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)
Related
Hello everybody. I have a small question for all Nexus S owners.
Does anyone else's signal strength bars fluctuate all the time? For instance mine goes from 3/4 bars to 1/4 to 0 bars and then back to 2/4 bars all within a couple of minutes in the same location.
I plugged my SIM into my BB Bold 9700 and it stays consistent at 4/5 bars. My signal db is like -103 dBM 5 asu as I type, on UMTS at the moment. EDIT: Now -111 dBM 1 asu in the very exact same spot. Wait. Now it is -97 dBm.
Does anyone else experience this or could it be my sole device? Or possibly my SIM card?
If it is a Nexus S thing, what other phone is recommended from Rogers?
Thanks for your time.
If it helps, I'm running stock Android 2.3.3.
Also is the Galaxy S Captivate from Rogers the other best phone they got on Android?
I had an evo, and it had much better signal strength and had far less dropped calls and connected much quicker to the internet. Maybe theres something in the PRL we can change or its just a hardware issue. but the nexus s 4g isn't on the same level as the evo 4g when it comes to signal strength
as stated before it's a radio issue. hopefully we will get a software update soon.
fixxxer2008 said:
as stated before it's a radio issue. hopefully we will get a software update soon.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
And where exactly was this stated? If you could post a link to a thread or something, I'd appreciate it.
fadentales said:
I had an evo, and it had much better signal strength and had far less dropped calls and connected much quicker to the internet. Maybe theres something in the PRL we can change or its just a hardware issue. but the nexus s 4g isn't on the same level as the evo 4g when it comes to signal strength
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for your experience. So it seems that it is a widely experienced issue. How do people live with having their phone have poor reception?
Nook000 said:
And where exactly was this stated? If you could post a link to a thread or something, I'd appreciate it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
HERE and HERE. And I guarantee an Internet search will reveal more.
good day.
chopper the dog said:
HERE and HERE. And I guarantee an Internet search will reveal more.
good day.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the links.
It seems like the situation is not nearly as bad in Toronto, Canada (I was in Windsor for a while). But even in Windsor, if I set my phone to 2G, it gets 4/4 bars all the time. Note that the phone's reception is worse than my iPhone or BB Bold in Toronto too.
So is it only the 3G portion that is broken? And is it FOR SURE a software issue?
chopper the dog said:
HERE and HERE. And I guarantee an Internet search will reveal more.
good day.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Okay, but those are Sprint users. People keep comparing against the EVO, but how do know if the EVO just flat out has better antennas/reception. I've compared my Nexus S i9020a to my 2 other phones, the Motorola Milestone and the iPhone 3GS (oh let's not forget my ancient Nokia N82). The Nexus S is crap and is worse than the iPhone 3GS in terms of SNR. In fact it's about as bad as the iPhone 4 with death grip issues. The death grip isn't really an issue for the NS, but damn the reception to begin with SUCKS.
My question is how can you say it's a radio issue for sure? This means you know that for certain it's a software fix.
Perhaps the antenna for the Nexus S isn't good to begin with. Another benchmark I did was GPS Status on my Motorola Milestone and my former Nexus S. Both of those phones locked quickly WITHOUT SIM, meaning they use GPS only and no aGPS. The signal was strong even indoors. While sitting at my desk my Nexus S is absolutely horrendous and takes forever to lock. Even when I scoot to the window it gets barely enough signal to lock. My N1 locked anywhere in the house with great signal without SIM. This perhaps says that the Nexus S has weaker antennas overall compared to similar phones. Maybe it's a radio issue like you say, but honestly, how can you be certain it's software and NOT hardware?
Anandtech's review mentioned the Nexus S drops HSDPA down to 3G UMTS a lot, and sometimes EDGE. Why is this? Could be radio, but I notice the H and 3G switching a lot during low signal. There's more than enough people saying the signal is bad. I almost want to say everyone attributes this to radio because they're optimistic there's a fix. Sometimes you have to admit certain features of the phone just aren't strong
i.e. the N1 earpiece. no matter how much you boost it, you'll just get tinny sound, and in no way does it compare with the SGS or Motorola Droid phones.
