Develop Bugs

Desire POOR RECEPTION

I have had my new Desire for 2 days now. It is the telstra version (australia) (which also has the non working GPS).
I am using my postpaid telstra sim in it which was previously in my blackberry 9700 which is NEXTG capable.
I have found the reception to be noticeably poorer. My BB would show full 5 bars and would never drop a call or have any issues with calls breaking up and being unable to hear the other person. The actual 'bars' was about 2 out of 4 for the android. it is 5/5 for the BB. The android signal strength meter shows anywhere from -90 dBm to -105 dBm in the same spot. My BB9700 shows -70 dBm !!! in the same spot with the same sim!!! -70 is as good as it gets.
for example today, i had trouble maintaining a conversation for more than a few minutes without it breaking up and having to repeat myself a few times. This happened at least on 2 separate phone calls with the desire. Granted, it never cut the connection completely.
i got sick of it because i was on call and had to be able to be contactable 100% so I swapped the sim in to the BB and continued on my conversation – 30 minute conversation without a hint of an issue.
I have always found the BB to be the ultimate in the phone department – but i was seduced by the pretty screen and graphics of the Desire and also the integration with google apps – which i use a lot of.
I also note that people have been complainng about the nexus one over in the US of A regarding the reception quality too. I bet it is the same thing.
The call quality is quite good though. The speakerphone is crap though.
The other bits of the phone are great – screen, speed, apps, and everything else everyone said was good... though i havent heard anyone complaining about the reception
Just want to know if anyone else is having similar experiences and if it is just me. Can ppl with phones that can show signal strength objectively (i.e. dBm measurements) look into a comparison? and also state what network you are on?
Im now thinking it is too unreliable to use as my primary phone... which is too bad. I hope it is a matter of a software update or somesuch to fix this. The price one pays to be an early adopter.

I suspect this applies to your Desire?

bloody hell... same thing happened when i tried what that dude did... pick up the damn thing and the signal goes to hell
devastating.... this is sad.

It's because the antenna is at the bottom, and you're most likely covering it with your hand when you pick it up.

It's quite worrying this sort of hardware design flaw wasn't spotted by HTC. I too can confirm it happens on mind has well....at least I know how to hold it now!

This thing really is a nexus one+sense huh? It even copies the 3g coverage issue.

I just tried that and found the same problem...that is really a big problem.

hi, even if that shown in the video partially occurs to me as well I can't say I'm noticing any difference with my old handset (touch hd)

I have currently got an O2 simcard in my desire with GPRS reception only.
I do not have that issue, will try with my orange 3g sim as well.

Has anyone a work around or advice for this?

Held tight in the palm I lose bars, held to the head I don't - enough of a different grip when actually using for a call. Cupped in the fingers rather than the palm, no loss.

I have the sim free desire bought from UK, and I'm using the optus prepaid sim. There is no problem for me at all.
Maybe update the radio would fix the issue, but it seems no radio update atm.
Sent from my HTC Desire using the XDA mobile application powered by Tapatalk

HTC Desire Bad reception Solved!!
Hi All,
I recently bought a second hand HTC Desire and had the same thing: Bad Reception.
I tried EVERYTHING, Rom's, Radio's, Task-killers, etc. but I found the reason was something completely different!
Now my Desire has FULL 4 bars reception: What did I do?
Remove the battery cover, take out the battery, unscrew the two small Torx screws at the bottom left and right.
These two screws hold the antenna cover which is actually the antenna itself!!
You will find two spring-loaded contacts at the left of the phone on the circuitboard: these are the antenna contacts. Pry them up al little bit and clean them with some alcohol.
Now clean the two grey contact surfaces in the antenne. Do not use any scratching tool, but use a small pencil eraser!! The surface will stay a bit grey, but this is normal.
Now you are done!
Put the antenna back in place (bottom first) and put the 2 screws back.
Boot your phone and you will have good (4 bar) reception like before.
If you want to check?
Before you do anything "dial" *#*#4636#*#* , choose "Phone Information" and look at the signal strength.
The lower the number of dBm the better the signal.
Same as: the higher the ASU the better the signal.
Do the same after cleaning and you will see the result.
Succes to you all!
Extra: The antenna is at the bottom of the phone, poor design choice, we all know.
However:before -when holding the phone- the Signal Strength went from -103 dBm tot -119 dBm and then to 0, meaning losing the connection completely.
Now, the reception at the same location when holding the phone goes from -79 dBm to -85 dBm still holding 4 bars and having good reception.
My guess is that with all the Desire's these contacts corrode over time, so cleaning does help to get the phone back in it's original condition..

