iPhone 5 lte signal/reception problem

BTW - Current speedtest after I bounced LTE to get it to actually lock LTE since it was showing "o" is 1 bar LTE,

66ms 5.06Mbps down, 0.04 Mbps up

this is in a town with strong VZW LTE coverage

Field test mode shows -121 dBm on top left (bad)

Phone just dropped LTE and is now reading "o" with only 2 bars. Previous iPhone 4 had a solid 3G connection which never dropped.

These tests are without the case on the phone.

3G is showing -91 dBM with 3 bars now that it dropped LTE, which isn't great either, but may be expected with the current tower performance.

** ACTION REQUESTED FOR VZW CUSTOMERS IMPACTED BY iPHONE 5 LTE / OVERALL SIGNAL STRENGTH PROBLEMS **

Spoke to VZW today to follow up on my forum post on their internal forum. So far only one other person has called VZW and linked to the forum post "iphone 5 loses 4g lte" (there are a total of two reports in this forum post for this problem). If you are experiencing this problem on the VZW network, please contact VZW at 800-922-0204 ASAP, ask customer service to connect you to tech support and ask that in addition to filing a ticket for your local tower signal strength (Which will have a ticket #), that they specifically post to this forum on your problem.

http://digitalhome.ca/forum/showthread.php?t=152023

for Canadians and ATT users: an article that, in the curent context,makes sense: LTE in Canada: why you might not want it yet.

As for the user who asked me why GS3 works, let's not forget: NOT THE SAME CHIP. iPhone 5 has several combined in one, and was already told that there might be interference. I do not know. but have seen it all. LTE dumped by 3GS dumped by 3G or wifi.. Bars up and down so on.

Same here in Ottawa. I live outside of town where there is no LTE, but the 3G is still not as good as it was on my iPhone 3GS. When I'm at work in town, I sometimes get Full LTE service, it then drops down to 3G and at multiple occations even goes to No Service. Gah, and I waited so long to upgrade, I should have stayed with my 3GS.

I took it back to Apple and they gave me another iphone 5, seems some models are having LTE antenna issues. get it replaced.

JJ, is yours good now?

Hey all,

So I have been having connectivity issues for a while....especially at work. It looks like as soon as it connects to 3G I loose complete connectivity to the network so I am unable to call out or send texts ( even though I have bars for service). I have phoned Telus and Apple a couple of times and they are working on the fix for this ( So I have been told. My Question is this: Temporarly would a fix be turning off Celular Data when you are in an area that does not have LTE coverage or you know is a trouble area? This would allow you to make phone calls and text.....

Let me know. Sorry if this was already discussed.

Hi,

Replacing the phone hasnt solved the issue, it seems to be a SW, Possible HW flaw if they determine that, It really is fustrating. I have been having flucuation all day, It really is annoying. I turned my LTE off for now as it makes it run so much better....

Are you on Verizon? I went to apple tonight and replaced mine. Will see how it goes tomorrow.

Yes siri BOB, I am.. Me and the wife are and have the same phone, Today hers showed LTE, 3G the the "0" while mine showed 3G or LTE for a little..

Defintly let us know please....

Anyone have a response to my question about the WIFI to LTE with iMessage???

I was able to learn a little more today than I knew previously since I was able to do head-to-head comparison between iPhone 5 and Galaxy S III, both on VZW.

In a very good signal strength area - iPhone 5 provided download speeds as fast / if not a little faster than Galaxy S III. The iPhone 5 upload speeds were regularly slower than the Galaxy S III unless in the best of the best signal strength area in which case the speeds were fairly comparable.

In an area with medium/low signal strength, Galaxy S III hung on to LTE much longer and as a result, was pushing much better transfer speeds than the iPhone 5 which was switching between "o" and 3G. In these areas, download speeds were OK, upload speeds were not that great.

