• After 15+ years, we've made a big change: Android Forums is now Early Bird Club. Learn more here.

Reception

Depends on the carrier you're on and where their nearest tower is. I'm on Sprint, and I have great reception all over - except at my daughter's house. She's in a shadow, so I get kinda-sorta reception if I stand at her bedroom window upstairs and hold the phone horizontally. It works fine in the street, in her neighbors; houses - just her house is shadowed by a small ridge between the house and the nearest tower. So no Sprint phone will help. (Which is why I'm switching to AT&T - their only dead area around here is somewhere I never go.)

So it's not as simple as getting a better phone. If your wife is on the same carrier you're on, or you're willing to switch to her carrier, you already know that an iPhone 5 will work. Otherwise, you have to run an app that shows you signal strength from all the carriers you can receive, then pick a phone for that carrier that meets your other needs (size, price, features, etc.)
 
And you can't simply make the comparison by looking at the signal strength meters on the phone itself. All phones and all carriers signal strength indicators could vary greatly but have the same signal strength in reality.
 
Rukbat brings up a good point. Here's an example: In my apartment I can only get a 4g signal on my front and back porches, inside I use Wifi. Moving 1 house over and 2 floors up. No reception issues at all. 50 feet up the hill from my house I get 4g Lte and full bars.
 
We are both on att and my service was noticeably worse than hers. She could easily surf net I could not.
 
My Note 3 on AT&T is better than any phone I've had so far. Although my Galaxy S4 is a very close second.

My iPhones 4S, 5 & 5S weren't bad, just not as clear and strong as my Galaxies.
 
So far so good on my end as well......of course it has been only one day out......but I got great signal strengthen on both my data and cell and I'm on Sprint.
 
Are there any apps that compare the signal strengths in one location between the various carriers that cover that area please? I want to find out which operator has the strongest signal where I live and the usual places I frequent as there are a couple of places where I get low to no signal and i'd like to find out if it's just my carrier or all carriers in that area. I've had a look on Google Play but I can't find anything that does it.
 
With Sprint...

I get a lot of dropped calls and I have a Sprint Airwave 2.5 in the room with me. Maybe its time to regurgitate the "hand is covering the antenna" myth.

:confused:
 
I'm on AT&T and came from the Note 2. I can say that the reception on the Note 3 is worse than the Note 2. Still a great device though.
 
Omicron Note 3 said:
With Sprint...

I get a lot of dropped calls and I have a Sprint Airwave 2.5 in the room with me. Maybe its time to regurgitate the "hand is covering the antenna" myth.

:confused:
Click to expand...

Sometimes, lemons happen - happened to me.

Here's what I did and this advice has served others well here.

Call Sprint Customer Care. Explain you have a new phone that you think might be a lemon - and for them to please schedule an RF box test at your nearest Sprint service center.

You get an appointment, you go in and no one can argue with you - Sprint corporate is in control.

They do the test. If it's bad and you bought it from them, they replace it, no questions asked. If you bought it from someone else, they give you paperwork to prove to the other vendor that you have a bad phone.

Easy peasy. Hope this helps. :)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom