Hey All.
My test methods: I have a Nokia Lumia 928 for work I'm able to keep side by side with my M8. I also have a family member with an iPhone 5s. Both phones on Verizon of course. Keep in mind, this is months of sporadic testing I've been able to compare the three phones side by side.
In weaker LTE signal areas, I noticed the iPhone and the Lumia keep LTE where the M8 would revert to 3G.
Situation 1) I was in a building last week where the iPhone 5s had 1 bar of LTE and was working. Side-by-Side, my M8 would never grab the LTE signal even after toggling airplane mode. Case or no case, had the same outcome.
I've had the M8 side by side with the iPhone 5s/Lumia 928 with a 1 or 2 bars and the M8 actually got faster speeds.
Here's what I'm thinking...
A) The M8 radio is comparable to the Nokia or iPhone, however the M8 reverts down to 3G within a shorter time span. The moment the Lumia/iPhone looses LTE, it puts it in a frozen state for a little while longer to see if it will recapture LTE again.
B) The Lumia/iPhone have a different signal tolerance than the M8. For example: The M8 is programmed to cut back to 3G at around -120 dbm (just a random number throwing out there, may not be -120 but it's an example) on LTE. I am not able to measure signal numbers on the Lumia or iPhone, maybe those are -130 dbm or so. This would explain "Situation 1" above.
For example, "B" could explain if all phones were at -120dbm signal, the M8 could still achieve same speeds as other phones.
Scenarios "A" and "B" could both hold true. I have seen a time where the Lumia/iPhones were at 1 Bar and data was a hit and miss.
I'd rather the HTC M8 keep a non-existent LTE signal for a couple of seconds longer instead of reverting down to 3G and sometimes wait minutes before the LTE scan timer grabs another signal.
I've had the M7 and M8 on Sprint before coming to Verizon. Unfortunately I saw the same issues and don't think it's isolated to my phone. Verizon having the 700MHz spectrum is night and day compared to Sprints 1900MHz: I keep LTE a lot better on Verizon.
Thoughts, Comments, Ideas?
It's due to network dormancy
Verizon network is crap right now.
Wanted to see what everyone thinks of my signal at my house... I haven't had dropped calls but I'm worried I'm missing some calls on my Nexus 5.
Left Nexus 5, Right Samsung Galaxy S4 (Click for a larger picture)
Difference in accuracy of signal strength indicator ?
I am assuming that the S4 doesn't have a sim card inserted and is simply connecting to whatever network that has the best reception it can find for emergency calls (which may not be your actual service provider). Note your signal strength and put the sim in the S4. It's fairly common to have LTE signal at that strength.
EDIT:
I should also note that you are connected with the S4 at 3G and the N5 is on LTE.
I was wondering how everyones experience with network signal is on their S6.
I upgraded from an S4 i9505 to the S6 SM-G920F and I notice that the signal to my network is about -5dBm worse on average. It means the phone isn't as good at keeping signal in a low signal area, and it drops from 4G to 3G much more often that the S4 in the same place.
Maybe my antenna is bad or does anyone else experience this?
Also, don't use the signal bars as a judge of your signal. Samsung has changed them, for example they now show 2 bars 4G when my S4 shows 1 bar. Both phones could have -105dBm and the S6 will show 2 bars but S4 1 bar. It makes it look as if the S6 signal is the same or better when in fact the true signal is worse on the S6.
If you want to see your true dBm signal on the S6, go to the dialer and type *#0011# and choose STACK 1. Your signal is the RSRP.
Screenshots attached of S4 and S6, you can see S6 shows 2 bars with -109dBm and S4 shows 1 bar with -106dBm. S4 has a better signal, so don't believe the bars.
Well, i have a couple of flagship cell phone, including 2 motorolas ( Turbo and X 2nd gen) , i thing it might have differences from region to region , but from my experience , Samsung and LG was the ones with bad reception from past experience, S3 , S4 and S5 they were always with a bar or two lower than other phones, and when motorola has only one bar , sammy was with no signal at all ,long time already .
Well, motorola are the best in signal strength for me, follow by HTC. This time sammy has improved, i guess it's the in-house chips or something. Still no Motorola tough .
I guess we notice those things because we live or work in a region that has weak signal so a little bit more or less makes huge difference.
