Database Users

Terrible Reception

I just got my VZW Ozone three days ago. This phone replaced my beat up but trusty Motorola Q (original version).
I really love the Ozone, but it get's just absolutely terrible reception. My Q get's 2-3 bars in my apartment where as the Ozone gets 0-1 bars at most. I keep missing calls and when I do connect, I drop the call 4-5 times per phone call.
Is there anything I can do to increase reception? If not, it's going to have to go back. The reception is just unacceptable.

thats just insane..
everyone ive come across with an Ozone has had great reception
take it back to VZW tell em the device is faulty!

Really? Most people on howardforums say that the reception is weaker than their previous phone.
I don't think it's defective; outside I have had 5 bars and I can get data at 1.2mbps when I have good signal. I think that the hardware just doesn't receive well in fringe areas.
I was just wondering if there was any kind of radio hack available to help, even at the expense of battery life.

A cross-country trip, the Froyo Radio and what it might mean to you!

So I just recently took a trip from northern California to Tennessee and had some interesting results with the Froyo radio. For reference I own the ATT-version Nexus One and have data roaming enabled.
When I used the phone before Froyo radio I had many problems with the 3G switching to Edge and back when needed which caused random data dropouts. Even turning the phone off and back wouldn't force the phone to switch connections to Edge when needed which would make me very frustrated in times of need.
On my trip I found something very interesting, not only did 3G and Edge switch almost perfectly, but Edge performed MUCH faster than before. While it isn't as important now in a world of 3G coverage, when I was on the "edge" of civilization I still got surfing speeds that were not far behind that of 3G speeds. My browsing, and most importantly Google Maps usage rarely suffered a performance hit despite where I was or what type of connection was available to my phone.
There was a difference between performance; 3G would act like Comcast and Edge would be a little behind, but in terms of actually surfing the Internet the extra 2-5 seconds it took to load up a desktop webpage didn't make a difference.
Technically the bandwidth speeds were much different. 3G performed from 1 to a max of 2 megabits down and .3-1 megabits up, while Edge showed speeds of 300-500 kbps down and 100-200 up.
One thing I did notice throughout the trip is the Nexus One's signal meter did not report correctly, there were times where it showed no signal and I had super fast connection, and also times when it would show full or near-full bars and there was no connection.
Hope someone finds this info useful!!! I'm very happy with the coverage my Nexus One gets with the Froyo radio now!

I have always found that my nexus holds calls and has fast data showing zero bars. One reason I've always loved the nexus

Just a point of clarification, EDGE has a maximum theoretical bandwidth of 473.6 kbits/s for 8 timeslots.
In real world conditions EDGE should have throughput of 236.8kbit/s with 4 timeslots(which is what most carriers employ).
Dan

Wonder if there's and app/mod to replace the signal bar with the actual signal #s?

Hey Sellitus, what else did you find working/not working on that trip?
I am considering a longer drive (SF to NY) and want to know about battery life, apps that were really handy, and which weren't.

SiNJiN76 said:
Wonder if there's and app/mod to replace the signal bar with the actual signal #s?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
hey that would be nice. just like how cyanogen puts the battery percentage, it would be nice to have the dBm level of signal overtop of the signal meter.

RogerPodacter said:
hey that would be nice. just like how cyanogen puts the battery percentage, it would be nice to have the dBm level of signal overtop of the signal meter.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The dBm and signal bar IMO opinion are rather pointless in regards to data. Having a very poor 3G signal will always be faster than a full GPRS signal.

Also, a signal meter in terms of DB would jump around quite a bit...

sprinkles said:
Hey Sellitus, what else did you find working/not working on that trip?
I am considering a longer drive (SF to NY) and want to know about battery life, apps that were really handy, and which weren't.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well for ATT I hit data roaming quite a few times, and although it worked on edge pretty quickly during those times it would randomly drop when the R was showing randomly. I think what happened a lot on the trip is when I was out in the middle of nowhere bouncing between towers would cause random dropouts, but they were usually no more than a few seconds.
I don't remember which apps specifically though a few also did not like the trip, but most would hang and resume in a few seconds after data was reconnected even if the signal strength showed it was connected the entire time with signal. Sometimes Google Maps hung, though it was rare and I noticed it more because I used it near constantly on the trip.
If I were to give advice to anyone looking at a cross country trip, buy a map or get offline GPS maps to help. We bought a map and it proved valuable at times, though we rarely needed it.

