szilagyic writes:

On Jul 17, 4:44 am, LA4RT Jon Kåre Hellan wrote:
Around here, marginal areas mostly have 900 MHz. So if you need an
external antenna at all, you probably need one for 900.

OP: There has to be something wrong with your antenna system.

73
Jon

Thanks for the reply. When you say 900 MHz, what frequency range
should I look for, for an antenna? For instance, the one I have now
claims it covers 824-896Mhz, so apparently it doesn't cover 900?

Sorry, I wasn't clear enough. And come to think of it, I probably made
some unwarranted assumptions. I'm in Europe. Cell phones here use the
900 MHz band and the 1800 MHz band. All phones are GSM. I believe you
are in the U.S., where there's both GSM, CDMA and some analog, and
frequencies are different. In the U.S., GSM uses the 800 MHz and 1900
MHz bands, and I would expect CDMA to use the same bands.

In the U.S., rural areas are typically covered by 800 MHz networks, as
you want lower frequencies for larger cells. But you'll have to check
if this is actually the case for you. If it is, your antenna is cut
for the right frequency, but there seems to be something wrong with it.

Good luck
Jon