Develop Bugs

Post Your Radio Observations and Experiences

So I recently decided to try out different radios to see what they have to offer. I will post my observations here. For reference I have a G2 on T-Mobile in upstate NY area.
I started with the stock T-Mobile OTA radio, 26.03.02.26 on stock froyo rooted. I had no particular complaints about this combo, though I thought idle power consumption was way too high. I would lose over 35% idling over night on wifi calling.
I flashed CM7 stable and heard that the latest radio was required for full functionality. I tried flashing without updating the radio first, and GPS was non-functional. So I flashed the latest gingerbread test radio, 26.08.04.16 and GPS was working again. Now I am extremely pleased with battery life. Max idle power consumption I have seen so far was 8% overnight on wifi calling. If I charge to full right before going to bed, it still say 100% when I wake up in the morning.
In addition to the increase in battery life, data speeds were much improved. At home, with only two bars of H, I used to get just above 1Mbps down. The new radio easily and consistently hits over 2Mbps in the same location with the same reception.
I do think there are some trade offs with this radio though. I noticed a higher rate of wifi disconnects. Every now and then when I look at my phone, wifi calling has dropped and I have no data. Takes a few seconds to come back. I'm still not entirely sure if this is radio related or if it is my specific wifi environment.
I also noticed my phone bouncing between 3G and H a lot more frequently with the newer radio. In areas where I used to get very solid H, it will now bounce between 3G and H. Connectivity is not affected and I hope this is not bad for battery life. I suspect reception is slightly worse with this radio, maybe the tradeoff for better speeds.
I recently flashed back to the T-Mobile OTA radio to test it with CM7 and I was horrified at the battery drain. I lost 25% in less than 2 hours. Granted, the phone was active for half that time, but even still, that is terrible battery life. Needless to say, I am back to the 26.08.04.16 radio.
What have you noticed about the various radios you have tried so far? Any preferences? Post your experiences.
--MrAnt--

Just got off the phone using 26.08.04.16 and my call quality is extremely clear.

With the stock radio and the stock ROM I had terrible cell coverage in general, I would routinely not have usable cell signal let along data in my house even when my old G1 or two MyTouch 4G devices would work fine.
Specific symptoms would be the phone randomly cycling between 2-3 bars of 3G/HSPA+ and 2-3 bars of EDGE and then no bars of anything, even if it reported 2-3 bars when you went to use it almost invariably you would lose all bars and would be unable to make a call or use data. Could not identify any sort of pattern, it looked like the phone was having a hard time negotiating with one or more cell sites, I'd guess that there are two that have OK but not great coverage in range of my house and the phone could not figure out which one it wanted to connect to.
While still on the stock ROM I loaded radio 26.04.02.17, it did seem to help some but not significantly.'
After I switched to CM7 final there wasn't much if any change to my cell coverage (still sucks) but my GPS was ridiculously unreliable/unstable. I am a Foursquare users and use GPS every day several times a day and my phone would not turn on GPS consistently and would not turn it off consistently when I exited the application. A couple times I could not turn off GPS even if I disabled it in settings and would need to reboot to get GPS to turn off. Sometimes I would have to try several times (by exiting/restarting my GPS enabled application) to get it to turn on and sometimes it would just randomly turn off while in use (had this happen twice while using navigation). I would need to exit the GPS enabled app (exit navigation if I was using it) and then relaunch (sometimes more than once) to get GPS back up and running again)
I tried using the wipe the EFS data fix but that didn't fix my GPS problems
I have since upgraded my radio to 26.08.04.16 which has made my GPS better (but not as reliable as it was before CM7), I think my cell coverage/data is better but honestly the GPS is a much higher visibility problem for me so I haven't been paying as much attention to that.

Interesting, my GPS reception seemed to improve a lot with the new radio and CM7. Used to take well over a minute for a GPS lock, now its around 10-20 seconds.
I also have no cell reception problems, just power consumption complaints.
I just flashed the new test radio that was leaked, 26.8.04.30. I'm hoping this will solve my flaky wifi issues and, if I'm lucky, reduce cell radio power consumption to something more reasonable/manageable. I will update once I have a chance to try it out and see how battery performance is.
So far the wifi appears more stable, and cell bandwidth is about the same as the 26.8.04.16 radio, maybe even a little better.
--MrAnt--

mrant said:
Interesting, my GPS reception seemed to improve a lot with the new radio and CM7. Used to take well over a minute for a GPS lock, now its around 10-20 seconds.
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I have noticed when GPS works it is much faster than stock, GPS locks, when I can get them are lightning fast (usually less than 5 seconds if I'm outdoors in a remotely clear area).
Interesting problem I had yesterday, I would fire up my GPS app (tried both Foursquare and Google Maps) and the GPS icon would activate then turn off after 1 second, usually if I exit my app and relaunch it a few times I'm able to get it working again but yesterday I needed to disable and re-enable GPS to fix the problem. These problems are very strange.

