Turn cell id on?

I noticed in the UK when I visit there that only Vodaphone showed cell id,
and then that was only in numerals; I presume you may want to know what
these represent. Who knows what these mean, although someone on an UK group
once posted that they were part of the post code?

With other networks, unless they broadcast the cell id, I don't know how you
can determine this.

Here in Australia all three major carriers show cell id in alpha format,
(i.e. usually geographical name of the area where the transmitter is) -
sometimes they replace this with a promotional message, or "New Coverage"
(meaning obvious).

In Thailand they show the cell id in streaming format, so that it scrolls
across the page, if the name is too big for the screen.

China, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Cambodia, Hong Kong, USA no cell id at all,
from what I have seen.

Do you mean cell ID or cell geographical name?

The true cell ID is a number which, when combined with the PLMN
(country and network operator code) and LAC (Location Area
Code), uniquely identified the cell world-wide.

Some networks in some countries use the CB (cell broadcast)
message facility to give their cells geographical names like
"Sydney CBD".  Many cells can then have the same name.

Without some sort of netmonitor facility running on the phone,
the only way to read cell ID is via an "AT" command over a
serial link.  "AT+CREG=2" will give you LAC and cell ID in
hexadecimal format, and "AT+COPS=2;+COPS?" should give you the
PLMN.

Cell name is broadcast on CB channel 50 (200 in the UK, I
believe).  In most phones, the display of this can be activated
somewhere in the  message settings.

To read the CB channel 50 and 200 messages over a serial link,
you can use

       AT+CNMI=1,0,2,0,1;+CSCB=0,"50,200","1-15"

noting that the output will be in either directly human-readable
text (if "AT+CMGF=1" is supported and active), or Protocol Data
Units if PDU-mode ("AT+CMGF=0") is active.  The PDU must be
decoded to be read.

John

A few phones offer the option of displaying (if it is available, it
isn't always).