Here is my screen shot right now. The signal bar seems to be accurate with the signal db.
Thanks for the screenshot Galinha1. That's interesting that you find Samsung has improved this time around. I notice that your screenshot has "Ant RSRP Diff" at a minus number (-26) but I've never seen mine in a minus, you can see mine is at 14. I don't know what Ant RSRP Diff means though, any ideas?
If you find that the S6 signal is better than the S4, maybe I have a faulty device?
mupet0000 said:
I upgraded from an S4 i9505 to the S6 SM-G920F and I notice that the signal to my network is about -5dBm worse on average. It means the phone isn't as good at keeping signal in a low signal area, and it drops from 4G to 3G much more often that the S4 in the same place.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have the exactly same experience. The S6 is more agressive drops to 3G. I'm coming from an HTC One M which in my everyday, according to OpenSignal, has 70-80% 4G connection 24/7, the rest 3G.
My S6 has around 30% 4G, 40% 3G and 30% Edge . Because of the great camera in the S6 I have decided to stick with it for now. Sadly. The great 4G signal in my area actually made me stay on 4G all day on the M8 and disregard wifi usage. On the S6 I've falled back to wifi which on my connection is a lot worse than 4G.
I'm really hoping for this issue to be in the Modem/radio firmware and not in the psycially device.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/galaxy-s6/help/lte-signal-indicator-issues-t3083001
mupet0000 said:
Thanks for the screenshot Galinha1. That's interesting that you find Samsung has improved this time around. I notice that your screenshot has "Ant RSRP Diff" at a minus number (-26) but I've never seen mine in a minus, you can see mine is at 14. I don't know what Ant RSRP Diff means though, any ideas?
If you find that the S6 signal is better than the S4, maybe I have a faulty device?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well, i don't know for sure if it's better than S5, it's been around 7 to 8 months i last used my S5 . But i remember that it was a really bad device for signal and call quality. Looks like it's better or is the placebo effect from a shiny new toy . About yours been faulty , well, before last week i would say no for sure, i would assume a firmware or modem software issue, not hardware, but i bought my S6e 2 weeks ago, and i had a lot of drop calls, random reboots , freezes ,and people complaining that they call me and the phone rings once or twice and hung up , and in my end i never saw that attempt of calling, so i tried a new firmware, updated, downgraded it.. still having issues. So i went to my carrier and they didn't even let me finish my complains and handed me a new device. I went back home , thinking that couldn't be hardware issue and this new one would have the same problems. But now it works as it supposed to do . So i guess they might have a lot of faulty devices and software issues for those initial batches . Although i still have some drop calls, and 3g or 4g drops , is not that noticeable like it was before.
I have no idead what ANt RSRP Diff means.
I hope you solve your problem, anything i can help you let me know.
better than my old nexus 6 and m7. plus it holds onto lte much longer
I also have issues with cell reception. I'm on att, and although in areas where signal is strong there are no issues, I have serious issues maintaining a cellular connection when the signal is mediocre. I'm at my wits end with this. The phone seems to run fine, no issues besides the fact that I don't get signal in many areas that my old Nokia lumina 930 had no issue getting reception. Also, ive compared with a few friends iphone 6's and they have signal while my s6 will have nothing. I will be bringing the phone in tomorrow, but if anyone has any other suggestions to fix this besides factory reset, which I've already done, I'd appreciate the help.
I also had problems with cell reception. (no signal, drop calls)
As suggested on several forums I changed the network mode in settings to WCDMA/GSM and this seems to solve the reception problems. This way I am not be able to use 4G but at least I can make calls now XD
hnos said:
I also had problems with cell reception. (no signal, drop calls)
As suggested on several forums I changed the network mode in settings to WCDMA/GSM and this seems to solve the reception problems. This way I am not be able to use 4G but at least I can make calls now XD
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well looks like it's many more of us than I thought... I am on EE and reception is a joke ( joke anyway on EE) but with S6 reception is much weaker than on any previous phones I've had. What firmware r u running
misiokicio said:
Well looks like it's many more of us than I thought... I am on EE and reception is a joke ( joke anyway on EE) but with S6 reception is much weaker than on any previous phones I've had. What firmware r u running
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am on stock 5.1.1 G925FXXU2BOFJ
I believe the version is the same for the G920F
Just came back to Verizon after being with T-Mobile for a year. Signal is pretty much the same at the house as I has always been.
click for larger image
Around town it is normally pretty good. At work, it is much better than T-Mobile ever was.
