Telstra Next G Blue Tick phones

Had the ZTE and thye phone was but ugly but worked well but the car kit was next to useless, real pain putting the phone in and connect the cable which failed. Appently a common failing with the car kit. Now have a Nokia E51, car kit is blue tooth so no wires to constantly plug in so hopefully one less problem. I run one of those thick ariels (not sure of db gain) and at best it may give me 2 bar gain or from a spot that I can only text, in thye car kit I can ring. The phones are likely on a par with each other, when in the car and out of it.
cheers
blaze

I didnt know that you could bluetooth signal to your phone.

Does it automitically connect when you get in the car so you could leave it in your pocket and still get the benifit of the aerial


Adam

Quote:

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Originally Posted by boxhead

I have a Nokia N95 with a car kit and a 9dbi aerial and i get service pretty much everywhere. i live at Mutawintji national park and i get service the whole way from broken hill to when i get behind the hills 130kms from town.

i have a LG TU550 as my work phone and i dont get service until i am 15kms from broken hill with it

So i think it is all to do with the phones.

One of the guys here bought a cheap ZTE prepaid for 100 and he gets amazing service a little bit better than my nokia and it has an external aerialport.



Adam

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I've also got a Nokia N95 which at the Telstra shop had a Blue-tick sign right next to the Phone , however I've found that in some Rural/regional areas without an External car arial they don't seem to pick up any or hardly any NextG reception.:( and this is why I bought this phone for....

Is there any chance you could post up a pic of your set up? sorry for Hijack...

Quote:

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Originally Posted by boxhead

I have a Nokia N95 with a car kit and a 9dbi aerial and i get service pretty much everywhere. i live at Mutawintji national park and i get service the whole way from broken hill to when i get behind the hills 130kms from town.

i have a LG TU550 as my work phone and i dont get service until i am 15kms from broken hill with it

So i think it is all to do with the phones.

One of the guys here bought a cheap ZTE prepaid for 100 and he gets amazing service a little bit better than my nokia and it has an external aerialport.



Adam

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Is this LG TU550 in a car kit with external aerial, or are you comparing N95 with external aerial to a YU550 without?

I have a TU550 and after your post I am wondering about value of fitting a car kit for the TU550 or upgrading to another phone plus car kit.

I live in the SW of Vic wth alot of blackspots towards the SA border (Mt Gambier direction) Got the Telstra (ZTE) 165i, after struggling with a non-blue tick phone and limited coverage, and have been extremely happy with coverage. I also have a "broomstick" external antenna which does seem to help in areas I would never had reception before. I bluetooth for handsfree operation with a Blueant device. Simple connect up. I work with Ambulance Vic and need to have my phone, so I have been pretty happy with this combo, so far.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by bblaze

Had the ZTE and thye phone was but ugly but worked well but the car kit was next to useless, real pain putting the phone in and connect the cable which failed. Appently a common failing with the car kit. Now have a Nokia E51, car kit is blue tooth so no wires to constantly plug in so hopefully one less problem. I run one of those thick ariels (not sure of db gain) and at best it may give me 2 bar gain or from a spot that I can only text, in thye car kit I can ring. The phones are likely on a par with each other, when in the car and out of it.
cheers
blaze

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Blaze,

How are you running the external aerial on the E51? Have you modded your phone or something???

-adam.

Hi Guys,

The original Telstra country phone (F165) unfortunately was bloody awful - not a huge amount of testing done and didn't have the transmit power required. The new F165i's we have been doing quite a lot of testing all over NSW and they have worked flawlessly. Getting the right external antenna helps a heap - don't settle for any antenna.

The other one to look for if you don't want the uglyness of a F165i, is the Easy Touch discovery. Wouldn't say its the best looking phone around, but much better than the 165, and also has an external aerial port. The Nokia N95 was good, but has been end-dated with Telstra now so we wont be seeing too many more of them in the stores.

I've been having this debarcle for a while now - I look after the IT for a customer of mine who has the core of their businesses in Remote NSW & WA so trying to find decent phones that'll do the trick has been the source of many expletives let me tell you! We seem to be pretty set now with two phones that actually do the job!

If you need any details, feel free to pm me...

Cheers,
-Adam.

I had the later ZTE165i and was very impressed with its performance. Unfortunately it was let down by poor software issues. The phone went back to Telstra 3 times . Each time I got a new 165i which subsequently failed. 1st phone suffered a terminal software failure, 2nd phone destroyed SIM cards within 2 hours of picking it up from Telstra and the 3rd phone never left the telstra store as it rattled.
In the end Telstra were good about it and honoured the Multiple Equipment Failure policy and I opted for a Samsung. I feel that ZTE (which I believe Telstra have significant interest in) isn't very mature product yet.

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Originally Posted by Armadillo

I had the later ZTE165i and was very impressed with its performance. Unfortunately it was let down by poor software issues..... (snip)

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I also have the ugly ZTE T165i, there's a self serve firmware update on their webpage and some discussion on their forum. I haven't done the update yet, coz I haven't had any issues.

Coverage has been good where I've needed it .. no external ant. (anymore) ... coz it ripped off the windscreen before I got a chance to test it out.

Stevo

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Originally Posted by Mutley

... The new F165i's we have been doing quite a lot of testing all over NSW and they have worked flawlessly. Getting the right external antenna helps a heap - don't settle for any antenna.

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Adam, what antennae would you recommend for use with the F165i?

I assume you are comparing different antennae, all of which claim to be suitable for the nextg/cdma frequency.

Assume I don't have a restriction on height, mounting location (bull bar, etc.), and just want best performance while traveling on country/outback roads.

Edit:
My current antenna is an RFI and the label states: model CD1795, gain 6.5 dBi, frequency 824 - 960 MHz, CDMA/GSM900