Database Users

WiFi / battery efficiency

At home my cell coverage is a little spotty. It jumps between 1x and evdo frequently. I'm experimenting with WiFi (just set it up yesterday at home) and I haven't yet had a chance to see first hand, but my question is, if I have a solid WiFi connection, is it more battery efficient than solely using the cell radio? I know that just having wifi on will drain the battery hence my confusion.

Strong WiFi is generally better on battery than even a strong EVDO signal. You should be much better off using WiFi. Make sure to set the WiFi to never sleep in the advanced settings.

zesta said:
Make sure to set the WiFi to never sleep in the advanced settings.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Is this a new 2.1 option? I didn't even look for it because I am so used to having keepWiFi installed. Also, I have noticed that my wifi signal appears low even though I am only about 50 feet away from my router with only 1 wall in the way running on 802.11g on a dual band router. Also, my router has the ability to broadcast 2 SSIDs to allow for a guest network so you dont have to give out your WPA password to friends and it firewalls them away from your network. I have noticed that my phone has a problem with this. My netbook sees both SSIDs without any problems and stay connected to my main SSID. On my Hero, the main SSID appears and disappears constantly. I have to log onto my guest network because it is the one that my Hero likes for some reason.

In the WiFi setting, click menu and advanced option is available.
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Great info. Thanks!

HD2 low WiFi reception

Is it normal that my hd2 has lower wifi reception than my laptop? I mean, my router is in the living room and i have 4 to 5 Bars of wifi signal on my laptop in the bedroom, but i have only one bar on my HD2! There are two walls(one room) between living room and bedroom? I've try'd it at my friends house with his laptop and his router, it's the same thing.
Is it normal the phone to have lower reception or may i try to flash a new radio?
I'm using stock ROM 1.48 with radio 2.05.
Thanks in advance!

doesn't anybody have this problem?

My HD2 gets slightly less reception bars than my
laptop in the same location. Could be the way the meters are calibrated, but more likely the larger antenna in the laptop. With wireless N enabled my internet speed tests seem about the same with two bars as with three. Almost same with N disabled.

I have a linksys WRT54GL router and the HD2 gets low signal strength. Only about 7m away from the router and behind one wall. So I am not sure what is up. The router also has 7db antenna attached.
Laptops get much better signal strength. Not sure what the issue is.

A phone doesn't have the same amount of Power as a laptop nor the Antennas Range ... On my Laptop i get several WiFi Signals while on my HD2 I only get two... In the Same location

Could be that you need the wireless N enabled on your phone use the search option

Thanks for the tip about the wireless N enabled on the phone.
I understand that laptops have higher powered antennas. But even if I place the phone right next to the router it will not get 100% signal strength. It will go to maybe 50-60% tops. This is with the phone right next to the router.
Maybe a radio upgrade etc might be on order.
Will try the N enabled feature 1st, even though I use a G router.

try to remove the battery cover. See this thread: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=785907

antenna in your laptop will be much bigger and better located than the one in your phone

with a WRT54GL Router The Wireless-N Option will have no effect.
Your router only supports Wireless-G

Wierd Wifi issue

Hello all,
I have a nexus s 9020t with stock 2.3.4.
I have been in an office building that has 2 Wifi networks, one for each company.
With my PC I can see both networks, the one for the company I am visiting is a very strong signal and I can connect to it without a problem, the second company is a weak signal.
With my nexus s however, I can only see the weak Wifi, it won't even show the strong signal in the Wifi networks list (and one of the access points for it is right on top of me), I tried both with the stock Wifi setting and with Wifinder.
Other smartphones such as the iPhone have no problem in seeing both networks and connecting to the one with the strong signal.
Any idea why is that?
And do you think we will ever get a fix that boosts the phone's Wifi strengh? (or is there one?) kinda annoying having poor reception when people with iPhones etc... have a good recepotion to the same network.

I had some issues with wpa encryption and networks not showing up on my nexus. Changed the network to wep and the issue went away.
Sent from my Nexus S 4G using Tapatalk

This was an open network on which you need to login via the browser after you connect.

