What is Off-Air?

Video Description

When remediating in building cellular coverage issues, you need a cellular signal source or donor signal to bring inside, improve, and distribute. Two common sources of donor signals are local sources and off-air sources. When using local sources, such as a base station with fiber backhaul or a small cell with public Internet access, you need a source for each carrier. Securing these sources will require multiple interactions with the carriers. A base station is the main communications point for wireless mobile devices and serves one cell in a cellular network. Fiber backhaul means it's connected to the core network by fiber. A small cell is a type of low-power base station that increases network capacity and quality for smaller areas. Off-air signal sources are signals pulled from the outdoor macro network wirelessly through an antenna. In building DAS or signal boosters using off-air technology, like Nextivity cellular coverage solutions, literally bring the power of the macro network indoors. There are several advantages to using off-air signal sources. First, the signals are free. In many places, public cellular network signals may be utilized without any type of formal agreement in place with regulators or operators. Second, macro networks typically have sufficient capacity available to support in building coverage needs. In fact, smart cellular coverage solutions like the CEL-FI product family increase the available network capacity by making the delivery of signals to end users more efficient. Another benefit of using off-air signals is that you are taking advantage of the billions of dollars spent spent by operators to deliver signal quality, capacity, and a good user experience to their subscribers. As operators continue to invest in and improve their networks, the performance of systems utilizing off-air signals will improve as well. Finally, by pulling a signal off air, you can keep system costs low while still maintaining the ability to optimize signal quality.