- the iphone speaker. people say each iOS revision boosts it, but at the end of the day, the Motorola Droid phones are like boomboxes compared to the iPhone
- The NS just has bad reception. Maybe we should just admit that and move on. There's only so much radio updates can do at this point unless you're saying Samsung totally screwed it up as badly as the Captivate/Fascinate/Vibrant GPS issues.
so long story short I am looking at ditching sprint where I have an EVO LTE. Trust me when I say I am used to crap reception and data speeds. I was reading the thread full of other people who have came from sprint and most seem happy but... I read a lot of comments from long time Verizon users saying things like " I have to contort like a monkey to get a message to go through". Are these just spoiled Verizon users that don't know how good they've got it? Or is coming from sprint a waste of my time? Thanks for any and all input.
PS: Verizon has LTE all over my area, sprint has not announced any LTE anywhere near me. Is the LTE utilized for voice and text? Will this help?
Sent from my EVO using xda premium
Im sure others have problems, but mine has been great. Not a single issue to speak of. Been running CM10 for 2 months now.
Gordon Ramsay said:
so long story short I am looking at ditching sprint where I have an EVO LTE. Trust me when I say I am used to crap reception and data speeds. I was reading the thread full of other people who have came from sprint and most seem happy but... I read a lot of comments from long time Verizon users saying things like " I have to contort like a monkey to get a message to go through". Are these just spoiled Verizon users that don't know how good they've got it? Or is coming from sprint a waste of my time? Thanks for any and all input.
PS: Verizon has LTE all over my area, sprint has not announced any LTE anywhere near me. Is the LTE utilized for voice and text? Will this help?
Sent from my EVO using xda premium
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
NO radio problems here.... I think a lot of people with problems may be on the border of having coverage where they are...? I have FULL bars no matter where I go in Michigan (except in Walmart) LOL I have LTE coverage too and it's been a solid performer and I may drop a call here and there but nothing out of the norm... Just my personal experiences...:good:
My .02
Go to a verizon store, put a rezound side by side to a samsung galaxy s3 and compare the dbm and asu and u will see how terrible the signal is . My phone is constantly at least 20 dbm less than the rezound .
It feels like i am back to sprint or tmobile since i got my device, constant data drops, phone call break ups and 4g/3g handing off is terrible .
Btw this is my 4th sim and second samsung galaxy s3 trial now , still reception in comparison to any htc phone is horrible.
Htc put their 4g antennas on the back cover which i think makes them practically immune to low signal issues.
Its a pretty phone , but if u want a device that actually communicates with satellites and cell towers, then get a real phone . not this one .
waiting for htc dlx
Mine has been completely fine.
Currently not being productive on my S3.
I came from Sprint at the beginning of the month. On Sprint it had gotten so bad that I was on 1 bar 90% of the time in the middle of the New Orleans area. I gave up waiting for it to get better and installed Roam Control so I could force it to roam on Verizon. Forced roaming only gets you 1x data, but it gave me full signal which prevented dropouts and draining the battery.
Now I'm on Verizon with the S3 and have no signal issues. I don't think I've ever seen less than 3 bars. The signal starts might be lower than other phones based on other people's experience but I wouldn't know because I haven't had any problems to make it worth checking. I think it really depends on your area. If your current phone is rooted, you could try Roam Control to get an idea of what the signal strength will be like, although you'll be stuck on 1x data.
I too was scared by the reports in various threads that these devices have horrible radios. We switched to Verizon from ATT because ATT doesn't work at all at my office (searching for reception).
I haven't been looking at dBM or anything but from a functional standpoint I haven't had any issues. There are some areas where before I was getting 4-5 3G bars on my ATT iPhone4 where the SGS3 bounces between 1-3 bars 4G LTE. It's always disturbing when you see 1 bar of reception, but the phone operates well even getting 4-5Mbps in speedtest. If you look at bars (I know not really accurate) and whether or not I can browse, call, etc. the SGS3 compares favorable to the wife's iPhone5. In fact there were a couple places where I was getting 1-2 bars 4G and the iPhone5 dropped to 3G.
Her are some screen shots of my signals after an update last night. These are the best I've gotten on both and better than anything I saw on my Rezound.
Currently not being productive on my S3.
Never had an issue with signal on my S3. You also need to realize that the most vocal people are those that have an issue. For every 1 person posting about an issue there a dozens that have no problem at all.
Signal on my s3 is great its 100 times better then gnex was and about on par with my old droid RAZR.
dwyw42 said:
I came from Sprint at the beginning of the month. On Sprint it had gotten so bad that I was on 1 bar 90% of the time in the middle of the New Orleans area. I gave up waiting for it to get better and installed Roam Control so I could force it to roam on Verizon. Forced roaming only gets you 1x data, but it gave me full signal which prevented dropouts and draining the battery.
