[Q] Unstable WiFi - Nexus S Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

Hi,
My Nexus S WiFi is really unstable, it disconnects quite frequently, even when the screen is ON and I'm working. No youtube video plays to the end before the Wifi disconnects, this is really annoying.
iPhone and Galaxy works fine on the same WiFi network.
Please don't suggest resetting the router and changing channels, I've done that already and its an open network (no security) but it allows only certain Mac Addresses. Is there any real fix available or do I have to live with it?
Thanks!

from what i can tell, like the gs, the wifi, gps and perhaps other components have taken a hit in terms of their sensitivity. perhaps interference from other componenets, perhaps a poor broadcom board. who knows. whoever does, isn't saying.

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[Q] Wifi issues

My wifi is very spotty at best. It always seems to say it connects just fine but it won't let me actually use it. I just went and stood right above my router and had full wifi strength and couldn't browse the internet. Are there any solutions to wifi issues or do I probably just have a bad wifi chip?
There could be a ton of different reasons why you can't connect. There might be a compatibility issue (some devices just don't get along), there might be an issue with security (you aren't using WPA2/AES on your router), there might be a channel issue that can be fixed by trying another channel on the router, the list goes on and on.
What kind of troubleshooting have you done so far? What router do you have?
Running a netgear WNR3500L with WPA2 encryption. All I've done so far is a simple restart of the router.
EDIT: downloaded and used wifi analyzer to see which channels were open and they looked to all be about the same. I switched it to 6 for tests without any improvement. My router auto detects the best channel to be on. Any other advice?

[Q] Need advice on transfer speeds/video recording

Hoping someone could shed some light and/or point me in the right direction. I just go my TF and upgraded to the latest stock firmware from ASUS. I am having two issues that may or may not be unique to me, one being almost a deal breaker for me.
1) My wifi speeds are running below my expectations. I am measuring around 11Mbits/s reads, while using various SMB explorers. I have run internet speed tests that have measured around 20Mbit/s reads from the stock browser though. I am running on a wireless 54 Mbit/s g-router. While I didn't expect 54Mbit/s, I did hope for the 30ishMbit/s I have been getting with various laptops.
My concern mainly lies with video streaming from my NAS as 11 Mbps is borderline for my uses. I am getting those transfer rates from the NAS and from my Win7 setup as well. My hope is that the SMB file sharing apps aren't optimized and I can wait it out and hope to get at least the 20 MBps rates that I am seeing from the internet speed tests. Should I try to throw in a wireless N in to the mix and if so besides WEP (which I assume is limited to 54mbps) is there any other encryption that the TF supports over WiFi? I ask so I can research the best match wireless -n access point for the TF. I don't see the ability to change the authentication/encryption as the 'Advanced' tab on the TF settings is greyed out.
2) I am getting significant audio sync issues while recording video. Playback of video is smoother with the new firmware but I see an occasional stutter. I could live with that if the audio stayed in sync (playing back with built in player and mobo). THis one is not a dealbreaker as I will rarely use the video but I am concerned this is an issue with my device. The realtime playback during recording is terribly stuttery (though this isn't a big deal since the playback is far smoother).
I haven't rooted yet but has anyone used cifs.ko successfully and seen better transfer rates than some of the SMB implementations in terms of transfer rates?
Thanks for any advice on routes to go or just general confirming that these are issues you don't see.
Anyone able to chime in on this for me?
1) It sounds like you need to upgrade your wireless hardware. WEP is easily crackable nowadays by anyone who googles how to do it, and has been for a while. WPA2 is usually a much safer option if your equipment doesnt support it then its probably time for an upgrade. Wireless N routers are pretty cheap nowadays via ebay, so there's not really any reason not to get one (I've bought a few for around £5 each on there). It should increase your throughput dramatically, and increase the range you can use your wifi devices at. I'd also advise setting up MAC filtering and hiding your network from prying eyes if you do all this to make it more secure. Plenty of guides on the net for that, and it's very easy to do.
2) I don't get the audio sync issues you have, but then the quality of the audio via video recording is terrible, so I've not used it much. I've yet to try this, but perhaps plugging a microphone into the headset jack will help with your sync issue, just an idea to try. And if it doesnt help then perhaps another app would.
thanks for the reply.
I will try both suggestions.
stuntdouble said:
1) It sounds like you need to upgrade your wireless hardware. WEP is easily crackable nowadays by anyone who googles how to do it, and has been for a while. WPA2 is usually a much safer option if your equipment doesnt support it then its probably time for an upgrade. Wireless N routers are pretty cheap nowadays via ebay, so there's not really any reason not to get one (I've bought a few for around £5 each on there). It should increase your throughput dramatically, and increase the range you can use your wifi devices at. I'd also advise setting up MAC filtering and hiding your network from prying eyes if you do all this to make it more secure. Plenty of guides on the net for that, and it's very easy to do.
2) I don't get the audio sync issues you have, but then the quality of the audio via video recording is terrible, so I've not used it much. I've yet to try this, but perhaps plugging a microphone into the headset jack will help with your sync issue, just an idea to try. And if it doesnt help then perhaps another app would.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
don't want to hijack but i have been using a netgear dg834 and am looking for a new router and a way to improve security as i use my wireless a lot more now so any links to tips or recomends for routers would be greats
combat goofwing said:
don't want to hijack but i have been using a netgear dg834 and am looking for a new router and a way to improve security as i use my wireless a lot more now so any links to tips or recomends for routers would be greats
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Any well known brand (such as Belkin, Netgear, Linksys, Buffalo) will do you fine. Just check out their product page from the manufacturers website before you buy. Things that it should have as basic specs are a NAT firewall, 256bit WPA2 encryption, 2.4ghz operating spectrum and obviously compatibility with your current operating system. An easy to use setup is always a must for those not very confident in their tech abilities.