In the medium/low signal strength area (iPhone 5 showing 1-2 bar LTE), the iPhone 5 LTE was pretty much unusable, low download speeds and very low upload speeds. Galaxy S III was much faster on the download speeds and marginally faster on the upload speeds. BTW - in these areas, AT&T has a significant advantage, since its HSPA/HSPA+ network "4G" is much faster as a fallback to LTE than VZ's 3G network.

Once signal strength became marginally better, the iPhone 5 was relucant to switch back to LTE on its own without either forcing it to do so (i.e. Airplane mode on/off) or (I assume) eventually traveling such that I reached a different tower.

Summary:

Verizon does in fact have areas here in Eastern Mass which are called "strong LTE" areas, which are definitely not strong. In these areas, both the iPhone 5 and Galaxy S III did not perform well, although the iPhone 5 performed significantly worse and chose 3G or "o" much more often than LTE (vs. Galaxy S III).

iPhone 5 does not handle the swap from 3G back to LTE well (or perhaps at all unless moving to a different tower). In fact, I almost never saw the phone swap back from 3G to LTE unless I changed towers or attempted to force it to.

IPhone 5 shows "o" very often when not in a top-strength signal area, this is not something I ever saw on the Galaxy S III or my prior iPhone 4 (3G). I am not sure if "o" is a transition state or "o" is truly 2G.

iPhone 5 signal strength (particularly for uploads) in low/medium signal areas is marginally impacted by either holding the phone or having a case (Speck) on it.

(In case anyone was confused by my post, I also have a AT&T Galaxy S III and was simply stating that AT&T is going to have a faster network fallback than VZW any time a phone needs to fall out of LTE). This was a random thought and is not related to my Galaxy S III VZW vs. iPhone 5 real-time comparison 🙂

Pete thank you so much for taking the time to do these tests. It is really appreciated by us. This helps give detail to see if we have same and if we do that we know its not just us and many of us.

Thanks for the info Pete. I live in the Berkshires in far Western MA. I found out that Verizon implemented 4G LTE in most of my county. I don't care about having LTE at home, but it is important for me to have this at work. Verizon's CDMA network is half the speed of AT&T's HSPA+ around here. I was using Straight Talk with an unlocked 4S and it worked wonders! I am finding myself with the same LTE issues as you're experiencing in Eastern MA. I'm about to call Verizon. If they don't solve this shortly I will cancel my contract (without fees) due to bad service in my home area...

I've noticed that sometimes after I make a call, data ceases to be uploaded until I restart my phone. That HAS to be a carrier settings issue!

This is disappointing as I have an iPad with LTE on AT&T and it works flawlessly compared to Verizon. They may not have as much LTE infrastructure, but it seems like AT&T is doing it right. My theory is that the switch from GSM LTE to CDMA when using a Verizon iPhone (combined with Carrier firmware / iOS software) is the issue here. Since AT&T already use GSM for their 3G HSPA network, the radios don't have to completely switch.

Speed test (ookla) 1: Pittsfield, MA 01201 10-4-12 2:20PM

Ping: 56ms

Download: 9.12mbps

Upload: 1.47mbps

Speed test (xtreme labs) 2: Pittsfield, MA 01201 10-4-12 2:27PM

Ping: 81ms

Download: 8.099mbps

Upload: 0.524mbps

For a comparison, my iPhone 4S on AT&T's MVNO network (using straight talk; basically same speeds as AT&T customers)

Ping: 321ms

Download 2.78mbps

Upload: 0.455mbps

I'll try to follow up with a response once I find out more.

This is getting so fustrating..... Today I left it on 3G only so no LTE was enabled. I was in a WIFI area and then left that area, Phone switched to the "0" ***, I had to put in airplane mode to have it go to 3G at least. Then turned LTE on and it didnt switch in a LTE strong area. So had to restart phone to make it work.. GRRRRR

I have a petition set up where I can send all our issues in one spot to there customer service.. Maybe this could help.. I figure I try anything LOL...

http://www.change.org/petitions/apple-inc-fix-lte-on-iphone-5