Now I'm on Verizon with the S3 and have no signal issues. I don't think I've ever seen less than 3 bars. The signal starts might be lower than other phones based on other people's experience but I wouldn't know because I haven't had any problems to make it worth checking. I think it really depends on your area. If your current phone is rooted, you could try Roam Control to get an idea of what the signal strength will be like, although you'll be stuck on 1x data.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This doesn't work, each manufacturer measures it slightly differently. You have to use a third party app to compare phones that are not the same model.
Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD
Yes, it is. My GS3 consistently drops in places where my Rezound and iPhone work without a hiccup.
I actually just switched from Sprint to Verizon last week and love it. My gs3 has great reception and the network is very fast. I get a consistent 30 mbps down all over my area. With Sprint I was lucky to get 500 kbps
Sent from my SCH-I535 using xda premium
The Nexus was the worst for reception. The S3 is a close second. It seems to be people in some parts of the country don't notice the issue - possibly because they don't use their phone much or because they have towers that use different technology than the towers in the areas I travel. I spend a lot of time in Los Angeles, Vegas and Dallas. I can be at 4 bars one second and no bars (drop the call) and go back to 4 bars the next.
I was on Sprint and the HTC EVO 3D had that same issue even though the EVO didn't. I did always get crap data speeds on Sprint though. Some phones get great signal like the Motorola - so the question is - which is more imporant to you - the PDA or the phone. I use about 3000 minutes per month so I notice quickly when there are issues with a phones reception. My data speeds on the S3 are much better than I had on Sprint.
No the radios are not bad.
Excellent service, all the time here. In fact, I've never seen my phone with less than 3 bars, anywhere I go. And I travel a lot.
Yes the radios are very bad.....although improving. With the HE radio I finally have seem -99 dbm at my house although most of the time it is around -105. This is much improved compared to the original radio where I saw on average -110. I still drop calls in areas where I never have before. The poster that stated that HTC's have better signal are definitely correct. My wifes old rezound normally saw -80 to -85 at my house and never dropped calls anywhere. My old Thunderbolt was the same. Funny thing is that no matter what direction I go from my house, once I am a minute away I get full reception.....no matter what way I go. The radios don't do a good job of reaching out for the signal. The range is bad. Those stating that they are happy with their radios are probably in areas that don't have any weak spots. I'm holding out for newer radios cause every release seems to be a small step in the right direction.
ercDROID said:
Yes the radios are very bad.....although improving. With the HE radio I finally have seem -99 dbm at my house although most of the time it is around -105. This is much improved compared to the original radio where I saw on average -110. I still drop calls in areas where I never have before. The poster that stated that HTC's have better signal are definitely correct. My wifes old rezound normally saw -80 to -85 at my house and never dropped calls anywhere. My old Thunderbolt was the same. Funny thing is that no matter what direction I go from my house, once I am a minute away I get full reception.....no matter what way I go. The radios don't do a good job of reaching out for the signal. The range is bad. Those stating that they are happy with their radios are probably in areas that don't have any weak spots. I'm holding out for newer radios cause every release seems to be a small step in the right direction.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Same exact thing here! You took the words directly out of my mouth.
Sent by one of my many Anthromorphic Personifications
Here are the results of a real world test that I just did with a co-workers HTC Thunderbolt compared to my SG3:
Both phones on 4g and side by side
HTC dBM -66
SG3 dBM -92
I think the results are pretty clear. Nothing else really needs to be said about the quality of the SG3 radio......it is not as good as the competition. If it was close by a few dBM then it would not be of concern to me. A 26 dBM difference is huge!
Because of this difference in signal strength he was able to have much faster download speeds. I was 17 down compared to his 27 down.
I've realised that the signal strength in Phone Status (in dBm) does not seem to work correctly when on LTE. Very often, it'll show that my signal is -113 dBm, which is an extremely weak signal, while showing 2 or 3 signal bars. Something is obviously wrong as 3 out of 4 bars should NEVER be as weak a signal as -113 dBm. Is anyone else experiencing this?
G920F (bought from Germany) on 3 UK.
Japultra said:
I've realised that the signal strength in Phone Status (in dBm) does not seem to work correctly when on LTE. Very often, it'll show that my signal is -113 dBm, which is an extremely weak signal, while showing 2 or 3 signal bars. Something is obviously wrong as 3 out of 4 bars should NEVER be as weak a signal as -113 dBm. Is anyone else experiencing this?