[Q] Wi-Fi not working. Am I the only one?

Okay, a little about my setup. I have tested on Slim ICS 2.7, 2.9; Codename Android 1.4, 1.5.5; as well as AOKP (I dont know exact builds, but am on the latest now - build 28). I have a Cradlepoint MBR 1000 which is a b/g/n 4g router (though I only have cable hooked up - was bought originally to allow me to broadcast my Clear 4g service, but Clear doesnt work where I live now).
EVO 3D, iPhone 4s, All my laptops, HeroC, Kyocera Echo, Roku...I mean everything connects to my Wi-Fi EXCEPT my NS4G...WTH?
Does anyone else have this issue?...could it be some settings with the N router?...I cant believe everything but this phone works.
Please help. It is so frustrating to be limited to 3g that works intermittently while I am at home. I have all my apps from the Google Play backed up to my sdcard so I dont have to connect to install them...it is a huge pain. Thanks in advance
Need some more description. What settings do you have on the router, how have you tried to connect, does it connect then drop out, can you see the network at all, etc?
Either your phones wifi hardware is gone or your house.
So here's what you can do to narrow down on the problem.
Tell me if you can connect to any other wifi hotspots outside your house. If it does connect then problem is router if it doesn't than problem is with the phone.
Good luck.
Sent from my Nexus S using Tapatalk
Does it detect any Wi-Fi networks at all?
Does it detect any Wi-Fi networks at all? or just can't make the connection
I have the same problem but only at home .I don't anderstand a lot about this, I change my rom with ice scream sandswich 4.0.4 it was working with 4.0.3. Where is the problem. Thanks for your help.
Sent from my GT-I9000 using xda premium
shockem said:
Either your phones wifi hardware is gone or your house.
So here's what you can do to narrow down on the problem.
Tell me if you can connect to any other wifi hotspots outside your house. If it does connect then problem is router if it doesn't than problem is with the phone.
Good luck.
Sent from my Nexus S using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Not necessarily. Setup of each router can change in numerous ways so as to stop certain devices from working, as can certain phone settings not allow connecting to certain routers. It is not quite so black and white, and we already know the router works.
daviki said:
I have the same problem but only at home .I don't anderstand a lot about this, I change my rom with ice scream sandswich 4.0.4 it was working with 4.0.3. Where is the problem. Thanks for your help.
Sent from my GT-I9000 using xda premium
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sounds like a channel setting problem. Easiest way is to open up your router config and change the channel between 1 and 12 and this shouldn't happen again. Alternatively you could mess around with your build.prop.
Harbb is right, you might want to test several things within your router:
Change channels (use 1, 6 or 11-12)
Set it to only use on b/g connections (don't use n)
Different authentication methods (WPA2 with AES, etc)
And make sure you don't have a limit on your DHCP settings (just to make sure you don't have a ton of devices connected so it's not handing more IPs) or MAC filter.
Okay, sorry for not replying sooner. I posted this, then went to bed.
@Harbb:
It does see the network, lets me connect, put in the password, and says it is connected. It always says the connection is poor when I know it should be a good connection. The phone then shows the wifi icon and up and down arrows inside of the icon...I never see a portion of blue. When I try to download from the market, it will act like it is working, then the icon will disappear/reappear numerous times before it tell me there is not a connection.
As for my router setup. I do not know what information will help in this but here is some info: I do not have MAC filtering on, WISH is active (dont use it), WPA2 Only Personal AES (this is what I use), Channel 6 (I have tried channel 11 because I read somewhere the Wii needed 1 or 11 or one of my devices needed it), Transmission rate is Best, Channel is Auto 20/40 MHz, Mixed b/g/n (to utilize N and G, it has to be on this setting, there isn't an option for Mixed n/g), it is set on 192.168.0.x, NetBIOS mode type is Mixed (Broadcast then Point to Point).
@shockem I have not tested it with any other hotspot to see if it is just a problem with that router and this phone. I will try if I can find an open hotspot and let you know.
@Billchen0014 It does detect the network and connects, but drops it constantly...I cant even download a <1MB file from the market.
@Harbb (2) Going by your advice to daviki...it looks like I need to check another router. I go by a Starbucks, so I will try their hotspot...unless it isn't free, then Ill look around.
Thanks everyone who is helping me with this.
@Oogway, I will try G only and see what happens...if I use Mixed it has to be g/b or b/g/n. As for DHCP there is only 2 maybe 3 devices connected and No MAC filtering
Could it be the Wifi country code issue?
Is that something on the phone? Also, I tested different channels (1, 6, 11) as well as b/g and g only. Still no go.
Sent from my Nexus S 4G using XDA
Thanks for the info. Test another hotspot (preferably one with a wpa2 password too if possible) and let us know. I'll reply later with some things to try as I gotta get going.
Okay, I did test one more thing. I sat right next to the router and it had full bars. Stayed full and my speed tests were great. Moved to where I sit on the couch about 30 walking steps away and no connection. I know the signal reaches because it is where I use laptops and other devices. The PS3 and Wii are further away and have no issue. It is not a clear path, but there aren't any doors between the router and the couch.
Just some more info...leading me to believe it is an issue with the phone. I get horrible service with Sprint also, so it may be connected. I don't know.
Any ideas? Is it just because of how far away I am?
Again, thanks everyone for the help. It has been so frustrating ever since I got the phone.
Sent from my Nexus S 4G using XDA
Wifi Analyzer can give you a dB reading on the signal strength if you'd like to try that from a distance too. Wifi at uni likes to show low bars quite often, however alot of the time i have great signal and it shows through wifi analyzer. May not be related since uni is a peap connection, but worth a shot anywho. Might give another hint on whether you should seek out warranty or router settings.

