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Help wifi stinks

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yamhill

Lurker
I can get marginal wifi reception at home, but my Charge doesn't even see the work wifi. My laptop shows excellent signal strength and stays connected all day without problem. I downloaded wifi analyzer and it doesn't see the work wifi either. Should this unit go back to Verizon, or am I missing something that would effect this?

John
 
Same problem here, the wifi range is really bad on this phone. 7 feet from the router shows a fluctuation between 1 bar and 2, sometimes point blank next to the router still 2 of 3 bars.
 
Same thing here. This thing is simply not very sensitive to ANY signal, be it 3G, 4G or Wifi. Lousy radio if you ask me.
 
I can get weak reception about 30 feet from my router that drop occasionally and decent within 15 feet that matches my 4G throughput.
 
I simply have problems to where it might show plenty of reception but 'no worky'.... I thought this was related to the switching between radios that the charge can't seem to do... but maybe its the wifi itself.

Hope they can fix it software-wise because I like the phone but that part of it is USELESS.
 
Mine is the same too. I am starting to think that the wifi radio is a G not an N. Makes sense with the poor range and connection speed.
 
I've never tried the wifi on my phone until now. I just connected to my home network and ran a speed test with the speedtest.net app from the market. With only one bar of signal strength, I got 6.4 mb down & 4 mb up. I spent a few minutes surfing the internet with no problems. My router is upstairs in one of my bedrooms. I'm on the couch in my living room. Is this good, bad, or ?
 
Just did some Wifi testing on my phone, getting some really bad results. Wondering if you guys are getting similar results as I am. I'm using speedtest.net on my home computer and speedtest.net app for my phone. Both the computer and phone are sitting next to the router, no more than 1 foot away.

Just to note, I use Verizon FIOS as my home connection.

Computer results are almost identical after numerous tries, numbers don't differ.

29-31 Mbps down
23-25 Mbps up
Ping: 9-11ms

Now the phone through wifi at the same distance.

11.74 Mbps down
4.2 Mbps up
ping: 58ms

15.81 Mbps down
1.9 Mbps up
ping: 63

11.72 Mbps down
1.64 Mbps up
ping: 175

8.27 mbps down
1.63 mbps up
ping: 166

13.41 mbps down
0.75 mbps up
ping 80

and it just keeps going inconsistent at that rate, the upload especially, never seems to be able to get past 5 mbps on Wifi.

4g speed is fine though at about 12 mbps down and 5 mbps up @ 50-80 ping.

I still have my Droid INC so i'm testing the wifi on that as well, but it's pretty consistent with my comp speeds, although it seems to be capping around 20 mbps up and 12 down.

Anyone experiencing similar results or is my charge just defective.
 
My iMac on Cox Communications:

ping - 50
DL - 27.47
UL - 6.86

My Charge same location next to the iMac and 6 feet from the router:

ping - 803
DL - 2.66
UL - .43

ping - 190
DL - 16.30
UL - 1.34

ping - 195
UL - 12.6
DL - 1.60

We'll call the first one a fluke, but still some inconsistency. Only showing 3 - 4 bars on signal at 6 feet away.
 
Ok, I got up this morning and ran these tests 6-7 times.

My Laptop with
Comcast service (average)
23.6 mbps down
4.25 mbps up
Ping: 9 ms

4G on my phone (average)
11 mbps down
2.2 mbps up
Ping: 162 ms

Wifi (average)
17 mbps down
4.2 mbps up
Ping: 39 ms

I'm on a different floor from my router with at least a wall/floor and 20-25 feet between my router and my phone. These numbers are looking pretty good to me!! If it matters, I am running a pretty new Linksys E3000 router.

My laptop does get a stronger signal than my phone does. Obviously, the phone's antenna isn't as good as a computer's antenna. This really doesn't surprise me though. Actually, it's about what I would expect. Does anyone know any different?
 
TS, your numbers seem pretty on par, I think the wireless on my phone is just defective, something blocking my upload. Anyway did some testing again today and took some screen shots. And again these are all sitting next to the router so i'm not sure why the Charge can only manage 1.53 mbps upload and sits at a 2 bar signal.

Droid Charge

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Droid Incredible

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PC

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iamdlux said:
TS, your numbers seem pretty on par, I think the wireless on my phone is just defective, something blocking my upload. Anyway did some testing again today and took some screen shots. And again these are all sitting next to the router so i'm not sure why the Charge can only manage 1.53 mbps upload and sits at a 2 bar signal.

