Verizon GS3 signal reception thread

[bennybbc]

Well I went in for the warranty exchange but the representative wanted to give me a hard time about exchanging the phone saying that she and her manager tested the phone by making some calls and determined there was nothing wrong with it. After trying to explain to them that it only was a problem where the signal was in weaker areas not in the store where it had full bars I basically told them I was not leaving the store with that same phone. I told them I was within my 14 day window and was allowed 1 exchange so they wrote it up as not being a warranty exchange thus the 35$ fee.

Wow, they sound like real jerks at your local store. My local store has now replaced both of our SGS3's without hassle, (Or charging a fee). The closest the guy I dealt with for my phone was when he said "Samsung phones suck for reception so it will be a waste of both of our times to replace it." But when I said I'd like to do it anyway he said no problem and he got right on it without giving me any grief.

My wife took my daughter with her SGS3 to the same store yesterday. Her phone has been getting the exact same reception as my SGS3 (Original and replacement). It was practically unusable and then without explanation it started getting (Barely) acceptable voice reception instead of dropping every single call like it had been. And data went from practically unsuable for 3G, 1x (NO 4G in our area) to a weak but partially usable 1x signal that would do in an emergency.

But something else was going wrong with her phone that made her bring it in. The Backup Assistant Plus was going berserk. No matter what the settings were it was constantly backing up practically everything it could on her phone. It filled up the Backup capacity quickly but kept trying to backup her photos, music and all of the apps on her phone. The guys at the local store couldn't do anything to make it stop so they just swapped it for a new one. Reception is just like the old one and like mine, improved from earlier in the week from completely unacceptable to barely tolerable.

I've had the phone now for TWO days without the first sputter or dropped call. The phone has been nothing short of just awesome. It's hard to believe the first phones reception was so different than this phone. It truly has been a night and day difference. All I can say Benny is don't give up and maybe exchange your daughters phone and hopefully u can be as lucky as I was.

Oh yea I called Verizon and they did credit me 40$ to my account for the restocking fee.

I think you've missed my previous posts saying that I have replaced my phone. I told how I did swap my old phone for a new one and how the reception on both my new phone and my daughter's original phone "Magically" improved from unacceptable when I had last tested my phone that morning to barely tolerable when I got home with the new phone that evening. Bizarre phone behavior! I can't explain it but I'm not complaining.

We've experienced no where near the dramatic improvement you have but at least the phones get voice reception at home now, although it isn't very clear. At least it's not dropping virtually every single call anymore. The data is only slightly better but at least it will usually pull up a website if I'm really patient now instead of quickly giving up like it was doing. Fortunately I have Wifi so that's what is used. But until I get out of this part of my neighborhood the data connection is really poor. When I get to the top of my street and around the corner it's about 25' or so higher in elevation and I actually get fairly reasonable 3G reception.

My Droid X and every other phone we have had in the past or currently have (Spectrum-wife, Bionic-son) have no problem getting reasonable 3G reception in our house and have NEVER dropped a call. After testing 4 SGS3's in my house it is an absolute FACT that at least in some circumstances the SGS3 has worse voice and data reception capabilities than any other phone that my family and I have ever experienced.

Benny

 

[bennybbc]

I can tell you from personal experience, yes, the S3 did work with the Samsung network extender. but that extender won't help me at work or when I travel.
When I returned my 2 phones, I made them guarantee I would get my previous unlimited plan. There was no problem there and they put me right back to where I was. In fact they reset my upgrade date for a new phone as well. So if the Razr HD comes out this year, I am jumping on it ( though I will have to part with my unlimited data then ).
I'm not sure you can sell your S3's if since they won't have a clean ESN number. I think when the new owners go to set them up it will show in Verizon's record you didn't complete your 2 year agreement with them ( hence why Verzion discount the price of the phone. ). You may want to triple check that before you sell them on eBay.
Personally if I were you I would take advantage of your 14 day window, have them reset your upgrade date, shine your old phone and buy a new case for it. That's what did.
Keep us / me up to date as to what you decide to do.

I won't know anything about the network extender until Monday. Good to know it can work for us though if it's offered at a reasonable price/free. We'll see...