G920F (bought from Germany) on 3 UK.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
LTE dBm are calculated differently. 113 is good around 140 is bad.
SmiLey497 said:
LTE dBm work different. 113 is good around 140 is bad.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've read that signal drops off at -120, so -113 is pretty close to the edge, but either way, that signal indicator is wrong. If I go into the service menu (*#0011#) the RSRP (dBm) it shows fluctuates from -91 to -98, which seems to be the more appropriate dBm for 3 bars of signal. The dBm in my phone status still stays static at -113 (it doesn't fluctuate at all)
As per your request in the other topic here are my findings.
I live in Amsterdam and I work in the harbour area (a lot of open spaces). I work next to a 4 x 3 meter window. With every device I've owned I would get full reception. Though under settings > device > status it would always say -113. My reception bar is always near empty.
When I go outside, even in the middle of a park in the middle of the city with nobody around, I will still get the same result. In my apartmentbuilding, on the 7th floor outside on my balcony, same result.
I'm currently in the office so I thought I'd send a screenshot of what the *#0011# screen looks like.
(Apologies for the big image)
In my parking garage I would even get reception with my OnePlus One, which isn't really great when it comes to reception. It would be only a sliver, but at least I would get something. The S6 doesn't get anything. When I leave the bigger urban area I'm immediately knocked off 4G and 3G and I'm pretty much left to calling and texting. The Netherlands isn't really like the outback of Australia, I had expected better
I can live with not having reception in my parking garage, but I'm more concerned with the fact that I've never seen more reception than you can see in that screenshot and that I have close to no reception when I go out of town. I'm using T-Mobile which I know only uses the higher frequencies. In the Netherlands they use 900 MHz, 1800, 2600 MHz. I don't know if that comes into play much. I had a bit better reception when I was still at Vodafone, but that was a few years back. With a top of the line device like the S6 I had expected better. Much better.
Maybe I should have the device swapped?
Thijsvr said:
As per your request in the other topic here are my findings.
I live in Amsterdam and I work in the harbour area (a lot of open spaces). I work next to a 4 x 3 meter window. With every device I've owned I would get full reception. Though under settings > device > status it would always say -113. My reception bar is always near empty.
When I go outside, even in the middle of a park in the middle of the city with nobody around, I will still get the same result. In my apartmentbuilding, on the 7th floor outside on my balcony, same result.
I'm currently in the office so I thought I'd send a screenshot of what the *#0011# screen looks like.
(Apologies for the big image)
In my parking garage I would even get reception with my OnePlus One, which isn't really great when it comes to reception. It would be only a sliver, but at least I would get something. The S6 doesn't get anything. When I leave the bigger urban area I'm immediately knocked off 4G and 3G and I'm pretty much left to calling and texting. The Netherlands isn't really like the outback of Australia, I had expected better
I can live with not having reception in my parking garage, but I'm more concerned with the fact that I've never seen more reception than you can see in that screenshot and that I have close to no reception when I go out of town. I'm using T-Mobile which I know only uses the higher frequencies. In the Netherlands they use 900 MHz, 1800, 2600 MHz. I don't know if that comes into play much. I had a bit better reception when I was still at Vodafone, but that was a few years back. With a top of the line device like the S6 I had expected better. Much better.
Maybe I should have the device swapped?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I see that your RSRP is the same as what it states in the phone status menu. Does this number ever change? For me, I (mostly) always see -113 (such as right now in my office) but my RSRP actually fluctuates. Screenshot of my RSRP attached.
Japultra said:
I see that your RSRP is the same as what it states in the phone status menu. Does this number ever change? For me, I (mostly) always see -113 (such as right now in my office) but my RSRP actually fluctuates. Screenshot of my RSRP attached.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
In my phone status window I've never seen it change. In the RSRP it does vary a little bit, from -115 to -110.
I actually just got it working properly for the first time. I went to the rooftop of my office, as far away from anything that could interfere and I got -77. Bars actually went up too which I haven't seen before. So I guess the device really does just have poor reception. Strange that not more people are reporting on this though.
Edit. These guys are also reporting on low signal stuff: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/04/08/samsung_galaxy_s6/
Thijsvr said:
In my phone status window I've never seen it change. In the RSRP it does vary a little bit, from -115 to -110.
I actually just got it working properly for the first time. I went to the rooftop of my office, as far away from anything that could interfere and I got -77. Bars actually went up too which I haven't seen before. So I guess the device really does just have poor reception. Strange that not more people are reporting on this though.