Droid Charge
Click to expand...

I'm no expert. Could your slow upload speed be your router rather than the Charge? I had a router issue when I switched to Windows 7. Something about the switch in operating sytems prevented me from accessing my printer through my old wireless router. That is why I have the new Linksys e3000. It works much better.
 
I'm doubting its the router, or else the other devices would also be stuck with a bad upload. I've also tried a laptop as well as an iPhone 4. Charge is the only one struggling
 
iamdlux said:
I'm doubting its the router, or else the other devices would also be stuck with a bad upload. I've also tried a laptop as well as an iPhone 4. Charge is the only one struggling
Click to expand...

It looks like you tried with a Droid Incredible too. Sorry, didn't see that at first.
 
That's odd. Gotta get a new wireless router myself but living in an apartment I am able to pick up the Wifi signal of the 6 other units in my building along with 1 from the other building next to mine. Granted 1 or 2 bars but still not bad considering all the wall and brick it's going through to detect those. Can't connect because they are secured networks but doubt i will have a problem with wifi on my charge when i get my new router.
 
The one thing I see missing from these posts is what type of signal are you connecting to...802.11B..G...N? This can make a big difference in network speed.
 
Here's an update to my initial post.

I've fix the problem of not seeing wifi at work, and my Droid Charge is now connecting reliably. It doesn't pull wifi signals nearly as well as my laptop, but it is workable. At home I get one bar of wifi bar in my bedroom - about 30 feet from my router. I do think that some routers cause it fits, but for now I'm getting what I need. On a recent trip it did fine in all the airports, hotels, Starbucks, and businesses I encountered.

My current router is "g", will an "n" router be likely to improve the wifi signal to the Droid Charge?

John
 
I use a Belkin Wireless n router and I get 16 to 25 Mb d/l speeds. When I'm away from home I wouldn't connect to any public wifi in existence. Maybe I'm paranoid but I don't trust them. I once got a computer virus that tried to send off my bank numbers to someone. Luckily I had a computer mentor that had me set up with a firewall that blocked it. Now I'm probably the most security conscious internet user in the world.
 
yamhill said:
Here's an update to my initial post.

I've fix the problem of not seeing wifi at work, and my Droid Charge is now connecting reliably. It doesn't pull wifi signals nearly as well as my laptop, but it is workable. At home I get one bar of wifi bar in my bedroom - about 30 feet from my router. I do think that some routers cause it fits, but for now I'm getting what I need. On a recent trip it did fine in all the airports, hotels, Starbucks, and businesses I encountered.

My current router is "g", will an "n" router be likely to improve the wifi signal to the Droid Charge?

John
Click to expand...



Make sure you turn off anything wireless in your house. I have wireless headphones and a baby monitor that both wreck wifi signals
 
My speeds were fine, but took multiple restarts and crap to switch between WIFI and mobile data at home. Finally gave up, am I missing something?
 
Has anyone changed the channel of their router to see if that helps? If you are in an apartment building & there are other routers around you all may be competing on the same channel. Most are set to 6 as a default. Although I am in a house, I still get signals from my neighbors and changed mine to channel 1 and saw some improvement. I never had issues at all, but did change it to avoid to overlap/conflict.
 
I found this thread and forum while sitting in a Starbuck's, frustrated with my email not loading although connected to their wireless. I had my iPhone3GS with me, from which I recently switched (left ATT for Verizon), and which I tote around for sentimental reasons and as an iPod while I'm learning the Charge. Unless I decide to exchange it for an iPhone4.

My iPhone3GS made a stronger wireless connection and downloaded my email several times while the Charge never did---except when I turned off the wireless and used the 4G. But of course I want to be able to use the wireless in places like Starbucks and Barnes and Noble and airports, etc., so I don't use up my data.

Anyway, I was quite surprised by this. My daughter got a Charge the day after I did, and she's having issues as well with the wireless connectivity. She thought it was the wireless where she's staying.

I had noticed last night that I saw more bars on my iPhone in various rooms in my house than I did on the Charge.

We both bought ours at Best Buys--and have 30 days to exchange if we want.
 
Yep, for some reason Samsung pounded the pooch on the WIFI on this Charge. Mine rarely works, and when it does it won't switch seamlessly back to 4G when I leave wherever I am connected from.

I'm hoping a software fix is coming. Even though I don't have a limit on my data plan, it would be nice to have the extra speed when I can and probably less battery consumption.
 
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