If you live in an area with a relatively low 3G coverage and you do not have a WiFi network at home, getting your own signal booster for the house may be the right solution for you. Otherwise, this is probably one of the most redundant items you can ever have. Signal connection for voice call and SMS hardly matter if you are bouncing between GSM and 3G, the speed and quality are the same. If you rely on 3G for internet however, that’s a different case.
The big investors in Vodafone’s Sure Signal Femtocell gadget would be those who exclusively stick to their 3G broadband connections for net access.
Now, take a quick step back from here and take this consideration; the Femtocell works by connecting to your internet connection and piggybacks your phone connection to the internet. Clever, yes, but it also means that you need to have some sort of internet connection at home. The Femtocell is priced at £50, and has a monthly rate of £5. On the other hand, you can just buy a wireless router.
Most smart phones are WiFi capable and unless you are using one of those rare 3G phones that do not support WiFi, then using the 3G booster is hardly the right solution for you. This may certainly help future owners of the Nexus One (which has problems connecting to 3G) but the general public would be better off doing without this device.
All in all, the Femtocell is hard item to place. It has a limit on the number of mobile devices that can log on to it making it unfeasible to use as a 3G booster in public areas and at home, it cannot even compete with a wireless router. The worst part is that the device requires your connection speed to be 1MB or higher, meaning it will be eating up some of your precious bandwidth.
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