Steven Gutfreund <sg04%harvey@gte.com> (04/11/91)
I apologize if this has been discussed already, but what are the qualititive and/or other differences between at car-based cellular (at I believe 2 Watts) and a hand-held (at I believe .6 Watts)? Yechezkal Shimon Gutfreund sgutfreund@gte.com GTE Laboratories, Waltham MA harvard!bunny!sgutfreund [Moderator's Note: Actually, the permanently mounted phones in cars and transportables (sometimes called 'bag phones') are rated at three watts. Depends on where you use them, but in a large city like Chicago, where cellular signals saturate everything and towers are seen only a few city blocks apart, there is no real difference. On my handheld (Radio Shack CT-301) I don't even use the 'standard' antenna; opting for a 1/8 wave loaded coil -- a stub about the size of my thumb -- instead, and I get along fine. If you are buying your first unit, and plan to use it mostly in a metro area, don't let the references to the watts it puts out concern you (very much). PAT]