Just tested GPS lock in a location where it used to take forever, so long I never waited for a lock before moving to a window. Sitting on my couch, a good 15 feet from the nearest window, I got a lock in 10s flat. Impressive.
Battery life does not seem to have changed in the latest radio, .30, and things seem more stable and faster. Battery consumption is about 2%/hr on wifi calling, and a little under 4%/hr for cell radio. These are idle consumption rates.
Additionally, my HSPA+ speeds have reached rates I have never seen with my phone before. I just clocked in a hair under 5Mbps down and almost 2Mbps up. I used to see only 1-1.5 down and .25-.5 up.
I am very pleased with the performance and power consumption improvements this radio brings.
--MrAnt--

What's better 4.0.3 or 4.0.4 radios?

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk

use it for yourself and find out. radio results won't be the same for everybody.

To my understanding the radio stays the same? the only change is to the listing of towers? and the change of the way it toggles from 3-4g service.
I could be completely wrong though...

4.0.4 seem to use more power when in low signal areas than 4.0.2 and 4.0.3, at least during active use. FA2 will cut battery life in half (1.5 hours of on-screen time vs ~3 hours in good signal areas). Older radios/OS combos generally gave me ~2 hours on screen time in signal poor areas.
4.0.4 seems to have slightly better signal than 4.0.2 and roughly equal to 4.0.3 in my area. I don't think it's commensurate/ proportionate with the slight increase in signal. For a 25% decrease in life, I'd expect a more solid signal and less jumping around between towers.

VZW Version: What's your battery life? How's your signal?

Well, I just purchased a Note 2 and am still in the "evaluation phase". I really do like the phone, fast, amazing battery and awesome signal. However I am asking this because I ama wondering if I am getting all that I can be from my Galaxy Nexus before I decide to keep the Note 2 for $700+.
For reference I have recently been using the Euroskank CM10.1 releases with Franco's newest kernel and undervolting CPU to approximately the values in the LeanKernel Aggressive Undervolt levels as well as knocking down all IVA and CORE voltage 100mv.
I can generally stretch the Nexus' battery life to 13 or 14 hours, but that's with <2 hours of screen on time. If I am using it a lot 8 hours of battery life is lucky, if not less. This really isn't with any gaming or using it for listening to anything, just genrally Facebook and the internet. I do leave LTE on even though at work I can only get 3G. I have turned LTE off before but honestly I have never seen an increase in battery life from doing so. This goes to signal issue also, at work it will go to 30% or more time without signal and Cell Standby will be the second highest use of battery. I have a refurbed unit from Asurion that is version 10 and using the latest radios for CDMA and LTE. The Note 2 in the same usage environment reported 0% time without signal and Cell Standby was way down the list of power usage.
So, basically I am wondering, am I getting everything out of the Nexus that I can, or should I be getting better numbers. Maybe some of you on here can verify that the Note 2 is actually better for signal etc. or that I am just being delusional. Thanks in advance to all of you!
EDIT: Oops, meant to put this in the Questins section, accidentally put it here, Mods, please move!

No one?

Seriously? Even a piss off would be nice to hear, lol.

My signal is fine, my battery life is like yours (<2hr screen on) even with the OEM ext battery.

WiredPirate said:
My signal is fine, my battery life is like yours (<2hr screen on) even with the OEM ext battery.
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Thanks for the reply, good to hear my battery life isn't out of the ordinary. Signal does seem bad on mine though, I am going to call Asurion as this one runs unusually hot, uncofortably hot to hold even.

Yeah, mine gets fine signal, though the current radio firmware that came with the 4.1.1 OTA seems to have a problem hanging onto LTE signal indoors. I'm sure it'll get fixed in the next OTA (hopefully to 4.2.1). As far as battery life, it's what you would expect from an LTE phone...about 2.5 hours of screen-on time, maybe 3 if you're really lucky. Battery life can be affected by so many things like apps you have installed, screen time, cell signal, etc.
One thing I'll tell you, though...you'll find your battery life go up by at least 30% by keeping it connected to WiFi. If you're on a cell connection, your battery is going to zap a lot faster because as a matter of principle, cell modems are far more power-intensive than WiFi is because WiFi is a much shorter-range technology, thus the transmitters don't have to put out nearly as much power. Also, if not connected to WiFi, weak cell signals are going to drain your battery even faster than a stronger signal.
But, as long as you keep the phone on WiFi when you can, you'll find the battery life is no better or worse than most other LTE phones.

sesdevel bordure
With WiFi, easily 15 hours with ~2 hours screen time. With LTE enabled, usually around 6-8 with ~1.5 hours of screen time. I also get pretty bad signal around my city.