What ROM are you on. CM7 has many legacy wifi support built in. It would be that if you're on stock is missing proper support for certain channel/frequency (wifi is not all exactly 2.4mhz).
Also, CM7 you can set up to 14 channels that you can use.

Note 2 not automatically switching to stronger WIFI signal?

Ok this may be kind of a long post but I'll first address what I think is the issue.
My note 2 doesn't appear to be automatically switching to stronger available wifi signals unless I manually toggle the wifi off then back on again. It will then connect to the stronger signal.
The reason why this has become an issue is because I bought a Diamond WR300n wifi range extender. I'm using it as a reapter. I want to have better wifi signal in my garage where I spend a lot of time. My current wifi signal drops off pretty much near the garage when using my phone. My laptop still gets decent wifi reception when I'm in the garage though.
I went through the fairly basic setup for the extender and got it working. I confirmed this by plugging in the ethernet port from the extender directly to my laptop and its receiving a signal just fine, browsing the internet etc.
So i put this extender in my garage, it connected normally and I confirmed it was working using my laptop again. Everything appeared to be working fine. The extender has the same SSID as my main wireless router (uverse 78wireblahblah).
The issue is when I'm inside my house I'm connected to the main wireless router because this is obviously the strongest signal. When I walk out of my house the signal diminishes as I approach my garage. I can walk into my garage and my wifi signal is pretty much gone even though there is this repeater putting out a working wifi signal with the same SSID as my main router.
Weird right, one would think it would automatically switch and connect to the repeater in the garage, but it doesn't.
Now if I manually turn off wifi and turn it back on while in the garage, bam, very strong signal and I'm connected. There really is two issues though, 1. my note 2 is not automatically switching over to the stronger signal (both the repeater and main wireless router have the same SSID) in the garage and 2. sometimes it connects to that stronger signal in the garage from the repeater (only after i manually toggle wifi off and on) but the internet doesn't work. I'm actually connected to my network because I can access my "Yamaha receiver app" that lets me turn up volume etc on my receiver but I don't have internet access etc. This is usually the case but after awhile it just seems to start working and I have full internet access.
I know this is only semi phone related but I figured since alot of guys on here are very savvy with this tech stuff, maybe someone could help.
Again
1. why won't my note 2 automatically switch over to that stronger wifi signal which should be the same in the garage.
2. why does it sometimes only connect to the network but doesn't allow outside internet access.
Should I try the "wifi jumper" app that supposedly auto switches to best wifi signal (i thought our phones do this anyways)?
Not sure if this is the right place to post this so please move if need be =)
Thoughts?

Stay on what Samsung preset.
Basically I owned a nexus s, it does have automatically jump to higher signal router or access point in android 4.1+.
So basically the WiFi just jumping from my router to access point and from access point to router and I ended up getting no WiFi signal. I have to switch off my access point (extender) to get my WiFi working again...
And note 2 won't give me this problem.
Accidentally sent from my Samsung Galaxy Note 2

If you'd ask me, just buy wifi jumper, you won't regret it!
It works perfectly fine with my 4 routers, all with different SSID. It's nice to have the best signal available wherever you are in the house. Wifi jumper gives me the best results I have had since trying a few different apps like it. The owner just finished rewriting the code for connecting to different routers with same SSID, so it should be the perfect solution in your situation!
And no, I'm not affiliated with it in any way, just a happy user :thumbup:
Edit: oops, old thread

