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VZW: How to diagnose and debug the radio issue!

jkc120 said:
I wish I had a rezound to bring into my in-laws' house (faradayville) and see if it also dropped 4G. I have a feeling it wouldn't, but I'm not willing to spend $35 and then get stuck with one to test it out. :(
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Just tell cust serv your prob. Theyll credit the restock back to your account ;)
 
Ok, I forgot I brought my old dinc with me and it does appear to show the signal level even though it's not activated, cool!

All reading are taken in the same locations of the same house (that I like to call faradayville, see this post for why (thanks BlueBiker! :D).

- inside the front of the house by a large (like 10'x5' window)
* dinc: -93 dBm, 0 asu
* gnex: -93 dBm, 2asu

- just outside on front porch:
* dinc: -82 dBm, 0 asu
* gnex: -83 dBm, 2 asu

- kitchen (near back of the house):
* dinc: -90 dBm, 0 asu
* gnex: -93 dBm, 2 asu

- just outside on back porch:
* dinc: -88 dBm, 0 asu (flipped between -88 and -83)
* gnex: -93 dBm, 2 asu <-> -83 dBm, 4 asu (started out at 93, but settled in at -83)

- out front on side walk:
* dinc: -83 dBm, 0 asu
* gnex: -83 dBm, 4 asu

Looks like the two are quite comparable, at least here. I don't know why my phone was losing 3G along my drive today while my wife's iPhone 4 had a 3G connection, though :( I have no idea if the dinc 3G radio is any good, though. Do all 3G-only phones not report asu? Or just some radios?

But at least for me on 3G it should be a similar experience to my dinc if these numbers hold true for other locations. As lame as it sounds, I may take my dinc with my out and about tomorrow and periodically compare it to my nexus.

I wish I could perform the same experiment with the Rezound or Razr, but even if I had one of those since gingerbread reports 3G dBm/asu and not LTE, I wouldn't be able to do the side-by-side comparison. :(
 
BubbaNexus said:
Some serious cellphone hypochondria going on in here :eek:
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To some extent, but there are people who have shown that the Rezound holds onto a 4G signal when entering a building, while the Nexus drops to 3G (and in some cases has a tough time even holding that). So the question is: is the rezound radio top notch and the nexus just average, or is the rezound average and the nexus below average? Either way, the rezound seems to maintain a 4G signal when the nexus is unable to, at least in some scenarios.

In places with a strong 4G signal, it probably doesn't matter. In places where the 4G isn't blazing hot, it DOES matter.
 
Just went to Costco to exchange my nexus due to horrible 3g 4g reception, sales rep pulled out his Samsung Charge and he had good 4g signal when my GN had weak 3g reception. We'll see how the replacement unit performs, I will report back after a few days of trial.
 
kl68 said:
Just went to Costco to exchange my nexus due to horrible 3g 4g reception, sales rep pulled out his Samsung Charge and he had good 4g signal when my GN had weak 3g reception. We'll see how the replacement unit performs, I will report back after a few days of trial.
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Couldn't you fire up the replacement right there for comparison? :confused:

I plan to go to the local mall that has a VZW corporate store kiosk tomorrow and compare my gnex to the other phones (will have to do speed tests, since we already know you can't compare dBm/bars from gingerbread-based 4G phones). Of course, if the other phone(s) have 4G at all and mine is stuck on 3G, that's a pretty obvious problem, no?
 
jkc120 said:
I plan to go to the local mall that has a VZW corporate store kiosk tomorrow and compare my gnex to the other phones (will have to do speed tests, since we already know you can't compare dBm/bars from gingerbread-based 4G phones).
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Would you mind reporting back a brief summary of your findings? Thanks!

jkc120 said:
Of course, if the other phone(s) have 4G at all and mine is stuck on 3G, that's a pretty obvious problem, no?
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Definitely.
 
Didn't have time, didn't even boot it up yet. CSR said to bring it back if it doesn't work and they'll exchange it out for another one...gotta love costco. That's the reason why I bought it at costco, I was anticipating problems with a new release, I have 90 days to exchange.

jkc120 said:
Couldn't you fire up the replacement right there for comparison? :confused:

I plan to go to the local mall that has a VZW corporate store kiosk tomorrow and compare my gnex to the other phones (will have to do speed tests, since we already know you can't compare dBm/bars from gingerbread-based 4G phones). Of course, if the other phone(s) have 4G at all and mine is stuck on 3G, that's a pretty obvious problem, no?
Click to expand...
 
