Poor mobile phone reception

[AC Question]

I have a Motorola RAZR HD mobile phone. I used to get 3 to 4 bars reception when it was running the ice cream sandwich version. Phone said in updates "you can now upgrade to KitKat 4.4.2". I did the upgrade thinking I was doing the right thing, thinking it might help. Waste of time. No major improvement, and mobile phone signal now 1 to 2 bars where I live. Rural area with plenty of blackspots.

 

[Rukbat]

The number of bars is relative to that phone only. (IOW, 2 bars on your phone means less signal than 3 bars on your phone. I could be getting 1 bar or 5 bars in the same place on the same carrier with the same model phone. "A bar" isn't a measure, it's just an indicator, it doesn't mean anything. KitKat could be calibrated to show fewer bars - that has no effect on the signal.

If here's no carrier that has solid coverage where you are, you choose the best one, see if they'll supply you with a repeater (Verizon uses the Samsung repeater, which is about as useful as what you muck out of a stall) and live with what you get. Coverage in rural ares will never be good until we're all using satellite phones. They're not spending half a million dollars for a tower to cover 10 accounts.