Coverage Maps

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DjShadow

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#8549 9-Jul-2006 21:01

How often would vodafone update their 3g coverage maps?
according to their site there is no 3g coverage north of Porirua city however when traveling to the hayward hills, in the paremata/mana area I was getting 3/5 bars on 3G for a little while, but thinking the hill whitby is on would be blocking the porirua signal good.

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#40724 9-Jul-2006 21:15

As you come off the Paramata bridge heading north, there is a carpark on your left where a walking track runs to the north alongside the inlet. I went for a Sunday afternoon stroll there a few weeks ago and there was a clear GSM signal, but 3G was dead.

In an earlier thread, though, I mentioned that I noticed that Vodafone's coverage maps show that there is no 3G signal available in Seatoun, despite my phone getting a very clear signal there. Obviously, coverage maps are not intended to be anything more than a rough guide, but I still tend to agree with you that they seem out of date.

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#40725 9-Jul-2006 22:13

Or try getting coverage where the maps say there is some... For example Queensgate Mall in Lower Hutt. As soon as you enter the building the coverage drops to zero - nada. I tried sending a friend a couple of SMS from one of the cafes in the ground floor, to arrange a meeting, but couldn't send or receive anything - voice, SMS, data - until out of the mall.

As Alasta says, rough guide.

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psychrn

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#40728 10-Jul-2006 01:06

Could this be area specific due to buildings interference/obstruction
In a location such as hamilton central where 3g is definitely in-inside the place where I work I often loose 3G to plain GSM-3-4 bars.
Albeit it being a hospital

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#40731 10-Jul-2006 06:47

Vodafone are rolling out 3G coverage to the North of Porirua City but they were involved in a battle with the Council over resource concents. There are something like 7 new sites in the Porirua basin including Paremata on the water tower where existing Telecom & Woosh sites are but no plans for coverage over the Haywards Hill at this stage.

Queensgate is just a joke, as discussed earlier a few months ago 3G coverage is non existant in most of the mall and GSM coverage in Woolworths (and the Eastern end of the mall in general) is either 1 bar or non existant. Vodafone have a site directly across the road from Queensgate however during the 3G upgrade of the site last year the 900 & 1800 panels where realigned which means there are now no panels actually facing the mall which is just plain crazy. Hopefully somebody will realise this one day..

freitasm

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#40733 10-Jul-2006 09:25

Shame, really... You walk into the mall, go upstairs to the Vodafone shop - and there's no signal at all. How do they sell Vodafone connections on that spot is beyond me, seems impossible to demonstrate much there...

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sbiddle

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#40735 10-Jul-2006 09:33

freitasm: Shame, really... You walk into the mall, go upstairs to the Vodafone shop - and there's no signal at all. How do they sell Vodafone connections on that spot is beyond me, seems impossible to demonstrate much there...

Not long after the 3G launch there was a huge Vodafone 3G display at The Warehouse end of the mall upstairs where you could play with the phones which were connected to the network (Vodafone UK do this in all their stores, I can't understand why this doesn't happen in NZ). I spoke to somebody at the stand about the poor coverage in the mall and they mentioned they had to move their stand from it's initial location because there was no coverage!

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#40736 10-Jul-2006 09:35

Don't we just LOVE 2.1GHz and it's inability to penetrate paper..... not.

DjShadow

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#40741 10-Jul-2006 13:00

Interesting that, I did get my phone from the queensgate vodafone shop, they did manage to show me a video stream working (unless they got their own mini instore transmitter). Inbuilding coverage is def not good however, unless you sit near a window then its fine.

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#40742 10-Jul-2006 13:21

Hmm, The VF rep tried to give me a demo of Video calling at the VF store here in Dunedin but then couldnt find any 3G coverage and tried blaming it on a broken phone so got another phone out and it had the same problem

sbiddle

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#40745 10-Jul-2006 13:42

Obviously Vodafone need to do something about their coverage or start moving some of their stores! :-)

In Palmerston North there is no 3G inbuilding coverage in The Plaza - you get marginal 3G coverage on the Church St side of the the Vodafone store but walk out of the mall side and there is nothing.

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#40747 10-Jul-2006 14:08

and may i add... Kaiapoi is not UMTS ready... and oh, this is kinda expected. Hanmer Spring is not covered with UMTS either... it was such a pain trying to get on the web to do some update on websites using UMTS card operating at GPRS.... yuck!

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#40761 10-Jul-2006 19:46

chiefie: and may i add... Kaiapoi is not UMTS ready... and oh, this is kinda expected. Hanmer Spring is not covered with UMTS either... it was such a pain trying to get on the web to do some update on websites using UMTS card operating at GPRS.... yuck!

I suspect that they're focusing on built up areas at this stage so that they can maximise the return on their investment. There seems to be very good coverage in Christchurch city, although I was surprised when I noticed that there is no 3G coverage at all in Invercargill.

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#40774 10-Jul-2006 22:09

Yet Invercargill according to the MED site, it says Vodafone has 4 3g frequencies there.
Wanganui has 3G, I would of thought Invercargill was bigger....

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#40991 13-Jul-2006 20:10

sbiddle: In Palmerston North there is no 3G inbuilding coverage in The Plaza - you get marginal 3G coverage on the Church St side of the the Vodafone store but walk out of the mall side and there is nothing.

I get really goot 3G when I'm in the Plaza, all over it (even if its not full signal but still get it)
I still get almost perfect signal when in the lifts at work too (the telecom building in palmy, how does that work lmao)

sbiddle

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#40994 13-Jul-2006 20:36

The problem with coverage in Palmy is that the site is on the tall building the next block to the South (Farmers Mutual from memory). Because panel antennas send a signal out horizontally and not downwards the coverage below some sites can be poor - this is why it's possible to stand directly below a cellsite and get no coverage and very little detectable radiation. Since Vodafone don't have 3G sites anywhere in Palmy except for the CBD they have slightly more down tilt on their GSM panels than their 3G panels to try and offer slightly better range from the 3G panels. This gives great inbuilding GSM coverage nearby but the downside of the 3G panels having less tilt is poorer coverage below the sites.

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