If you are having trouble getting cell phone reception in this area, you may be overlooking one important step of cell phone use.

"Sometimes if you reset the phone [by turning it off and on], it will help reception," said Scott Walters, store manager of Verizon Wireless, 1500 N. Atherton St. He recommends "recycling" cell phones at least once a day by turning them off when charging them at night.

Nicholas Carita, communication specialist for AT&T Wireless, 147 S. Allen St., said, "It's just like a computer. If you have it on for an extended length of time, it won't work well."

Although, this technique may improve reception, Angel DiNovo, lead communication specialist for AT&T Wireless at the Allen Street store, said the bottom line is "wherever you go, you're going to pick up a tower."

The problem some people have with reception is they pick up a tower signal that is too far away from their present location. Michael Brooks, retail sales manager for AT&T Wireless State College, said if a person is at the Nittany Mall and makes a call, the signal from the tower closest to the mall will stay with that person's phone, even if the person travels to downtown State College. As a result, the person may not get good reception downtown because the phone is still using the signal from the tower at the mall, not a signal from a tower downtown. One way to fix this problem is to turn the cell phone off and turn it back on so that it can pick up the closer tower signal.

Some companies have reprogramming services to help customers gain better reception. Verizon Wireless customers are advised to dial *228 at least once a month to update their roaming list of towers and add any newly activated services, Walters said.

Thomas Houck, store manager of Immix Wireless, 134 W. College Ave., advises his customers to call into the company every two or three months to connect to the computer system and update their phones. AT&T Wireless customers can call 1-800-888-7600 for troubleshooting tips regarding new equipment on cell phones which may interfere with reception.

Some of the new digital camera phones will not get signals in rural areas that only use analog networks instead of new digital networks because "digital only phones will not have analog service," Walters said. However, most phones are Tri-Mode, which can pick up digital and analog service.

Bad reception is caused by a number of factors, such as cloudy and rainy weather, Brooks said. Also, a wooded area with many leaves may not be the best place to make a call because leaves can defer the signal.

Some students notice that reception is better during the day than at night, but this is just because there is a "huge, huge overload in the system" at night when people take advantage of free night minutes, Brooks said.

There is a "higher call volume time" at night, which leads to more congestion on the network, Walters said.

"The more people that are on a network, the network will actually shrink," Houck said.