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Is the G1's Wireless Really 802.11g?

I have my router setup in my den, less than a foot away from the outside window. If I goto my car in the driveway, 75ft (max) from the router itself, I don't even pick up a weak signal. Why is this? I feel like I'm running on 802.11b with the range I get. Speeds seem to be at G speeds but still, the distance seems really false. Anyone else experiencing this?

802.11b and 802.11g have the same effective range.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/802.11

i have the same issue. i have a linksys router, but it might be crap. Ill swap and see what happens

@coolb, sorry, meant to type a, just had b still in my head from looking up the g1's specs.
I have a Belkin N1 Wireless Router, most definatly not a POS And I mean it can pick it up from other rooms, but it seems when i go out of my house it just says no to me.
Either way I'm still under 40m from it, I wouldn't expect any more than 15m, maybe 20m, and like i said its right next to a huge bay window that I'm in direct sight of.

Try changing your router's channel or something. Maybe too much interference.

i have a belkin b/g and get no or 1 bar of wifi signal in my house. my buddy has the same basic router, but the n model and my meter is full and the connection was fast. I am definitely getting an N router in a week or so. i havent had any problems with the last couple of belkin routers i have had, so it will prolly be them.

I have a belkin n1 vision router, and i get signal down the street, about 50 feet away.

i have 3 routers, a 2wire gateway, a crappy netgear and a linksys, and on all 3 sometimes i get great signal sometimes i get low signal, i think the wifiradio no the g1 reacts based on battery life, i could be wrong but its just random like that... prob something that will be fixed on future firmware updates.

It can be anything not just the G1 but what is around, between you and the router, which way the antenna's are pointing, what is near the router. Honestly... I had a microwave between the router and one desktop and it always had issues even when the microwave was off... I moved it and signal came back and no problems. So just because it is off it could still impact the router.

i cant get any wifi network even from 2 feet away.

I had the same problem with my linksys wrt54gs till I went to do some searches about firmware on it. I came across a free firmware site that replaces linksys original firmware and worked great after I installed it. It was fairly easy to install and a big community for help incase you come across some issues. the website is http://dd-wrt.com. I usually had to reset my router once a week cause of failure to connect issues, but since the change I yet have not to reset my router and the signal is stronger. Its been two months now since.

qtronix said:
i cant get any wifi network even from 2 feet away.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Go to a computer connected to you router preferable wired and connect to you router(by typing its ip address in browser) it might ask you for a username & pass, you can looked it up online ie google linksys admin password. Usually its admin and there's no password or admin admin etc. Then change some of the settings around until you get it to work . Mess around with the security and the frequency. That's what did it for me.

I have problems with the G1's WiFi as well, it refuses to stay connected for more than 10 seconds at a time to my uni wifi. It'll constantly disconnect and reconnect... I have to turn off the wifi to get any internet usage out of this thing. It works fine with my home router, and my laptop and old winmo phone connect fine to the school network. No idea what's wrong

Poor WIFI reception on Captivate

HI,
Has anybody noticed that captivate has poor WIFI reception compared to other devices? I have two captivates with the same problem and have seen others have the similar problems.
It is just fine anywhere wifi signal is good. but it becomes horribly bad with farther distance from APs. The tested place is my office desk
where I never had any problem with my laptops and my old phone(Lg-incite) during the last 2-3 years.
Are you all fine with WIFI performance of Captivate?
Thank you

It seems equivalent to my old iphone.

My captivate was getting less wifi bars then my iphone from just 10 feet away from cable modem router. Checked on both original captivate and replacement. Seems like the reception and wifi seems a bit weak

Is it still connecting and just not showing as strong a signal, or not connecting at all?
Also, if you have both phones handy maybe you can do a speed test/comparison between the two. Maybe it's all in how they calculate those signal bars. . .

Bars don't necessarily mean anything.

