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Help Signal Strength

I'm in San Diego, CA and my signal isn't an issue. Out site our concrete building I got 18 up 20 down. Inside our building got 10 up and 4 down.
 
OfTheDamned said:
A friend of mine that works for VZW corp informed me a little bit ago that there is another update coming down the pipe (4.1?) that will really help if not solve the signal issues. He said it should probably be in the next week or two. He also suggested I take this with a grain of salt because of the last few weeks and the update delays that delayed the phone's launch.
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I will try to wait and see if this helps, but if not I'm returning it for the Rezound. I am on my 4th battery today! :eek:
 
Crayon said:
Report is that it's showing a lower signal strength than is actually there. Bars are irrelevant, check actual signal strength in settings and you'll notice it's peachy.
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Not mine, it's -109dBm. My husbands blackberry is -90 and our son said his Dinc is -54.
 
bcltoys said:
These signal problem's you guy's are having is this happening in your hand cause my X has about 20dbm diff from my hand to just laying on my couch.This only happen's if i'm a marginal area like my house which is about 5 mile's from the tower that I get my service from.
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I call it like I see it, BS.

I was at the Verizon store about an hour ago. The Nexus, Rezound and Charge. All right next to each other in their respective stands. No hands. I checked the signal strength on each phone. The Nexus was at -100, the Rezound was -80 and the Charge was -79. Nexus 1 bar, Rezound 3 bars, Charge 4 bars.

All were on 4G. Heck, the 4G tower is right down the road. But, I have to say, I ran a very unscientific browser test (3 times) on all 3 at the same time. The Nexus loaded the page as fast or faster than the other 2 phones. In fact, the Rezound lost connectivity for about a minute, even though the 4G symbol was in the status bar.

And having owned the Rezound for a few weeks, I can say for a fact that I have had intermittent connectivity problems with the Rezound. On the way home the Rezound showed 4G, but I couldn't load a web page. It then dropped down to 1X. I had to reboot to get it back to 3G. So, it went from 4G, to nothing, to 1X. No 3G. I never had 1X in my area before.

I'm not sure what's going on with the Verizon network. Before the outage the Rezound was flawless. Now it seems to get stuck in 1X mode every so often.

And I'm betting that one of the reason why the Nexus is having battery draining issues is because the radio sucks.
 
So from what I'm understanding from you guys, when comparing the Galaxy Nexus to another phone for signal strength, the Galaxy Nexus appears to be worse according to the numbers. Before concluding that the Galaxy Nexus does not get good reception, has anyone noticed that it can do better with a week signal vs. the other phones.

What I mean is this. Gnex VS. X-phone is -110dbm and -90dbm. But what if the Gnex can still function with a signal as bad a -130dbm but X-phone wont work with even -110dbm. In that case, the numbers don't matter much. All I care about is how the thing performs in the real world. So far its been working great for me.
 
TheXFactor said:
I call it like I see it, BS.

I was at the Verizon store about an hour ago. The Nexus, Rezound and Charge. All right next to each other in their respective stands. No hands. I checked the signal strength on each phone. The Nexus was at -100, the Rezound was -80 and the Charge was -79. Nexus 1 bar, Rezound 3 bars, Charge 4 bars.

All were on 4G. Heck, the 4G tower is right down the road. But, I have to say, I ran a very unscientific browser test (3 times) on all 3 at the same time. The Nexus loaded the page as fast or faster than the other 2 phones. In fact, the Rezound lost connectivity for about a minute, even though the 4G symbol was in the status bar.

And having owned the Rezound for a few weeks, I can say for a fact that I have had intermittent connectivity problems with the Rezound. On the way home the Rezound showed 4G, but I couldn't load a web page. It then dropped down to 1X. I had to reboot to get it back to 3G. So, it went from 4G, to nothing, to 1X. No 3G. I never had 1X in my area before.

I'm not sure what's going on with the Verizon network. Before the outage the Rezound was flawless. Now it seems to get stuck in 1X mode every so often.

And I'm betting that one of the reason why the Nexus is having battery draining issues is because the radio sucks.
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Verizon's network is under attack buy to many sub's and is starting to get the at&t i-phone shimmy that happened to them when they got the i-phone. 3g or 4g to many people not enough backhaul not enough spectrum that why they are buying spectrum as fast as they can. Granted it's not just the nexus all of verizons 4g phone have signaling problem's or growing pains. It's only going to get worse as more people get smartphone's it's at all most 50% smart phone usage now. I'm sticking with my X till they get these growing pain's ironed out if they can but i'm not going to hold my breath.http://technolog.msnbc.msn.com/_new...lmost-half-of-us-mobiles-now-are-smartphones?
 