Just because a phone has been used doesn't mean it has a "Dirty" ESN. Not at all, in fact. People sell used phones all the time and I've bought 3 used smart phones and sold a few too. No problems at all.

I'm not sure what exactly determines if a phone has a less-than-clean ESN but I believe it has to do with if the phone has been reported lost or stolen and/or if there is an outstanding balance or some other financial problem with the account in which it is associated.

And just because I sell my phones doesn't necessarily mean I didn't complete my 2 year agreement with Verizon. First of all, all I have to do to keep Verizon from charging me the rest of the full price of the phone is to activate it briefly, not for a full 2 years. Second, I would just switch my account back to the phones we were using before we sold the SGS3's and continue on with our account agreement. BUT, if I decided NOT to reinstate my old phones I've already been told by several different Verizon CSRs that if we return the phones within the 14 day window the new contract that we signed (When purchased over the phone) would be cancelled and we would be done with our old 2 year contract.

Regardless, I think we are probably going to keep the 2 SGS3's we have in spite of the fairly poor reception. The reception HAS improved (Inexplicably) enough to make voice reception mediocre but usable and while the data is still pretty bad we do have wifi at home. once I leave my neighborhood the voice and data reception is relatively good because most of the town I live in has great Verizon signal saturation. Seems you can't swing a dead cat without hitting one of those Verizon towers. Is anyone actually fooled by the tree disguises they use on some of the towers?

Benny

 

[Ken7]

My Droid X and every other phone we have had in the past or currently have (Spectrum-wife, Bionic-son) have no problem getting reasonable 3G reception in our house and have NEVER dropped a call. After testing 4 SGS3's in my house it is an absolute FACT that at least in some circumstances the SGS3 has worse voice and data reception capabilities than any other phone that my family and I have ever experienced.

Benny

Benny, why are you knocking yourself out with this phone when it's clear you don't like it? If it's not working for you, get rid of it or sell it. If other phones do a better job for you, why not go with them? I had a lousy experience with a Samsung Charge and eventually got rid of it because of the frustrations it caused. Life is short, it's not worth it.

Just a friendly thought.

 

[rushmore]

After looking at the poll on this thread Ron Burgundy says, " The Galaxy S3 works 75% of the time.....everytime." So tell your friends James Westfall & Dr. Kenneth Noisewater that this phone is a o.k. Whammmmmy!!!

I finally watched that movie about a week ago. Land of the Lost was better. I kid

Overall, I am getting just as good actual signal results as the Razr. The biggie though is 4g battery life is better than the Razr in 3g. For 4g, the Razr can not even be compared to the GS3. Especially if you actually use the features of the device beyond calls and texting.


Added:
GPS locks on quicker than the Razr and just as stable, but like every device I have tried, the GS3 gets warmest when using GPS.

 

[you2]

How is visiblity outdoors; it turns out that we have a tax free day aug 11 so I'll probably wait till then to evaluate my options To be honest i liked how the phone handled videos and that it was very snappy but beyond those two things it didn't seem to be a major step forward (well there is also the primary complaint with the razr which is battery life). I do wish it was a bit louder and I'm worried by some of the reported issues with connection.

 

[Ken7]

I finally watched that movie about a week ago. Land of the Lost was better. I kid

Overall, I am getting just as good actual signal results as the Razr. The biggie though is 4g battery life is better than the Razr in 3g. For 4g, the Razr can not even be compared to the GS3. Especially if you actually use the features of the device beyond calls and texting.


Added:
GPS locks on quicker than the Razr and just as stable, but like every device I have tried, the GS3 gets warmest when using GPS.

Yup, GPS lock is by far the quickest I've had with any of my 3 Sammy phones.

Battery life has been very impressive to say the least.

We're in the Foxwoods Casino in Connecticut and although I'm getting 4G pretty much throughout, speeds here are pretty mediocre. I got a bit concerned when my wife's IPhone was loading page after page quicker on her 3G than mine was on 4G. That was weird. That result only seemed to occur in our room, but when I moved to another part of the room, I began to get consistently faster loads than she did. She's convinced I'm hopeless...she's right.