Satbeginner said:
Hi All,
I recently bought a second hand HTC Desire and had the same thing: Bad Reception.
I tried EVERYTHING, Rom's, Radio's, Task-killers, etc. but I found the reason was something completely different!
Now my Desire has FULL 4 bars reception: What did I do?
Remove the battery cover, take out the battery, unscrew the two small Torx screws at the bottom left and right.
These two screws hold the antenna cover which is actually the antenna itself!!
You will find two spring-loaded contacts at the left of the phone on the circuitboard: these are the antenna contacts. Pry them up al little bit and clean them with some alcohol.
Now clean the two grey contact surfaces in the antenne. Do not use any scratching tool, but use a small pencil eraser!! The surface will stay a bit grey, but this is normal.
Now you are done!
Put the antenna back in place (bottom first) and put the 2 screws back.
Boot your phone and you will have good (4 bar) reception like before.
If you want to check?
Before you do anything "dial" *#*#4636#*#* , choose "Phone Information" and look at the signal strength.
The lower the number of dBm the better the signal.
Same as: the higher the ASU the better the signal.
Do the same after cleaning and you will see the result.
Succes to you all!
Extra: The antenna is at the bottom of the phone, poor design choice, we all know.
However:before -when holding the phone- the Signal Strength went from -103 dBm tot -119 dBm and then to 0, meaning losing the connection completely.
Now, the reception at the same location when holding the phone goes from -79 dBm to -85 dBm still holding 4 bars and having good reception.
My guess is that with all the Desire's these contacts corrode over time, so cleaning does help to get the phone back in it's original condition..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I did the same thing when I was struggling with poor GPS - opened the phone and bent all contacts a little bit. Confirm that my (or my wife's more accurately) Desire now has outstanding GPS, 2G and 3G signal. This screenshot shows the two contacts mentioned by Satbeginner.
It is worth mentioning though - if your phone is still under warranty and has never been opened this procedure will void your warranty - you have to break a seal on one of the two screws to remove the antenna.

Desire Z Antenna location

Hey does anyone knows where the gsm antenna is located in the Desire Z?
Hope anyone knows.
thank you ollidiemaus

I believe it is located along the bottom of the back of the phone, about a half inch strip. When I cover up that area with my hand, my signal drops a bar or two. Also I recall reading in the safety booklet that came with my phone (yes, I actually read it.lol) that there is a antenna located in that area.
Sent from my SilverBullet 'HTCDesireZ running CM7'

bottom of the phone, where the trackpad is
also if it matters, wifi/bluetooth antenna is on the opposite end (the top, by the speaker grill)

Hello. I have a Desire Z Spanish, and I had to disassemble repeatedly to change the display. But now I notice that catches two striped little coverage, or sometimes even a sometimes gets no service, I tried several sims card and similarly ...
Disassemble and look? Antennas as they are?, If the antennas are integrated, some connector fails ... if anyone has any better position image.
regards

http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1596603
I disassembled the phone and these two metal parts I have them

morrit said:
Hello. I have a Desire Z Spanish, and I had to disassemble repeatedly to change the display. But now I notice that catches two striped little coverage, or sometimes even a sometimes gets no service, I tried several sims card and similarly ...
Disassemble and look? Antennas as they are?, If the antennas are integrated, some connector fails ... if anyone has any better position image.
regards
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Long back i disassemble the while desire z to replace LCD (you nearly take everything out for this). At that time i followed a video from a guy. Same guy put in few Desize Z videos in the mean time
youtube. com/watch?v=b9S7k1OJalM
see if it helps.

Thanks for the video, I'll watch if I can solve the problem of coverage.
Let's see if I can fix that. often leaves no streaks and no coverage.
regards

[Q] Desire Switching Off *only when SIM inserted*

i have a really strange problem that has caused my handset to be back to the UK repair centre for HTC 4 times.
When i have a SIM inserted (and I have tried it with several!) the phone boots to the point where you get the "limited reception" display then it just switches itself off.
If however the SIM is removed then it boots fine.
I have tried added pressure to the SIM area to ensure a good contact aas well as adding a "spacer" in the battery area to ensure a good contact there.
HTC have replaced the mainboard and a variety of other items, the latest is the following; Sub Assy to 82H Lamination, Touch Window, HTC, TPK TW Bezel Pre-Assy, A case, Gen Receiver, AAC ELECTRONICS, SDRP061
What else can it be? Should I try a new battery? The battery is indicating that it is chareged fully.
Anyone with any suggestions?

[Q] Signal drop (phone network, not wifi)

Hi,
I have had my HOX for 3 weeks now and since yesterday (so, not a new thing), I keep losing the signal in my appartment, in some places outside. Oddly enough, signal is OK (tho just 3-4 bars) in my office.
1. Could this be related to the WIFI antenna issue even tho it's not WIFI issue? In other words, is there a chance that by fixing the WIFI antenna issue, I can get solve this?
2. If not, what are my other options? The garanty is already voided so I cannot send it to HTC for repair (voided by an "unofficial repair center" after the screen got smashed by dropping it from like 1m... - it's very possible that the fall or their repair broke something else, but the repair was already 2 weeks ago)
Thanks for your help!