Edit. These guys are also reporting on low signal stuff: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/04/08/samsung_galaxy_s6/
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Unfortunately, I've noticed the same thing, though not nearly as bad as what The Register is experiencing. For me, it is only slightly worse than my G3.
Japultra said:
Unfortunately, I've noticed the same thing, though not nearly as bad as what The Register is experiencing. For me, it is only slightly worse than my G3.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The review sounds pretty accurate to me, but others are reporting their device has connectivity as good as HTC's M9. Luckily I've got an M9 lying around, so I'll put my sim in that and see if it too gives me poor reception.
---------- Post added at 02:49 PM ---------- Previous post was at 02:36 PM ----------
Haha, I guess I have to blame T-Mobile and not Samsung. The M9 I have gets -112 dBm at the same location where the S6 has -113 dBm. Seems the problem is with the network and not with the device. Not sure yet if that's good news or not
Thijsvr said:
The review sounds pretty accurate to me, but others are reporting their device has connectivity as good as HTC's M9. Luckily I've got an M9 lying around, so I'll put my sim in that and see if it too gives me poor reception.
---------- Post added at 02:49 PM ---------- Previous post was at 02:36 PM ----------
Haha, I guess I have to blame T-Mobile and not Samsung. The M9 I have gets -112 dBm at the same location where the S6 has -113 dBm. Seems the problem is with the network and not with the device. Not sure yet if that's good news or not
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well, it's good that you know it's not your S6! I was actually walking along a street where I got horrible reception with the G3 (after I posted the last comment) and realised I was actually holding onto a signal when the G3 would lose signal completely. Guess it's not as bad as I thought!
Japultra said:
Well, it's good that you know it's not your S6! I was actually walking along a street where I got horrible reception with the G3 (after I posted the last comment) and realised I was actually holding onto a signal when the G3 would lose signal completely. Guess it's not as bad as I thought!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
We're just too critical Glad we got it solved, haha. Back to fully enjoying the device!
I have this issue also.
I had a nexus 5 before on EE and pretty much always had 3-4 bars if not full signal. On the GS6 still with EE i rarely see it go above 1 bar.
I am still within my 14 day return time but i am stuck now with what to do. Do i risk waiting to see if this is fixed with a software update or return it. If i wait and its not fixed them im stuck with a phone that gets very little signal. If i return it i have no idea what else i would get as i love this phone. I have also tried another GS6 in store but same issue so makes me wonder is this a software or hardware issue. Seems several people on varying networks have this issue.
I have the same experience. -113 dBm at home inside our house.
1 max 2 bars on the signal indicator. Lots of places where I had 4-5 bars on my One M8 I now have these -113 dBm on S6 4G, or only 3G connection (-79 dBm - 4 bars, the max on S6). Sitting here with my SIM card placed in my M8 I get -98 dBm 39 asu inside our house. Thats 4 out of 5 bars on the HTC indicator. It's the same with other 4G handsets we have in the house. I have a cheap company Nokia 4G phone that also have 4 bars inside the house. I've had a Z3 compact that also had great reception on 4G. I think I have data enough to conclude:
Conclusion: S6 have bad LTE/4G reception. Very very sorry about this. This is a real stepdown from what I otherwise think of the S6 handset. Other than that, I don't know wether this can be made better by software, but I doubt it..
EDIT: Just tried by wifes Samsung A5, which sees -97 dBm on my SIM card.
Different carrier roms seem to deal with the signal differently, but essentially it's a cosmetic issue. I'm using the Three UK (H3G) rom and my signal bars work fine but my dBm signal level in settings is always stuck at -113dBm.
I took these 2 screenshots at the same time standing in a great 4G signal area:
http://i.imgur.com/n6eUmaS.png
http://i.imgur.com/v5KsmgH.png
As you can see, the settings shows -113dBm but the service menu (*#0011# in dialer) shows -84dBm.
Maybe this thread is really about that - the signal interpretation internally. But nevertheless my S6 handset is 'downscaling' to 3G all the time (and staying there), hente twice the roundtrip and less bandwidth for me.
duckstardeluxe said:
Maybe this thread is really about that - the signal interpretation internally. But nevertheless my S6 handset is 'downscaling' to 3G all the time (and staying there), hente twice the roundtrip and less bandwidth for me.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It sounds like you have a different issue. Have you tried checking what your signal is in the service menu using *#0011#?