I wonder if the "enable data while roaming" setting had anything to do with that. Maybe an internal bug.

torchedlh said:
Also, a signal meter in terms of DB would jump around quite a bit...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I don't know how a number jumping around would be any different than a graphical signal meter jumping around. The iPhone has had this hack for a long time where you can replace the signal meter with the dBm reading. Though I've never owned the iPhone, but seen it on friend's iPhone before.
I know I'm often going into the android settings to look at my dBm reading, didn't jump around too much for me to see.

I've been having some reception issue lately with AT&T around my hometown (usually its quite good),so I did some googling, and found plenty of info on radio signal, and how to interpret -dBm, but I'm still baffled by the ASU. I really couldn't find much, just some random post on a random forum that left me with some questions:
In a 3G network your cell phone tries to open three channels to three radios so they can locate you and hand you off properly.
Those three channels make up you ACTIVE SET.
ASU is ACTIVE SET UPDATES or the rate at which your phone is able to update its location to the towers/radios.
This rate is affected by signal strength, load, and probably a lot of other factors that I haven't puzzled out yet.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Can anyone shed some more light on this? Usually at home I have 2 bars of HSDPA, somehwere in the -90s dBm, and anywhere from 4-8 asu.

[Q] Anyone having signal issues?

I just picked my new Fascinate yesterday and have been noticing something strange. I routinely have a very low signal with 3G and WiFi in places I've always had a great signal (or so I thought). Just to get it out of the way, I am not using any kind of case and I have already done a *228 update.
For example, tonight I put my Fascinate, a friend's Continuum, and a friend's original Droid in front of me on a table to compare their 3G signals. The Droid reported 4 bars, the Continuum 2 bars, and my flickered between 0 and 1.
At home, my "old" Omnia 2 routinely got 3-4 bars (still does even though it's deactivated) and my gf's LG Ally gets the same. However my Fascinate gets 1-2, sometimes dipping to 0.
Oddly, I have the same issue with my WiFi signal. At home my PC and laptop have a full strength signal while the phone is lucky to have a that first dot and maybe a bar. At work, I can walk within 4 feet of my Wireless-N router and still not have a full signal
Now everything *seems* to work so I'm hoping it's just an algorithmic display issue, but I have gotten a "Network Error" message a few times. For good measure, I'll probably pop into Verizon to compare my signal to the various displays there.
My question is: Is this a general Fascinate issue? Do I have a lemon? Should I just hope 2.2 is magic?
Thanks

same problem here.
I'm really hoping this gets fixed with 2.2.

I've had two fascinates now, and they've both had really poor signal strength compared to any other phone I've used or seen. Was at lunch the other day with a friend with a Droid 1, and I was getting 1 bar, he was getting 4. At home, it's consistently 1 to 2 bars at best, and I live less than a mile and a half from the nearest tower.
While I don't drop calls, I think it's pretty clear that the phone has a particularly week antennae design.
Since you say you just got the phone, I assume you haven't rooted and played with other roms yet. But in case you have, I noticed a significant drop in signal strength, both cellular and wifi, using JT's DJ05 rom. And it was more than just a display issue, since the wifi connection would repeatedly drop - even in the same room as my router. Switched to the stock DJ05 and I was back to normal (if you consider 1 to 2 bars normal).

Just wanted to follow-up on this. After a week of comparing signals to every smartphone I ran into, I came to the conclusion I either had a lemon or the Fascinate had serious engineering issues.
I went back to my local Verizon store and compared my phone's signal strength to all the Android phones in there, including the other Fascinates. Every phone was between -73 and -86. My phone never got any better than -101. So they swapped phones for me (new one out of the box) and this one performed like all their other phones in the store. I am now enjoying my old, normal, strong signal strength and my battery is still at healthy 80% after several hours of use, even a little wifi usage.
Moral of the Story: Check your signal strength (on any phone) against the phones in the store before you leave and don't be afraid to demand a new phone if you have that sort of concrete data to back it up!
Sent from my SCH-i500 Fascinated using the XDA App

DI01 has a signal reporting bug that is fixed in DJ05/DL09. With DI01, the best I got was -86dBm, and the jumps did not really seem to make sense. After going to DJ05, the reported signal goes up to -50dBm or so and moves in a logical direction (go inside, signal goes down) where before it would just move randomly. It is possible that there was also bad hardware, but I'd guess that it had more to do with the crappy software Samsung provided.

Interesting. I've not had any ambition to root/flash my Fascinate (I swear I did it weekly with my old Omnia 2) so for whatever it's worth, my experience was always with the stock DI01.

Hopefully you won't have similar problems after we get the maintenance update, whenever that may be.

Poor Signal Reception?