What I thought was funny, was when she wanted to see how the S3 fit in her jeans pocket. I asked her if that meant she was finally considering an Android and she said no, my S3 was too big. In actuality the S3 is thinner and lighter but it is bigger. She wants one, I know she does.

 

[Member 536573]

I finally watched that movie about a week ago. Land of the Lost was better. I kid

Overall, I am getting just as good actual signal results as the Razr. The biggie though is 4g battery life is better than the Razr in 3g. For 4g, the Razr can not even be compared to the GS3. Especially if you actually use the features of the device beyond calls and texting.


Added:
GPS locks on quicker than the Razr and just as stable, but like every device I have tried, the GS3 gets warmest when using GPS.

One of the first things I downloaded to my S3 from Google Play Movies was Anchorman, since it's not in the Samsung Media Hub.

As you know from my earlier post signal is not an issue, however battery life on 4G is just plain bad for me. This thing enjoys eatting battery life on 4G like Rush Limbaugh enjoys his OxyContin. Too much..too fast & in high doses. :burnout:

 

[Member 536573]

Yup, GPS lock is by far the quickest I've had with any of my 3 Sammy phones.

Battery life has been very impressive to say the least.

We're in the Foxwoods Casino in Connecticut and although I'm getting 4G pretty much throughout, speeds here are pretty mediocre. I got a bit concerned when my wife's IPhone was loading page after page quicker on her 3G than mine was on 4G. That was weird. That result only seemed to occur in our room, but when I moved to another part of the room, I began to get consistently faster loads than she did. She's convinced I'm hopeless...she's right.

What I thought was funny, was when she wanted to see how the S3 fit in her jeans pocket. I asked her if that meant she was finally considering an Android and she said no, my S3 was too big. In actuality the S3 is thinner and lighter but it is bigger. She wants one, I know she does.

Is that your S3 in your pocket or are you just happy to see me ? 😍

 

[rushmore]

I guess I had nowhere to go but up, since the battery life with the Razr thin was awful, if actually using the features much. It got real bad after the ICS update. Added: I tried the update with a clean device and made no difference.

Interesting tidbit. I notice that performance for almost everything except N64, PSX and MAME suffers no apparent performance issues when using cpu power saving.

I started using it this morning and will probably leave it on, unless playing the stuff mentioned above. The emulators for those are more cpu dependent.

Quadrant drops from the 4700 range down to 3000 range, but not seeing a practical hit on performance.

My fair guess is battery life will be even better than already is.

 

[Sandroidfan]

Regardless, I think we are probably going to keep the 2 SGS3's we have in spite of the fairly poor reception. The reception HAS improved (Inexplicably) enough to make voice reception mediocre but usable and while the data is still pretty bad we do have wifi at home. once I leave my neighborhood the voice and data reception is relatively good because most of the town I live in has great Verizon signal saturation. Seems you can't swing a dead cat without hitting one of those Verizon towers. Is anyone actually fooled by the tree disguises they use on some of the towers?

Benny

Have you tried Open signal map to diagnose your signal issue on GS3 at home? I found that app quite useful for testing signal strength, data speed and cell tower connections. If your GS3 tends to connect to distant tower than other verizon android phones at home, it might be SIM authorization issue that VZW can resolve I guess.

 

[Trent Reznor]

While I stated myself that Verizon is trying to get people to use Wifi and not their network as much as possible, we still don't know if removing the WiFi toggle is due to a technical difficulty or purely a way to remind people to use their WiFi as often as possible.

Just to update.... there is no technical difficulties using a wifi toggle. Wifi toggle is enable on my GS3 via root and works perfectly. Even removed the dialog in the drop down menu and the annoying popup (thanks Rush).

 

[finn5975]

Hey all, my findings will not have the fancy numbers and scientific dabblings as most can provide, but I did try my S3 in all of the places I get spotty 3G signal on my 4S.

In literally all of the places my 4S will drop to 1X the S3 held strong on 3G with more than impressive web browsing response. When the 4S would buffer on streaming from spotify, the S3 kept playing.