[Q] Issues on home wi-fi network

This problem happened spontaneously with all the android devices in our house. Router had been set up for a month with great performance and then the day before yesterday things just got crappy on our wifi.
Here's the problem:
There's a significant lag between trying to get data (refresh Facebook app, load a Youtube video, go to a web page in Chrome, whatever) and actually getting the data. This occurs on two Nexus 5 phones running Lollipop and a tablet running Kit Kat. Sometimes it'll be 10 to almost 30 seconds between trying to view, for instance a youtube link, and the video description and video actually starts to load. Sometimes I'll get a network timeout. A laptop running Arch Linux on the same network has no such lag.
Here's the weird thing. When I do a speedtest with the Ookla app, it will take a VERY long time to "find the best server" (it's been a minute so far while I've been writing this post just sitting at that screen) but once it does I'll get really excellent speeds. Basically maxing out the possibility of my home internet connection (40Mbps+). Same with upload (13Mbps). Ping to server was 10ms. When I use a terminal emulator to ping a site like google or facebook it will ping with typical wifi reaction rates, usually under 25ms consistently.
Wifi reception on the 2.4Ghz band is great. throughout the house. Different wifi channels do nothing. Note, my wi-fi signal is not dropping, so it's not that issue that's often reported. Reception is great, there's just major lag between trying to get data, and actually connecting.
And again this isn't just one device, this is three separate devices running two different flavors of android. So I'm guessing my router one day decided it didn't like android. Because like I said, things were great until literally just Thursday, with no change in settings on any devices or the router from us.
Yes, I've done a power cycle on the router, which is a Netgear C3700
Any ideas on what might be happening?
It's possible there is an IP addresses conflict. Do any devices on the network have a static IP?
No IP conflicts that I can see ever have been the issue.
If I reboot the router the problem goes away for a couple hours, but then I get the WiFi lag soon enough. I've seen a lot of reports about lag on WiFi (with bad ping results) on some other google searches I've run, but they all point to problems with IPV6, which my router doesn't support at all, so there's nothing for me to turn off there. I can't find any IPV6 settings for anything anywhere on the phone itself.
I don't see any other problems with my router and android devices specifically mentioned anywhere.
Are your android devices using different DNS servers than that of your laptop?
I have never specifically set up any DNS settings on any device in the house. Not even sure how to see what the settings for that are on the Android devices.
I'll try using a static DNS settings from the router instead of the "let my ISP choose" as I have been having problems possibly related to DNS issues on a wired laptop machine (running Linux as well).
Hooya said:
I have never specifically set up any DNS settings on any device in the house. Not even sure how to see what the settings for that are on the Android devices.
I'll try using a static DNS settings from the router instead of the "let my ISP choose" as I have been having problems possibly related to DNS issues on a wired laptop machine (running Linux as well).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Try Google DNS or something
I'm fairly convinced it's not a DNS issue. If it was, rebooting the router would have absolutely no effect at all. But a reboot of the router (unplug and re-plug, a software initiated reboot doesn't seem to work) makes the net fly at great speeds and pings on all devices. For a while. Then it goes bad.
I'm testing a 3rd party app to change the DNS settings to 8.8.8.8 (google) on one android device to see if that one behaves differently. Setting the router to custom DNS settings caused me to get locked out of all internet completely. I couldn't even get into the router software from a wired computer to see the settings anymore. It was like the router didn't exist anymore.
