Most of us have seen the coverage maps featured on all the top mobile network’s websites and although they help to give us a decent idea of how good we can expect our coverage to be they’re a long way from being 100% accurate. The BBC are launching an independent survey to find out just how good coverage is up and down the country and anyone with an Android phone running version 2.1 upwards can help contribute.
Taking part couldn’t be much simpler, just download the UK 3G Survey app from the Android Market and your phone will start collecting data on how good your signal is. You may understandably have a few concerns about an app that collects and transmits data but the BBC clearly state no personal information is kept and that it’s all anonymous. Be warned that while the app uses very little bandwidth, if you don’t have an internet allowance included in your tariff your network may charge you a small amount for the bandwidth used. We also wonder how it might effect battery life.
There’s no iPhone app available as it’s difficult to collect this kind of information in the background on iOS devices but with such a huge number of Android handsets now in use there should still be plenty of data collected for the survey. The more people that take part the more accurate these results will be, so if your willing to be a part of the survey then head over to the Android Market and download the UK 3G Survey app. The app will run in the background so once it’s installed you shouldn’t even notice it’s there.
Once the results are in it should be much easier to see which network will give you the best coverage in your area which may result in a lot of people buying new phones to change networks. Just make sure that if you’re one of those people you do the sensible thing and sell your old mobile for cash to a mobile phone recycling company.
When the first Android smartphone hit the market in the UK a few years ago, overtaking the iPhone as the most popular mobile platform seemed unlikely. While the T-Mobile G1 was a decent handset and Android showed signs of promise, the sheer dominance of the iPhone seemed to rule out the possibility of major success for Google’s open source mobile operating system.