I'm not having any WiFi problem on my Captivate at all - even in the corner of the house where my laptop and my wife's laptop sometimes have problems - I also pick up signals from neighbor's wifi routers.

mongstradamus said:
My captivate was getting less wifi bars then my iphone from just 10 feet away from cable modem router. Checked on both original captivate and replacement. Seems like the reception and wifi seems a bit weak
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
They might calculate that wrong too, seeing how they were really far off on calculating phone reception.
The best thing to do is a speed test on each. Obviously higher speed is better but I am curious what the latency is like.

candymann said:
Is it still connecting and just not showing as strong a signal, or not connecting at all?
Also, if you have both phones handy maybe you can do a speed test/comparison between the two. Maybe it's all in how they calculate those signal bars. . .
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am not complaining about bars. all show weak signals and still can connect to internet, while captivates are disconnected.
it may be normal for smartphones. The only smartphone I am comparing is Lg-incite. Incite may be exceptionally good on wifi reception. In the points I have tested, laptops do not have problem to connect.
thanks,

I've noticed that same problem with my Captivate....I'll connect with "Good" to "Excellent" connection, but data crawls if at all....Full data reset, and still no improvement...

[Q] Is your Wifi Reception crappy?

Hi all,
Wonder if any of you have bad reception with WiFi? I have an extended range router that allows me to get full bars on wifi even at the far reaches of my yard (about 300 feet) when i had the Atrix and the Inspire. Now with the infuse, as soon as I leave the indoors and step outside my signal bars drop to 2 or 3 and gets worse very quickly as I walk away from the house. Is this a bad radio, bad phone or am I just asking to much?
Thanks

The radio is kind of craptastic
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I997 using XDA App

im like 30 feet away from my router and i have just the little dot most of the time...

Yep mines suck too.. I thought i was the only one that noticed that noticed
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I997 using XDA App

Yes its weak. I'm only 5 feet away from my wireless n router and it flucuates between 4 and 5. sometimes it feels like touching the sides of the phone degrade the signal. I'm on my 3rd infuse and it has the same issue but this one seems to having better reception. again im only 5 feet from my router and non of my other wifi devices haves less then 5 bars. also testing the infuse at att vs other phones the infuse always had less bars for wifi.

Hopefully a radio update will help with this in the future. It's virtually the same hardware that's in many phones. The antenna array shape or location may have something to do with it, though. I'm guessing it's in the "chin" somewhere.
EDIT:
What a coincidence! I just got the update pushed to my phone from AT&T, and the new baseband FIXED my poor wifi reception.
Thanks AT&T / Samsung / Engineers!

tankmorph said:
Hopefully a radio update will help with this in the future. It's virtually the same hardware that's in many phones. The antenna array shape or location may have something to do with it, though. I'm guessing it's in the "chin" somewhere.
EDIT:
What a coincidence! I just got the update pushed to my phone from AT&T, and the new baseband FIXED my poor wifi reception.
Thanks AT&T / Samsung / Engineers!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have two Infuse 4G units with same wifi problem. no wifi signal where I can watch youtube with blackberry curve and iphone 3 . talked to ATT tech support. no newer version of baseband. talked to samsung tech support and tried soft reset and hard reset. no improvements. should I just return them or try to fix the problem?

I get a wifi signal in all 3 stories of my house.
Get wifi analyzer from the market and see what channel is strongest for your router/phone. Switch the router to that channel (it'll probably have the least amount of competing signals), and reconnect.

apallohadas said:
I get a wifi signal in all 3 stories of my house.
Get wifi analyzer from the market and see what channel is strongest for your router/phone. Switch the router to that channel (it'll probably have the least amount of competing signals), and reconnect.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
+1
& bars usually dont mean much i usually have 65mbps connection no matter what the bars say

My wifie provides good reception. Sometimes I lose connection to my wifie even though she is sending strong signals...but usually after dinner out, maybe some flowers, I can reconnect.
I have no problems with my wifie.