Hooya said:
I'm fairly convinced it's not a DNS issue. If it was, rebooting the router would have absolutely no effect at all. But a reboot of the router (unplug and re-plug, a software initiated reboot doesn't seem to work) makes the net fly at great speeds and pings on all devices. For a while. Then it goes bad.
I'm testing a 3rd party app to change the DNS settings to 8.8.8.8 (google) on one android device to see if that one behaves differently. Setting the router to custom DNS settings caused me to get locked out of all internet completely. I couldn't even get into the router software from a wired computer to see the settings anymore. It was like the router didn't exist anymore.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Try setting static IP's for the Mac adresses of the phones in the router and on the phone. Make sure it's outside of DHCP lease boundry of your modem. Sounds like conflicting IPs as already mentioned.
The responders have good intentions but really don't understand the problem entirely. I've faced similar issues.
To quickly dumb down the problem:
Wifi stays connected, but all packets are lost for 10-60 seconds or until wifi is toggled off then on again.
We'll call this Wifi-Connected-No-Connection (WCNC) for the purposes of this thread for easier reading.
Here are my findings...
It may be related to this issue on the google code discussions, there are mentions of complete drop out while remaining connected: https://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=64706
This has affected both N4 and N5 devices since Jelly Bean. The issue persists in Kitkat but I haven't followed to see if it's entirely been resolved in Lollipop as I refuse to upgrade until certain other issues are worked out with L. If you're good at searching you'll find posts about this drop out issue from a decent time ago.
AP isolation doesn't help.
Modifying most other settings for the router did not help.
What DID help though, is turning the router from N/G mode to B/G mode. I had no WCNC issues with that. Of course, that meant slower speeds, significantly slower speeds. Back on N/G, I find this problem happens pretty frequently.
Packet loss happens at the connection level. Pinging the router means some or all packets are dropped. This is NOT a dns issue.
toastgodsupreme said:
The responders have good intentions but really don't understand the problem entirely. I've faced similar issues.
To quickly dumb down the problem:
Wifi stays connected, but all packets are lost for 10-60 seconds or until wifi is toggled off then on again.
We'll call this Wifi-Connected-No-Connection (WCNC) for the purposes of this thread for easier reading.
Here are my findings...
It may be related to this issue on the google code discussions, there are mentions of complete drop out while remaining connected: https://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=64706
This has affected both N4 and N5 devices since Jelly Bean. The issue persists in Kitkat but I haven't followed to see if it's entirely been resolved in Lollipop as I refuse to upgrade until certain other issues are worked out with L. If you're good at searching you'll find posts about this drop out issue from a decent time ago.
AP isolation doesn't help.
Modifying most other settings for the router did not help.
What DID help though, is turning the router from N/G mode to B/G mode. I had no WCNC issues with that. Of course, that meant slower speeds, significantly slower speeds. Back on N/G, I find this problem happens pretty frequently.
Packet loss happens at the connection level. Pinging the router means some or all packets are dropped. This is NOT a dns issue.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This makes a lot of sense. Wonder why this would happen with one router set to b/g/n and not another set to b/g/n (the a/n settings are only for the 5Ghz band)...

