5BARz™ News

We all know, Inflight Entertainment is quickly becoming an experience that is supplemented on the ground (and many times in the air) by an assortment of devices, the most notable of which, is the iPhone. A lot of road warriors rely on smart phones for entertainment, telephony, and data. The telephony part is the focus of this Hot Topic and the seemingly lack of consistent voice connectivity is the problem we set out to solve. Enter 5BARz from CelLynx, the mobile/fixed, cell phone solution. Simply put, the 5BARz Road Warrior (product image)pumped-up any and every telephone signal to 5 bars on our phones. If there was a signal (and sometimes where there wasn’t one), 5BARz found it and connected our iPhone every time. Seldom do we test a product that works so effectively but this gadget is really worth the bucks, after all, what is a dropped call worth?

Technically, the 5BARz solution is a femtocell (Access Point Base Station) and it simply increases the effective range of your cell phone by “relaying” the existing signal, amplifying it, and coupling the output to your phone, thus raising the signal level (5 bars – get it?). Current femtocell solutions are only one-carrier service and are not portable like the 5BARz. The system is really simple – two units (base station/receive antenna) and phone cradle. After hooking them up and dropping in our iPhone, need we say it – five bars in a home location that previously produced barely one bar…and at times, zero bars! The unit is also portable, and it is this feature that we had to test. With a cigarette lighter gooseneck attached to the phone cradle and the base station on the dash, we started our testing on the road where dropouts are notorious. After 4 exhaustive 100 mile trip tests up and down Interstate 5 near Seattle, we were amazed that there were consistently 5 bars everywhere…and nary a dropped call. We tested the unit with 5 different phones and 3 service providers with no difference. Suffice it to say, dropped calls will still occur because of network congestion, however, we did not experience one during our testing, affirming the value of the system and the relative improvement to the phone radio.

From a technology viewpoint, the antenna design in the base station is quite small and first rate. Employing a patented PIFA (Planar-Inverted-F-Antenna) design (the kind used in microstrip applications) is perfect for compact products like this. It covers the full US cellular and PCS bands and we found no difference in signal strength between carriers. Cellynx has patented an “active stability loop” to improve the isolation obtained between two co-located antennas, thereby allowing higher gain in a bi-directional amplifier (or repeater) system. You have probably heard the squeal from an audio system amplifier when a microphone gets to close to a speaker. This phenomenon is commonly called feedback. Similarly, there is an inherent problem with having receive and a transmit antennas close together with a signal booster in-between; if the antennas are too close to one another a feedback oscillation would occur unless the booster can be adjusted to prevent the feedback oscillation. The 5BARz Road Warrior self adjusts to prevent a feedback oscillation by turning down its gain – the ability to boost a signal. The base station is about the size of a couple packs of cigarettes and is placed on the dashboard. A small dipole antenna in the phone cradle couples the signal to your phone. And yes, you have to use a headset because the phone must be in the close proximity to the cradle to get the signal boost. Small price to pay for connectivity! Use it in your car or in your hotel room. If you have a need to stay connected, this is the only active way we have found to make our iPhone work. Heck, they ought to package one with each phone.

Zero bars on your cell phone could be a thing of the past with the 5barz Road Warrior, Hirsch reported.

"Snowed-in someplace on the road? I have five bars of coverage," said creator Barry George. "5barz takes the technology of a cell phone tower and shrinks it down into the size of something I can put right in the palm of my hand."

George said the antenna system inside the road warrior boosts even the spottiest of cell signals for voice or data usage.  

"Any cell phone device on any carrier within 2 to 3 feet of this device gets the benefit of that boosting," George said.

It seems to work a weak cell signal jumped a few bars when Hirsch put the phone next to the box.

There is nothing to connect to your cell phone and 5barz comes with a car charger that turns into a desktop stand.

Another gadget that can be on anytime, anywhere is Flo TV, allowing you to take television on the road, Hirsch reported.

Flo TV is already on some cell phones, and the hardware and antenna work with whatever audio/video setup the customer already has.

It brings a lineup of popular channels right to your car.

Coverage is spotty to non-existent in rural areas and you can find a coverage map online, Hirsch reported.

Flo TV is set to be installed in some Chrysler vehicles by the end of the year and an after-market version is expected to be out in a few months. 

Stay with 10TV News and 10TV.com for the latest information.  For full article:  http://www.10tv.com/live/content/local/stories/2009/11/24/story-stay-connected-5barz-flo-tv.html

You'll encounter weak cell signals or no bars (especially if you're an iPhone user in midtown Manhattan) everywhere you go, which is where this CellLynx 5BARz booster ($300) comes in. About the size of a paperback book, you just plug the box into an AC outlet or cigarette lighter and it somehow corrals and amplifies weak signals to create drop-free conversations and speedy Web surfing where you had neither before, on the road or at home.

No, if won't create signal where there isn't any, but it's fairly portable. It comes with a CLA car mount for use in a car — but just remember its dangerous, if not illegal, to use a cellphone while driving. Your cellphone has to be within a couple of feet of the cradle, which must be a transmitter or some sort, but the main receiver/amplifier box doesn't necessarily have to be near a window such as similar (and less portable) cell boosters. It also works with either GSM or CDMA signals. The company guarantees five bars anywhere within your carrier's coverage area. Let us know how that goes.