Why are mobile phones called "cell" phones?

Why are mobile phones called "cell" phones Asked by Midsykes 62 months ago Similar questions: mobile phones called cell Consumer Electronics > Cell Phones & Accessories.

Similar questions: mobile phones called cell.

Consumer Electronics > Cell Phones & Accessories.

It is called a cell phone because the system used to operate cell phones divide a city into small cells for service One of the most interesting things about a cell phone is that it is really a radio. Before cell phones, people who needed mobile communications ability installed radio telephones in their cars. In the radio telephone system, there was one central antenna tower per city, and perhaps 25 channels available on that tower.

The cellular phone system divides the area of a city into small cells. This allows extensive frequency reuse across a city, so that millions of people can use cell phones simultaneously. Here's how it works: The carrier chops up an area, such as a city, into cells.

Each cell is typically sized at about 10 square miles (perhaps 3 miles x 3 miles). Cells are normally thought of as hexagons on a big hexagonal grid. Each cell has a base station that consists of a tower and a small building containing the radio equipment.

Cell phones have low-power transmitters in them and the base station is also transmitting at low power. Low-power transmitters have two advantages: 1. The power consumption of the cell phone, which is normally battery-operated, is relatively low.

Low power means small batteries, and this is what has made handheld cellular phones possible. 2. The transmissions of a base station and the phones within its cell do not make it very far outside that cell.

Therefore, cells can use the same 56 frequencies. The same frequencies can be reused extensively across the city. The cellular approach requires a large number of base stations in a city of any size.

A typical large city can have hundreds of towers. But because so many people are using cell phones, costs remain fairly low per user. Each carrier in each city also runs one central office called the Mobile Telephone Switching Office (MTSO).

This office handles all of the phone connections to the normal land-based phone system, and controls all of the base stations in the region. As you move toward the edge of your cell, your cell's base station will note that your signal strength is diminishing. Meanwhile, the base station in the cell you are moving toward (which is listening and measuring signal strength on all frequencies, not just its own one-seventh) will be able to see your phone's signal strength increasing.

The two base stations coordinate themselves through the MTSO, and at some point, your phone gets a signal on a control channel telling it to change frequencies. This hand off switches your phone to the new cell. Sources: electronics.howstuffworks.com/question58... .

Cell is short for "cellular" The system doesn't have one big antenna to transmit to your phone, and to receive from your phone. Your phone isn't powerful enough to broadcast more than a mile or two. The way the system works is that there are little reception and broadcast areas spread all over town (an all over the country) so that at any moment you are in one little area and that local antenna is what you are communicating through.

These are the "cells. " The idea is that you have all these bunches of overlapping "cells" and should you move from one cell to another, the computerized system is smart and hands off control from one antenna tower to the next. This allows you to be able to use low power transmitters in cell phones, but still have coverage all over - plus that way, you can have eneryone have their cell phone without the frequencies overlapping, because there's only ever going to be a limited number of people using phones in any particular cell.So "cell" or cellular refers not to the phone itself, but rather to the network - a cellular network.

The network has "cells" Because the radio transmissions don't have a very long range, you need to be "inside a cell" to connect to a network and make calls. Also, only certain frequencies are reserved by the FCC for mobile phone usage. You don't want adjacent cells to use the same frequencies at the same time, but cells that are separated by some distance can without worrying about crosstalk.

The "cellular" comes from the layout of the network. Sources: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cellular_network .

Based from Cell sites / Cellular A mobile or cellular telephone is a long-range, portable electronic device for personal telecommunications over long distances. Most current mobile phones connect to a cellular network of base stations (cell sites), which is in turn interconnected to the public switched telephone network (PSTN) (the exception are satellite phones). Cellular networks were first introduced in the early to mid 1980s (the 1G generation).

Prior mobile phones operating without a cellular network (the so-called 0G generation), such as Mobile Telephone Service, date back to 1945. Until the mid to late 1980s, most mobile phones were sufficiently large that they were permanently installed in vehicles as car phones. With the advance of miniaturization, currently the vast majority of mobile phones are handheld.In addition to the standard voice function of a telephone, a mobile phone can support many additional services such as SMS for text messaging, email, packet switching for access to the Internet, and MMS for sending and receiving photos and video.

The world's largest mobile phone manufacturers include Audiovox, BenQ-Siemens, gh Tech Computer Corporation, Fujitsu, Kyocera, LG, Motorola, NEC,i-mate, Nokia, Panasonic (Matsushita Electric), Pantech Curitel, Philips, Sagem, Samsung, Sanyo, Sharp, Siemens SK Teletech, Sony Ericsson, T&A Alcatel, and Toshiba. The world's largest mobile phone operators (based on customer totals) include China Mobile, Vodafone, and China Unicom. There are also specialist communication systems related to, but distinct from mobile phones, such as Professional Mobile Radio.

Mobile phones are also distinct from cordless telephones, which generally operate only within a limited range of a specific base station. Technically, the term mobile phone includes such devices as satellite phones and pre-cellular mobile phones such as those operating via MTS which do not have a cellular network, whereas the related term cell(ular) phone does not.In practice, the two terms are used nearly interchangeably, with the preferred term varying by location. Sources: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cell_phones .

Cell is an abbreviation. They used to be called cellular, which I assume has something to do with how they function. Everything gets shortened in our culture, so now they are "cell" phones..

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