Free?!? What madness is this?

Oh, I know!!!!!!

Can't beat the price of "free" and I'm sure glad it is working for you.

That's a DEAL! Love that they gave it to you!

Question. Was your phone previously set to WiFi calling?

A lagniappe is always a nice feature. :)

Our hillside neighborhood has a lot of signal shadows and the Verizon cell signal has degraded over the years. Two bars at best but inconsistently so. I called them to talk about it and the outcome was similar, they sent me a network extender for no charge.

What I have is not a signal booster per se (that implies amplifying an existing signal) but rather it's like a mini cell tower. It sends and receives normal cell phone signals like any tower installation but with less power and range than a normal tower. The traffic gets routed with the same level of encryption (so they say) over the home's internet connection.

Using an extender differs from setting the phone to Wifi Calling in a few ways. At least for our phones, the Wifi routing isn't used if there is any cell signal at all. Sometimes it would try to jump from one to the other and the call would be dropped. To have it used consistently, we needed to turn on Airplane Mode on each phone and then turn on Wifi every time we came home, and then reverse that when leaving the house. A typical day for us involves several ins and outs and it was inconvenient to remember to do. Secondly, guests in our house who are Verizon customers automatically get the enhanced signal, there's nothing to say or suggest they do for that result. Thirdly, while I have a very robust Wifi system (Orbi and satellites), the extender's signal seems stronger. In fact, I have it turned down to 60% power (it's accessible/adjustable through a browser access like a router) because I don't want to act as a cell site for my neighborhood that would degrade the signal for my own use.

Our second house is also in a bit of a hilly area, also in a cell signal shadow, and so we take the extender with us when we go there. A funny thing is that part of the extender boot-up process is to capture GPS signals to determine its location (for use for emergency calls) and when we move it, it takes about 5 minutes for it to confirm that it's in a new location and it needs to adjust for that. I also need to put it initially near a window so that it gets clearer GPS signals, .

I'm pretty sure all cell phone carriers provide those extenders at no charge. I know for a fact that AT&T does, and as elmer states, Verizon does.

I don't know if all provide devices but I know at least one other does. That's what triggered my inquiry to Verizon.

We have friends in the neighborhood whose house is in a small dip in the terrain, like a very small valley. The Verizon reception there is so weak that in a 3-4 hour visit there, our phones could lose 50% of battery capacity because of turning up send/receive broadcasting power to try to get a decent signal. That's if left on, we turn them off now when we go. But, the point is, I once asked if they had a cell phone reception problem and the response was "We did when we moved in but not anymore, we got a gizmo from xxxxx (not Verizon) and we get a strong signal now".

Elmer, I don't know if you live on a large tract of land (acres) but our house is in the middle of 5 acres so I'm wondering if we would have that issue that you spoke of about your house being a neighborhood cell site?? Anyway, we have Verizon which normally is a better signal than AT&T (this is what I've been told) but right where we are it's different. The only reason why use Verizon is that DH's work phone is with them.

When I initially hooked it up it went through 14 steps before it started working and part of it said on the screen it was doing something with the GPS. It also came with an extra antenna that could be extended to a nearby window if necessary but where I have it is only about 4 feet away from one. Anyway, I managed to be able to follow the directions and get it running and now we are getting 4 bars instead of none or one. I'd just never heard of such a thing.

Yes, I have a Samsung extender too. No "acreage". It's a traditional suburban neighborhood of what (in this region) is a bit larger than average lots. There's a lot of walking activity and a few houses within a hundred or two feet away. When the broadcast percentage was at 100%, I was getting multiple connections through the day. The signal will only remain strong through so many sets of walls indoors but through a wall and then outside, it carries for a good distance.

The last page of the Quick Start Guide has a heading "Accessing Your Network Extender's Admin Website" and it tells you how to get to the admin info. Doing it the first time is a momentary annoyance because the default password includes the last 4 letters/digits from the device's MAC address (visible on the bottom). Once logged in, change the password to something you'll easily remember and enter it somewhere you can reference if you forget.

If you click on Connections, you'll see this:

If you click on Settings, Advanced, you can reduce the broadcast power if you see there have been extra connections. Our screen shows a max of 4 in the preceding 24 hours above because we had guests yesterday afternoon. Normally it's just 2.

There are many areas in the state I live in that have no cell service, my home for example and the nearby town. It's why I still have a land line and no cell. I can't afford to pay for two phones.