A Signal Booster is a device used for boosting the 3G signal to the local area by the using a reception antenna, a signal amplifier and an internal rebroadcast antenna.
The Signal Booster system can enhance the signal strength to your 3G modem by capturing the weak signal through the reception antenna and amplifying the signal that goes into your mobile broadband dongle.
There are 3 main types of signal boosters on the market at presents:
When comparing different signal boosters, it is important to look at the ‘gain’ that the antenna offers. Antennas with higher gain will produce the biggest improvements in signal strength. The antennas with the highest gain tend to be 'directional'.
Clip Antenna are the most common type of signal boosters and typically offer a gain in the region of 2db, High Gain Directional Antenna offer 8-10db while the external directional Antenna offers 10-12db. In all cases however, there will be a certain amount of ‘loss’ particularly in cases where long cables are used to connect the main ‘reception’ antenna to the signal amplifier. Universal Adapters will also suffer more ‘loss’ than wired CRC9 connections.
