I loooooove the phone super fast videos buffer with ease hands down the best phone i had and ive went through a evo evo 3d photon and iphone 4 BUT the signal and bars (maybe i should say lack there of) is a bit of a issue for me with the photon i had full bars 95% of the time now is there anything i can do to increase it or is it a phone issue
Sent from my SPH-D710 using xda premium
Get used to it. Lots of threads about this.
I got the Epic Touch 4G today and I have the same exact concern. Great phone but signal strength is not good in weak coverage areas. My Photon pulls a good signal everywhere, even in weak coverage areas. I might be returning this Epic Touch 4G. I'll give it a few days and see.
Don't let the signal bars fool u. They can be programmed differently. The epic touch might show one bar while the photon shows four bars but they have the same signal strength. To find the signal strength on the epic touch its under settings, about phone, status, and then look for signal strength. Compare that number to the photon's number.
Sent From My Evo Killer!!!
musclehead84 said:
Don't let the signal bars fool u. They can be programmed differently. The epic touch might show one bar while the photon shows four bars but they have the same signal strength. To find the signal strength on the epic touch its under settings, about phone, status, and then look for signal strength. Compare that number to the photon's number.
Sent From My Evo Killer!!!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
-76 dbm 0 asu
I dont know much about sig stregth reading is that good?
Sent from my SPH-D710 using xda premium
Do we even know what those bars are measuring? I have the feeling that some phones measure 2G and some measure 3G...2G (voice and text) being a far strong signal. I seem to recall from my Evo4G days that the stock rom measured 2G and CM6 measured 3G and this caused an endless amount of complaints about signal strength regardless of the fact that nothing was actually any different.
Or how about how when I went from stock, which uses 6 (?) bars and on 00001.PRL I get 3-4 bars...but on Starburst which uses the AOSP 4 bar meter I'm at 4 bars almost constantly?
My point? Ignore the bars. If you aren't looking at the signal strength in dbm you aren't looking at anything particularly useful. If the phone works for you then I'd say things are likely fine. On standard Sprint PRL (which oddly hasn't been updated in almost 2 or 3 months?) I get 0-2 bars on stock ROM...the phone and data still work almost perfectly.
and -76dBm? that's fantastic. The closer you can get to 0 the better.
My photon drops calls in the same areas my ET4g does, I don't think there's much of a difference in signal strength personally between the phones.
Yeah don't pay attention to the bars. Ill have 1 or 2 bars and make crystal clear voice calls with no dropped calls and send texts and data works fine so....if that all works, then what is there to worry about?
Sent from my SPH-D710 using XDA App
I have compared a photon to my epic touch and while the photon had two more bars the signal strength was the same. Running speed test shows similar results as well.
lafester said:
I have compared a photon to my epic touch and while the photon had two more bars the signal strength was the same. Running speed test shows similar results as well.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Same here, my buddy has a Photon and while it does roam less often, it also shows the same dbm while showing 2-3 more bars. If I have any service at all I can call, text, and browse with my Epic Touch. My Evo Shift would drop service at my parents house and show 40% time without signal....this phone never loses service when I visit them.
Sent from my SPH-D710 using xda premium
rruss said:
-76 dbm 0 asu
I dont know much about sig stregth reading is that good?
Sent from my SPH-D710 using xda premium
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
-76 is good. -65 is the best signal strength. Just compare those numbers to that if the other phones. Ignore the signal bars uptop.
Sent From My Evo Killer!!!
Related
With my Epic, i'd always get 2 out of 3 bars for wifi in my room.. i'm only getting 1 bar for wifi in my room
Hmm, I guess i'm the only one
have you noticed difference in speed between the two?
I'm on the fence right now as to whether to go trade the MoPho in for a Sammy. Last Sammy I had was the Moment, so you can understand the hesitation...lol.
yeah i did notice the fact that my bars are lower than usual
it's on par with my previous E3D's and NS4G, not like that's any compliment.
This thing is killer at locking onto even a weak 3G signal though.
I noticed it too, I usually have 3 bars wifi with my old epic 4g but now on 2 to 1 bar?
I am as well... I had to go right beside my router to even connect.
I wonder if there is a battery-chugging mode like on the E3D...I'm not sure if that was HTC's idea or not. Hard to tell, looked like a optional stock component. It helped a ton, but, at the expense of your battery.
bars dont really tell you much...
this has been well documented that cellphone manufacturers are always changing how many bars = how many dB.
It's annoying, to say the least.
If I am not mistaken the epic 4g only had a wireless G card where epic touch 4g has an N card. If you are broadcasting both aka your router has N and G then its going to auto connect to the N signal. N is faster but has a shorter range.
Zzim said:
If I am not mistaken the epic 4g only had a wireless G card where epic touch 4g has an N card. If you are broadcasting both aka your router has N and G then its going to auto connect to the N signal. N is faster but has a shorter range.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Almost everything you just said is incorrect. The Epic 4G supports 802.11N, and one of the primary functions of 802.11N besides increased speed is increased range. Every new standard of 802.11 focuses on improving both of these.