oldblue910 said:
Yeah, mine gets fine signal, though the current radio firmware that came with the 4.1.1 OTA seems to have a problem hanging onto LTE signal indoors. I'm sure it'll get fixed in the next OTA (hopefully to 4.2.1). As far as battery life, it's what you would expect from an LTE phone...about 2.5 hours of screen-on time, maybe 3 if you're really lucky. Battery life can be affected by so many things like apps you have installed, screen time, cell signal, etc.
One thing I'll tell you, though...you'll find your battery life go up by at least 30% by keeping it connected to WiFi. If you're on a cell connection, your battery is going to zap a lot faster because as a matter of principle, cell modems are far more power-intensive than WiFi is because WiFi is a much shorter-range technology, thus the transmitters don't have to put out nearly as much power. Also, if not connected to WiFi, weak cell signals are going to drain your battery even faster than a stronger signal.
But, as long as you keep the phone on WiFi when you can, you'll find the battery life is no better or worse than most other LTE phones.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well the Note 2 destroys the Nexus in battery life and signal reception to be honest, but then again a 3100mAh battery should. I like the Nexus and I am trying to get myself to keep it over the Note because having AOSP rocks and so does saving like $850.

Cellular strength and throughput

We know how much you like to stream, ahem, "videos", and so cellular data is mega-important. Rate this thread to express how you think the Google Pixel's LTE performs. A higher rating indicates that it's fantastic: throughput is excellent and signal strength is top-notch.
Then, drop a comment if you have anything to add.

I have been having awful 4g signal strength, throughput is fine, but suffers greatly when the signal drops out every 30-60 seconds. I might have a faulty device, not sure. Currently testing side by side with an identical device.
Edit: Pixel on Verizon, purchased through Google Store.

I give it much higher rating over my Nexus 5 as comparison.
For instance, in a regional "subway tunnel" with a roof opening to the air over it, I have more consistent signal. So far, the signal drops less than it used to in those dropout areas.
Data transmission is faster too. In general sites load well.
Sent from my sailfish using XDA Labs

When sitting right next to my Galaxy S6, the signal strength of the Pixel seems to be consistently 1 bar lower than what the S6 is showing. I know that is relative terms, but in terms of absolutes, as it sits right this minute, the Pixel is fluctuating between -85 dbm and -117dbm, whereas the S6 is at a very solid -72-77dbm, when connected to a Verizon Microcell across the room (~20 ft) from me.
This shows that the Pixel indeed has lower signal strength.

I average 80 - 160 Mbps on Verizon. Any slowness I have is directly related to the carriers business, aggregation, etc. and not the phone. Im totally happy with it.

I know they're not exactly related, but one of the main reasons I bought a pixel (besides just wanting one) is because my Nexus 6p seems to have horrendous cell and gps signal strength. How consistant is the signal? Does it disconnect from either and if it does, how frequent is it? I'm picking up my shiny new pixel phone today, and I guess I'll find out soon enough, I just wanted to see how your guys' experiences have been so far.

same here!

I noticed terrible service with the 6p as well, so far the pixel seems better. The GPS is much better as well.
Speed seems ok, havent noticed any real lag yet, I have had mine for about a week, somehow got mine a few days early (shipping error?)
Based on speedtest.net tests, WiFi appears to be much slower than the 6p, coming in at 17 Mbps where my 6p sitting in the same spot on the same network was at 26-30 Mbps

Regular black Pixel 128GB ordered through the Google store. Signal strength at home isn't quite as good as my Moto X Pure. Not a big surprise, because if nothing else, Moto has the reception game down pat. Will have a better Idea tomorrow because I just received the phone today and have been nowhere else but home.
On a side note, this phone just feels a lot nicer than my X. It's all of the little things that add up to make it a very nice experience.

I live in a poor signal area, and Telstra (Australia) LTE signal strength is higher than my Galaxy S6

I was a bit reluctant to get the pixel because my carrier didn't enable VoLTE and Wifi calling on it. I noticed that even though it goes down to 3G for phone calls, it goes back to LTE right after I hang up which it pretty bad ass!
Sent from my Pixel using XDA-Developers mobile app

With my 5X I was getting dropouts and dropped calls at work which is a metal clean room inside a metal factory building. I could barely maintain 3G, most of the times on 1x. Every so often I would get lucky and be able to stream a youtube video. Speed was less than 1mbs, usually 0.2-0.5. With the Pixel I see LTE and have used it for a few phone calls expecting it to drop or not be heard on the phone but I had no problems. I don't use LTE for voice calls. Data speeds are now about 2-3 mbps. 20 mb app took about 10 seconds to download. That would have taken several minutes with the 5X. So in my experience much better signal using Verizon UDP.