[Q] WiFi Priority

Hi all. I'm having problems using the GoPro app to control my camera from my phone. The app relies on the phone connecting to an ad-hoc WiFi network generated by the GoPro camera. The problem is that the phone keeps switching to my home WiFi. I presume this happens because the router signal is stronger than the camera's. However, in this case I want to connect to the camera regardless of signal quality.
I've searched XDA and the web at large and can't find a way to prioritise a given WiFi network over all others in Android 5. This makes it very hard or sometimes impossible to use the GoPro app at home.
Does anyone know a good way to solve this? Apparently KitKat had the option to prioritise a connection straight out of the box, but that option isn't available in Lollipop :/
daemonios said:
Hi all. I'm having problems using the GoPro app to control my camera from my phone. The app relies on the phone connecting to an ad-hoc WiFi network generated by the GoPro camera. The problem is that the phone keeps switching to my home WiFi. I presume this happens because the router signal is stronger than the camera's. However, in this case I want to connect to the camera regardless of signal quality.
I've searched XDA and the web at large and can't find a way to prioritise a given WiFi network over all others in Android 5. This makes it very hard or sometimes impossible to use the GoPro app at home.
Does anyone know a good way to solve this? Apparently KitKat had the option to prioritise a connection straight out of the box, but that option isn't available in Lollipop :/
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You need to use an app that prioritises one ssid over another.
I've never used it, but this one has good reviews:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.za.flash.wifiprioritizer
krs360 said:
You need to use an app that prioritises one ssid over another.
I've never used it, but this one has good reviews:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.za.flash.wifiprioritizer
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks a lot, I'll try that.
Why would Google remove this option from the WiFi advanced settings, though? It makes it a pain to use devices that create ad-hoc networks... Does anyone know if there is a planned comeback in future releases?

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