an 'old' SIM card that works for EDGE at 1800MHz (confirmed on a Huawei E166 USB card), and a new 3G card that I can NOT get to work.

I have a 2 to 6 bar signal for EDGE - nothing for 3G here at our island home.

[Petro5]

Hi,
First thing to note is that the Huawei E166 supports the following frequency bands:
# HSDPA/UMTS（850/1900/2100MHz）
# GSM/GPRS/EDGE（850/900/1800/1900MHz）

Not sure what cellular carrier you are using but make sure it does support 3G UMTS/HSDPA and it supports it at the right frequency band. Might explain why you are only getting EDGE. Sim card usually doesn't have much to do with the network unless the carrier is blocking 3G service via the sim card - in most regions we see the carrier allowing for any high speed service through the sim card and it's up to the modem to negotiate with the cellular network on what the fastest speed it can support is.

On the question of the Option globe surfer III: The GS3’s we carry are for North America and as such would work only on EDGE in Costa Rica and not 3G. Recommend you purchase a European version to guarantee compatibility. The SIM card that works for EDGE at 1800MHz would work in the GS3 just fine if you use the following wideband antenna: http://www.rfwel.com/shop/?target=pr...roduct_id=1793

In Costa Rica the GSM band in use is the DCS1800 band Uplink (reverse channel) 1710.2–1784.8 MHz and downlink (forward channel) 1805.2–1879.8 MHz.

Once you have the correct Option GS3 you would need the following items to boost your cellular signal:
1) Wideband Antenna that covers all these frequency bands. This is a LPDA (log periodic dipole array) antenna 800-2700MHz [N-Female connector]: http://www.rfwel.com/shop/?target=pr...roduct_id=1885 (here are other cellular antenna styles e.g omnidirectional - http://www.rfwel.com/signal_improvem...r_antennas.php)

2) Antenna adapter to plug into GS3 antenna port [FME-Male connector]: http://www.rfwel.com/shop/?target=pr...product_id=629 (for other adapters to other modems e.g the e166 - http://www.rfwel.com/signal_improvem..._reference.php)

3) Low loss cable to hook up antenna to antenna adapter [N-Male connector]: http://www.rfwel.com/shop/home.php?cat=183 (select the minimum practical length to minimize cable losses).

4) N-Female/ FME-Female Connector to allow the N-Male coaxial cable to mate to the FME-Male antenna adapter above: http://www.rfwel.com/shop/?target=pr...roduct_id=1036