Out side the house didn't notice any issues but at my house **** reception which is normal so I had a service extender that my galaxy 5 used just fine my pixel don't like it thought . But now that I can use wifi calling with this phone don't matter

So far it seems to be about on par with my Nexus 6 which had better signal than any other phone I've used. My 5x would drop to 3g in certain spots in my house and was a pain tethering occasionally. The pixel has been great.
Google store pixel on vzw

Not happy with cell reception. My HTC One M9 gets better signal. Drops from 4G to 3G then nothing until I cut the radio off and then back on. Flashed most recent radio from verizon software with no difference.

For me Nexus 5 works in subway tunnel on first 3 staitions from home without problem. I can talk whole time, but on pixel i can't do the same thing. Nexus 5 is so much better. Better reception, same display size with same resolution but more ergonomic, wireless charging, screen casting (which works everywhere not only on google chromecast like pixel does), easy to open and replace battery or anything and it's 3 years older then Pixel. Feels like Google degraded in those 3 years. Released nexus 6 which sucks, then nexus 5x which bricks itself in an instant, and 6p which does same thing plus bends like a b**ch
Google should have just released Nexus 5 again with amoled screen, better specs and 100% Same visually, that would be absolutely AMAZING.

Question Adaptive Connectivity

By default, the Adaptive Connectivity option is on to sense and handoff between connections to supposedly improve battery life. That said, I've noticed with the feature on, the Pixel 6 Pro stays on LTE, instead of 5G a lot more often than Samsung devices. I also noticed that Wi-Fi signal would trail off a bit when not actively in use (maybe a low power sleep mode?). I'm testing it with that feature turned off now to see if it makes much difference. Granted, 5G quality varies heavily, so there are times when 4G would be better. What are your experiences with this feature?
Battery life has been outstanding on the Pixel 6 Pro by the way.

It's going to be somewhat subjective people's carrier and location. I'm in Tampa on T-Mobile and pretty much 5G everywhere with and okay amount of 5G UC.
There's lots of discussion that turning off adaptive connectivity would help people's battery life especially in poor 5G reception areas.

I'm wondering if this "adaptive connectivity" setting also sends the network to sleep altogether when the device is idle long enough. I've lately had issues with some smart home app (smartlife/tuya) not executing scheduled tasks while the phone is idle. The app itself reports to check the network, which is always fine when i do (when the device is awake). That got me to check all the power and network related controls and this adaptive connectivity is the only really new control where Google also doesn't give any insight on how it actually works. It would be helpful to get an idea of that. Just there's basically no real information on the net.
Oh and besides, i feel the battery life of the Pixel 6 pro is pretty lame actually. I guess that also pretty much depends on network availability - i work in a rural area where the network isn't great (Mobile and WiFi both not great). As long as the device is off, battery drops at an acceptable, yet not great rate. But when i activate the phone, already the screen burns down the battery so fast it's annoying me (I've already set it to 60Hz permanently). Videos, navigating, even music - all that really chews away capacity really fast. That's one reason I'd rather keep Adaptive Connectivity on. I don't want even more drain.

Sneakyghost said:
I'm wondering if this "adaptive connectivity" setting also sends the network to sleep altogether when the device is idle long enough. I've lately had issues with some smart home app (smartlife/tuya) not executing scheduled tasks while the phone is idle. The app itself reports to check the network, which is always fine when i do (when the device is awake). That got me to check all the power and network related controls and this adaptive connectivity is the only really new control where Google also doesn't give any insight on how it actually works. It would be helpful to get an idea of that. Just there's basically no real information on the net.
Oh and besides, i feel the battery life of the Pixel 6 pro is pretty lame actually. I guess that also pretty much depends on network availability - i work in a rural area where the network isn't great (Mobile and WiFi both not great). As long as the device is off, battery drops at an acceptable, yet not great rate. But when i activate the phone, already the screen burns down the battery so fast it's annoying me (I've already set it to 60Hz permanently). Videos, navigating, even music - all that really chews away capacity really fast. That's one reason I'd rather keep Adaptive Connectivity on. I don't want even more drain.
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Click to collapse
My 6 pro lasts me pretty much the entire day with heavy usage. Before I charge it which is at around 9ish, I still have 17% left.

When I had it on I had lots of issues with the handoff from 5g/LTE and vice versa. Been turned off for the last 3 weeks and I just use LTE as preferred network with no issues. I do some gig work on the side and I can't be caught in the No Data limbo cuz the phone doesn't know what to do.

this is irrelevant but im comparing my wifi signal to my s21 ultra and it is pretty much the same. Same goes with my network speed

I played with adaptive connectivity and power and network settings a little more and got my SmartLife/Tuya to execute in background. It wasn't killed by adaptive connectivity, that does not seem to interfere with apps in this way at least. Seems to really rather deal with better handoffs between networks and not much more.