Moto Droid and ext antenna

[Adam Ball]

Has anyone here hooked up an external antenna to a Moto Droid? I'll be using mine as my modem this year and would like to get a direct connect amp for it. There is what appears to be a plug of some sort on the back under the battery cover. However some people say it's a service port, whereas some say it's a external antenna jack. No one seems to know for sure what it's for, and I don't want to get an amp only to find it I can't hook it up.

 

[D. Hayes]

it really looks like a antenna port to me:

I posted this over on howard forums. Maybe someone can clue us in.

 

[mrobinett]

That is a u.fl connector. They are used on Spread Spectrum RC radios on the boards where the antenna connects to the rf board. I used a pigtail from Lcom to create an external antenna jack so I can connect an external antenna to my RC radio and fly my plane from inside my car.

Heres a link to the pigtail:
http://www.l-com.com/item.aspx?id=21124&cmp=ALSOS
Be aware though, they say they are only rated for 20-30 connects and reconnects, they are pretty fragile.

 

[D. Hayes]

I had someone reply to my thread over on howard forums. They said it's to inject a test signal for testing the phone prior to it leaving the factory.

 

[mrobinett]

That is a u.fl connector. They are used on Spread Spectrum RC radios on the boards where the antenna connects to the rf board. I used a pigtail from Lcom to create an external antenna jack so I can connect an external antenna to my RC radio and fly my plane from inside my car.

REVISION: Its close, but not a u.fl, maybe a reverse polarity u.fl... I just checked the one in my radio, it has a center pin where the hole is on your droid.
Sorry..
Mike

 

[Ben Holcomb]

I was wondering the same. Either way, it seems like a pretty crummy place to have a wire hanging off your phone while trying to talk on it.

I would really suggest getting one of those repeater amps if you need to get one. No wires is a good thing.

 

[Josh VonFeldt]

I was just googling this since I will be using the droid as my modem this season as well and ended up coming back to the same forum I started at.

Has anybody found anything? I've read through the droid forums and there are some people testing, but it doesn't look like there's any solutions yet.

I did see this video saying there is another jack under the plastic that will work for an antenna but I haven't tried it myself.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wYolqzcoIbE&feature=player_embedded

 

[D. Hayes]

I don't know if I'd trust that video. The guys over at Howard's forum tend to be pretty good at finding this stuff. I'll check up with them again today to see if anything has surfaced.

 

[Adam Ball]

I asked over on the maximum signal forum, and was told Motorola told them there is no external antenna port on the droid. The port on the back is for diagnostics only.

Josh, have you used your droid as a modem yet? What are you using to do it? I've tried pda.net, and while it works great most of the time, I've noticed a few times where it will stop, and I have to manually restart the app on both the laptop and phone.

 

[Gordon Spencer]

According to the engineers at Motorola it is only a test port. It has limited number of insertions and will fail quickley if used for an external antenna port .

 

[Jason Montano]

I asked over on the maximum signal forum, and was told Motorola told them there is no external antenna port on the droid. The port on the back is for diagnostics only.

Josh, have you used your droid as a modem yet? What are you using to do it? I've tried pda.net, and while it works great most of the time, I've noticed a few times where it will stop, and I have to manually restart the app on both the laptop and phone.

I was having the same issue using pda.net on my droid. However, since the last update about a week ago I have not run into any issues. Hopefully the update fixed the bug.

 

[Josh VonFeldt]

Josh, have you used your droid as a modem yet? What are you using to do it? I've tried pda.net, and while it works great most of the time, I've noticed a few times where it will stop, and I have to manually restart the app on both the laptop and phone.

I just got my new laptop in the mail today so I am planning on trying it out with pda.net later on tonight.

Are you still planning to use your droid out on the road even if you don't have an external antenna?