Phone Signals Again

[wooster]

Hi

I've been reading a fair bit here about mobile coverage on the Broads but some of the threads are old and others are only slightly related to my problem so I thought I'd start yet another. Please forgive me if I'm flogging a dead horse.

I'm moored at Tingdene in Brundall. I use an iPhone X and I'm on EE. I want to watch Netflix etc and do some zoom stuff online tethering to my laptop. I've tried tethering from my phone which was hit and miss. I tried a 4GEE router  - same result. 

I was in Loddon last night and couldn't get anything with EE so I bought a Giff-Gaff thing and stuck it in. It was fantastic. Really fast internet and solid 5 bar signal. All good. It was the same cruising back today. I tried it at vairous locations and it was great, until I got to Brundall! It all started to go a bit pear - shaped then. 

To be fair, EE wasn't much better around there, but I got moored at the marina and EE was at least giving me 4G. Giffgaff could only manage 3G unless I went outside and tried some tai-chi which was both inconvenient and undignified for a man of my age and physique.

Anyway, my serious question is this. Is anyone moored at Brundall Bay getting good results with a particular network and if so what phone are you using? I saw in a post on here that the phone matters, which I didn't know, so please make any suggestions you have. I would even move from my iPhone and move to Android if it helped. I have heard a Samsung S20 was pretty good for 4G ?

[LondonRascal]

When I was moored in Brundall Bay, I used a router with a SIM Card (on the EE network) and would, at best, get 2 bars of signal, but more usually 1. Not ideal for streaming content. My phone is O2 and did no better.

The issue is the where the village is, in relation to the river - the river being far lower than the village.  The local phone Mast serving EE and O2 is at the back of the McDonald's (just at the Cucumber Lane Roundabout with the A47). This is not far away, but is far higher than the river, and the signal just does not reach the river area at this location very well - because it is close to the mobile mast.  It is why as you cruise toward Norwich or away from it, reception improves as the angle you are to the Mast decreases and you get more of the signal.

So, in short no you can't do much about phone signal near Brundall on the river. The WiFi at the Marina is also terribly slow, as I am sure you have found out too.

[wooster]

Thank you. That makes sense. It seems I just need to go with whatever I can use to get a reasonable signal while cruising and stock up on DVDs from a charity shop !

[Smoggy]

If it helps loddon has had a new mast this year but is only o2 and vodafone and those that share those networks,  rockland is still a lost cause and brundall is poor for vodafone.

[Mouldy]

We’re on EE and have generally found the coverage over The Broads to be quite good.  We were on the boat over the weekend before the Bank Holiday and coverage everywhere was atrocious, but we went again over the Bank Holiday weekend and we were getting 4G and sometimes 5G, even on Short Dyke, Rockland.

Not sure what happened the weekend before, but normal service seems to have resumed.

[chrisdobson45]

For the first couple of weeks in August I was able to work from the boat, moored at Cove, Brundall. The marina WIFI was good enough for Teams calls and my mobile (O2) was fine. However, last week saw the marina WIFI become unusable (even for web browsing and emails0 and the mobile reception gave up the ghost completely... 

[OldBerkshireBoy]

I was talking to a couple who live in a house in Brundall (so no swaying around in the wind or rise and fall with the tides ).  With indentical iphones both on Vodaphone they told me that as they move around from room to room the signal strength will be better on one phone then the other phone and sometimes no signal at all on one or the other phone.

Moored down by Peachments I have two Samsung S7`s, one on Vodaphone the other on O2 and Vodaphone whilst not perfect seems slightly better most of the time. The router has a Smarty sim installed which is 90% reliable but goes AWOL at the worst possible times! 

[ExSurveyor]

On the river front at Brundall Gardens I get a reasonable signal on O2. If I move towards the station it goes completely.

 The marina wifi is quite good, dependent on where you are but can be disrupted by poor weather as it is beamed in from some miles away.

[wooster]

Thank you all. It's probably a guess. I'm gong with an O2 provider - probably Tesco or Giffgaff. I can get 4g outside so I'm wondering if an ariel might help?