andrawer said:
My wifie provides good reception. Sometimes I lose connection to my wifie even though she is sending strong signals...but usually after dinner out, maybe some flowers, I can reconnect.
I have no problems with my wifie.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Depnds on the day
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I997 using XDA Premium App

andrawer said:
My wifie provides good reception. Sometimes I lose connection to my wifie even though she is sending strong signals...but usually after dinner out, maybe some flowers, I can reconnect.
I have no problems with my wifie.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thats funny

Mine is pretty shotty as well. Granted, even if I have 1 "bar" my speed is fine, I can't get a signal about 40 feet outside my house (about 100 feet total from my router).. My Inspire couldn't get signal there, either, but even being side by side with my wifes iphone 4 she gets 3 bars of signal from that same spot. Maybe it's an Android issue? It's not a big deal, as I'm in a "4G" area and speeds are good enough, but I just thought i'd share that I have the same issue.
Still the best phone i've ever owned, as a whole.

Did you try what I recommended in This post?

apallohadas said:
I get a wifi signal in all 3 stories of my house.
Get wifi analyzer from the market and see what channel is strongest for your router/phone. Switch the router to that channel (it'll probably have the least amount of competing signals), and reconnect.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
How do you change the channels on your router?

bignate78 said:
How do you change the channels on your router?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you tell me the model of your router I can give you specific details, but the short version is that you go into the setup page for your router (where you set your security settings and all that), and probably under the wireless page you should see settings for channel, country, etc. For my old netgear router the default was 6 I believe.
Before I changed channels, I used the wifi analysis tool and saw that there were 4 other wireless networks on that same channel. Changing to another channel helped quite a bit.

Mine is really crappy too. I would say pathetic and non usable most of the time.
I go to the local airport and to any restaurant that has free wifi and my blackberry get a full signal while this Infuse does not see anything. At home is only goes about 35 feet away from the router. Me telling hotspots to change their channel is noit a viable option. I wish I knew this before buying this phone.
I see this post (see below) and wonder if there is a ROM with this fix already in it. I am running CatyRom but I have tried all the other roms like CYM, Miui and so forth and the poor signal is the same.
EDIT:
What a coincidence! I just got the update pushed to my phone from AT&T, and the new baseband FIXED my poor wifi reception.
Thanks AT&T / Samsung / Engineers!
Last edited by tankmorph; 3rd June 2011 at 07:37 AM.

not an android issue, its phone specific but there may be many phones with the same shortcomming. wifi reception was way better on the captivate (I wish I still had that thing). but the infuse doesn't cause me any problems.
switching channels at home can't hurt. most routers are on channel 6 by default so it probably has many competing signals. not too much you can do if you are out and about though.

Cant take the WIFI issue anymore as I think its Hardware

The design is to blame for the wifi issue. IMO the G2x rebooting problem is less severe than this. I use wifi 90% of the time and ive had 3 units which all had this issue.
The others that dont, I dont know how you got lucky, or if you got a bad ass N router and thats the trick, but I cant take it. I cant even play a online FPS game in my room without losing signal. Anyone want to prove me wrong in that there are a few good ones? and if so please post a video?

Death grip here also. I guess I'll just have to live with it.
However, there is one good thing. HTC can release a cover with a design that won't have the issue (they won't, but I hope there will be some 3rd party ones)
Sent from my HTC Sensation Z710e

"Deathgrip"? WTF is that. the iPhone disgusts me, thanks for this.. now it's running rampant all over the internet even when it doesn't make sense.
There is obviously a problem with the WiFi signal strength and yes it's a design/hardware issue. Exchanging the phone won't fix the problem.
I solved it by moving up a WiFi router in my room that repeats the WiFi signal from my main router. I had the secondary router already running DD-WRT software which is required for this type of thing.

Why didn't you just continue your other thread? 2 about the same thing is a bit much

No deathgrip here, I've tried and tried. Dunno what to say Brah. Works the same with my N router and my G router, Perfectly.