S4 has better 4G signal then S6
This seems to be a problem world wide. Looks like Galaxy S6 is having issues with 4G. I compared it with my old S4 and it's way worse.
Here are the results.
S4- 4G inside the house signal: -109dBm 31asu
S4 - 4G outside the house signal: -102dBm 35asu
S6 - 4G inside the house signal: NO SIGNAL
S6 - 4G outside the house signal: -113dBm 0asu
On my S4 I'm getting a better signal inside the house than what I get on the S6 outside the house.
Does anyone know the reason for this and is there a fix?
4G is calculated differently than a 3G signal
4G: (113 is good, 140 is bad)
What kind of signal strength are others getting compared to other phones they have owned. When I am in an area that has excellent LTE coverage (as consistently shown on multiple other phones I have owned) I am only getting about one half to 3/4 of the signal I had been getting. I have yet to get a full strength LTE reading on the signal strength indicator. I am also having problems with the signal dropping completely (no service) and then coming back at 3/4 strength? Very flaky.....
My AT&T signal was always terrible. Almost always 1 bar but sometimes two. I preordered a H2O Wireless SIM about a week before I got the Idol 3. My AT&T plan expired the day after I got the phone so I just popped in the new H2O sim into the idol 3. With the H2O sim I get really good signal, sometimes full; bars! The weird part is that H2O uses AT&T towers so I can't explain why I am getting better signal except that it could be the phone. Unfortunately I was unable to compare the same sim card in both phones. Overall signal strength is better for me.
Shodan5150 said:
My AT&T signal was always terrible. Almost always 1 bar but sometimes two. I preordered a H2O Wireless SIM about a week before I got the Idol 3. My AT&T plan expired the day after I got the phone so I just popped in the new H2O sim into the idol 3. With the H2O sim I get really good signal, sometimes full; bars! The weird part is that H2O uses AT&T towers so I can't explain why I am getting better signal except that it could be the phone. Unfortunately I was unable to compare the same sim card in both phones. Overall signal strength is better for me.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i got the same problem i had a moto G lte had all of the bars then i put in my sim card and now i dont get much signal even at work with the moto i had all of the bars and this one i get like half then dissapears goes back to half then of a sudden all of the bars show im running cricket and as same as you we run on ATT towers
I had to set mine to wcdma/gsm on T-Mobile to get good coverage. It wouldn't pull signal unless it was 5 bars LTE.
Tmobile in SF. Brand new phone less than a week in use, also terrible signal. LTE Discovery shows I'm on band 4. Funny enough I still get calls and txt messages when displays shows not signal at all. This is one thing I hate in reviews, they all mention how fast and great display and audio, but none of them mention call reception. IT'S A FREAKING PHONE!!!
My signal sucks regardless of this being a Band 12 capable phone. I know you should never go by the signal bars, but rather the dBm's/asu, but my signal strength fluctuates constantly and doesn't even show signal at all until a few seconds later as if it "reconnected" to the network and jumps 2 bars. This phone needs a major modem update. I don't think I've ever seen my signal bar icon fully lit even when I'm outside. Maybe I just need a new SIM card.
My network is fine. AT&T/AIRVOICE. SLC, Utah.
I compare my Idol 3 signal to varying Androids i know that are on Tmob, it seems to be par for the course. Often it is half a bar better. It is certainly better than the OPO i sent back.
Compared to my Note 2 the Note5 seems worse at picking up the Mobile Signal. I have 3G in some places that were 4G, and dropouts in places that were 1x.
This is a Verizon Note5, and so was my Note 2.
Any thoughts? Anything I can do to increase strength?
Thanks.
I have the opposite. I am on a business trip in a location where the Verizon signal is weak, and while on this trip I upgraded from a Note 3 to a Note 5. The Note 3 kept dropping the calls and the Note 5 sounds crystal clear and doesn't drop any calls, even with the weak signal. And I don't have advanced calling turned on either (because I have to make many overseas calls)...