In 4G areas, the reception is superb. I pull 7mbps down in my basement. I have gotten has high as 21mbps down in my driveway. Unfortunately I dont have another 4G device to compare to but to be honest, with those results, why bother?

I am not as much shocked by the solid performance of the S3 as I am by the sketchy signal of the 4S. I thought the iphone had a solid radio but it truly struggles in poor 3G areas.

I hope this helps.

 

[yorklab]

A few people got a hold of a leaked Razr update and have already flashed it to their phones and have reported much better 4g signals.

I'm reporting this because it shows that at least there is hope (even if remote) that a software patch could improve the S3 reception.

The caveat is that Samsung (from what I've read anyway) is terrible about timely updates.

 

[bennybbc]

Benny, why are you knocking yourself out with this phone when it's clear you don't like it? If it's not working for you, get rid of it or sell it. If other phones do a better job for you, why not go with them? I had a lousy experience with a Samsung Charge and eventually got rid of it because of the frustrations it caused. Life is short, it's not worth it.

Just a friendly thought.

Ummm...I'm NOT knocking myself out with this phone. I'm not sure what that means but it doesn't sound like something I am doing or would want to do. How is it clear that I don't like it? I think if anything the exact opposite is true. The only reason I still have it (Them) is because I DO like it. When I'm away from my neighborhood it gets decent signal reception and the other aspects of the phone work well no matter where I am. Believe me, I've had plenty of opportunity to return them at no cost and reactivate my phone or mine and my daughter's phones.

And what other phones are comparable to (Or even close to) the SGS3 but get better reception? On Verizon there aren't any. If I'm going to have this phone for probably a couple of years I want to get the latest and greatest there is so it will take a little longer to be obsolete.

While I appreciate the thought, this isn't really the sort of advice that I'm hoping for. What I would really like is some suggestions on what I might do to improve reception and/or reasons why our 2 phones' reception suddenly and inexplicably improved for no apparent reason. I think I have a handle on managing my life, thank you very much.

Thanks to Sandroidfan for the type of useful, helpful post I was hoping for.

Benny

 

[bennybbc]

Have you tried Open signal map to diagnose your signal issue on GS3 at home? I found that app quite useful for testing signal strength, data speed and cell tower connections. If your GS3 tends to connect to distant tower than other verizon android phones at home, it might be SIM authorization issue that VZW can resolve I guess.

I have but not tried Open Signal since I got the second set of SGS3's. I'll have to test them out later and I'll post what I find. The last #'s I remember from last night were from the phone's "About Device--Signal Strength". It was about -100dbm and 1asu and if i recall that's about what my first set of phones showed too. I'll look later when I get home to see what the Open Signal Map app says. Thanks for the advice. It's one of the more useful posts I've seen regarding my reception issues.

Benny

 

[Trent Reznor]

That open signal app is pretty cool... I now know why I never had any signal issues with my Gnex at home! Apparently I am only 39m from a VZW tower

 

[rushmore]

That open signal app is pretty cool... I now know why I never had any signal issues with my Gnex at home! Apparently I am only 39m from a VZW tower

Yep, and willing to bet most people with great Gnex signal fit in the same boat. Probably not road warriors. The fellow geek folks I know that are, bailed on the Gnex within two weeks.

As far as weak signal: I know the Gnex, I used the Gnex, people, the GS3 is no Gnex.

 

[boomerbubba]

That open signal app is pretty cool... I now know why I never had any signal issues with my Gnex at home! Apparently I am only 39m from a VZW tower

It is well known that the "tower" locations mapped on Open Signal are very inaccurate. They are basically guesses calculated from crowdsourced signal-strength data. Even the developers admit this:

Data is mainly crowd sourced - wireless and antenna locations are calculated by triangulation. This means they are not exact, and sometimes they may be way off. As more people use this app the data will improve.

There are other ways to solve this problem.

Under the CDMA standard, the base station radios actually squawk lat/lon coordinates, but Verizon apparently blocks these. I think the blocking occurs on the handsets, not the towers. I have not seen anyone try this on a GS3, so maybe it is not blocked.