BlueBiker said:
Would you mind reporting back a brief summary of your findings? Thanks!
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Absolutely! :)

If I'm feeling adventurous, I'll go to that store as well as another non-mall corporate store and gather data there as well. Hopefully they both have working razrs and rezounds to compare with.
 
kl68 said:
Didn't have time, didn't even boot it up yet. CSR said to bring it back if it doesn't work and they'll exchange it out for another one...gotta love costco. That's the reason why I bought it at costco, I was anticipating problems with a new release, I have 90 days to exchange.
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Nice. Let us know how it goes with the replacement! No costco near my parents' house nor my in-laws' and I knew I'd be back here for a while, so I just went to the corporate store, since they said I can return it to any corporate store if need be.
 
Yesterday afternoon I drove from DC to Philadelphia. During the trip there were multiple times the phone lost data completely. I have a Rezound and iPhone currently and neither lost a data connection. I am talking about entering the browser and showing the screen telling you there is no connection on the Nexus while the Rezound and iPhone had zero issues. Something is not right.

I really hope there is a fix and not a band-aid as the device is amazing, but there are radio or software issues in my opinion.
 
Are any of you with this issue in Southern California? Or do we just have THAT good of 4G coverage? I have been in 3 counties (2 different counties every day, 30 miles apart) and I have not yet once been forced to 3G. 1 bar at times in my house (and only in certain areas) but I still get 9 Mbps down. That is plenty fast for me and I can't complain. It does suck if LTE isn't that great in some markets, but in SoCal (at least the areas I have been) 4G has been more than sufficient. If there is a radio issue and it eventually gets fixed, even better. My signal will just get stronger.

So if you are in a VZW SoCal LTE covered area and are experiencing this problem, I'd be interested to know what city you are in and if it is wide spread. I might even make a trip somewhere to test.
 
This phone is pissing me off. I cannot even keep a signal long enough to run Speedtest.net anymore from my house.

With VZW announcing there is no issue and they will change code to simply adjust the bars, this phone is becoming useless. I am going to have to exchange it.
 
jkc120 said:
I wish I had a rezound to bring into my in-laws' house (faradayville) and see if it also dropped 4G. I have a feeling it wouldn't, but I'm not willing to spend $35 and then get stuck with one to test it out. :(
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Why not just open a third or fourth line, play with it until the 15th of Jan and compare the two? Then just return which phone you don't like and pay the $35 restocking fee.
 
daddyd302 said:
Why not just open a third or fourth line, play with it until the 15th of Jan and compare the two? Then just return which phone you don't like and pay the $35 restocking fee.
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I believe that the new line has to be canceled in he normal 14 day window. Only the device has an extended return period.
 
jkc120 said:
To some extent, but there are people who have shown that the Rezound holds onto a 4G signal when entering a building, while the Nexus drops to 3G (and in some cases has a tough time even holding that). So the question is: is the rezound radio top notch and the nexus just average, or is the rezound average and the nexus below average? Either way, the rezound seems to maintain a 4G signal when the nexus is unable to, at least in some scenarios.

In places with a strong 4G signal, it probably doesn't matter. In places where the 4G isn't blazing hot, it DOES matter.
Click to expand...

I live in a strong 4g area and cant hold onto 4g.

Im not in some rural area barely getting 4g. Im in the middle of 3 cities with 4g.

Baltimore md, frederick, md and washington d.c.

So the nexus should get 4g in a building but cant
 
jkc120 said:
Unfortunately, even my modern (like only 6 years old) home in California also seems to kill the 4G signal where I am. I can't test it at the moment, but I was dropping from 3 bars to 1 bar of 4G and it was much slower than my 22/5 comcast cable connection so I just used wifi at home.

.
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radient barrier. most houses built in the last 5 or 6 years has some of it in them (energy star rating). if you have never seen it is just a thin sheet that is put in some outside facing walls. either way that barrier is like kryptonite to any cell signal don't care what phone you are using.
Oh and believe it or not refridgerators , walk near a fridge (at least mine) and you will find the signal on any phone start to go down.

to answer your other question about the rezound, i have 3 htc phones in the house and they none of them display anything but the dbm of the 3g radio. it is an htc thing i think, a great example is my droid X will show the dbm and the asu. one thing i did notice doing some personal testing was all the htc phones and motorola phones in my house will update the signal strength every few seconds, the galaxy nexus would seem to take a minute or better to update as i moved around the house and outside.
 
jkc120 said:
Ok, I forgot I brought my old dinc with me and it does appear to show the signal level even though it's not activated, cool!

