Signal strength
When a mobile phone is turned on the handset's outgoing signal locks onto the strongest transmitter. There is an almost continuous communication between the two, as they remind each other that they are in union. This continues until you turn off the phone, move nearer to a different transmitter or something happens to break that contact. All the while the signal remains, you will be able to make and receive voice calls and the call quality is virtually the same regardless of the signal strength displayed on the handset, at least in theory.

Modern phones have battery saving programs which means that when communicating with base stations they go into an idling mode when not actually being used for a call. If you dial out, or a call comes in, then the power output of the phone is increased to cope. However, this power saving device can affect your signal as the phone may even give up trying to stay in touch if it is not used often or the signal gets too weak.

Landscape and the weather
The topography of the location that you are in will be the biggest factor in getting a good signal. Obstacles such as hills, buildings, trees, and similar, can block or interfere with the signal, resulting in a poorer data connection or missed calls. 3G networks are most susceptible to this as the frequencies used are higher than for 2G services. Likewise networks on the 1800 MHz frequency band suffer more than those on 900 MHz.

Weather is also a factor, albeit a much smaller one, lower frequencies are not affected as much but the 3G 2100MHz band can be affected noticeably. Rain, snow, and electrical storms cause interfernce which will result in more dropped calls to your mobile.

Cell breathing
Base stations only have a certain power output, and can therefore only host a finite amount of connections at any given time. During some times of the day and week, more people will be wanting to use a mobile phone at the same time, and so more traffic will be using a given transmitter.  When this happens the coverage area of the transmitter will decrease, which can make a big difference if you are in an area of fringe reception. This is known as breathing because the cell gets bigger or smaller depending on the traffic.

In order to combat this base stations do not normally operate at their full licensed power, leaving some spare so the output can increase accordingly with the network traffic at the time. This doesn't quite combat the problem though, as there are still going to be areas where you are in the fringe zone and can't get a signal all the time.  Using one of our antenna can solve this problem, as it will help improve even weak signals, which could make the difference between able to make a call and not.

Frequency bands
Mobile phones do not all use the same set off frequencies to access cellular services. Depending on location, and network, the frequencies used change. In the UK and most of the world the frequencies used (excluding 3G) are in the 900MHz and 1800MHz bands. On the American continents the frequencies are 850MHz and 1900MHz. 3G services currently use the 2100MHz band.

Carrier waves
A carrier wave is the means by which electromagnetic wave radiation "carries" the information we want to convey between the base station and our handset. This information is converted into the form we need, in our case either speech or data. We are often asked what is data? the answer for our purposes is anything that is not speech, so as you will be interested in sending and receiving e mails, they are data transmitted via a carrier wave to and from your mobile phone handset.

What can interrupt the transmission and reception of data?
Data transmission is more prone to dropped connections and if you lose your connection half way through an e mail, you lose the whole document and have to start again. This is unlike speech where you have heard the conversation until the point at which the call becomes unstable. An external antenna that boosts the signal and keeps the connection prevents those dropped calls. In addition transmission speeds can be greatly increased if one of our external antenna is used.