Knowledge Base

• According to a study conducted by the NOP World Technology, almost half of US teens and tweens own cell phones. Over 16 million teens and tweens own cell phones. Approximately 44% of 10-18 year olds in the US own a cell phone. What does all of this mean? You can own one too!
• Did you know in 2004, approximately 68% of all mobile phones sold were colored screen. Upgrade your Platinumtel phone today!
• In 2000, the percentage of US college students that had cell phones on campus was slightly over 33%. This number increased dramatically in 2004 when a study showed nearly 90% of college students own a cellular phone.

Some Interesting Facts

1. $ 3.5 billion ringtones were sold in 2004
2. 171.2 million Americans own a cell phone
3. 735 million cell phones are predicted to be sold in 2005
4. Americans send 2.5 billion text messages a month

Cell Phone Knowledge (Source: wikipedia under the GDFL)

Mobile Phones

A mobile phone or cell phone is an electronic telecommunications device with the same basic capability as a conventional fixed-line telephone, but which is also entirely portable and is not required to be connected with a wire to the telephone network.

Most current mobile phones connect instead to the network using a wireless radio wave transmission technology (the exception is satellite phones). These mobile phones communicate via a cellular network of base stations (cell sites), which is in turn linked to the conventional telephone network. In the late 1970s and early 1980s the car phone was the only mobile phone available.

In addition to the standard voice function of a telephone, a mobile phone can support many additional services such as SMS for text messaging, packet switching for access to the Internet, and MMS for sending and receiving photos and video.

Some of the world's largest mobile phone manufacturers include Alcatel, Audiovox, Fujitsu, Kyocera (formerly the handset division of Qualcomm), LG, Motorola, NEC, Nokia, Panasonic (Matsushita Electric), Philips, Sagem, Samsung, Sanyo, Sharp, Siemens, SK Teletech, Sony Ericsson, and Toshiba.

There are also specialist communication systems related to, but distinct from mobile phones, such as satellite phones and Professional Mobile Radio. Mobile phones are also distinct from cordless telephones, which generally operate only within a limited range of a specific base station.

Technology

Mobile phones and the network they operate under vary significantly from provider to provider, and even from nation to nation. However, all of them communicate through electromagnetic radio waves with a cell site/base station, the antennas of which are usually mounted on a tower, pole, or building.

The phones have a low-power transceiver that transmits voice and data to the nearest cell sites, usually .5 to 10 miles away. When the cellular phone or data device is turned on, it registers with the mobile telephone exchange ("switch") with its unique identifiers, and will then be alerted by the mobile switch when there is an incoming telephone call. The handset constantly listens for the strongest signal being received from the surrounding base stations. As the user moves around the network, the mobile device will "hand off" to new cell sites.

Cell sites have relatively low-power (often only one or two Watts) radio transmitters which broadcast their presence and relay communications between the mobile handsets and the switch. The switch in turn connects the call to another subscriber of the same wireless service provider or to the public telephone network, which includes the networks of other wireless carriers.

The dialogue between the handset and the cell site is a stream of digitized audio (except for the first generation analog networks). The technology that achieves this depends on the system which the mobile phone operator has adopted. Some technologies include AMPS for analog, and TDMA, CDMA, GSM, GPRS, EV-DO, and UMTS for digital communications. Each network operator has a unique radio frequency band.