I used to love watching late night commercials. You know the ones where the product was too good to be true at a too low to believe price.

“It dices, it slices and it will stay sharp for one thousand years or your money back! Order now and we’ll throw in five more sets at no additional cost. All this for the low price of just $7.99″

or

“The Weblo Cooker makes a five course meal in just three minutes! That’s right, from freezer to table in minutes AND the meal will rival the finest restaurant. Best of all is it yours for just 3 easy payments of $9! But wait… there’s more…”

Yeah! Right! I’m overstating it but not by much and, after getting burned a few times (I never said I was a quick study) I realized- if it is too good to be true… it isn’t true.

So each time I have seen advertisements for cellphone reception boosters I passed. The problem is- I really need one.

A few years ago we moved. It was a good trade- more land, nicer house but unfortunately in the process we went from great to marginal (at best) reception. It is a problem since I live and work off my cell phone. As a result, for the past few years I have stopped down the street as I came home each night and forwarded my cell to the home number. (Can you say “annoying”?)

So when Wayne asked is any of us might be interested in a CellRanger Signal booster he had just reviewed I figured, “Why not?” The promises are lofty- increased data speeds and “over 200% increase in signal stregnth”! I was skeptical.

It came two days later. (Thanks Wayne!!) I plugged it into my iMac (it uses the usb for power) and I turned it on. My expectation were rather low.

Set up was a breeze but did it work? Take a look–

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Honestly, when I asked CellRanger if we’d be able to test their cellular phone booster, I made the request was with a lot of internal joking about whether it would work. We’ve seen all the $9.99 cell booster scams doo-dads that you are supposed to tape to your cell phone battery and receive an instant boost in signal. To say that everyone here was skeptical that this device would do anything except use electricity was an understatement. I’ve been testing this for the last few weeks with my iPhone 3G.

Because my house is in a strong signal area and CellRanger recommends you be within a 6 foot “optimal range” of the base, I’ve only tried this in the car when at known low signal areas. Yesterday I was at a client site who has almost no signal. The perfect place to test. And does the CellRanger do anything more than use electricity? Find out below.

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