Anyone else noticing a lower signal reception with this phone?
I am coming from an iPhone 4. Previously at my house I was at 4-5 bars, now 2-3.
At my work I usually had 2-3 bars, now I get no signal to 1 bar.
I was trying really hard to enjoy the phone but now that I have seen the signal at my work I think it's going to have to go back
I wonder if the Inspire would get a better signal.
Update: It's not just the bars, I make calls and texts regularly at work with my iPhone and have never had a problem. With the Atrix it is dropping to no service and I can not make a call or text.

I was just noticing this same thin as well, i'm coming a captivate and where i normally have full service, the atrix gives me 2-3 bars. That said however, i don't notice much of a difference, if any at all, in the speed of things

Signal bars are different from phone to phone. I wouldn't trust those to much. However I find this behavior odd as I get better reception on this phone vs my old one. A lot better as in 2 - 3 bars better. Were you able to make calls on you iphone when it actually had the 1 - 2 bars at your office?

Vaires from phone to phone, remember when iPhone 4 showed higher signal then it was supposed to? then apple pushed the update

Yeah I made calls and texted regularly in my office, with the Atrix it drops service enitrely (says no service) and I can't make a call or send a text
I wouldnt care about the bar difference if it wasn't for the actual no service vs never having a problem.

That is interesting , my captivate had 0 to no service in my office, while the atrix has atleast 3 bars of edge.

crawlgsx said:
Anyone else noticing a lower signal reception with this phone?
I am coming from an iPhone 4. Previously at my house I was at 4-5 bars, now 2-3.
At my work I usually had 2-3 bars, now I get no signal to 1 bar.
I was trying really hard to enjoy the phone but now that I have seen the signal at my work I think it's going to have to go back
I wonder if the Inspire would get a better signal.
Update: It's not just the bars, I make calls and texts regularly at work with my iPhone and have never had a problem. With the Atrix it is dropping to no service and I can not make a call or text.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Comparing using the bars is not going to work across different phones, besides the iPhone 4 was known for reporting more bars then other phones.
In Android go to Menu > Settings > About Phone > Status and note the signal strength.

On Verizon you could update what they call "roaming capabilities". It's not really roaming, its more like manually updating or sync'ing tower or geographic locations. It's supposed to help some issues with signal strength.
Does ATT have a method to manually re-sync in this fashion?

HAROLDS Did u even read the bottom of my post?
Sent from my MB860 using XDA App

tbae2 said:
That is interesting , my captivate had 0 to no service in my office, while the atrix has atleast 3 bars of edge.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i think that means your Captivate still tries to look for a 3G signal but the Atrix is so weak that it cannot find any 3G signal and therefore it automatically starts looking for the Edge signal.
I am saying this because I also noticed the same behavior inside my apt building elevator.

This is interesting. I guess I'll find out tomorrow, but several of my friends and I have been noticing that deadspots with our N1's and Captivates. Like no signal, no voice, no text, no data. In the same locations iPhone 4's are good to go on everything. I volunteered to be the guy that gets an Atrix to see how it does. This thread has me worried.

Best modem for AT&T

What's the best reliable.modem.for use with aTt? I'm having service issues at a location.
Sent from my GT-N7000 using xda premium

I'd also like to know. I'm currently on LA6 and it works, however there is still something left to be desired because my coverage is really patchy.
I'll try some other modems out and see. BTW I'm in the northeast.

I'm in Chicago. would also like to know of the best modem..but i'm running the new miui beta 4 rom. this thing is beautiful. tied for best with PA

In Chicago Also....For me, by far it's LR1.
Also I get the best results using the 'phone' apn Internet setting

Hey so I'm stuck at pepboys getting an oil change (terrible service btw...but wrong forum.) Anyways, I've had intermittent cell phone and data reception here in Boston MA using LA6 for the past few weeks. Choppy voice calls and extremely flakey reception (for instance no phone reception while watching the fireworks last night on the Charles River.)
While waiting for my car I decide to surf the interwebs-of course. My signal bar continuously jumping from H to 3G to E and "page not available" from my browser. If I did get service it was very slow. I decided to try out a new modem. I managed to download LB2 and install it. I'm very happy to say my internet is startlingly faster and my reception indicator has stayed at H the whole time!
YMMV but I'm happy to report this might be the holy grail for me! I'll update my post when I get more time with it at home where I have had very consistent crappy reception.
Weird thing is my status still shows the same signal strength though...But the speed difference is definitely not just in my head. However, I can't say if the reboot didn't also play a role in my reception.
UPDATE: Besides the fact that I sat at Pepboys for 1 hour and 45 minutes for a simple oil change that I had an appointment for, I am completely stoked. I'm home now, a place where with LA6 I got nearly zero data reception, and I just pulled up the full desktop Amazon site in a few seconds on LB2! This is fantastic!