Hi,
For a dual band phone such as the AT&T 8260, does the phone simultaneously use the analog and digital band for bandwidth, or must the phone switch back and forth between the two bands?
That would be great if the phone could use both bands for bandwidth, in case a signal on one band does not get received.
phil
I’m not 100% sure, but I’m fairly sure that the phones do not use them simultaneously. It’s my understanding that a dual band phone will search for a digital signal first, and if one isn’t found, it’ll switch to analog. I don’t believe there’s a loss of call when moving between the two, though. It’s much the same as transfering between different cells. (towers) When you get out of range of one tower, the signal is transferred to the next tower, and so on, as long as the call is in progress. You’ll lose the call if there’s no new tower to transfer to, though.
Jman
Digital communication in a cell phone consumes considerably less power than analog, so when the phone can achieve a digital signal, that’s all it does. You will almost certainly find smaller, digital-only carriers in your area who “hand-off” a call to another carrier that still maintains an analog network when required.
I don’t have any diret experience, but my boss, a gadget aficianado (sp??) has tried just about every cell phone. His experience is that dual (or tri-) mode phones end up spending more time deciding what band to work in than actually working as a phone. He never got reliable service from multi-band phones while travelling around the country.
His final solution was to buy the smallest analog phone and the smallest PCS phone he could find. He carries them both around in his coat pocket, and each one works fine in its mode.
Arjuna34
I have a dual-band cell phone. The firmware allows me select from a number of options to set the default band. I can choose from, digital only, digital primary/analog secondary, and analog only. I should add that I don’t have any problem using digital 99% of the time and I’ve used my phone all over the U.S. east of the Mississippi.
The phone will not use analog and digital simultaneously. I gotta think simultaneous use of both bands would lead to a whole mess of synchronization problems when you attempt re-assmeble the signal(s). You’d also hav to have two cells occupied at all times. I’m not sure why you think bandwidth is an issue, unless you are concerned about data (ie. wireless web); wireless web requires a digital signal anyway. You can’t use analog for this.
And finally, the phone cannot switch between signal types while in use. I don’t know exactly why.
[Edited by UncleBeer on 04-02-2001 at 04:47 PM]