EddyOS said:
Why didn't you just continue your other thread? 2 about the same thing is a bit much
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Don't think this one posted...
It's got to be ground issue.

yeah. i have been with mine for 2 weeks and since about just a couple of hours ago the wifi wont work. it was working fine all day then i was going to check fb and it said that there was no connection. it clearly had full signal. i restarted the phone and worked well. then later i was going to access the camera app directly from the lock screen and it froze, it wont do anything. pulled the battery and turned on the phone. after turning on the phone i turned on the wifi and it will not connect. it detects the signals and tells you all the info about it but it wont connect. it stays in a loop saying obtaining ip address, disconnected and scanning and then goes back again to obtaining ip address and so on. i have done 2 hard resets and restarted the router and nothing.btw the router is in the same room just a couple of feet from me.
EDIT : i think i jump the gun too fast. tested my ps3 thru the wireless network and it connects like 50% of the time. again the ps3 is in the same room as the router. went to my cousins house and the phone conected to the wireless effortless on the first try. i dont know if it is the phone or the router.i dont know what to think anymore.

The Sensation doesn't have brilliant WiFi reception and can't hold on to a weak signal if you hold the device, whereas something like a laptop could.
But with a good signal it does work well and for me that's a fair trade off at present. Yes it could be better, but is there a perfect device.
Typing this in Starbucks at present over WiFi and yes in landscape, and I even have my fingers covering the back of the device
Full signal strength. Same at home.
I tried this in another Starbucks, I lost connection every time in landscape mode, returned in portrait, that has been the only time that I could recreate this death grip issue.....

SNK180 said:
i dont know if it is the phone or the router.i dont know what to think anymore.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've seen a few issues lately with the Cisco/Linksys E1000 routers and wifi. 3 out of the 5 i installed in the past 6 months kept dropping wifi,even right next to it. Probably not what you have, but just in case, i thought i would mention it. At $50-$60 they've been a popular model lately.

I am using a netgear n router and I still have signal in the basement and second floor (router is on the first floor)..I haven't noticed any WiFi problems but I have only had the phone 3 days...but I use WiFi calling all the time..
Sensation/G2x Best of Both Worlds

Stop posting threads about this. The Sensation has an alleged WiFi problem. We get it. Unless you have a LEGIT fix for it, don't post about it.
SHIELDS UP!
RED ALERT!
Thread CLOSED. K'PLAH!

[Q] Nexus S extremely poor wifi

Hello there,
i know that this topic has been already debated several times but I couldn't find any solution to it.
I'm running MIUI 1.8.19, android version 2.3.5, kernel version 2.6.35.7-g3cc95e3, baseband I9023XXKB3.
Wifi signal is extremely weak, few meters away from any router and the connection becomes extremely unstable making the wifi experience a total nightmare.
I've been previously tried NSCollab and also different baseband configuration files but nothing seems to get things better.
For what is worth (even though the wifi is bad anywhere and with any router) my router is a Linksys WRT150N running on DD-WRT.
The Nexus S wifi thing seems to be a little bit controversial. Some users seem having no problem with it, some other experience the same problems i do.
Question #1: is that a hardware, software or both kind of problem?
question #2 : is there any workaround that would allow me at least to comfortably browse the internet from my bedroom (5-6 mts away from my router) without getting disconnected every other 30 sec?
Thank you in advance,
D.

You kept a phone that can't hold a wifi connection over a distance of 5m? I'd have returned it on day 1.
It's normal that the distance of WIFI on smartphones is less than say a laptop or pc, but 5m is definitly not normal.
Verify w/ other wifi networks, same problem = return it. If not, bad luck, might be the combination of your phone + the router not working properly.
You can try changing radios to see of that improves your situation, for some it did.

Yes, it is normal having a weaker wi-fi but my blackberry has no problem at all. it is the nexus and it seems to be quite a widespread problem around the globe.
Well i was abroad on business and couldnt return it. Just looking for clues....

I know that netarchy's kernel uses updated wifi drivers, you can try flashing that and see if it does anything.
Sent from my Nexus S using xda premium

Hi there,
i tried several kernels: netarchy, matrix and also installed MIUI and also tried the MIUI Brainmaster ROM. Same result: in my bedroom the wifi signal score a miserable -85/90 db. Is there any kernel out there optimized for wifi? I mean, it seems that the wifi weakness on the nexus S is a common problem.
Thank you in advance.