I'm getting an error dialing the service menu (OSSD code) stating N/A.
duckstardeluxe said:
I'm getting an error dialing the service menu (OSSD code) stating N/A.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Are you typing it in exactly like this: *#0011# ?
Here in Italy very bad signal with TIM also with 3g. Where my Iphone and Note 4 get full signal only 2 bars on my GS6. What the hell Samsung always release buggy phone!!!
I forgot to mention that I was running the Lite version of the stock rom found here on XDA. The service code don't work on that rom, which made me downgrade to my backup of the stock rom.
I'm getting RSRP:-98 RSRQ:-6 RSSI:-71
duckstardeluxe said:
I forgot to mention that I was running the Lite version of the stock rom found here on XDA. The service code don't work on that rom, which made me downgrade to my backup of the stock rom.
I'm getting RSRP:-98 RSRQ:-6 RSSI:-71
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That matches your M8.
i get reception problems in my house
never had those
it started the second i changed from s4 to s6
i dont know what to do
the only thing i can think of trying is to download my provider's stock rom for this device and pull the modem from there
the only one i could find is file named CEL-G925FXXU1AOD4
its 5.0.1 though and my device has the updated 5.1.1' would this modem work ?
Hello,
Return your Galaxy S6, it's useless if you want a signal. I also have the same problem coming from the Galaxy S4, I sent the S6 for repair twice and the signal is still poor. Samsung have made a horrible mistake with the antenna on the S6. it's the worst signal of any phone I've ever seen. And don't worry about 5.1.1, I have it on my G920F and the signal is still poor.
Change mobile providers. My signal is generally full on my S6 indoors and outdoors. In the basement at work right now I have Full bars, -95dbm, 10asu. No different than on S4 or HTC One M9.
How is changing mobile provider going to help an issue caused by the phone? We both notice worse signal with our S6s compared to other phones, on the same network. So Samsung probably has a huge batch with useless antennas.
Hi guys recently I bought an unlocked g955u1 from best buy and am on Verizon. I've noticed that my cell signal has been reading a bit off despite doing the Verizon software update. My phone is almost always stuck on 3 bars lte according to lte discovery and the range of dBm will average -100 to as low as -108 which realistically should be 1-2 bars not 3. In the past the only time I've really saw inaccurate readings like this is when I've been on gsm carriers. It's not as much as a problem as more of an annoyance as everything works fine. My question is anybody know why it's reading so inaccurate?
The bars are more or less just approximate visualizations of the network strength anyway. It varies from carrier to carrier, as well as phone manufacturer. You're better off sticking with the dB display if you want a truly accurate reading. Imho.
I have a T-Mobile variant and have noticed the my DL and UL speeds are a lot faster than any of the phone I've had in the past. We live out from town and even on the Nexus 6 it shows 3 bars and on the S8+ I get all the bars and the DL speed on the other phones at my house are around 5Mbps and on the S8+ I get 17-20Mbps at the house now. In town it has gone up from 40Mbps to 55Mbps.
My ATT S8+ reception
While I agree that the dBm is what you should be looking at, I have noticed some funky things going on with my ATT S8+ in terms of reception. Using the same SIM card, placing the phone in the exact same place, my S6 Active has a signal strength of -124 dBm /asu 16/"In service" on LTE. The S8+ gets a signal strength of -113 dBm/asu of 0/"Out of service." To me this seems like the S8+ is actually getting better reception than the 6S Active but the phone is out of service. I also tried this same test in another location using a different cell tower. Same results, the S8+ gets better reception...but the phone does not perform as well. In location number 2 I have also notice the S8+ fish for better signal and switch from LTE to HSPA where the signal strength is -99 dBm but the asu is only 7.
Since I live in a area with weak cell coverage the S8+ is driving me nuts...I contacted ATT about it last night, will see what happens.
Also somewhat related:
I'm using a US Unlocked on T-Mobile, and I've noticed my signal dropping out in areas where I previously had great signal on my Pixel XL. My buddy (also on T-Mo) just got an LG G6 and had full signal when mine dropped out.
Anyone else notice a weak signal? If I flash the T-Mo firmware, will that improve my signal? Did I get a bad unit? I hope not as everything else is perfect, screen included.
i notice (with TMobile) that if i am in 4g lte, then move to area with only edge for a few mins, then back to the 4g lte area...my phone doesn't connect back to the best signal
only a reboot let's me reconnect to 4g lte