Some Verizon GS3 user might try the app CDMA Field Test, which works with Sprint, and see if the base station you are connected to can be mapped. It is possible that the coordinates will not match the tower location exactly. (Some of Sprint's do, but some are offset for each sector.) The first step is to see whether the lat/lon values can be mapped at all. If so, the next step is correlating that with towers.

CDMA Field Test also will capture your signal strength. All that stuff is coming from the Android API anyway.

 

[Trent Reznor]

Yep, and willing to bet most people with great Gnex signal fit in the same boat. Probably not road warriors. The fellow geek folks I know that are, bailed on the Gnex within two weeks.

As far as weak signal: I know the Gnex, I used the Gnex, people, the GS3 is no Gnex.

Yup... my experience away from home was a different story

This afternoon is my first day in a 4g area with my GS3... so far so good. Tomorrow will be the real test when I can test some dead spots that I had at work on the Gnex.

I am very pleased with 3g on the GS3. I was working on a study in one of my companies factories this week and I had solid connection with the GS3 on the production floor. Could never dream of that with my Gnex.

 

[Trent Reznor]

It is well known that the "tower" locations mapped on Open Signal are very inaccurate. They are basically guesses calculated from crowdsourced signal-strength data. Even the developers admit this:

There are other ways to solve this problem.

Under the CDMA standard, the base station radios actually squawk lat/lon coordinates, but Verizon apparently blocks these. I think the blocking occurs on the handsets, not the towers. I have not seen anyone try this on a GS3, so maybe it is not blocked.

Some Verizon GS3 user might try the app CDMA Field Test, which works with Sprint, and see if the base station you are connected to can be mapped. It is possible that the coordinates will not match the tower location exactly. (Some of Sprint's do, but some are offset for each sector.) The first step is to see whether the lat/lon values can be mapped at all. If so, the next step is correlating that with towers.

CDMA Field Test also will capture your signal strength. All that stuff is coming from the Android API anyway.

Interesting.... I will take open signal with a grain of salt then. I don't really care where the tower is enough to try your recommendation but thanks!

 

[thelber]

I had a Razr Maxx and several days ago swiitched to the Galaxy S3. Love the phone except for data in weak areas.

In areas where I show 1-2 bars of signal on both 3G and 4G I get little if any data speed. Many times when running speed test the test just times out and says something about network issues.

This just doesn't happen in a certain location....it seems to happen whenever I have 1-2 bars. Doesn't matter if I'm at home, work or in town.

Keep in mind on my Maxx I never had any data speed issues as long as I had at least one bar showing.

When I had the S3 activated I do know that the used the sim from my Maxx for some reason. I asked them why not use the S3 sim but they said it didn't matter.

Could the sim be the issue? Maybe I need a new sim? It worked fine in the Maxx.

I tried taking the sim out and starting the S3 with no sim and then restarting the phone with the sim reinserted but that didn't seem to matter.

I also notice that when I have a good signal (4-5 bars) my download speeds will equal Razr Maxx speeds but the upload speeds will be 1/10th the download speed. Sometimes the upload will read 0 while download will read 12,000. Also, the upload test will be sluggish and appear to stall 3-4 times during the test.

Wife also got an S3 a few days earlier from the same store and has the same issues.

Any ideas would be appreciated!

 

[thelber]

Also notice the same speeds in the OpenSignal app.

 

[Metfanant]

could be the sim...but unfortunately everyone knows (or should know at least) that Motorola's radios are going to beat the pants off Samsung's no matter how you look at it...Motorola just makes better phones

 

[thelber]

Just for reference....OpenSignal app.
4G LTE
-89dBm
Ping: 526
Download: 1726 Kbps
Upload: 0 kbps

 

[thelber]

could be the sim...but unfortunately everyone knows (or should know at least) that Motorola's radios are going to beat the pants off Samsung's no matter how you look at it...Motorola just makes better phones

Agree but the signal strength readings are not that much different from the reading I got from my Maxx using the OpenSignal app. Just seems like I should have data with 2 bars. Still have my Maxx and am on the fence as to what to do. Bummer.