SureSignal

Okay got one and it has to be one of the worst bits of broadband hardware I've had the pleasure to use.

Four LED's are all you get to show what its doing. You MUST have DHCP enabled on the LAN for it to work, i.e. no web/telnet interface to allow you to set a static IP address.

Registration involves going online, providing MAC and other details, and then waiting for a text message back, 17 hours and counting!!!

Setup guide is as useless as a paper bag, the vodafone forums are littered with people saying port forwarding is needed, but not a single mention of this in the documentation. Vodafone refuse to provide specific guides for even the more popular routers/providers and refer people to their ISP for support.

If it works then it will be good to have decent reception, but still feels a little bad to be paying for the hardware, and my broadband usage, but getting no discount on the calls made.

If this just a poor femtocell implementation by Sagem/Vodafone, or is femtocell technology really this bad. Even the first broadband router I was playing with some 10 years ago had better user interface.

As of 10:30 it is happy in that it has an internet connection, but phone is still not seeing the femtocell.

Now onto support to find out why....

How is this for a fun procedure that I've been given over the phone...

1. on iphone turn wifi off
2. turn aeroplace mode on
3. physically put iphone on top of the suresignal box for 15 minutes
4. Turn aeroplace mode off
5. Hold home and top button on iphone until apple logo appears
6. press reset button and hold on sure signal
7. remove power count to 10
8. replace power and after 10 release reset button

Apparently may still take an hour for phone to be happy even after all that!!!!

I've installed a few for friends up in Scotland where I have a second home and yes I agree the installation guides and tech support are "four fifths worse than useless".

Never had to add an iphone to one but once the handsets are added they work really well - until the broadband network goes down.

In reply to a post by MrSaffron:

Okay got one

You did read the The Register article first?

Yeap - paying twice is not great, but was stupid in terms of reception where I am.

Trying to reset opening window and throwing box into the fish pond.

Some two hours of fiddling, reading random posts on internet

It is a good job you do not have a hyphen in your name.

One of those I set up had a hyphen in the main account name, but trying to get the Sure Signal registered and linked was impossible as the web forms reject an non-alphanumeric characters.

Customer/tech support - their availability was random! Sometimes there, sometimes not.

Well the help from support appears to have worked, as now up and running with the sure signal and full bars, so hopefully no need to run up three flights of stairs to maintain signal when talking on the phone now.

Hi, I must have been one of the few lucky ones. Signal at home is rubbish no bars downstairs and one or two upstairs so changed to Voda when got new HTC Desire. Plugged sure signal into router, registered and waited approx 4 hours and full strength on phone.
Only downside which isn't on the sure signal but my bandwidth (1mb) when on the phone and browing at sametime can cause the call to break up.

In my opinion i think this is a great device for people in a poor signal area especially as I need phone for work and other half on landline all the time!

Living as I do in a Welsh valley this works very well for me. I now have a good mobile signal, something I've not had since BT Fusion a few years back.

It did take about 12 hours to be fully actuated and I'm left with two issues:

1. It claims to deliver a 3G signal but the mobiles in use with it indicate 2G only.

2. Recently the Sure Signal web page seems convinced I don't yet have a registered box.
Consequently I'm unable to add on new mobiles.

In both cases Vodafone Customer Services, including the 'Technical Experts' have been useless.