All reading are taken in the same locations of the same house (that I like to call faradayville, see this post for why (thanks BlueBiker! :D).

- inside the front of the house by a large (like 10'x5' window)
* dinc: -93 dBm, 0 asu
* gnex: -93 dBm, 2asu

- just outside on front porch:
* dinc: -82 dBm, 0 asu
* gnex: -83 dBm, 2 asu

- kitchen (near back of the house):
* dinc: -90 dBm, 0 asu
* gnex: -93 dBm, 2 asu

- just outside on back porch:
* dinc: -88 dBm, 0 asu (flipped between -88 and -83)
* gnex: -93 dBm, 2 asu <-> -83 dBm, 4 asu (started out at 93, but settled in at -83)

- out front on side walk:
* dinc: -83 dBm, 0 asu
* gnex: -83 dBm, 4 asu

Looks like the two are quite comparable, at least here. I don't know why my phone was losing 3G along my drive today while my wife's iPhone 4 had a 3G connection, though :( I have no idea if the dinc 3G radio is any good, though. Do all 3G-only phones not report asu? Or just some radios?

But at least for me on 3G it should be a similar experience to my dinc if these numbers hold true for other locations. As lame as it sounds, I may take my dinc with my out and about tomorrow and periodically compare it to my nexus.

I wish I could perform the same experiment with the Rezound or Razr, but even if I had one of those since gingerbread reports 3G dBm/asu and not LTE, I wouldn't be able to do the side-by-side comparison. :(
Click to expand...

Did you switch the Gnex to CDMA only when comparing with the Dinc? My dBm measurements of Gnex v. Rezound at a Verizon store yesterday painted quite a different picture (Rezound trounced the Gnex in signal strength).
 
I live in an area where there is no 4G at all so I keep mine in CDMA only. My past phones normally hover around -88 dBm while this one frequents -100 -105 dBm. About every 30-45 minutes the signal will drop to -120 dBm 99asu and the phone will not connect to data at all for about 5 minutes until the signal goes back up to -105 dBm. I also notice a weak wifi signal as well. Sitting less than 20 ft from my router shows 1 bar and sometimes just the little blip at the bottom. I haven't paid attention to the dBm for the wireless yet but I will next time.

Sitting side by side with my work iPhone, the nexus drops signal while iPhone still has full bars. And speed tests side by side normally result in much lower results with the nexus as well. iPhone will be getting anywhere from 700 kbps - 1 mbps and nexus will be 200 kbps - 400 kbps.
 
I am having better luck today. I am going to be carrying both the Nexus and Rezound side by side for the next few days to make a determination. I like the Nexus and ICS much better, but can only keep it if it performs.
 
jkc120 said:
Nice. Let us know how it goes with the replacement! No costco near my parents' house nor my in-laws' and I knew I'd be back here for a while, so I just went to the corporate store, since they said I can return it to any corporate store if need be.
Click to expand...

OK, so last night I switched out my GN that had horrible signal reception for another GN. I fully charged it up last night and booted it up this morning. I did not install the update to 4.0.2, kept it at 4.0.1 because I read in this forum someone mentioning that the update screwed up their reception. I also did not sync anything, so I basically kept it as is out of the box.

My replacement GN reception is a little bit better but still pretty bad, seems like the new unit can hold onto the weak signal a little bit better. While driving into work this morning (from Diamond Bar, CA to Newport Beach, CA) I would get pretty good 4G signal (around -85dBm or less) but it was very unstable at times, jumping around from 2 bars to full bars. The moment I walked into my office building bam all signals went away and it showed grayed out bars. I
 
BubbaNexus said:
What signal issue? Swap your phone or move out of the boonies if you want stronger signal strength.


My gn is as good as any other phone ive had where signs is concerned.
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LOL! Yeah, I am sitting back and laughing at these posts. Everyone is crying about 4G. BOO HOO.:p

I can only get 3G where I am at and the best data transfer was 400 kbps.
^^^^Snails around here move faster.LOL.:rolleyes:
 
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