I absolutely love my phone but the reception is definitely an issue. please see the following picture of the GN sitting next to a iphone 4s. NO SERVICE on the GN



Uploaded with ImageShack.us
pc160197.jpg
 
ryotto said:
So from what I'm understanding from you guys, when comparing the Galaxy Nexus to another phone for signal strength, the Galaxy Nexus appears to be worse according to the numbers. Before concluding that the Galaxy Nexus does not get good reception, has anyone noticed that it can do better with a week signal vs. the other phones.

What I mean is this. Gnex VS. X-phone is -110dbm and -90dbm. But what if the Gnex can still function with a signal as bad a -130dbm but X-phone wont work with even -110dbm. In that case, the numbers don't matter much. All I care about is how the thing performs in the real world. So far its been working great for me.
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That doesn't seem to be the case from reading what's being written here. But, the other issue you have is that having poor reception causes other issues. The biggest issue is battery drain. If you are in a fairly strong area, it's not that big of an issue. Go further out and the radio struggles to maintain a signal. From my understanding, that will suck the life out of any battery, especially on the 4G network.
 
I'm thinking the Nexus just reads lower and isn't actually getting a worse signal. It reads lower than my Droid X yet still loads faster when on 3g. 4g is blazing fast all the time, even with a consistently low reading signal.
 
Graham84 said:
I'm thinking the Nexus just reads lower and isn't actually getting a worse signal. It reads lower than my Droid X yet still loads faster when on 3g. 4g is blazing fast all the time, even with a consistently low reading signal.
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I'm getting mine next week, but I tested demo unit at VZW store today. Gnex and Razr were sitting next to each other. Gnex had -80dB and Razr at -60dB on 4G. But when I loaded the same couple of heavy web pages, Nexus completed loading it faster than Razr consistently. So this makes me think Nexus reading on signal strength is quite conservative. Pinch to zoom and scrolling on web was smoother on nexus too.
 
TheXFactor said:
I call it like I see it, BS.

I was at the Verizon store about an hour ago. The Nexus, Rezound and Charge. All right next to each other in their respective stands. No hands. I checked the signal strength on each phone. The Nexus was at -100, the Rezound was -80 and the Charge was -79. Nexus 1 bar, Rezound 3 bars, Charge 4 bars.

All were on 4G. Heck, the 4G tower is right down the road. But, I have to say, I ran a very unscientific browser test (3 times) on all 3 at the same time. The Nexus loaded the page as fast or faster than the other 2 phones. In fact, the Rezound lost connectivity for about a minute, even though the 4G symbol was in the status bar.

And having owned the Rezound for a few weeks, I can say for a fact that I have had intermittent connectivity problems with the Rezound. On the way home the Rezound showed 4G, but I couldn't load a web page. It then dropped down to 1X. I had to reboot to get it back to 3G. So, it went from 4G, to nothing, to 1X. No 3G. I never had 1X in my area before.

I'm not sure what's going on with the Verizon network. Before the outage the Rezound was flawless. Now it seems to get stuck in 1X mode every so often.

And I'm betting that one of the reason why the Nexus is having battery draining issues is because the radio sucks.
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Before the outage my Rezound was getting stuck in 1x daily and a battery pull was the only fix. On HTC that cost me 10% battery each time.
 
When I got out of the store yesterday, I checked the signal difference between my OG Droid and G-Nex. G-Nex was -51 dBm, Droid was -61 dBm. Seems to get about the same as my old Droid though. At work, I always have a relatively 3G weak signal and sometimes drops to 1X. It was about the same deal with my G-Nex today. It hung to a weak 3G signal and dropped to 1X once for a few mins.
 
Puppa said:
Careful--there's reported signal strength and then there's the actual quality of the signal. CDMA is a bit tricky in this area. If you get good connection quality, don't drop calls, and have good data rates, then the signal strength reported is just a number...

On the other hand, if your seeing calls drop, data outage, etc., please post--then it's something more tangible.

Just to be clear, I was talking about CDMA above. Wifi can be similar, especially N, with the reported strength only being part of the picture--if you still get good, reliable data transfers, don't worry.
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The number has a lot to do with it.. they dont just make it up
Your justifying it because its our phone with bad signal.

The 4g radio is weak very weak.
 
yawdapaah said:
I don't know if you can compare signal power readings across different OEMs/radios/etc. My Droid X always had terrific signal but the bars were all over the place. The signal bars on my GNex seem to be steadier and I have no issues with 3g/4g.
My managers TBolt can barely hold a 4g signal (and I've tried almost all the available radios).
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Bars are not the issue, but the dBm signal is. Pending an update that could improve the signal (if the radio can increase the mW, which could drain more battery), there is an average delta of 14 points under the Razr and 9 below the Charge, which has the same radios (per Anandtech).

If you are in close proximity to a tower, you will not see much of a difference, but will beyond that.

Regardless, the display is the best of both worlds of the Razr and Rezound. Nice.