thegipper said:
Ok this may be kind of a long post but I'll first address what I think is the issue.
My note 2 doesn't appear to be automatically switching to stronger available wifi signals unless I manually toggle the wifi off then back on again. It will then connect to the stronger signal.
The reason why this has become an issue is because I bought a Diamond WR300n wifi range extender. I'm using it as a reapter. I want to have better wifi signal in my garage where I spend a lot of time. My current wifi signal drops off pretty much near the garage when using my phone. My laptop still gets decent wifi reception when I'm in the garage though.
I went through the fairly basic setup for the extender and got it working. I confirmed this by plugging in the ethernet port from the extender directly to my laptop and its receiving a signal just fine, browsing the internet etc.
So i put this extender in my garage, it connected normally and I confirmed it was working using my laptop again. Everything appeared to be working fine. The extender has the same SSID as my main wireless router (uverse 78wireblahblah).
The issue is when I'm inside my house I'm connected to the main wireless router because this is obviously the strongest signal. When I walk out of my house the signal diminishes as I approach my garage. I can walk into my garage and my wifi signal is pretty much gone even though there is this repeater putting out a working wifi signal with the same SSID as my main router.
Weird right, one would think it would automatically switch and connect to the repeater in the garage, but it doesn't.
Now if I manually turn off wifi and turn it back on while in the garage, bam, very strong signal and I'm connected. There really is two issues though, 1. my note 2 is not automatically switching over to the stronger signal (both the repeater and main wireless router have the same SSID) in the garage and 2. sometimes it connects to that stronger signal in the garage from the repeater (only after i manually toggle wifi off and on) but the internet doesn't work. I'm actually connected to my network because I can access my "Yamaha receiver app" that lets me turn up volume etc on my receiver but I don't have internet access etc. This is usually the case but after awhile it just seems to start working and I have full internet access.
I know this is only semi phone related but I figured since alot of guys on here are very savvy with this tech stuff, maybe someone could help.
Again
1. why won't my note 2 automatically switch over to that stronger wifi signal which should be the same in the garage.
2. why does it sometimes only connect to the network but doesn't allow outside internet access.
Should I try the "wifi jumper" app that supposedly auto switches to best wifi signal (i thought our phones do this anyways)?
Not sure if this is the right place to post this so please move if need be =)
Thoughts?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
wifi jumper is a good idea

luega said:
wifi jumper is a good idea
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah, Wifi Jumper is probably the way to go. In an ideal world, the WiFi stack would roam properly in all cases, but sometimes you're just not quite far enough for it to roam. This is even an issue with the PC also, but most manufacturers allow you to configure the roaming behavior of the driver to your tastes (max range or max speed).

Wifi not reconnecting

What happened:
I am using a new Nexus 4 in various buildings on a campus (specifically, the University of Washington). For simplicity, let's assume that there are just two buildings, Building A and Building B.
There is a strong WiFi signal within both buildings, and I can connect to the WiFi network in either one. When I walk between buildings, the signal drops outside, and the phone switches to 3G networking (as expected).
Once I'm inside the other building, however, the WiFi does not always automatically reconnect. Instead, the phone will often remain on 3G mode, despite being in the presence of a strong WiFi signal.
If I restart the phone, the phone will then reconnect to the WiFi signal. Unless I do this, however, the phone will remain in 3G mode indefinitely. This drains the battery and results in high data usage with my phone plan.
Steps to reproduce the problem:
1. Connect to campus-wide WiFi.
2. Walk outside. WiFi connection will drop, and phone will switch to 3G.
3. Walk inside another building. Phone will remain in 3G mode, rather than switching back to WiFi, despite being in the presence of a strong WiFi signal.
4. Restart the phone. After rebooting, the phone will now connect to the WiFi network.
What you think the correct behavior should be:
The phone should automatically switch back to WiFi when in the presence of a suitable WiFi signal. A manual restart or manual reconnecting to the network should not be necessary.

What kernel are you using?

Jsparta26 said:
What kernel are you using?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
stock kernel from paranoid 3.50
(molesarecoming)

Did this issue occur before you were on PA rom 3.5?
If it didn't then I think it could be the rom if it's not then it's the school's wifi. It happens to me when I'm on campus too and I found out it the school's WiFi network was getting hammered and the signal was disrupted. No clue how that any of that happened.
Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk 2

Hi, I have the same problem. Did anyone manage to solve it? I have my Nexus 4 since yestereday and it's not reconnecting to my home wifi. Previous phone HTC Incredible S didn't have this issue and since that phone my wifi settings wasn't changed. I have AirLink AP, no name router and wifi is encoded with WPA. But i don't have to restart the phone to reconnect. It's enough to turn wifi on the phone off and on in settings. But it's really annoying. Thanks for hints.
And please excuse wrong expressions, I'm from Czech republic
Edit: I have stock rom, JB 4.2.2