Mine seems to be as good as the EVO
I am having the same issue... Sitting in my living room I have full signal with my Evo... 1-2 bars with the SG2.
Sent from my Epic 4g Touch using XDA Premium
Mine is showing 1bar and my wifes EVO is show 3 so I did a speedtest and the results are amazing 18down 4up for the E4GT and I didnt waste my time testing the EVO.
Same here, used to get three bars in this room with OG Epic, now only 1. Not worried about it though because the up/down speeds are right on.
Sent from my SPH-D710 using xda premium
Someone already said this here but I think it needs to be restated. Just because you only have x amount of bars means next to nothing. Do a speed test and see what the difference is. Different companies will show different amount of bars for different amounts of signal strength (which can be very misleading). What really matters is your signal strength in dB, not your bars. If your EVO gets the same down and up speed as your E4GT, you probably have similar signal strength with your wireless connection regardless of how many bars you see.
mine is a lot better than my nexus s. about 4x better in fact.
Same here
But i did a sppedtest and it is a great connection 18 up 8 down these bars dont mean much
Same here. I'm one room over from my router and I only have 1-2 bars. My EVO3D has full.
I think they put the wifi radio in the bottom... When i cup it the signal goes down
Sent from my SPH-D710 using XDA App
Anyone having weak wifi radio where I get full bars with the e3d I get one bar on the epic touch and the speed are on half compared to my e3d any one else having this
Sent from my SPH-D710 using XDA App
I have the same problem
Sent from my SPH-D710 using XDA App
same problem,,,
I got time warner 20mbps down and 2mbps up. I only get one bar on wifi signal but i get full 20mbps and 2mbps up. i only used to get 7mbps with my og evo
Same problem
Sent from my SPH-D710 using xda premium
Same problem. Mine cuts on and off every few minutes
Ditto.....
Ditto
Sent from my SPH-D710 using XDA App
it is better than my EVO with CM7 but it is a little weak
No problems with mine. Rock solid!!! I can go to the end of my driveway and check the mail which is over ~125'
You can not look at the amount of bars you have. What do the bars mean? ! You have to actually look at the speeds if they have not changed then you have nothing to worry about. One bar on this phone might be the same as three bars on our old phone.
But if it's not working correctly all together then that is something ole' Sammi needs to fix.
Kiki
Sent from my hand crippling Epic 4g Touch
Same problem here. If I am in the front room mine won't even connect to the router in the other room most times. Hope this gets fixed in a update.
You might check the galaxy s2 forums over at androidforums.com; I remember when i was following the gs2 that there were some issues with wifi; not sure if htey were resolved. Generally folks loved the phone nad thought the gps was decent; but there were one or two threads on wif. Not sure if they figured it out...
Same issue here. My laptop and my EVO3d have FULL bars while this phone is hovering back and forth between 2 bars and none. The connection even drops. It has a horrible wifi signal, even at work.
Maybe I will switch to the iPhone 4... they have the wifis.
Im thinkin just the bars are not what your used to seeing, mine always shows 0-2 bars but the connection is always solid.
I have a nexus s 4g. I think Sammy makes some weak radios. I have the same problem. OG evo works fine.
digweed4me said:
I got time warner 20mbps down and 2mbps up. I only get one bar on wifi signal but i get full 20mbps and 2mbps up. i only used to get 7mbps with my og evo
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah same here TimeWarner is good here. I had the nexus S 4g a week ago and that phone could not lock into a wifi signal even standing in front of the router so as much as i like it i said goodbye and hello Epic touch 4g even on 1bar its blazing fast.
I have the same issue, but I think it's also more of the signal indicator making it worse in your head...as it does mine! I'll hold a wireless signal at good strength but the WiFi icon has no bars...just the dot at the bottom! I did to some "field" tests in my driveway and yard with my Toshiba netbook, iPod touch, and ET4G; the netbook definitely had the best signal at a distance, the iPod in second, and the ET4G in VERY close third. Anyone think there could be a firmware fix or is it just a bad radio?
I read in two separate places that the fewer bars were due to a linear formula used to calculate them, which was not a standard in the industry.
When decibel levels were compared, they were about the same.
I don't know how true that is.
I guess that's possible but then what do you need to have FULL bars? I am sitting right next to my router and I only have 3 bars... Maybe I need to shove the Router antenna up my phone's mini port
Is this an issue for anyone else?
I just switched over from Evo 3D. And in my living room, where I used to get 2 bars on Evo, I get absolutely 0 on this phone. It goes in and out of roaming like 100 times while I'm there. And in the basement, where I used to get at least 1, I get roaming at all times.
Is there a fix for this?
(I searched on the 1st two pages of this section, and found nothing.)
arozer said:
Is this an issue for anyone else?
I just switched over from Evo 3D. And in my living room, where I used to get 2 bars on Evo, I get absolutely 0 on this phone. It goes in and out of roaming like 100 times while I'm there. And in the basement, where I used to get at least 1, I get roaming at all times.
Is there a fix for this?
(I searched on the 1st two pages of this section, and found nothing.)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I see the same signal strength on both phones. You should check with your local Sprint people for getting a refund or something.