Added: The biggest gap was 20 points and correlates the further away from a tower. Since same radios as Charge, there should be an improvement with software (Charge is better), unless the antenna array design is the issue.
 
Bars are not the issue, but the dBm signal is. Pending an update that could improve the signal (if the radio can increase the mW, which could drain more battery), there is an average delta of 14 points under the Razr and 9 below the Charge, which has the same radios (per Anandtech).

If you are in close proximity to a tower, you will not see much of a difference, but will beyond that.

Regardless, the display is the best of both worlds of the Razr and Rezound. Nice.
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TechRadar's teardown confirmed that its the same as the Charge.

Cracking Open the Samsung Galaxy Nexus | 41 of 64
 
Here is the comparison in La Grange, IL (just outside Chicago) with the Galaxy Nexus and the Moto Droid Razr. My wife's Razr outperforms the Nexus :( GNex -112 and Razr is -93

We are in an area that is typically 2 bars. Got two bars of 3G on the OG droid prior to our new phones.
Razr_Nexus.png
 
Karuk said:
I'm in San Diego, CA and my signal isn't an issue. Out site our concrete building I got 18 up 20 down. Inside our building got 10 up and 4 down.
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That sounds good as I'm in north San Diego. LTE coverage in SD area seems pretty good on most devices. Today I measured LTE speed on Gnex vs Razr at my local VZW store. Gnex turned out 8.1Mbps down, 6.2Mbps up and Razr next to it got 10.1Mbps down and 8.2Mbps up. But on browser testing, Gnex definitely felt faster and smoother on web page rendering.
 
illinimatt81 said:
Here is the comparison in La Grange, IL (just outside Chicago) with the Galaxy Nexus and the Moto Droid Razr. My wife's Razr outperforms the Nexus :( GNex -112 and Razr is -93

We are in an area that is typically 2 bars. Got two bars of 3G on the OG droid prior to our new phones.
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To follow up my brother has a Samsung Stratosphere and it has -99 next to my GNex with -112. His shows 3 bars of 4G with that signal strength whereas the GNex shows 1 sometimes 2 of 4G but sometimes reverts to 3G. The Razr is always showing 2 bars of 4G.

Seems the signal is being reported conservatively by the phone as it works fine but there might be some needed tweaks to the radio too.

I like this phone best so I'm sticking with it and hoping for tweaks in OTA updates
 
I am hoping that an LTE radio update will be coming up soon.
The update from 4.0.1 to 4.0.2 only updated the CDMA radio.

I see a 40dB difference between a Rezound/Thunderbolt and a Nexus.
I have always had a very good signal at home, usually in the low/mid 60s in the house and down into 50s outside.

I seriously doubt that the antenna design is in question as I have seen mentioned in other places, this is likely a software problem.

If they managed to fubar the antenna design like Apple........ :eek:
 
Did these pages have flash? Remember the razr/rezound will load flash while the nexus will not.

Sandroidfan said:
I'm getting mine next week, but I tested demo unit at VZW store today. Gnex and Razr were sitting next to each other. Gnex had -80dB and Razr at -60dB on 4G. But when I loaded the same couple of heavy web pages, Nexus completed loading it faster than Razr consistently. So this makes me think Nexus reading on signal strength is quite conservative. Pinch to zoom and scrolling on web was smoother on nexus too.
Click to expand...
 
I think the GNex is using the actual signal strength of LTE now with support for it in ICS. Previously, the signal strength on 4G phones was actually displaying 1X. My thunderbolt would slow down in some areas where I had full bars and be very fast in other areas where I had 1-2 bars.

Remember that LTE on 700mhz travels further and is more efficient so Verizon can space the towers further apart. That is why we are seeing low signal strengths. There are 3 different radios (1X, EVDO, LTE) each with their own Signal strengths. They can only display 1 and I think for the first time, we are seeing the actual LTE signal.

That said, that doesn't mean that there aren't issues with the radio or improvements that could be made, but may explain why we are seeing such differing signal strengths.

Try turning LTE off and comparing signal strength. It should be capturing the 1X or EVDO signal at that point.
 
I live in a 3g only area. Comparing signals to my old Dinc running MIUI with a non-stock radio (I don't remember which one right now) and my wife's Thunderbolt running BAMF forever (also with a non-stock radio), my signals are anywhere from the same to -5db less with the Gnex. 4g may be a completely different story, but I can't really complain about that. You can bet the developers will be coming out with all kinds of custom radios for this shortly.
 
Just checked my wife's Bionic sitting in our apartment:
Bionic - -68dBm 0 asu
Nexus - -95dBm 45 asu (not sure what that means)

So far, phone calls have been fine, but I'm generally finding not as great 4G reception on the Nexus. This is in a very strong 4G area too.
 
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