It sounds as though you have a hardware problem or a router problem. I have to go to a room in the other side of my house to get -90 db and even then it doesn't disconnect. I have to get about 200 feet away before it disconnects.
Sent from my Nexus S using XDA App

Also it might have something to do with interference on whatever channel you are connecting on but I don't really know enough about wireless networking to help you troubleshoot that.
Sent from my Nexus S using XDA App

What i'm wondering is wheter Samsung uses different wifi chipset on the same phone cause i'm not the only one complaining about it. just google "nexus s weak wifi" and you'll see hundreds of people with the same problem.
still wondering if there's a software solution to it.

caravaggio971 said:
What i'm wondering is wheter Samsung uses different wifi chipset on the same phone cause i'm not the only one complaining about it. just google "nexus s weak wifi" and you'll see hundreds of people with the same problem.
still wondering if there's a software solution to it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It has been documented that the Nexus S uses an under powered wifi chip. The chip uses less power but with that comes a weaker signal.

mine seems to be weaker than average...

Yours does seem weaker than normal, but no nexus s has decent wifi range.
What I have done is purchase 2 old linksys wrt54gl routers, have them both loaded up with DD-WRT and then link them (bridged mode or WDS if you prefer) and situate the routers in either end of my house. I have a decent sized 3 bed detached house, with a 70ft garden, I can now get a reliable wifi connection near the end of my garden on my nexus, where as previously I couldnt get to the back door

Might be an old thread, but I just traded my trusty HD2 for a Nexus S and god I hate the WIFI reception on this thing.
I am on stock 2.3.4 Rooted with KD1 radio and 2.6.35.14(Pete's) kernel. Tried just about anything out there, and nothing worked out.
Being a Pure Google experience phone, I was expecting a lot more happening for this phone, but it seems that my 2009 released HD2 was way better for all it had to offer.
Subscribing to this thread!

WIFI is fine for me, same as with HTC Desire, and stronger than iPhone 3G...

Its terrible on my Sprint Nexus.
Where I have an Ipod touch and a LG Optimus, they get an 'excellent' connection anywhere in the house. The Nexus drops the connection all the time, shows a 'poor' 5Mbps connection.
Will swapping the phone do any good?

OK.
I bought my Nexus S yesterday and I was soooo disappointed because of its poor wifi reception... But...
I am a network Administrator and a few minutes ago i just couldn't beleive that about 10 meters away from our Cisco Antennas i had about 89db signal so i started playing... and guess what i now have 55dbs at the same spot! What i found out is that Nexus S doesn't work well with High Frequencies so I disabled channels 8-13 and my AP had to work on the low channels and BAM! everything works fine now (My phone is in stock FW)
I hope I helped

Gorbi_gr said:
OK.
I bought my Nexus S yesterday and I was soooo disappointed because of its poor wifi reception... But...
I am a network Administrator and a few minutes ago i just couldn't beleive that about 10 meters away from our Cisco Antennas i had about 89db signal so i started playing... and guess what i now have 55dbs at the same spot! What i found out is that Nexus S doesn't work well with High Frequencies so I disabled channels 8-13 and my AP had to work on the low channels and BAM! everything works fine now (My phone is in stock FW)
I hope I helped
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Awesome tip! Thank you so much

I found this channel number which it uses to make no difference to the wifi performance.
I tried channels 1,6,11, no difference.
The phone just has poor wifi.
As a note, usually I don't use the low channel '1', as this gets interference from microwaves more than the upper channels.

just bought a Nexus and and experiencing heavy wifi issues.
I tried changing AP channel but doesn't fix.
Testing signal strenght with a LG Optimus one for comparison:
1- LG: -72db. stable
2- Nexus S: -85db web pages loading fails quite often.
Tomorrow my NS will return to the store. Bye Bye