This phone's reception is way worse than the evo 3D.
Sent from my SPH-D710 using XDA App
Try calling Sprint and having them do a profile reset on their end and then update your PRL and profile while in your home. It helped me
Sent from my SPH-D710 using xda premium
I can't compare to evo3d, but compared to evo 4g this phone is far worse reception. Also, wifi reception is at least as terrible. At is, assuming the DB levels and bars both correlate to the real signal level. I often send and receive calls with 0 bars. It makes no sense, but i've learned to live with the concept that 0 bars on an samsung epic 4g touch does not mean anything.
If you are roaming however where you previously got 2 bars.. well.. thats a different story. Try turning off roaming and see if you can't dial out.
i feel ya. both me and my father got new epic touches and i at least really love the phone.. but ... the 3g at least signal strength is subpar.
where i was getting -78 db on a moment
and he was getting -71 db on an evo
we are both hovering around the -101 db mark at home.
poor.
very sad because other than the poor signal strength outside of major areas these things blow my mind.
arozer said:
Is this an issue for anyone else?
I just switched over from Evo 3D. And in my living room, where I used to get 2 bars on Evo, I get absolutely 0 on this phone. It goes in and out of roaming like 100 times while I'm there. And in the basement, where I used to get at least 1, I get roaming at all times.
Is there a fix for this?
(I searched on the 1st two pages of this section, and found nothing.)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Take it into Sprint store. They will do a test. My first SII ET had some other bug. I had very poor reception and very slow internet.
Yep. My speeds suck on 3g. Works great on 4g
Sent from my SPH-D710 using XDA App
speedy0339 said:
This phone's reception is way worse than the evo 3D.
Sent from my SPH-D710 using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am finding exact opposite results.
Sent from my SPH-D710 using Tapatalk
if i lean forward on my couch, I get 1 bar sprint, lean back, nothing, unless i force roam to VZ, i get 2-3 on that... anyways, reception is about the same as for the OG epic for me, the 4g is way better for me though, I was in my work parking lot and got 13 megs down... but 4g is so spotty here I rarely turn it on. Anyways, with the Network Vision thingy going on... I suspect some crazy signal drops/increases coming...
10-13Mbps download speeds on full bar 4G at home. No LOS, Not a single issue with this phone. Battery life is amazing. I am finding it hard to be on the forums because everyone is complaining about something. Bad 3g...blame the IPhone for that. My 4G has gone up by 5+Mbps. I did the 4G signal hack that I did on my Epic and it only got better. I guess I need to go chill in the Nexus forums until people get their issues worked out. Its probably a voltage increase when phone is idle that will fix LOS issue
Sent from my SPH-D710 using xda premium
I have an EVO 4G and I've switched back and forth between AOSP ROMs and Sense ROMs. The problem is my 4G will show full bars but the connection is terrible and the speed slows down. For example, on CM7 2 bars of 4G is faster that 3 full bars of 4G. What's the deal?
Bars are never a true way to tell how much signal you have. Every rom has different ways they calculate the amount of bars. Get an app that shows you the actual signal strength in decibels.
yeah there are plenty of apps out of the market that will give you the actual signal like the last post said in decibls. Your 4g tower might have just been down and sprint got rid of wimax so they might not be in a hurry to fix it. I have also noticed in cm7 my bars are always less anyways.
Now just remember wimax isnt like 3g! 3g goes out much further and can cover a lot more area. but with 4g think of it as a wifi network it is really strong at the source but when you get further away it will drop speeds and bars sugnificantly.
If I helped please hit thanks!
I've always got lte the house with no bars on ics now that I got the ota I'm getting 4 -5 bars which is awesome being my apt sits between two towers. I'm a happy camper.
Sent from my LG-LS970 using xda premium
You know, I've seen a lot of people post about how, with the JB update, they're getting better 4G signal. I don't think we really are. There is a spot outside my workplace where I pick up 4G, and I have a work-provided LTE hotspot. The hotspot shows the same number of bars that it always has, speed tests on each device are the same as the were with ICS, but my LGOG now shows 4-5 bars, instead of one. To me it seems like LG just changed the way that the phone reports 4G signal strength, and nothing else.
Yes they fix the signal bar. I never or rarely had bars but now I do. More than my other old lte phones. A full 4-5 bars I've never seen consistently on this phone until now with jb.
Sent from my LG-LS970 using xda premium
cowfodder said:
You know, I've seen a lot of people post about how, with the JB update, they're getting better 4G signal. I don't think we really are. There is a spot outside my workplace where I pick up 4G, and I have a work-provided LTE hotspot. The hotspot shows the same number of bars that it always has, speed tests on each device are the same as the were with ICS, but my LGOG now shows 4-5 bars, instead of one. To me it seems like LG just changed the way that the phone reports 4G signal strength, and nothing else.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I was always under the assumption on Sprint phones the signal bars were really indicating 1x and not data. Also I vaguely remember Android API not having a real method to display LTE signal strength, CDMA being RSSI and LTE being RSRP. Unless that change recently?