First thing I'd ask is are you rooted? Have you been playing with radios recently?
If not, the next thing I'd look at is trying to find someone else with a micro-sim, and asking to borrow it. If they still get a good signal on their network on your phone, it might be your sim card. I had a faulty one once which just started dropping network like you describe. It can happen.
If their sim card also shows poor reception, you might have an aerial issue caused by the unofficial repair centre opening the phone up. (Although from the feedback on the WiFi issue thread HTC have worrying repair standards too).
If you can't find another micro-sim, just try finding someone on the same network. This phone (when working) has excellent network reception (better than my previous Desire S) so if a side-by-side comparison shows a big difference in signal strength, again I'd think about getting the sim replaced.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=de.android.telnet&feature=search_result#?t=W251bGwsMSwyLDEsImRlLmFuZHJvaWQudGVsbmV0Il0.
If your replacement sim still has the same problem, then I'd consider opening the phone up as per the video guide in the WiFi Issue thread in the general section. Seems to be quite easy if you are careful. It is unlikely that the same aerial for the WiFi is also the 3G one, but I've looked at the tear down pictures, and can't read chinese! If i find out which one it is, I'll update this post. If not, just check all the connections.

Hi,
I have also been having this network drop issue but only near my office. The reason I think is that my office is between two towers and every now and then it tries to balance the traffic on the networks and hence keeps disconnecting devices from one to connect to the other one... However, I have cut out my normal sim into a micro sim and that was done by the guys at the shop from where I bought the device and they had said that if there are any issues, then please order a proper micro sim and use it....
I think that might also be the problem.....

levtrp savans
All,
After checking that my SIM card wasn't in cause (used a friend's HTC One X to test my SIM card and test with his), I broke open the case and saw the problem.
The problem is the damn design of those antenna contact! I saw probably around 10 of those small metal piece that are supposed to be a bit "up" and somehow touch the contact area on the back cover.
I found that 2 of them (in two different pairs, they all seem to be in pair to create a closed circuit I suppose) were a little bit lower than their counterpart, so with a flat screwdriver, put them upright, closed the case and voila, I am enjoying network with full bars since yesterday.
If the issue comes back (and it probabl will, if they got bent the first time it probably means that the metal already was bent beyond its elastic deformation area), I'll probably end up buying a soldering iron a add some patch of silver to increase the height of the contact zones. That's .... just lame I am sure they had a good reason to do that, but seriously!?
Guillaume

Glad you got to the bottom of it. Yeah I think the design choice is forced from having the main body of the phone slide in at an angle into the outer case. If the two parts just clamped together like a more traditional phone build, then they perhaps could have used a different approach.
I'm putting off opening mine up (I have the dreaded WiFi drop issue) as my current case puts just enough pressure on the screen to act like a permanent squeeze, halting my problem.
Would be interested to know if the problem reoccurs like you said it might. Keep us posted.

[Q] Radio/Antenna Repair Issue

Dear folks,
One night I reached out my hand while sleeping, touched a glass of water (which fell over) and my Galaxy Nexus GSM got wet. In the morning I dried it (*no* hair dryer, just a vacuum cleaner and a radiator), and it still works like a charm. With few exections: Almost no signal anymore. Most often no signal, sometimes weak signal, rarely full H+ speed.
In my flat I have no radio at all (-110db if that matters). No speech, no data.
Outside I may have luck, I may not. Sometimes I get almost full HSDPA+ as stated, but most of the times with "standard" covering just no signal or a really really weak one, where my old HTC Hero (T-Mobile H2 Touch) and my work phone (Nokia 31xx) have full(!) radio signal. Embarassing.
Speaker was damaged, too. So was the USB port (not charging when switched on, no sound, wrong headset recognition).
I decided to repair it myself. I did this before many times with my old Nokia 3310, and ifixit.com suggested, it's not that hard. So I went to eBay and bought a new speaker part (that more bulky part at the bottom of the disassembled phone).
Well, this fixed the speaker/headset and the USB issue. Hooray! But my radiosignal was still bad.
So today, I replaced the antenna mainboard (L-Shaped). Well, this fixed… nothing at all. I still got bad radio (at least it's not broken down completely). Now I wonder: What could I do next? Flasing radio firmware has no effect either (I think, I tried three or so). Is it really because it got wet? Sth else to replace?
I'm looking forward to any suggestions on what to do next. If you need any information, just ask.
Thanks in advance.

I'm sorry I can't provide pictures atm, but I only wrote 5 posts or so.